President Donald Trump's Pentagon faces a new legal threat after a Department of Defense official admitted to tossing up a word salad press policy in response to a court order.

On Monday, the Pentagon released a new press policy after a federal judge ruled that the agency's current policy is unconstitutional, The New York Times reported. Those policies included closing the Pentagon workspace used by journalists and requiring any journalist seeking physical access to the building to be escorted.

Cmdr. Tim Parlatore, a special adviser to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, told the Times in an interview on Monday that the new policy essentially uses "more words to say the same thing and to foreclose creative misinterpretations."

Lawyers representing the Times cited that interview in a court filing on Tuesday seeking to have the Pentagon's interim policy thrown out.

"Rather than comply with the Court’s Order and accompanying Opinion, Defendants are contemptuously defying it—both in letter and spirit in a newly released 'interim' policy," the lawyers argued. "Among other things, for the first time in history, the Interim Policy bars reporters with press passes from entering the building without an escort, sets up unprecedented rules governing when a reporter can offer anonymity to a source, and leaves in place provisions that this Court’s Order struck."

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was angry about settling the Iran war.

Trump was taking press questions after swearing in new Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin in the Oval Office when he gave a frank response about the status of the ongoing military conflict in the Middle East, which has now reached its fourth week and left 13 troops dead and 232 service members wounded.

This was the second time in two days that Trump had punted the blame to Hegseth over the war. On Monday, during a visit to Tennessee, Trump claimed that Hegseth urged him to pursue joint military strikes with Israel on Iran.

"I don’t want to say this, but I have to. I said to Pete and General Caine, I think this thing [the war] is going to be settled very soon. They said, 'Oh, that’s too bad.' Pete didn’t want it to be settled," Trump said.

Political commentator Brian Krassenstein shared the video on X, saying, "In other words our Sec. of War doesn't want peace, he wants war."

One of the president’s allies, however, shared some insights into a possible motivation for the policy. The Hill reported:

Former White House strategist and podcaster Steve Bannon said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers assisting with airport operations is a “test run” for the 2026 midterms.

During a conversation with conservative lawyer Mike Davis on his ‘War Room’ program, Bannon asked, ‘We can use what’s happening with these ICE [officers] helping out at the airports, we can use this as a test run, as a test case to really perfect ICE’s involvement in the 2026 midterm elections, sir?[/i]’

His guest, predictably, wasted little time in expressing his agreement.

To be sure, reports like these come with caveats. Bannon is a prominent MAGA voice, but he’s not currently a White House official and he has earned a reputation as a blowhard who says outrageous things to get attention. There’s no reason to assume Bannon has any idea what he’s talking about in terms of likely future developments.....

In other words, radical ideas can pop up on “War Room,” but it’s not unusual to see those same ideas spread quickly in GOP politics.

What’s more, there’s a certain political logic behind the dynamic Bannon described. The administration may very well want Americans to grow more accustomed to seeing ICE agents — on public streets, in busy airports and elsewhere — so that it seems less jarring to see them similarly patrolling local polling places, looking for fraudulent voters who don’t exist in any meaningful way.

A few months ago, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker appeared on MS NOW and told Rachel Maddow that he was concerned about the Republican administration deploying federal agents to polling locations under the pretense of “protecting the vote.” The more Bannon endorses this approach, the more alarming his rhetoric becomes.

In late January, Donald Trump and his team deployed FBI agents to raid an elections office in Fulton County, Georgia, walking away with what local sources called “pallets of ballots.” There was no credible reason to execute such a raid, which was driven by the president’s absurd election conspiracy theories, and it led to speculation about whether, when and where more ballots might be seized.

Roughly seven weeks later, The New York Times reported:

A Republican sheriff who is running for governor of California recently seized more than 650,000 ballots cast in a 2025 statewide election, prompting criticism from the state’s top election official, who said the sheriff’s concerns about fraud ‘lack credible evidence.’

The sheriff, Chad Bianco, on Friday said he was investigating allegations by an election activist group that vote tallies did not match the number of ballots received. … His office confirmed the ballot seizure and investigation on Sunday.

At issue is last year’s Proposition 50 election in the Golden State, which cleared the way for a redistricting plan that will benefit Democratic candidates, as a counter to a comparable plan in Texas that will benefit GOP candidates. Voters in California overwhelmingly supported the effort, approving the ballot measure by nearly 30 points.....

At its root, this is a story about a Republican official whose office has literally nothing to do with election administration, in his county or anywhere else, who decided to seize election materials in response to assorted conspiratorial complaints. This comes on the heels of Trump sending the FBI to seize election materials in Georgia in response to other assorted conspiratorial complaints.

The broader concern is that a template is taking shape, offering precedents for law enforcement to start making plans to seize ballots in areas nationwide — after or even during official counts.

What’s more, the more frequently this happens, the more Americans may be led to believe it’s normal and routine for law enforcement officials to seize and impound ballots — despite the fact that this is neither normal nor routine. Watch this space.

On Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Paul Friedman ruled against the Pentagon’s restrictive press access policy, concluding that it violated the First Amendment and granted the government overly broad authority to control access to the press corps. The court decision fueled some hopes that conditions at the Defense Department might return to normal.

Those hopes were soon dashed. The New York Times, which helped take the lead in challenging the Hegseth-imposed restrictions, reported:

The Pentagon is closing the workspace used for years by journalists with credentials to cover the military, Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, wrote in a memo to senior Pentagon leadership. A new area for the press will be set up in an annex outside the main Pentagon building, he said, and all journalists now seeking physical access to the Pentagon will require an escort.

In addition, the department is changing the wording of some of the rules for journalists requesting a credential, Mr. Parnell wrote.

As far as Hegseth’s team is concerned, the department can impose these restrictions, limiting access to media organizations, without running afoul of Friday’s court ruling, which the Pentagon is appealing.

The Times doesn’t quite see it that way. “The new policy does not comply with the judge’s order. It continues to impose unconstitutional restrictions on the press,” a spokesperson for the newspaper said. “We will be going back to court.”

The Pentagon Press Association similarly said that the department’s latest announcement “is a clear violation of the letter and spirit of last week’s ruling.”

It’s not exactly a secret that the partial government shutdown affecting the Department of Homeland Security has led to exceedingly long lines at many American airports, but the White House apparently has an idea to help improve matters. MS NOW reported:

President Donald Trump and top administration officials said Sunday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will arrive at the nation’s airports on Monday to handle security at exceedingly long lines driven by a shortage of TSA workers.

‘I look forward to moving ICE in on Monday, and have already told them to, ‘GET READY.’ NO MORE WAITING, NO MORE GAMES!’ Trump said on Truth Social.

On the surface, it’s likely that many air travelers would welcome the president’s “no more waiting” message, but as the policy advances, a handful of questions hang overhead......

2. What will ICE agents do at airports? This is arguably the most obvious of the questions, but there’s ongoing uncertainty about the answer. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump’s online announcement “came as a surprise to officials inside ICE and at DHS,” who spent the weekend “trying to figure out how it could work.”

On CNN’s “State of the Union,” White House border czar Tom Homan, who will lead the effort, conceded that the plan was hatched by Trump a day earlier and was “a work in progress” — a problem that became more acute when Homan said ICE agents would not be involved with security screening operations, right around the time Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy appeared on ABC News and said the exact opposite.....

5. Is this all about petty, partisan spite? On Monday morning, Republican Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, who chairs the House Oversight Committee, endorsed the administration’s policy, telling Fox Business, “It’ll drive the Democrats crazy.”

Comer on airports: "I'm glad the president has put ICE in there for a multitude of reasons. It'll drive the Democrats crazy."

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-03-23T12:36:14.007Z

With this on-air comment, the congressman said the quiet part loud. This isn’t about solving a problem, this is about playing political games. Or, as MS NOW contributor Philip Bump summarized, “[T]he ICE-at-airports thing is no more complicated than Trump knowing that his opponents hate ICE and thinking that they will therefore be tearing out their hair at this devious gambit.”

My advice for air travelers: Keep showing up extra early at the airport, because there’s no reason to assume that ICE agents’ presence will make a positive difference.

“You know, it was brought to my attention today that we’re the only country that does mail-in voting,” the Republican claimed. “Mail-in voting means mail-in cheating. I call it mail-in cheating.”

As is too often the case, the president had no idea what he was talking about. For one thing, many countries in continents around the globe rely on postal balloting without incident. No matter how many times Trump says the U.S. is the only country that embraces such a system, reality keeps proving him wrong.,,,,

But there’s another element to this that’s just as notable: The president who wants to stop Americans from voting by mail also votes by mail. MS NOW reported that the website for the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections shows that Trump voted by mail in this week’s special election in Florida. The Washington Post similarly reported:

President Donald Trump, who is in the midst of pressuring senators to curb the use of mail-in voting, voted by mail ballot in Tuesday’s special election in Palm Beach County, Florida.

The Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections website indicates that Trump, who is registered to vote at his Mar-a-Lago estate on Palm Beach, ‘voted by Mail Ballot’ in a special election between Democrat Emily Gregory and Republican Jon Maples for a seat in the state legislature. A spokesperson for the office confirmed to The Washington Post that the ‘information [on the site] is accurate.’

If this sounds at all familiar, it’s not your imagination. In Trump’s first term, the president also condemned mail-in balloting as “horrible” and “corrupt,” even as he continued to vote by mail.

Pressed on the conflict between his position and his record, the Republican told reporters, “Sure, I can vote by mail — because I’m allowed to.”

Six years later, Trump is still condemning mail-in voting for baseless reasons, he’s still voting by mail himself, and he’s also demanding that congressional Republicans impose new election restrictions that would prevent millions of Americans from doing what he’s done on multiple occasions.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (The Borowitz Report)—TSA officers arrested hundreds of ICE agents on Monday after the untrained individuals inadvertently set off airport metal detectors with their guns.

In airports across the nation, ICE agents walked through the detectors despite signs warning that firearms were not permitted.

“This is so unfair,” said one ICE agent as he was being handcuffed. “When I took this job I was promised it wouldn’t involve reading.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent asserted on NBC on Sunday morning that those who were offended by Donald Trump’s universally reviled Truth Social post about the death of former FBI Director Robert Mueller, should approach the controversy from the president’s point of view.

“Meet the Press” host Kristin Welker kicked off the conversation by reading Trump’s posts where he wrote, “Robert Mueller just died. Good. I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people,” and then pressed, "Do you think it’s appropriate for the president of the United States to celebrate the death of an American citizen; someone who’s a Bronze Star, Purple Heart Kristen and who served in Vietnam?”

The nonplussed Bessent replied, ”Kristen, I was with the president in the green room at Davos and there was a video playing of what may have been an illegal raid on his home at Mar-a-Lago,” and then recalled, “They are going through his wife’s wardrobe. And I watched the look in his eye, and I think that neither one of us can understand what has been done to the president and to his family.”

Welker was quick to point out that Mueller had nothing to do with the court-approved raid looking for stolen government documents stored about the Florida resort, including in a bathroom.

Bessent, as he is known to do, cut off the host, and talked over her, asserting, “I think that given what has been done to President Trump and his family, it is impossible for either of us to understand what he has been through.”

While one might think this was a recipe for mischief, an unlikely hero has arisen, Judge Richard Eaton of that court, who appears to be holding the administration’s feet to the fire and does not appear like he is about to tolerate many shenanigans should the administration seek to drag those feet in an effort to evade the law.

While Trump administration officials may have believed they could tie the case up in the courts for months, even years, Eaton has different thoughts about how, and when, to refund those who paid these illegal tariffs, and he has laid it all out in two opinions spanning no more than six pages of text combined.

At a time when lawyers and judges gravitate toward complex reasoning, obscuring jargon and legal briefs and opinions that seemingly go on forever, Eaton has taught a masterclass in simple, concise and clear language. What this straightforward approach has done is not only made it patently clear what the administration’s legal obligations are, he has left little wiggle room for the administration to avoid reparations.

Eaton, a 77-year-old jurist who once served as a village justice in rural upstate New York, has taken the reins of this sprawling, high-stakes legal battle. In the case of Atmus Filtration, Inc. v. United States, the plaintiff is seeking an immediate refund of the payments it made under the illegal tariff scheme. Eaton’s first opinion in the case is a model of judicial brevity and clarity. And he has also shown no patience for bureaucratic stonewalling.

The first decision was issued on March 4, 2026. Importers across the country may have been bracing for a convoluted, multiyear slog to get their money back, but Eaton quickly eased those fears. In a simple, three-page order, he directed Customs and Border Protection to refund the illegal tariffs paid by American companies......

When it too often seems like the legal system is paralyzed by procedural gamesmanship and judicial opinions frequently span hundreds of pages, and sometimes constitute tales of sound and fury signifying little, Eaton’s approach is a breath of fresh air. His rulings demonstrate that the most effective jurisprudence is often the most direct. He saw a problem — billions of dollars in illegally collected taxes and an administration reluctant to return them — and he used his court’s unique jurisdictional power to solve it.

He didn’t write for the history books, even as he made history; he wrote to get American businesses their money back and to protect American taxpayers from footing a multibillion-dollar interest bill.

The Constitution requires that tariffs be lawful, and the Supreme Court has confirmed that these were not. But rights without remedies are meaningless. Thanks to the brevity, clarity and undeniable courage of a seasoned judge in lower Manhattan, who no doubt has seen his share of litigant mischief in his court for decades, the rule of law is being enforced in as straightforward and efficient a manner as possible.

In a world where the courts must serve as a significant check on abuses of power, particularly executive power, we need more judges like Eaton: those with the courage, and the willingness, to, in the words of Chief Justice John Marshall from over 200 years ago, “say what the law is” and to do so in a concise, fair, clear and accessible manner.