Yesterday, after a federal court forced the White House to readmit three news organizations to the White House, Donald Trump ordered the Secret Service to bar CNN from a flight today to a college football game in Knoxville. Right-minded people get infuriated and understandably so. But I would like to encourage you to see it in a somewhat different light.

Trump went to war against Iran because he was upset, disequilibriated by his declining popularity and power at home. Now he is boxed in by, defeated by Iran and pouring all his energy into a fever run of monument buildings and renamings. The news organization bans are just another part of that same storm of acting out. More failure, more ego-soothing. The guy is doubling down on what actually accounts for a larger part of his unpopularity and likely midterm drubbing than people realize. Yes, gas prices, diesel prices are driving him lower and lower. Just as much, I would argue, is Trump’s constant performance of “People Care About X, Trump Cares About Y”. His enemies can claim he only cares about himself. He’s far more convincing when he says it himself. Everyday. Through his own actions. You’re more spun up about the particular offenses. Most voters are seeing his priorities, and attempted demonstrations of power that look increasingly silly, often pitiful and cringey. He’s in a regressed feedback loop. It’s turning the people whose support he needs against him more every day.

Here is a short update on the so-called Broadview Six case — one of the high-profile prosecutorial abuse cases coming out of ICE/CBP Midway Blitz occupation of Chicago in the fall and winter of 2025-26. To catch everyone back up, this was a case involving four candidates or elected officials, one campaign staffer and one activist. It was tied to ongoing protests outside the ICE Broadview facility outside Chicago. Federal prosecutors took a situation that involved protestors briefly making contact with a vehicle unexpectedly trying to drive through a protest line and jacked it up to a felony case. As one of the lawyers on the case told me at the time, the facts supported at best a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge, and even that would been a wild overreaction to what actually happened.

Throughout the case, it was clear that the case was part of the Trump administration’s larger strategy of targeting peaceful protestors with wildly excessive charges. Eventually the case fell apart when major prosecutorial misconduct was uncovered on the part of the prosecutors in the case. All charges were eventually dropped in May with prejudice, just before the trial was to take place. The remaining mystery was tied to the original prosecutor in the case, who committed the misconduct securing the indictment the previous fall. (There was other misconduct tied to turning off doctored transcripts of that grand jury session.) That prosecutor, Sheri Mecklenburg, had a generally apolitical reputation and certainly was no right-winger. Defense attorneys had the impression she didn’t have a lot of confidence in the government’s position. She left the case with little explanation for a DOJ assignment working on the Senate Judiciary Committee under Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) in February. Meanwhile, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois — Andrew Boutros — and Mecklenburg’s replacement — William Hogan — were both known to be strongly onboard with the Trump/ICE program. (Hogan also had a tattered reputation on the professional ethics front.)