Two hundred and fifty years after declaring that all people are created equal, America remains an unfinished project. We are living through another season of growing pains. One marked by division, uncertainty, and fierce arguments over who we are and where we’re headed. But every generation has faced its own tests, and every generation has had the opportunity to move the country a little closer to its founding ideals.

This Independence Day, I’m choosing hope over despair. The American experiment has never been about perfection; it’s been about the relentless pursuit of a more perfect union. Our best days won’t come from pretending we’ve already arrived. They’ll come from continuing the journey.

America is struggling. Our politics are angry, our institutions are under strain, and too often we treat our fellow citizens as enemies instead of neighbors. But this country has survived darker chapters than this one, and its greatest achievements have always come when ordinary Americans chose principle over partisanship and courage over cynicism.

The Declaration of Independence was never a description of America as it was. It was a promise of what America could become. Two hundred and fifty years later, we are still trying to keep that promise. I still believe we can.

Trump has made America 250 all about himself. No one is surprised. But we are all disgusted.

Every now and then, the Supreme Court reminds us that the Constitution isn’t a menu. You don’t get to keep the parts you like and cross out the rest with a Sharpie.

In a welcome rebuke to the Trump administration, the Court reaffirmed one of the clearest guarantees in the Constitution: if you’re born in the United States, you’re an American citizen. That principle has stood for more than 150 years, ever since the ratification of the 14th Amendment in the aftermath of the Civil War. It survived world wars, depressions, and political upheaval. It also survived Donald Trump.

The administration argued that a president could effectively rewrite the Citizenship Clause through executive action. The Court correctly said otherwise. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the 14th Amendment guarantees citizenship at birth to children born in the United States, including those whose parents are unlawfully or temporarily present. “We keep that promise today,” he concluded.

We keep that promise today. Not because it’s politically convenient. Not because public opinion demands it. But because constitutions are designed to restrain power, especially when powerful people decide they’d rather ignore them.

Trump has already vowed to keep fighting, this time through Congress. He’s free to try. That’s how constitutional democracy is supposed to work. If Americans truly want to redefine citizenship, the Constitution provides a mechanism: amend it.

What it doesn’t provide is a shortcut through executive fiat. For one day, at least, the rule of law won. And in times like these, that’s worth celebrating.

Donald Trump appears convinced he has found the secret to winning the 2026 midterms. If voters become unhappy, simply redraw the districts. Republicans have embraced an unprecedented mid-decade redistricting campaign designed to squeeze a few extra House seats out of states they already control. It’s the political equivalent of moving the goalposts after halftime. The strategy may work around the margins. But it rests on a dangerous assumption: that even Republican-leaning voters are more loyal to him than they are about the price of groceries, endless political drama, or a government that increasingly resembles a reality show. History suggests otherwise.

The irony is that Trump seems to understand the political danger he faces. That’s why he’s become obsessed with election rules. He browbeats Congress to pass the SAVE Act, pressures states to redraw congressional maps, and insists every electoral safeguard imaginable is urgently needed. You don’t spend this much time trying to change the rules unless you’re worried about the score.

The problem is that maps don’t vote. People do.

Even members of Trump’s own party are beginning to say so. After losing his Republican primary, Rep. Thomas Massie warned that Trump has alienated libertarians, fiscal conservatives, anti-war Republicans, and independent-minded voters whose support the party will need in November. You can dismiss Massie as a disgruntled former congressman if you like, but he’s describing something larger than his own defeat: a coalition that is steadily shrinking even as Trump tightens his grip on the GOP.

Look at the administration’s record over the past few months. The promised DOGE revolution produced far less savings than advertised while throwing hundreds of thousands of federal employees out of work. The administration’s signature foreign-policy achievement was an Iran agreement that left supporters and critics alike asking what, exactly, America gained. A $14 million effort to repaint the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool “American flag blue” turned into an algae-covered punchline complete with criminal investigations over peeling paint. Republicans were preparing to celebrate a bipartisan housing bill addressing affordability until Trump canceled the signing ceremony because he’d rather talk about voting restrictions that even Republican senators say cannot pass.

These are not the hallmarks of a confident administration. They’re the actions of one that keeps changing the subject. Midterms are usually referendums on the party in power. Gerrymandering may protect a handful of incumbents, but it doesn’t lower inflation. It doesn’t make housing more affordable. It doesn’t erase public frustration. And it certainly doesn’t persuade independent voters that Washington has suddenly become competent.

In fact, there’s a real risk the redistricting campaign backfires. Aggressive partisan map-drawing has historically energized opposition voters, fueled lawsuits, and reinforced public perceptions that politicians are choosing their voters instead of voters choosing their politicians. Even analysts who believe Republicans could gain seats through redistricting warn that the effort may provoke precisely the kind of backlash that narrows those gains.

Trump’s political instinct has always been that every problem can be solved through domination: more lawsuits, more executive orders, more loyalty tests, more threats, more favorable maps.

But there remains one obstacle he has never fully conquered. Reality.

No amount of gerrymandering can redraw public opinion. If enough Americans conclude that the administration has spent more time staging spectacles than solving problems, no congressional map will be oddly shaped enough to save it. Eventually, every politician runs out of districts to redraw. Then comes Election Day.

Instead, it has become a case study in how not to manage a major public works project.

After years of redesigns driven by freeway construction, railroad…

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For years, Donald Trump and Elon Musk have preached the gospel of efficiency.

Government was bloated. Bureaucrats were wasteful. Foreign aid was a scam. USAID was portrayed as little more than a giant slush fund for left-wing causes, ripe for the chopping block. Musk famously declared the agency a “criminal organization” and said it was time for it to “die.”

Mission accomplished.

The problem is that reality has a nasty habit of showing up with an abacus.

A new study published in The Lancet—one of the world’s premiere medical research journals—estimates that if the dismantling of USAID continues through 2030, it could contribute to roughly 14 million preventable deaths, including 4.5 million children under the age of five. The researchers concluded that USAID programs over the past two decades were associated with dramatic reductions in deaths from HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, malnutrition and childhood diseases. Undoing those programs, they argue, could erase much of that progress.

Studies are not crystal balls. This one models possible outcomes based on assumptions, and reasonable people can debate those assumptions. But the findings are serious enough that they deserve to be confronted, not dismissed with social media insults or threats of lawsuits.

Instead, that’s exactly what happened when Rep. Ro Khanna cited the study, Musk responded by threatening to sue him rather than addressing its conclusions. It is a familiar pattern. If the facts are uncomfortable, attack the messenger. But the underlying question remains. What exactly was achieved?

If the objective was to root out fraud, prosecute fraud. If the goal was to improve accountability, improve accountability. If programs were ineffective, reform or replace them. Instead, the administration reached for a chainsaw.

The irony is hard to miss. Trump and Musk marketed DOGE as an exercise in eliminating “waste.” Yet many of the programs targeted were among the most measurable public-health successes ever funded by the United States: childhood vaccinations, malaria prevention, HIV treatment, tuberculosis control, maternal health and emergency nutrition.

These aren’t abstract line items on a spreadsheet. They are programs whose success is measured in people who didn’t die. Fiscal conservatives often remind us that budgets reflect priorities. That’s true. So what does it say when one of the richest men in history celebrates eliminating programs that researchers conclude have saved millions of lives?

Government absolutely should spend taxpayer money wisely. Every program deserves scrutiny. Every dollar deserves accountability. But there is a profound moral difference between trimming bureaucracy and dismantling systems that keep children alive.

The administration loves to boast about “America First.” Yet for generations, one of America’s greatest sources of influence wasn’t simply military power or economic might. It was the knowledge that when famine struck, when disease spread, when disaster hit, the United States usually showed up. Not because it was always profitable. But because it was right. It reflected who we aspired to be.

The architects of these cuts congratulated themselves for shrinking government. They posed with charts showing billions of dollars “saved.” They celebrated efficiency.

But did DOGE actually save any money? DOGE was sold as a revolutionary effort to eliminate government waste and slash between $1 trillion and $2 trillion from the federal budget. Elon Musk touted massive savings, and the administration repeatedly pointed to DOGE as proof that government could be run more like a business.

The reality turned out to be far less impressive. Investigations by The New York Times, Politico, NPR, and others found that many of DOGE’s headline-grabbing savings claims were exaggerated or simply incorrect. In numerous cases, the agency counted the maximum potential value of canceled contracts rather than the amount the government was actually expected to spend. Other savings were double-counted or couldn’t be substantiated at all. Independent reviews concluded that verifiable savings amounted to only a few billion dollars; a tiny fraction of the trillion-dollar reductions originally promised.

What DOGE did accomplish was shrinking the federal workforce. According to the Cato Institute, it oversaw the largest peacetime reduction in the federal workforce in U.S. history, eliminating more than 250,000 positions. Yet despite those cuts, overall federal spending continued to rise, largely because the vast majority of the federal budget consists of mandatory spending on programs such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and defense—areas that cannot be substantially reduced without congressional action.

In the end, DOGE proved remarkably effective at generating headlines and cutting jobs, but far less successful at achieving the dramatic budget savings that had been promised.

Now comes the harder accounting. If The Lancet’s study’s projections are even partly correct, the savings will have been purchased at a staggering human cost. The Trump administration has done many things that I believe were cruel, reckless, or destructive. But the USAID cuts were one of the most profoundly evil acts I have witnessed as an observer of American politics for more than four decades. And the saddest part is that it was all for naught. It was simply performative, gratuitous cruelty in service of dismantling a program valued by the left.

This next sketch was one I pitched to a freelance client here in Texas (not the Da…

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For years, Americans were told that the greatest threat to national security was an unelected “deep state” secretly pulling the strings of government.

Then came reports that the nation’s top intelligence official may have spent much of her political career receiving guidance that allegedly originated from a reclusive spiritual guru whose followers regard him as an enlightened authority. Apparently, the deep state was fine. The deep ashram was where the real action was.

According to a lengthy investigation by The Washington Post, thousands of pages of documents and internal communications suggest that policy recommendations, political messaging, legislative ideas, and strategic guidance flowed through networks associated with the Science of Identity Foundation and its founder, Chris Butler, a spiritual leader whom former members have described as cult-like. Gabbard and her supporters dispute the characterization and have accused critics of religious prejudice.

Let’s pause and appreciate how absurd this sounds. Imagine applying for a security clearance.

Question 17: “Do you maintain relationships with any foreign governments?”

“No.”

Question 18: “Do you receive policy guidance through mysterious intermediaries connected to a guru revered by followers as a divine authority?”

“Well, that’s complicated.”

Security clearance granted.

The issue isn’t religion. America has had presidents, senators, judges, generals, and intelligence officials from virtually every major faith tradition. The issue is whether someone entrusted with the nation’s most sensitive secrets is exercising independent judgment. When reports emerge suggesting that political guidance may have originated from a figure operating outside normal democratic accountability, people are entitled to ask questions. Those questions become even more reasonable when the official in question is the Director of National Intelligence.

Yet somehow, this barely registers in a political culture that has become immune to absurdity. The same government that mobilized National Guard troops to protect a malfunctioning reflecting pool and threatened decade-long prison sentences over peeling paint apparently saw nothing unusual about placing vast intelligence authorities in the hands of someone dogged for years by questions about outside spiritual influence. The standards seem to have become remarkably flexible.

Perhaps that is the ultimate lesson of modern politics. We no longer ask whether something is normal. We merely ask whether it is the strangest thing that happened this week. A guru allegedly shaping the political thinking of the nation’s intelligence chief would once have generated months of hearings and front-page coverage. Today it competes for attention with algae blooms, mystery vandals, billion-dollar ballrooms, and peace deals that look suspiciously like the agreements they were supposed to replace.

In another era, Americans might have been alarmed to learn that the nation’s intelligence apparatus could be influenced by a figure operating outside government channels. In 2026, it barely cracks the top ten.

In addition to taking her cues from a flaky spiritual guru, many national security officials and lawmakers were concerned even before she was nominated that Gabbard had become a favorite of Russian state media because of positions she had taken on issues such as the war in Ukraine, NATO expansion, and U.S. foreign policy. Russian television and media outlets frequently amplified her comments when those comments aligned with Kremlin narratives.

Critics cited several issues:

• Her 2017 meeting with Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.

• Statements about Ukraine and U.S.-funded biological research facilities that critics said echoed Russian talking points.

• Concerns that allies might become reluctant to share intelligence if they believed the intelligence community was being led by someone perceived as sympathetic to Russian viewpoints.

Trump’s Cabinet is already a traveling circus of sycophants, cranks, conspiracy theorists, and underqualified loyalists. Yet appointing someone this compromised to oversee America’s most sensitive intelligence was so incandescently reckless that it manages to stand out even in a crowd that includes RFK Jr., Pete Hegseth, and whoever is currently investigating algae at the Reflecting Pool.

The Trump administration has finally clarified its theory of law and order.

Touch a loose flap of paint in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool? Potentially ten years in prison.

Storm the U.S. Capitol, assault police officers, smash windows, force lawmakers into hiding, and attempt to overturn a presidential election? Here’s a pardon. And perhaps, if things had gone according to plan, a chance to apply for compensation from the administration’s controversial $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”

The contrast would be hilarious if it weren’t so revealing.

After Trump’s $14 million “American Flag Blue” renovation of the Reflecting Pool turned green with algae and began shedding paint almost immediately, the president declared war on imaginary vandals. National Guard troops appeared at the site. Surveillance cameras were deployed. Federal prosecutors promised aggressive enforcement. Trump warned that offenders could face up to ten years in prison for damaging federal property. Among those swept up in the crackdown was a former Olympic canoeist whose alleged crime appears to have involved touching a piece of material that was already peeling away from the bottom of the pool.

Meanwhile, many January 6 defendants received something quite different: presidential pardons. Some have since explored avenues for government compensation. Earlier this year, the administration announced a $1.776 billion Anti-Weaponization Fund intended to compensate people who claimed they had been victimized by government “lawfare.” Reports indicated that January 6 defendants and Trump allies were among those interested in seeking payouts before the fund ran into legal and political backlash.

Think about the message being sent. One group entered the Capitol during one of the darkest days in modern American democracy. The other group allegedly touched some paint. One group received mercy, and even praise. The other gets Jeanine Pirro.

In Trump’s America, the severity of the punishment appears inversely proportional to the embarrassment caused to Donald Trump personally. If you vandalize the Capitol while supporting him, you’re a patriot. If you expose the failure of a vanity project by poking a loose piece of liner in a reflecting pool, you’re apparently a threat to civilization itself.

The Reflecting Pool has become a perfect metaphor for the administration. A rushed, expensive project begins falling apart. The problems are obvious to everyone. Responsibility is denied. Blame is shifted. Law enforcement is mobilized. Political enemies are accused. And somehow the people pointing at the peeling paint become the villains while the people who created the mess become the victims.

There may be no better illustration of modern Trumpian American politics than this: the administration that pardoned January 6 rioters is now threatening decade-long prison sentences over a malfunctioning decorative pond.

The Capitol, apparently, was forgivable. The paint is where they draw the line.

Donald Trump has finally identified the culprit behind the disastrous renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Not the rushed timeline. Not the no-bid contracts. Not the decision to paint a historic monument “American Flag Blue.” Not the fact that algae naturally thrive in shallow, sunlit water. Not the peeling paint. Not the cost overruns that transformed a $1.8 million project into a nearly $15 million project.

No, the real villains are apparently a shadowy gang of super-vandals armed with knives, corrosive chemicals, and an inexplicable hatred of patriotic water features.

According to Trump, these mysterious saboteurs somehow carved a 250-foot gash into the pool lining. Then the story grew to 300 feet. Presumably by next week it will have stretched across the Potomac and into Northern Virginia. Reporters who visited the site found no obvious evidence of the alleged damage, but that’s exactly what clever vandals would want you to think.

The vandalism explanation is especially convenient because it spares everyone from considering a far more troubling possibility: that a project designed primarily for publicity may have encountered predictable problems that experts might have anticipated. After all, this was the same renovation that was supposed to transform the Reflecting Pool into a majestic shade of “American Flag Blue” in time for America’s 250th birthday. Instead, within days it had become a giant green science experiment visible to tourists, television cameras, and apparently satellites.

What makes the story even more remarkable is the administration’s insistence on treating every setback as evidence of success. The water turned green? The algae are losing. The paint is peeling? The paint is winning. The project is over budget? That’s because excellence costs money. The pool looks worse than before? Fake news.

The Reflecting Pool has become a perfect metaphor for modern Trumpian politics. First declare a problem that urgently requires your intervention. Then promise a miraculous solution. Award contracts to friendly people. Declare victory before the project is finished. Watch the project fail in public. Blame sabotage. Arrest a few confused bystanders. Repeat as necessary.

There is something almost admirable about the determination. Most people would look at a green, peeling, over-budget reflecting pool and conclude that perhaps a mistake had been made. Trump looked at the same pool and concluded that an organized conspiracy of aquatic criminals must be responsible.

In fairness, he may be onto something. There really was a culprit behind this fiasco. It just wasn’t the guy pulling a loose piece of paint out of the water.

The vandal responsible was the one who looked at a century-old national monument, decided it needed a patriotic paint job, and then spent $15 million proving otherwise.

Dallas City Council has decided it would rather move out of City Hall than fix it. After months of debate, the City Council voted against a plan to spend roughly $500 million repairing the iconic I.M. Pei-designed building, clearing the way for a possible relocation and redevelopment of one of downtown’s most valuable pieces of real estate.

Supporters of the move argue that City Hall is a deteriorating money pit and that the site could become a catalyst for revitalizing downtown. Preservationists counter that Dallas is preparing to abandon one of its most recognizable architectural landmarks because maintaining old buildings isn’t as exciting as handing prime real estate to developers.

The debate comes at an awkward moment for Dallas. The Mavericks are eyeing North Dallas, the Stars are heading toward Plano, Neiman Marcus is leaving downtown, and AT&T has already moved its headquarters north. Faced with the prospect of watching half the city relocate to the suburbs, Dallas leaders have concluded that the best way to save downtown might be to move City Hall, too.

It’s especially odd that city leaders voted to leave City Hall before choosing a new location. Most people shop for a new house before putting their furniture on the curb. Dallas, apparently, prefers to wing it.

I drew this one on Monday, but my freelance clients ultimately preferred some of my other concepts. In hindsight, I’m glad it didn’t make the cut. A few days later, I noticed that a couple other cartoonists had lan…

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Donald Trump spent years attacking the Obama-era Iran nuclear agreement as “the worst deal ever negotiated.” He shredded it, reimposed sanctions, and argued that it failed to address Iran’s missile program, regional influence, and long-term nuclear ambitions.

Now, after a war that cost lives, disrupted global shipping, rattled energy markets, and brought…

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Donald Trump spent nearly $15 million to turn the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool “American Flag Blue.” Within days, it turned green.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because it perfectly summarizes the Trump presidency.

The p…

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After spending nearly $15 million to paint the bottom of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool “American Flag Blue” and repeatedly boasting about its patriotic color, President Trump has achieved a remarkable feat: creating the nation’s most expensive algae farm. Just days after being unveiled as a symbol of American greatness, the pool turned a murky gr…

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President Trump wants Americans to celebrate his new Iran deal as a triumph of strength and diplomacy. But judging from the terms that have emerged so far, Tehran may have more reason to celebrate than Washington.

Trump entered the conflict talking about “unconditional surrender,” regime change, and eliminating Iran as a regional threat. Instead, the war…

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President Donald Trump has once again achieved what many thought impossible: negotiating a historic international agreement that seemingly nobody has actually read.

The administration insists the Iran deal is a triumph. Iran insists it’s a triumph. Oil markets seem cautiously optimistic. Shipping companies are unconvinced. Congress is confused. Israel is…

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To be fair to Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, he did warn that the New World screwworm was heading toward Texas. The problem is that leadership requires more than correctly predicting a disaster. If forecasting catastrophe were enough, every guy yelling at a television in a sports bar would be eligible for public office.

As the screwworm crisi…

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I wasn’t too sure I had the right caption, or word balloon, in this one:

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