President Trump shows off White House’s Lincoln Bathroom renovated entirely in marble
The Lincoln Bedroom, formerly the Blue Suite, in the White House, Washington, DC, circa 1962. (Archive Photos/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump isn’t just remaking the East Wing of the White House. On Friday, he showed off an entirely renovated Lincoln Bathroom on his social media platform.
“I renovated the Lincoln Bathroom in the White House,” Trump wrote on Truth Social alongside photos of the before and after. “It was renovated in the 1940s in an art deco green tile style, which was totally inappropriate for the Lincoln Era.”
He continued, “I did it in black and white polished Statuary marble. This was very appropriate for the time of Abraham Lincoln and, in fact, could be the marble that was originally there!”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — In two courthouses in different parts of the country, President Donald Trump’s attempt to send troops into Democratic-led cities faced a critical legal test on Thursday, with a judge in Chicago temporarily blocking deployment.
District Judge April Perry entered a TRO enjoining the deployment of National Guard troops from any U.S. state into Illinois. This ruling will be in effect for 14 days.
The U.S. Department of Justice filed a notice of appeal to Perry’s ruling late Thursday evening.
Meanwhile, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals helda heated, hour-long oral argument on whether to lift a lower court’s order blocking the deployment of troops into Portland.
The dueling hearings on Thursday set the stage for one of the most high-profile legal battles since Trump took office, as local governments turn to the courts to stop what some judges have described as a blurring of the line between military and civilian rule.
Chicago
In the decision, Perry determined that there is “no credible evidence that there is a danger of rebellion in Illinois” and no evidence that the president is unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the U.S.
She said that the deployment of the national guard to Illinois “is likely to lead to civil unrest” requiring a response from local and state law enforcement.
Referencing what she called the “provocative nature of ICE enforcement activity” in Illinois, she said, “I find allowing the national guard to deploy will only add fuel to the fire that they started.”
Before Judge Perry’s decision, a lawyer for the Department of Justice, Eric Hamilton, countered that the Chicago area is experiencing “brazen hostility” to federal law enforcement officers, a “tragic lawlessness” in the city that is manifesting in hostile and violent acts against the Department of Homeland Security and ICE personnel.
Hamilton listed as examples “agitators” that had brought guns to federal facilities, and who have thrown rocks, bottles, tear gas and fireworks at federal agents, and who have blocked and impeded immigration enforcement, including by surrounding ICE agents and ramming their vehicles into law enforcement vehicles.
All of which has shown, Hamilton argued, that in Illinois there is an “unprecedented” and “blatant disregard for law and order.”
Judge Perry questioned Hamilton extensively over the scope of the Guard’s deployments and responsibilities and asked what the limits were to their authority, scope and mission. Hamilton described a limited mission to protect federal personnel and property but, under repeated questioning from Perry, Hamilton declined to rule out an expansion of the mission if events were to warrant it.
Describing a “dynamic situation” on the ground in and around Chicago, Hamilton said, “the response is going to be tailored to whatever the needs are” at the moment.
If the mission changes, Hamilton said, the plaintiffs would be able to return to court to issue a renewed challenge.
Wells, the attorney for Illinois, contended that the situation on the ground, particularly outside the ICE facility in Broadview, had calmed substantially since the local government and police force had instituted restrictions on protest hours and since the Illinois State Police began providing protection at the facility.
Portland
As the Chicago hearing took place, a three-judge panel on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments about whether to lift a lower court’s order blocking the deployment of 200 federalized members of the Oregon National Guard into Portland.
On Wednesday, the Ninth Circuit issued an administrative stay of that order to preserve the status quo as the lawsuit moves through the court.
Oregon argued that the deployment of troops is “part of a nationwide campaign to assimilate the military into civilian law enforcement” and is based on “inaccurate information” about the conditions in Portland.
“Defendants’ nearly limitless conception [of the law] would give the President discretion to repeat this experiment in response to other ordinary, nonviolent acts of civil disobedience across our Nation. The public interest is served by a judicial order preserving the rule of law in the face of unprecedented and unlawful Executive action that threatens grave and irreparable damage to our State and the Nation,” lawyers for the state said in a recent filing.
A federal judge on Sunday expanded her order to bar any state’s National Guard from entering Portland after concluding that the Trump administration was attempting to work around her temporary restraining order by using troops from other states.
That second order has not been formally appealed yet, although the broader issue may arise during the hearing as the Trump administration challenges judicial limits on the president’s authority to deploy the National Guard.
“Congress did not impose these limits on the President’s authority to federalize the Guard, nor did it authorize the federal courts to second-guess the President’s judgment about when and where to call up the Guard to reinforce the regular forces in response to sustained and widespread violent resistance to federal law enforcement,” lawyers for the Trump administration wrote in a filing earlier this week.
In an amicus brief filed on Thursday, a group of former secretaries of the Army and Navy, retired four-star admirals and generals, encouraged Judge Perry to express caution about the broader use of the National Guard in domestic operations.
“Domestic deployments that fail to adhere to [the Posse Comitatus Act] threaten the Guard’s core national security and disaster relief missions; place deployed personnel in fraught situations for which they lack specific training, thus posing safety concerns for servicemembers and the public alike; and risk inappropriately politicizing the military, creating additional risks to recruitment, retention, morale, and cohesion of the force,” lawyers for the former military leaders wrote.
Vice President JD Vance sits with his wife Usha Vance prior to a Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony in the Rose Garden of the White House on Oct. 14, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Vice President JD Vance on Friday defended comments about his faith and marriage after critics accused him of throwing his wife’s Hindu religion “under a bus” during a Turning Point USA event earlier in the week.
Vance responded to a user on X who referenced the comments the vice president, who was raised Protestant but converted to Catholicism in 2019, on Wednesday. Vance spoke to the crowd about his faith and how it relates to his relationship with Usha Vance, who was raised Hindu.
“For us, it works out now most Sundays, Usha will come with me to church, as I’ve told her, and I’ve said publicly, and I’ll say now in front of 10,000 of my closest friends, do I hope eventually that she is somehow moved by the same thing that I was moved in by church. Yeah, I honestly, I do wish that, because I believe in the Christian Gospel, and I hope eventually my wife comes to see it the same way. But if she doesn’t, then God says everybody has free will, and so that doesn’t cause a problem for me,” the vice president said.
The comments have been met with extensive criticism.
“It’s weird to throw your wife’s religion under the bus, in public, for a moment’s acceptance by groypers,” the X user posted on Thursday.
Vance responded to and reposted to the comment, which he called “disgusting” and said he was being open when people were curious about his faith and family life.
“My Christian faith tells me the Gospel is true and is good for human beings. My wife — as I said at the TPUSA — is the most amazing blessing I have in my life. She herself encouraged me to reengage with my faith many years ago. She is not a Christian and has no plans to convert, but like many people in an interfaith marriage — or any interfaith relationship — I hope she may one day see things as I do. Regardless, I’ll continue to love and support her and talk to her about faith and life and everything else, because she’s my wife,” he said.
The X post was deleted after Vance reshared it and made his response.
Vance argued the post was “anti-Christian bigotry.”
“Yes, Christians have beliefs. And yes, those beliefs have many consequences, one of which is that we want to share them with other people. That is a completely normal thing, and anyone who’s telling you otherwise has an agenda,” he contended.
The Vances were married in an interfaith Christian-Hindu ceremony in 2014 and he has talked openly about their interfaith relationship.
During an interview with the New York Times last year, JD Vance said his wife has been supportive of his faith and has attended church with their three children.
“No, she hasn’t,” the vice president told the Times when asked if Usha Vance had converted to Christianity.
“That’s why I feel bad about it. She’s got three kids. Obviously, I help with the kids, but because I’m kind of the one going to church, she feels more responsibility to keep the kids quiet in the church. And I just felt kind of bad. Like, oh, you didn’t sign up to marry a weekly churchgoer. Are you OK with this? And she was more than OK with it, and that was a big part of the confirmation that this was the right thing for me,” he added.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol on September 16, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The House passed the Republicans’ short-term government funding bill on Friday ahead of the Sept. 30 deadline to avert a shutdown.
The final tally was 217-212. Ultimately, all but two Republicans supported the President Donald Trump-backed spending bill. Reps. Thomas Massie and Victoria Spartz voted no.
Nearly all Democrats who were present voted against the measure though Rep. Jared Golden of Maine voted in favor.
The funding bill now heads to the Senate where its fate is uncertain as Democratic support is necessary for passage.
Ahead of the vote, Democrats signaled they would vote to shut down the government if Republicans didn’t cave to Democratic demands to restore cuts to Medicaid and extend Obamacare subsidies set to expire at the end of the year.
House Speaker Mike Johnson slammed Democrats for the move.
“It’s just very unfortunate the Democrats are trying to play partisan games when we’re in good faith trying to fund the government,” Johnson told reporters as he arrived at the Capitol on Thursday.
For his part, Trump urged House Republicans to support the “clean” funding bill Thursday afternoon.
“Every House Republican should UNIFY, and VOTE YES!” Trump posted to his social media platform. He also repeated his claim that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Democratic lawmakers want a government shutdown.
The funding plan proposes $30 million in additional member security over a more than seven-week stretch — giving each member of Congress around $7,500 each week to spend on security — more than double their own congressional salary. The package also includes $58 million to meet the Trump administration’s request for supplemental funding for the executive and judicial branches.
That funding supplants a pilot funding program that lawmakers had utilized for member security in the wake of the shooting targeting state lawmakers in Minnesota over the summer.
“We will not support a partisan spending bill that Republicans are trying to jam down the throats of the American people that continues to gut health care,” Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters ahead of the vote. “No one who is following what Republicans have done to rip away health care of the American people can reasonably suggest that responsible legislators should do anything other than push back aggressively to protect the health care of the American people.”
Senate and House Democrats had unveiled a counter funding proposal that would only extend government funding until Oct. 31 and include health care-related proposals like rolling back Medicaid cuts in Trump’s megabill that passed earlier this year. This plan is a non-starter with Republicans who control majorities in both chambers.
The GOP plan, however, presents a real challenge in the Senate, requiring at least seven Democratic votes to reach 60 votes for passage.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune has urged Senate Democrats to support the short-term measure, arguing the bill is a clean extension of funding.
“There’s nothing in here about President Trump,” Thune said on the Senate floor this week. “This is a clean funding resolution, bipartisan funding resolution, short-term, to allow the Appropriations Committee to do its work.”
