NYT Has Generic Ballot D +11, Ukraine's Big Battlefield Win, Mortgage Rates And Brent Crude Rising - Trump's Failures Just Keep Mounting

Two big jobs this week - win in Georgia tomorrow, make our calls for The Ukraine Support Act (HR 2913) every day!!!!!!!

Morning all. If you choose to look the evidence of Trump’s mounting failures are all around us……

As Putin heads to China for meetings with Xi we are getting more information about the extraordinary success Ukraine had in breaching the air defense systems protecting Moscow this weekend, in what is now clearly one of Ukraine’s most significant achievements of the war. From Politico:

KYIV — Ukraine hit Russia with more than 1,300 drones over the weekend, penetrating Moscow’s heavy air defenses and successfully hitting targets in and around the capital.

While Ukrainian drones have penetrated Moscow’s air defenses before, this time they hit a wide range of targets, including industrial plants and an oil refinery. Three people were killed and 12 wounded, Russian authorities said.

“This is significant also because the Moscow region is the most heavily saturated with Russian air defense systems,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement on Sunday afternoon.

Brent crude starts the day at almost $110 a barrel, one of its highest levels of Trump’s failed war:

Trump’s failed war is causing mortgage rates to surge in the US and Europe. Here’s the homepage of the FT right now:

Here’s how the article opens (paywall):

Mortgage costs across Europe and North America have risen sharply as the economic impact of the Middle East war spills into housing markets, piling pressure on borrowers wanting to buy a new home or refinance.

The jump has come even though central banks have refrained from raising interest rates. Mortgage lenders are responding to increases in governments’ borrowing costs and betting that official rates will eventually need to rise to contain the threat of inflation.

In the US, the conflict has driven the 30-year mortgage rate to 6.36 per cent, above levels seen in September 2025, before the Federal Reserve began a cycle of three quarter-point rate cuts.

In the yes the main stream media is now regularly acknowledging what a complete f-ck up Trump is news category here's The Guardian’s home page right now. It’s something that immigration advocates have been warning about for years - undocumented immigrants pay an enormous amount of taxes, draw little in social services, and have helped significantly lower our ballooning annual budget deficit. That dynamic is now being reversed, and it’s more evidence of how damaging mass deportation is and will be to the American economy:

The NYT dropped a bit of a polling bomb on Trump and the Rs this morning clocking in with a new poll showing significant erosion for Trump and Dems jumping 6 points in the generic ballot to +11:

Here’s the front page of the NYT website right now. Ugly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Across the board rejection and repudiation:

The Real Clear Politics generic ballot average - will you be voting Dem or R in the Congressional elections this fall? - just crossed D+7 for the first time this cycle. It was +4 before the war began, and note that we have now seen five polls in recent weeks with the generic ballot +10 Dem or more. Commentator Bill Scher reminded us this morning that this average was +7.3 Dem right before the midterm Dem blowout election of 2018.

Last week’s revelation that Trump made already made 3,700 stock market trades while in office almost ensures that his unprecedented, vainglorious corruption - ballrooms, golf courses, arches, self-enrichment, direct theft from tax payers, shakedowns of corporations, selling of pardons - becomes a top tier issue in the election this year. Judd Legum has a new deep dive into Trump’s new financial disclosure report (the one that documented the 3,700 stock trades) that has some jawdropping new reporting:

The fact that Trump visited a Thermo Fisher facility on the same day he purchased the company’s stock — and bought Thermo Fisher stock repeatedly in the weeks before his visit — has not previously been reported.

The disclosures reveal that Trump has been a highly active trader in 2026, executing thousands of transactions — many in individual stocks impacted by his administration’s policies. In response to criticism, a spokesperson for the Trump Organization claimed that the trades were completely separate from Trump’s official duties and managed by an independent outside financial advisor. “President Trump’s investment holdings are maintained exclusively through fully discretionary accounts independently managed by third-party financial institutions with sole and exclusive authority over all investment decisions,” the spokesperson said. “Trades are executed and portfolios are balanced through automated investment processes and systems administered by those institutions.”

The fact that Trump purchased stock in Thermo Fisher the same day that he toured its facility undercuts this claim. Further, the March 11 purchase of Thermo Fisher stock was marked “UNSOLICITED” in the document. An “unsolicited” trade is one that is not recommended by a broker, but initiated by the customer.

If Trump wanted to legally remove himself from investment decisions he could do so by creating a qualified blind trust. Instead, before returning to the White House, Trump transferred his assets in a trust that is managed by his son, Donald Trump Jr. There are no legal or practical barriers preventing Trump from being involved in the management of his assets.

Here’s an excerpt from that Bloomberg article (sorry, paywall):

The disclosure reignites conflict-of-interest concerns that have shadowed Trump’s terms in the White House. Critics have regularly accused him of mixing his official duties with his business interests. Unlike his predecessors, Trump didn’t divest or move his assets into a blind trust with an independent overseer. His sprawling business empire is managed by two of his sons and operates in several areas that intersect with presidential policy.

At the same time, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner helps manage billions in investments for Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates while simultaneously serving as a “volunteer” envoy for the president on issues affecting the war in Iran and the Middle East in general.

The White House dismissed questions about potential conflicts, with spokesman David Ingle saying that Trump “only acts in the best interests of the American public.” He added: “There are no conflicts of interest.”

Yes, the failures are mounting and so is willingness of the main stream discourse to acknowledge what a complete f-ck up Trump is and just go there….

and that my friends is why it is time now…..

To Get To Work People!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We’ve begun a campaign to pass HR 2913 - The Ukraine Support Act - through the House and then work to get something similar through the Senate. Learn more here, and please call your House Rep every day until it passes. This one really matters people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Winning The Midterms, Competing In Red States and Red Places, Expanding The Map

Rallying For Jen Jordan and Miracle Rankin For Georgia Supreme Court - This is our next big opportunity to make good trouble all. The election is tomorrow, the early vote has been very encouraging, and we have 2 great candidates, Jen Jordan and Miracle Rankin, who have a serious shot at flipping two GOP-held Supreme Court seats. Watch our new interview with Jordan and Rankin, donate to their campaign, and volunteer no matter where you are!

We’ve now raised $52,500 towards our $50,000 goal. Amazing work everyone!!!!!!!!!

Hopium’s Winning The House Campaign (2026) - $693,000 raised, $1,000,000 goal (new ambitious, audacious even, q2 goal) - Donate to all twelve of our endorsed House challengers with one click | Get to know Jamie Ager (NC-11), Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Paige Cognetti (PA-08), Rebecca Cooke (WI-03), Elaine Luria (VA-02), Sean McCann (MI-04), Jo Mendoza (AZ-06), Chaz Molder (TN-05), Janelle Stelson (PA-10), Shannon Taylor (VA-01), and Sarah Trone Garriott (IA-03) by watching our recently recorded Hopium interviews.

Friends if these twelve win, the House will flip, no matter redistricting madness the Rs execute in the coming days. So eyes on the prize her

Mary Peltola For Alaska Senate - $93,700 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn more through my uplifting conversation with Mary Peltola as she fights to turn Alaska blue

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This total includes $21,000 sent by a Hopium community member directly to each of our three Buckeye State partners!

Hopium’s Audacious Expansion Fund - $566,100 raised, $1,000,000 goal (new stretch goal) - Join our campaign that has helped expand our map by investing in the Democratic Parties of Alaska, Florida, Iowa, Maine, and Texas, all now central battlegrounds in the 2026 election | Catch interviews with the five intrepid state chairs leading their troops into battle this year - will get you fired up! | Contribute to all five state parties with one contribution split evenly among these five new battlegrounds

Many thanks to two generous Hopium community members who have audaciously donated $20,000 to each of our five state parties over the past two years

Roy Cooper for NC Senate (2026) - $113,200 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn more through my new discussion with Gov. Cooper as he fights to turn North Carolina blue

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Keep working hard everyone. We have a country to save, and elections to win, together! - Simon