Rabbit Trails

The Dispatch President Donald J. Trump declared via Truth Social on April 22, 2026 that a rigged election had taken place the prior evening in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The declaration was filed in all capital letters. Republicans, the president reported, had been winning all day long. The Spirit, he noted, was unbelievable. The president identified the mechanism of loss as a mail-in ballot dr...

The Dispatch On April 20, 2026, at 2:11 PM, President Donald J. Trump posted to Truth Social that he was winning a War, BY A LOT, and that things were going very well. The post stated that the enemy was confused, that Iran’s Navy had been completely wiped out, its Air Force had gone onto darker runways, and that it had no Anti Missile or Anti Airplane Equipment remaining. The post further st...

The Dispatch On April 17, 2026, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted to X that passage for all commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz was declared completely open for the remaining period of the ceasefire, in line with the ceasefire in Lebanon. He stated that ships could move on the coordinated route as already announced by Iranian authorities. At 9:06 AM on the same day, Presid...

The Dispatch On April 16, 2026, Franklin Graham, president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan’s Purse, posted to X that he did not believe President Trump would knowingly depict himself as Jesus Christ, that when the President learned of concerns about the AI-generated healing image he immediately removed the post, and that upon viewing the illustration himsel...

The Dispatch On April 15, 2026, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth led a Christian worship service at the Pentagon, one of a series of regular services he has hosted at the department since taking office. During the service, Hegseth told those assembled that fifteen minutes prior he had been discussing blockades with Admiral Brad Cooper, who has led U.S. forces during the Iran war, and that what they d...

The Dispatch On April 16, 2026, President Donald J. Trump posted to Truth Social that he had spoken with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and that the two leaders had agreed to begin a 10-day ceasefire at 5 PM EST. The President announced he would invite both leaders to the White House for what he described as the first meaningful talks between Israel a...

The Dispatch On April 14, 2026, Vice President JD Vance appeared at a Turning Point USA event at the University of Georgia in Athens as part of the organization’s This Is the Turning Point Tour, a college campus speaking series. During the event, Vance was asked by a host what it was like to be positioned between President Trump and Pope Leo XIV amid their ongoing disagreement over the Iran...

The Dispatch On April 15, 2026, at 7:56 AM, President Donald J. Trump reposted to Truth Social a screenshot of a post from the X account @Dkelly4congress, which operates under the name Irish for Trump. The post contained an AI-generated image depicting Jesus Christ with his arm around the President, set against an American flag background. The accompanying caption read: “I was never a very r...

The Dispatch On April 15, 2026, President Donald J. Trump posted to Truth Social in support of a clean 18-month reauthorization of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is scheduled to expire on April 20. The post acknowledged that the program had been used against the President personally and stated that he was willing to “risk giving up his Rights and Privileges a...

The Dispatch On Monday morning, the AI-generated image depicting President Donald J. Trump in white and red robes performing a faith healing was deleted from the President’s Truth Social account. Direct links to the post returned an infinite loading screen. Speaking to reporters at an impromptu press conference outside the Oval Office, the President confirmed he had posted the image and offe...

The Dispatch At 9:03 PM on April 12, 2026, President Donald J. Trump posted to Truth Social a lengthy critique of Pope Leo XIV, describing the pontiff as WEAK on Crime and terrible for Foreign Policy. The post, which received 5,820 ReTruths and 21,500 Likes, stated that the President did not want a Pope who thought it was acceptable for Iran to possess a nuclear weapon, nor one who objected to the...

The Dispatch On April 9, 2026, the White House Office of the First Lady issued a formal statement regarding Jeffrey Epstein on the official White House briefings and statements page — the same page used to publish executive orders, presidential proclamations, and statements of administration policy. The statement, attributed to First Lady Melania Trump, denied any meaningful relationship with Epst...

The Dispatch The United States House of Representatives voted 212 to 219 on March 5, 2026 to block a war powers resolution that would have required congressional approval for any further military action against Iran. The Senate had defeated a similar measure the previous day. Following the House vote, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana, stated: “We are not at war. We...

The Dispatch The Selective Service System submitted a proposed rule to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs on March 30, 2026, outlining the implementation of automatic registration for military draft-eligible men, scheduled to begin in December 2026. The rule follows the passage of the fiscal year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, signed into law by President Trump in December...

The Dispatch Power Plant Day concluded without the destruction of Iran’s power plants. A ceasefire framework was agreed on April 7, 2026, brokered by Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir. Iran’s Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi issued a formal declaration on behalf of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, stating that if attacks aga...

The Dispatch The President of the United States published two posts to Truth Social on the morning of April 7, 2026, the date designated Power Plant Day and Bridge Day in Iran, with strikes scheduled for 8:00 PM Eastern Time. The first post, published at approximately 7:20 AM, read as follows: “Two more major pharmaceutical companies to launch products through TrumpRx.” The post linked...

The Dispatch Two Iranian official accounts filed responses on April 5, 2026, to the President of the United States’ announcement that Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day in Iran, with the event scheduled for 8:00 PM Eastern Time. The first response was filed by @IRTruePromise, a state-aligned X account associated with Iran’s Operation True Promise IV military campaign, which...

The Dispatch The Secretary of War of the United States issued an Easter greeting on April 5, 2026, via his official X account, @SecWar. The post read: “The tomb is empty. The promise is fulfilled. Through His sacrifice, we are redeemed. We stand firm in faith, courage, and truth — Happy Easter.” The post was accompanied by an image bearing a cross, the seal of the Department of War, an...

The Dispatch The President of the United States published two posts to Truth Social on April 5, 2026, pertaining to scheduled infrastructure events in Iran. The first post, published at 8:03 AM, read as follows: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll...

The Dispatch Three United States military aircraft were struck by Iranian forces on Friday, April 3, 2026, in the vicinity of the Strait of Hormuz and southwestern Iran. This correspondent files the following status update as of late afternoon Eastern time. The first aircraft struck was a United States Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle, a two-seat platform crewed by a pilot and a weapons systems office...

The Dispatch The President of the United States published an update to his position on the Strait of Hormuz on April 3, 2026, at 8:22 AM. The post read as follows: “With a little more time, we can easily OPEN THE HORMUZ STRAIT, TAKE THE OIL, & MAKE A FORTUNE. IT WOULD BE A ‘GUSHER’ FOR THE WORLD???” The post was signed President DONALD J. TRUMP. For the purposes of admi...

The Dispatch Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps conducted a series of strikes on Thursday, April 2, 2026, targeting technology infrastructure, military assets, and transportation facilities across multiple countries. The strikes were described by Iranian state media as retaliation for the ongoing United States and Israeli military operation against Iran, which entered its second month...

The Dispatch Paula White, spiritual advisor to the President of the United States and director of the White House Faith Office, attracted public attention in January 2020 for a prayer delivered at a church event in which she called for all satanic pregnancies to miscarry. The prayer was delivered in full as follows: “In the name of Jesus, we command all satanic pregnancies to miscarry right...

The Dispatch The White House Easter Lunch held on April 1, 2026 featured a formal spiritual programme comprising seven prayers delivered by six named clergy and one unidentified pastor. The event was attended by cabinet members, faith leaders, and the President of the United States. Remarks by the President preceded the prayers. The programme was organised by the White House Faith Office, which th...

The Dispatch The President of the United States delivered remarks at the White House Easter Lunch on April 1, 2026, prior to the event’s formal spiritual programme. The remarks were unscripted and covered multiple subjects. The full transcript runs to approximately 10,000 words. This correspondent has filed a summary of the principal items of note. On Iran: the President stated that the mili...