Letters from an American April 10, 2026 Heather Cox Richardson Apr 10, 2026
It feels like something shifted in the United States this week after President Donald J. Trump threatened on Tuesday that “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.” As professor of human rights, global affairs, and philosophy Mathias Risse of Harvard University’s Kennedy School noted, the Geneva Conventions prohibit “acts or threats of violence whose primary purpose is to terrorize civilians.” He notes that Trump’s threat terrorized 90 million Iranians by threatening them with genocide.
Trump has continued to struggle to assert his power over Iran since Tuesday, and has continued to fail. Yesterday former secretary of state John Kerry told Jen Psaki of The Briefing that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu had urged presidents Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and George W. Bush to strike Iran, and they all refused him. Only Trump was willing to go along.
But negotiations have been rocky all along, and today Trump warned that if Iran didn’t come to a peace deal, the U.S. would launch even deadlier attacks. “We have a reset going,” Trump told the New York Post. At 9:31 this morning, Trump’s social media account posted: “WORLD’S MOST POWERFUL RESET!!! PRESIDENT DJT.” At 12:27, Trump vented some of his apparent frustration that the Iranians have been trolling him, posting: “The Iranians are better at handling the Fake News Media, and ‘Public Relations,’ than they are at fighting!” A minute later, he posted: “The Iranians don’t seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate!”
Trump continues to try to shore up the international right-wing authoritarian project even as people are turning against it. Today he threw the economic might of the United States of America behind Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, who gutted Hungary’s democracy and turned the country into an authoritarian state. Orbán is deeply underwater ahead of the April 12 parliamentary elections in Hungary. Vice President J.D. Vance has been in Hungary to support Orbán, and today Trump posted: “My Administration stands ready to use the full Economic Might of the United States to strengthen Hungary’s Economy, as we have done for our Great Allies in the past, if Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and the Hungarian People ever need it. We are excited to invest in the future Prosperity that will be generated by Orbán’s continued Leadership! President DONALD J. TRUMP”
A recently revealed transcript of an October 2025 phone call between Orbán and Russian president Vladimir Putin shows Orbán promising to be a “mouse” aiding the “lion” Putin, telling the Russian leader: “In any matter where I can be of assistance, I am at your service.” Tonight Hungarians filled the streets to protest Orbán, chanting “Russians, go home.”
Josh Dawsey of the Wall Street Journal reported today that Trump has repeatedly promised to pardon his top officials before he leaves office and that he brings up the subject frequently. In a recent meeting, he said: “I’ll pardon everyone who has come within 200 feet of the Oval [Office].” In response to a request for comment by Meredith Kile of People magazine, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “The Wall Street Journal should learn to take a joke; however, the President’s pardon power is absolute.”
But Tuesday has given momentum to those trying to rein Trump in. Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the top-ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, made a record of Trump’s recent bizarre behavior in a letter today to the president’s personal physician, Captain Sean P. Barbabella.
Raskin noted that “[e]xperts have repeatedly warned that the President has been exhibiting signs consistent with dementia and cognitive decline. And, in recent days, the country has watched President Trump’s public statements and outbursts turn increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening.” Raskin recounted Trump’s wild social media posts and weird performance at the White House Easter egg roll, what the congressman called “a bizarre display that shocked tens of millions of Americans and astonished observers across the political spectrum.”
Raskin wrote that Trump’s “apparently deteriorating condition has caused tremendous alarm across the nation (and political spectrum) about the President’s cognitive function and continuing mental fitness for the office of President, and prompted concerns about the President’s well-being.”
Raskin asked the White House physician to “[c]onduct a comprehensive neuropsychological assessment of the President, including a formal cognitive screening instrument, and publicly release the results; [p]rovide a detailed report on the President’s current mental and physical health status, including any medications he is currently taking and their potential cognitive side effects; and [m]ake yourself available for a briefing, under oath, with Members of the Committee on the results of this assessment.”
Former secretary of transportation Pete Buttigieg said on Morning Joe today that the gradual destruction of the United States under Trump changed suddenly on Tuesday. “For the leader of the free world, the leader of this country, to just make a nakedly genocidal threat against another civilization, as if the United States of America was a death star that was going around blowing up civilizations, of course that crosses a new line, and, of course, that’s a new low,” he said.
Buttigieg continued: “I think the really important thing to remember is that the effects of that kind of thing will outlive Donald Trump long after he has departed the scene, the collapse in trust, not just affection for the United States, but trust in the United States, and it’s very important that not just allies but, frankly, also adversaries that we’re negotiating with when we’re making a peace deal or some other kind of deal, that they have a level of trust that there is stability in the United States.”
Those trying to write off Trump’s threat as bluster or just Trump being Trump were missing the point, he said. “[T]he reality is that the whole country is being judged. Even though most Americans don’t support him anyway. The whole country is being judged just for tolerating that kind of thing at the White House.”
The pushback against Trump is spreading across the United States. Jess Craven of Chop Wood, Carry Water today called out rock and roll legend Bruce Springsteen’s opening last night at his concert in Los Angeles:
“Good evening, Los Angeles,” he said. “Welcome to the Land of Hope and Dreams tour. We begin tonight with a prayer for our men and women in service overseas. We pray for their safe return.
“The mighty E Street Band is here tonight to call upon the righteous power of art, of music, of rock and roll in dangerous times. We are here in celebration and defense of our American ideals, democracy, our Constitution, and our sacred American promise. The America I love, the America that I’ve written about for 50 years, that has been a beacon of hope and liberty around the world, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, racist, reckless, and treasonous administration,” he said.
“Tonight we ask all of you to join with us in choosing hope over fear, democracy over authoritarianism, the rule of law over lawlessness, ethics over unrivaled corruption, resistance over complacency, truth over lies, unity over division, and peace over war.”
The base is a conglomerate of single-minded groups looking for belonging. They are not united on even a single issue except irritating an antifa-loving- leftist-libtard-democrap that they can't even define as they used to align as MAGA and challenge the definition of what that is too!?!?! They don't even know what they are.
I don't rejoice in the inevitable fallout of biggest maga S&M influencers as they call-out the truth. Even politically fringe to lifers retiring or shifting publicly. Any quick return to global greatness has been squandered. Recovery can happen but it will be generations and honestly a global lesson I can only hope. It's baffling to most of the world.
I'm hopeful most of the global allies are just waiting out the inevitable political change without interference. And yet I know the Oligarchy reign will still endure in effort to save the collapse. Be ready to pivot! Again! A Jack of all trades is master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.
... And many thanks for the masters in skill for setting our standard of work to instill.
His days are numbered far less than a full term. If he doesn't die, he'll be removed
While Trump is looking for an ‘emergency’ to stop our elections, he has BECOME the emergency that must be dealt with NOW to stop him and his corrupt and lawless administration. Thankfully, many are beginning to see that we need to deal with this problem sooner than later in order to salvage what little trust and hope there is left that we are or still can be the leader of the free world in defending justice, unity and hope.
You're right!
Posted by Sia on April 12, 2026, 1:39 am, in reply to "Encouraging" ADMIN
on April 11, 2026, 11:12 am
