Trump souring on key ally might be Vance's ticket to 2028 and could reshape MAGA: analyst

President Donald Trump's shifting relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could be a boon for Vice President JD Vance's 2028 presidential ambitions, an analyst reported on Wednesday.

Jonathan V. Last, editor of The Bulwark, explained that a split between America and Israel could redefine the MAGA coalition. Although Vance is in a tough position with pro-war Republicans furious over the surrender and blaming the vice president — instead of Trump — he could also win over America First isolationists who have been skeptical of the relationship with Israel.

"Playing the part of Trump’s surrender monkey queers Vance with both wings of MAGA," Last wrote.

But there could be more to it for the vice president, who was skeptical of the war to begin with.

"The best thing that could happen for Vance would be Trump souring on Israel," Last wrote.

"Israel will be one of the big cleavages in the post-Trump GOP," Last wrote. "The rising, young segment of the base is . . . skeptical of America’s relationship with Israel. But the establishment wing of MAGA remains pro-Israel. So long as Trump was wedded to Israel and Bibi Netanyahu, Vance was going to have to tread lightly. He’d have to signal enough of his Israel skepticism to keep the Tucker-wing of MAGA guessing while staying publicly aligned with Trump."

If that changes, and Trump does turn on Israel, it could reveal a different future MAGA.

"Netanyahu has tried to undermine the deal. He is likely to fail because Trump needs to end the war, period. Which leaves Netanyahu with a choice," Last wrote.

The Israeli prime minister could examine two potential options: pretend Trump's deal is a good one and try to convince the Israeli public it is, or condemn the deal and break away from Trump.

Trump has criticized Netanyahu, calling him "crazy," and as the president's popularity has dropped in Israel, it could reveal that Israelis have soured on Trump — and Republicans might not have realized this as fast as Israelis have, Last explained.

"Vance has neither of those advantages and on top of that, he’s a bad politician," Last wrote. "He’s good at managing up, not pandering down. My guess is that Vance has taken stock of the situation and realized that he may be over a barrel now, but there is a path for him. If he leans into Iran, takes ownership of Trump’s surrender, then he can take advantage of any Trump-Israel schism and exit this war in a reasonably strong position with the Republican base."

President Donald Trump's plans for regime change at the Federal Reserve may not go according to his plan, one analyst warned on Wednesday.

Trump waged a pressure campaign against former Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell during the president's second term because of Powell's reluctance to lower interest rates, as the U.S. economy continued to grapple with stubborn inflation. That fight ended when Powell's term as chairman expired in May, and Trump's choice to replace him, Kevin Warsh, took over.

However, Trump's goal of lowering interest rates may not be possible at this point, CNN's Matt Egan reported on "CNN News Central." The central bank decided to keep interest rates steady during its first meeting under Warsh's leadership on Wednesday. The central bank also signaled that a future rate hike is in the works, as the economic fallout from Trump's war with Iran continues to weigh on the nation's economic growth.

"This might come as a surprise to some because the Fed is under new management," Egan said. "Fed chairman Kevin Warsh, of course, was selected by President Trump, who has made no secret of his desire for dramatically lower interest rates. However, this is not something that Warsh can decide unilaterally."

Egan noted that the war with Iran's impact on inflation, specifically energy prices, is preventing the Federal Reserve from lowering interest rates as Trump wants.

"The Fed makes these decisions by a committee, and ironically, that committee is now signaling that the next move may not be an interest rate cut," Egan said. "It may be an interest rate hike because new projections that were just issued by the Fed are now signaling a potential quarter-point interest rate hike by the end of this year. Now, that is a major shift from the last time they issued projections back in March; at that time, Fed officials were penciling in one interest rate cut."

A former Trump administration official is warning that the president's pattern of favoring authoritarian leaders over traditional democratic allies has hardened into something far more consequential than a personal quirk.

Miles Taylor, who served as chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security, published an op-ed for The i Paper tracing the warning signs back to 2018, when President Donald Trump arrived late to a G7 summit in Canada, lectured allied leaders on trade, and publicly disavowed a joint communiqué he had just signed – all while calling for Russia's reinstatement into the group.

"What looked like a tantrum in 2018 has now become national policy, and as Trump wraps up another G7 meeting, it’s clear that his mood swings (and strong opinions about who America’s real pals should be) have upended the world order for a generation," Taylor wrote.

Eight years later, that prediction appears borne out in hard data. A new European Council on Foreign Relations survey found that just 11 percent of Europeans now consider the United States an ally, a record low representing a nearly halving of transatlantic support since Trump's return to office.

Taylor attributed this collapse to a string of unilateral moves: launching military action against Iran without consulting allies, withdrawing American troops from Germany, threatening Greenland with annexation, sidelining Ukraine, and publicly disparaging leaders such as Keir Starmer.

The deeper consequence, Taylor argued, is the erosion of the mutual trust that historically deterred adversaries like the Soviet Union without firing a shot. With majorities across surveyed countries now doubting America would actually defend them, European nations are responding by increasing military spending and shifting away from U.S. weapons toward domestic defense industries, treating American unreliability not as a passing storm but as a permanent, system-altering shift comparable to climate change.

Taylor noted one small detail that he said symbolized the dramatic shift.

"The question hanging over the finale of the summit is no longer whether America still leads the free world," he concluded. "Clearly, it does not, as G7 leaders don’t even plan to issue the usual 'joint statement' at the conclusion of the multilateral meeting – a sign that the United States can’t align with its friends on a shared press release, let alone major global issues. The real question is whether our friends will wait any longer for us to get our act together. It seems like their patience is wearing thin."

President Donald Trump abandoned Jay Clayton's Director of National Intelligence confirmation hearing Wednesday and announced Bill Pulte would remain as the agency's acting director.

The President lacks the authority to cancel Senate meetings, according to NBC News' Chief White House Correspondent, Garrett Haake.

The sudden reversal followed bipartisan backlash against Pulte's nomination. Analysts suspect Trump's motivation to do so is tied to election fraud investigations. Pulte, currently leading the Federal Housing Finance Agency with no intelligence or national security experience, has faced intense criticism for targeting Trump's perceived political enemies with mortgage fraud accusations.

Rasmussen Reports wrote on social media, "He wants Pulte in there for a specific reason at this specific moment," and added, "The reason we suspect is related to the theft of the 2020 election."

Actor Geoff McGivern argued Trump's intention to name Pulte is clear, “It's worth pausing and reading this illiterate drivel with a fresh eye and marveling anew that a conman could hold this office and be so openly [planning] to steal/rig/annul elections to prevent the impeachments and legal action which would, if run fairly, follow his defeat,” he wrote in a social media post on X.

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