The Paper Trail: August 5, 2025

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The Paper Trail

Top stories for August 5, 2025

Unnoticed whistle-blower document alarms Justice Department veterans: The DOJ's inspector general received, but didn’t act on, a crucial account from a whistleblower detailing wrongdoing by recently confirmed federal appellate court judge Emil Bove III, raising concerns that the watchdog office may have gone dormant. (Devlin Barrett, New York Times)

At least 148,000 federal employees have left government under Trump, good government group reports: According to the Partnership for Public Service, the three departments most affected by the workforce reductions are Treasury (31,201 employees), Agriculture (21,600), and Defense (20,364). (Sean Michael Newhouse, Government Executive)

🔎 See Also: The federal government is paying more than 154,000 people not to work (Meryl Kornfield, Hannah Natanson, and Laura Meckler, Washington Post)

Supreme Court lets Trump dismiss Consumer Product Safety Commission members for now: In a brief, unsigned order, the Supreme Court allowed President Donald Trump to remove the three Democratic members of the CPSC while legal challenges play out. The court has increasingly voiced skepticism about the constitutionality of a legal requirement that CPSC members can be removed only “for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.” (Devan Cole and John Fritze, CNN)

🔎 See Also: 2 independent watchdogs quietly replaced by Trump (Sean Michael Newhouse, Government Executive)

Vast supplies of U.S. aid remain stranded, despite State Department promises: As a consequence of the dismantling of USAID, more than 60,000 metric tons of food have languished in warehouses in the U.S. and elsewhere, with expiration dates nearing for some items. (Annie Gowen, Washington Post)

🔎 See Also: Trump administration to destroy birth control intended as aid (Maham Javaid, Joyce Sohyun Lee, and Meg Kelly, Washington Post)

“Bounce-back emails and no-replies": IRS and Social Security workforce reductions are hurting constituent service, House Democrats argue: Dozens of House Democrats reported that their staffers assisting members of the public with tax refunds and Social Security payments received bounce-back emails and no-replies from agency legislative liaison offices. They also said that Congress has yet to receive “real-time, authoritative data sources tracking separations from the federal workforce and their impacts.” (Sean Michael Newhouse, Government Executive)

“College hazing” or training? Amid shortage, air traffic recruits wash out: The FAA’s high trainee dropout rate is a leading cause of the nation’s dangerous shortage of air traffic controllers. Recruits endure haphazard instruction, organizational dysfunction, and abusive conditions. (Ian Duncan, Washington Post)

🔎 See Also: Investigators detail points of failure leading to D.C.-area plane crash (Ian Duncan et al., Washington Post)

EPA drafts rule to strike down landmark climate finding: The EPA is proposing to rescind a landmark 2009 legal opinion regarding greenhouse gas emissions that underpins many of the government’s actions to combat climate change. (Jake Spring, Washington Post)

🔎 See Also: Legit climate scientists slam Trump EPA report as a “farce” and an embarrassment (Dharna Noor and Oliver Milman, Mother Jones)

Trump’s trip to Scotland as his new golf course opens blurs politics and the family’s business: Using a presidential overseas trip — with its sprawling entourage of advisers, White House and support staffers, Secret Service agents, and reporters — to show off Trump-brand golf destinations demonstrates how the president has become increasingly comfortable intermingling his governing pursuits with promoting his family’s business interests. (Will Weissert, Associated Press)

🔎 See Also: Donald Trump Jr.’s drone ventures could make a killing — thanks to dad’s big beautiful budget (Ellen Ioanes, The Intercept)

🔎 See Also: Company advised by Trump sons said it hoped to benefit from fed money, then took it back (Bernard Condon, Associated Press)

Elon Musk & DOGE

Revealed: Elon Musk’s $1 million gift to Trump inauguration: Elon Musk’s X Corp. gave $1 million to Trump’s inauguration, but the inaugural committee didn’t disclose it until six months later. Musk continues pouring money into politics, donating millions to pro-Trump and Republican super PACs. (Anna Massoglia, Influence Brief)

DOGE builds AI tool to cut 50 percent of federal regulations: The U.S. DOGE Service is using a new AI tool to slash federal regulations, with the goal of eliminating half of Washington’s regulatory mandates by January 20, 2026. (Hannah Natanson, Washington Post)

Weaponization of the Government

Office of Special Counsel launches investigation into ex-Trump prosecutor Jack Smith: The U.S. Office of Special Counsel is investigating Jack Smith after President Trump and other prominent Republicans accused Smith of violating the Hatch Act, which prohibits certain political activities by government officials. (Vaughn Hillyard, NBC News)

Attorney General Bondi orders prosecutors to start grand jury probe into Obama officials over Russia investigation: Attorney General Pam Bondi directed federal prosecutors to launch a grand jury investigation into accusations that members of the Obama administration manufactured intelligence about Russia’s 2016 election interference. The move follows a referral from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. (Hannah Rabinowitz, CNN)

Justice Department files formal complaint against Judge Boasberg: The DOJ filed a judicial ethics complaint accusing U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of misconduct and demanding that he be removed from a high-profile deportation case and face punishment. The complaint centers on comments Boasberg made to fellow judges at a March 11 meeting, when he reportedly said he was concerned “that the Administration would disregard rulings of federal courts leading to a constitutional crisis.” (Zach Schonfeld, The Hill)

🔎 See Also: Legal watchdog files bar complaints against Justice Dept. lawyers (Alan Feuer, New York Times)

Trump went to war with the Ivies. community colleges are being hit: The administration’s war on the wealthiest and most prestigious universities is inflicting collateral damage on the country’s 1,100 community colleges, some of which are grappling with disappearing federal grants, shuttered DEI offices, eliminated programs, and panicked students and staff. (Ben Austen, New York Times)

🔎 See Also: Trump administration is freezing over $300 million for UCLA (Jonathan Wolfe and Michael C. Bender, New York Times)

🔎 See Also: Brown University makes a deal with the White House to restore funding (Alan Blinder et al., New York Times)

🔎 See Also: Columbia agrees to $200 million fine to settle fight with Trump (Sharon Otterman, New York Times)

Epstein Files

Comer postponing Maxwell testimony for Supreme Court adds importance to her appeal: House Oversight Chairman James Comer agreed last week to delay Ghislaine Maxwell’s deposition until the Supreme Court decides whether to take up her appeal. After her meeting with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche (previously President Trump’s personal defense lawyer), Maxwell was moved from a low-security facility in Florida to a minimum-security camp in Texas. The president hasn’t ruled out whether he would grant Maxwell clemency. (Jordan Rubin, MSNBC)

🔎 See Also: House panel approves subpoena of DOJ for Epstein files (Emily Brooks, The Hill)

Natural Disasters

FEMA moved quickly to help Texas. These other states waited months: The robust response to the flooding in Texas contrasts sharply with delays faced by other states that have sustained deadly floods and other disasters this year. (Brianna Sacks, Washington Post)

🔎 See Also: FEMA search and rescue chief resigns after frustration with Texas flood response (Gabe Cohen, CNN)

🔎 See Also: Trump denies Maryland’s request for FEMA aid after devastating floods (Katie Shepherd, Washington Post)

Reproductive Freedom

Trump moves to bar nearly all abortions at Veterans Affairs hospitals: Pregnant veterans would no longer be allowed to receive abortions at VA hospitals in cases of rape, incest, or when the pregnancy threatens their health under a proposed rule that would revoke a Biden-era policy. (Praveena Somasundaram, Washington Post)

White House has no plan to mandate IVF care, despite campaign pledge: Last year, Trump said that if he returned to office, the government would either pay for IVF services or issue rules requiring insurance companies to cover the treatment. More than six months into his second term, the Trump administration hasn’t publicly proposed new federal subsidies to make IVF free or more affordable. In addition, the administration is backing away from proposals to mandate IVF coverage for the roughly 50 million people on the Affordable Care Act exchanges. (Riley Beggin and Jeff Stein, Washington Post)

Middle East Conflicts

Israel’s 12-day war revealed alarming gap in America’s missile stockpile: In addition to a gap in supplies, the U.S. also discovered inefficiencies in the way it fired its antimissile systems and is scrutinizing the performance of some interceptors. (Shelby Holliday, Anat Peled, and Drew FitzGerald, Wall Street Journal)

Trump says U.S. will partner with Israel to run additional food centers in Gaza, but details are scant: The White House offered few details about its “new aid plan” to address the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, such as how it would differ from the existing food distribution system. (Michelle L. Price, Associated Press)

Police Misconduct

Justice department drops cases against L.A. protesters after officers caught making false claims: U.S. immigration officers made false and misleading statements in their reports about several Los Angeles protesters they arrested during demonstrations in June. The DOJ charged at least 26 people with “assaulting” and “impeding” federal officers and other crimes during the protests; however, prosecutors have since dismissed at least eight of those felonies due to officers’ inaccurate reports. (Sam Levin, The Guardian)

🔎 See Also: Trump’s top federal prosecutor in L.A. struggles to secure indictments in protest cases (James Queally and Brittny Mejia, Los Angeles Times)

Feds make it a crime to give PPE to ICE protesters: In addition to arresting hundreds of immigrants across Southern California, the government is arresting people who are responding to the raids or helping protests. Some of those targeted have provided supplies to protesters or tried to identify masked ICE agents. (Akela Lacy, The Intercept)

Signalgate

Hegseth Signal messages came from email classified “SECRET,” watchdog told: The Pentagon’s inspector general found that messages from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Signal account previewing a U.S. bombing campaign in Yemen were derived from a classified email labeled “SECRET/NOFORN.” The revelation contradicts claims by the administration that no classified information was shared in those Signal chats. (Dan Lamothe and John Hudson, Washington Post)

🔎 See Also: Hegseth team lashes out at Pentagon’s internal Signalgate review (Dan Lamothe, Washington Post)

Defense and Veterans Affairs

Top generals nominated for new positions must now meet with Trump: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is requiring nominees for four-star-general positions to meet with President Trump before their nominations are finalized — a departure from past practice that has raised worries about the politicization of the military’s top ranks. (Greg Jaffe and Maggie Haberman, New York Times)

Trump’s domestic use of military set to get worse, leaked memo shows: An internal DHS memo lays out new details about a potential escalation of the military’s domestic immigration law enforcement role — and not just at the border. (Greg Sargent, The New Republic)

🔎 See Also: Pentagon shifting $200 million to border wall project in Arizona (Drew F. Lawrence, Military.com)

Analysis: The cost of domestic deployment: With the chance for further domestic deployment of the U.S. military ever-looming, it’s worthwhile to assess the cost of these deployments. There is the financial cost to the American taxpayer, of course, but more important is the impact domestic deployment has and could continue to have on American society — the cost to democracy, the cost to public safety, and the cost to military readiness. (Virginia Burger, The Center for Defense Information at POGO)

“Nobody to watch my twins.” Military spouses quit jobs, families bust budgets in scramble for child care: Military families and on-base child care providers have known for a long time that theirs is a system delicately balanced on a wobbling foundation. But suddenly, the country’s largest employer-sponsored child care system was upended by staffing shortages after a DOD-wide hiring freeze announced in February. (Jennifer Brookland, The War Horse)

Watchdog finds VA missed evidence, failed to order exams for military sexual trauma claims: Overlooked evidence, incomplete records, a failure to order necessary medical exams, and high staff turnover have hampered claims for military sexual trauma at the VA, according to the agency’s inspector general. (Linda F. Hersey, Stars and Stripes)

Veterans Affairs whistleblowers may not be getting settlement benefits due to a lack of oversight, watchdog reports: The GAO found shortfalls in the VA’s monitoring of whistleblower cases, meaning that whistleblowers may not actually receive their negotiated benefits for reporting report waste, fraud, and abuse at the agency. (Sean Michael Newhouse, Government Executive)

Business and Finance

Trump, claiming weak jobs numbers were “rigged,” fires Labor official: President Trump on Friday denounced new government data showing slow job growth, saying without evidence that the data were “rigged” and that he was firing the Senate-confirmed Department of Labor official responsible for compiling the numbers. Critics fear the firing will further erode trust in government statistics and make it more difficult for policymakers, investors, and businesses to make decisions. (Ben Casselman and Tony Romm, New York Times)

White House preps order to punish banks that discriminate against conservatives: The White House is preparing to step up pressure against big banks over perceived discrimination against conservatives and crypto companies with an executive order that threatens to fine financial institutions that drop customers for political or religious reasons. (Dylan Tokar and Alexander Saeedy, Wall Street Journal)

Whistleblower awards slow to trickle as SEC raises bar on claims: The SEC, now with a Republican majority, denied awards in 31 consecutive orders issued between April 21 and July 15, covering at least 55 different tipsters. It’s the longest drought in the history of the program, which was created in 2010 to encourage tips about financial wrongdoing. (John Holland, Bloomberg Law)

Big data is already jacking up your airline fares: Airlines’ use of AI to set fares could lead to illegal collusion that threatens to jack up ticket prices for everyone. (Katya Schwenk and Luke Goldstein, The Lever)

Tech

In Trump’s Washington, Palantir is winning big: Software and data analytics company Palantir has garnered at least $300 million in new and expanded business with the federal government since Trump took office. The company is potentially set to earn an order of magnitude more in Pentagon contracts. (Elizabeth Dwoskin, Hannah Natanson, and Jacob Bogage, Washington Post)

Zuckerberg fired the fact-checkers. We tested their replacement: Community notes, a crowdsourcing program Mark Zuckerberg announced in January, replaced fact-checkers with users to counter falsehoods on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. So far, the new program appears not to be up to the task. (Geoffrey A. Fowler, Washington Post)

ChatGPT promised to forget user conversations. A federal court ended that: Millions trust ChatGPT with their most sensitive questions, and, under OpenAI’s policy, most chats would be deleted after 30 days and not used to train the model. Now, however, a federal court has overruled that policy. (Dario Maestro, The Hill)

Infrastructure

More than 10 years later, Flint declares its water safe after replacing lead pipes, but health issues and doubts persist: Flint, Michigan, says it completed the replacement of 11,000 lead pipes and restored 28,000 damaged properties, but some residents still complain of discolored and foul-smelling water. (Nicquel Terry Ellis, CNN)

Trump administration canceled a $4.9B loan guarantee for a line to deliver green power: President Trump has repeatedly derided wind and solar energy as “unreliable” and opposed efforts to combat climate change by moving away from fossil fuels. The Department of Energy also said the project was among billions of dollars’ worth of commitments “rushed out the doors” by the Biden administration. (John Hanna, ABC News)

Health Care

Trump administration is launching a new private health tracking system with Big Tech’s help: The system, spearheaded by an administration that has already freely shared Americans’ personal data in ways that have tested legal bounds, could put patients’ desires for more convenience at the doctor’s office on a collision course with their privacy rights. (Amanda Seitz, Associated Press)

Trump demands that drugmakers lower some of their U.S. prices by September: Despite the strong language in the president’s letters to the major drugmakers, his demands amount to a request that they act voluntarily. The administration hasn’t put forward a clear legal authority to compel them to lower prices. (Rebecca Robbins, New York Times)

Kennedy intends to overhaul federal compensation for vaccine injuries: Though the compensation system is widely regarded as flawed and understaffed, critics have noted the health secretary’s lengthy record as a vaccine skeptic and view his campaign with concern. (Christina Jewett, New York Times)

New Medicaid federal work requirements mean less leeway for states: More than a dozen states are seeking their own versions of Medicaid work requirements. But upcoming federal standards pose questions around how much leeway states have to design their own rules. (Katheryn Houghton and Bram Sable-Smith, KFF Health News)

ICYMI

Immigration and Border Security:

→ House Democrats sue ICE for barring them from detention facilities

→ U.S. to require some foreign visitors to pay bonds of up to $15,000 for entry

→ State Dept.: Trump’s “third countries” for immigrants have awful human rights records

→ DOJ sues New York City over sanctuary city laws

→ Federal appeals court rules Trump’s birthright citizenship ban unconstitutional

→ ICE moves to shackle some 180,000 immigrants with GPS ankle monitors

→ ICE crackdown imperils Afghans who aided U.S. war effort, lawyers say

→ The former private prison exec behind ICE’s immigrant detention surge

→ This Tuckahoe home won a $1.26 billion contract for an ICE detention center. The owner isn't talking

→ His former company got caught employing undocumented workers. Now he’s profiting off contract to build migrant detention camp at Fort Bliss

Other News:

→ FBI agents would get increased whistleblower protections under bipartisan bill

→ Trump administration illegally withheld Head Start funds, GAO finds

→ What will it cost to renovate the “free” Air Force One? Don’t ask

→ Experts raise concerns over Trump’s White House ballroom renovation plans

→ Russ Vought bills CFPB $5M for his security detail

→ Congressional stock trading ban gets Senate panel’s OK

→ Trump told park workers to report displays that “disparage” Americans. Here’s what they flagged

→ Four radioactive wasp nests found on South Carolina nuclear facility

→ American freed from Venezuela in prisoner swap was convicted of triple murder

→ Army says 250th anniversary celebration in DC cost $30 million

On The Lighter Side

Trust on the tarmac: Lawmakers who travel together legislate together: Anecdotes abound about how trips taken by congressional delegations have led to social relationships, and then to bipartisan legislative collaborations. Now, two academic researchers have developed quantitative metrics that show how these trips lead to bipartisan bills. (Bradford Fitch, Roll Call)

Upcoming Events

📌 VIRTUAL EVENT: The Trump Administration’s Conflicts of Interest. ProPublica. Wednesday, August 13, 4:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. ET.

Hot Docs

🔥📃 GAO: Decision in the Matter of: Department of Homeland Security—Application of the Impoundment Control Act to Reductions in Force for the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, and the Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman. B-337366 (PDF)

🔥📃 GAO - Defense Industrial Base: Actions Needed to Address Risks Posed by Dependence on Foreign Suppliers. GAO-25-107283 (PDF)

🔥📃 Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction: Quarterly Report to Congress. July 30, 2025 (PDF)

🔥📃 Project On Government Oversight: Assessing Inspector General Nominees. August 4, 2025

🔥📃 Just Security: The Anti-Corruption Tracker: Mapping the Erosion of Oversight and Accountability. July 2025

Nominations & Appointments

Nominations

• Thomas Albus - United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri
• Timothy Dill - Assistant Secretary of Defense
• Andrew Duva - Assistant Attorney General
• Daniel Edwards - Assistant Secretary of Transportation
• Thomas Ferguson III - United States Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina
• Edward Forst - Administrator of General Services
• Ho Nieh - Member, Nuclear Regulatory Commission
• Michael Payne - Director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation, Department of Defense
• Richard Price - United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri
• Darin Smith - United States Attorney for the District of Wyoming
• Maurice Todd - Assistant Secretary of Defense
• Douglas Troutman - Assistant Administrator for Toxic Substances, Environmental Protection Agency

Appointments

• Alina Habba - Acting United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey

Withdrawals

• David Eisner - Assistant Secretary of Energy
• John LaValle - Governor, United States Postal Service
• Jason De Sena Trennert - Assistant Secretary of the Treasury