Barack Obama returned to the campaign trail on Saturday and used his first midterm rally to say Donald Trump has the White House looking "like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory." Meanwhile, the Director of National Intelligence is warning that Iranian plots to kill Americans have reached "advanced stages," and the U.S. is quietly pulling people out of the region. It was a Saturday news cycle with a little bit of everything, mostly dread.
The Cheesecake Factory Line Heard Round the Ballroom
Obama made his first appearance of this fall's midterm campaign in Ohio, according to NBC News, where he stumped for Amy Acton, the Democratic nominee for governor, and former Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is trying to win back his old seat. He called Trump an agent of "chaos and cruelty" and a man of broken promises. That part was standard stump material.
Then he got to the ballroom. Obama lambasted Trump for his obsession with White House ballroom construction and delivered the line that will be on every group chat by Monday morning: the president has the place looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory.
Look, it's a joke about gold-plated excess, and it lands because everybody can picture it. The menu is the size of a phone book, the lighting is a crime scene, and somehow there are still forty minutes until your table is ready.
Ramaswamy and the Line He Apparently Cannot Find
Obama saved some heat for Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican running for governor of Ohio, over an attack ad aimed at Acton. His verdict was that there is "no line" Ramaswamy won't cross.
That is a rough thing to hear from a former president, but it is also the kind of thing you say when a campaign has decided that decency is a luxury item. Ramaswamy built a brand on being the smartest guy in the room. Now he's the guy whose ad got singled out from a stage in his own state.
Later that night, Obama headed to Detroit to rally for Michigan's Democratic Senate nominee, Abdul El-Sayed. The city is 75 percent Black and crucial to winning statewide in Michigan, which is why a former president spent his Saturday night there.
Mike Rogers Has Never Called Anyone a Terrorist, Probably
Which brings us to El-Sayed's opponent. Trump called the Democrat a "jihadist" and a "violent terrorist." Mike Rogers, the Republican nominee, was asked about it on "Meet the Press."
His answer: "I've never called [El-Sayed] a terrorist."
Notice what he did there. He did not say Trump was wrong. He did not say the words were out of bounds. He said he personally has never said it, which is a statement about Mike Rogers's vocabulary and not about whether a sitting president slandered his opponent. It's the political equivalent of watching your friend set the couch on fire and announcing that you don't own a lighter.
Iran Is Plotting, and Everyone Is Leaving
Now for the part that isn't funny. Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton sent a memo to Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday warning that "the lethal plotting efforts by the Iranians against U.S. citizens have reached advanced stages." Axios reported it first, and a U.S. official confirmed the memo's authenticity to NBC News.
Clayton also wrote that the risk is "relevant to more individuals than are currently cleared to receive this information," and promised to downgrade as much intelligence as possible so the State Department can share it with personnel. Read that again. The danger is wider than the list of people allowed to know about it.
This lands days after sources told NBC News that the U.S. military has been quietly scaling back its troop presence at bases across the Middle East. The State Department has also ordered further staff reductions at posts in Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Jordan. So the picture is a drawdown on one side and a memo about advanced assassination plotting on the other. Nobody has explained to the public how those two things fit together.
Schiff Wants Hegseth in the Witness Chair
On "Meet the Press," Sen. Adam Schiff said Democrats would "win both" the House and Senate if the election were held today. He also said that if Democrats retake the Senate, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth should be hauled in to testify about Starlink satellite limitations that disrupted Ukrainian military operations.
"Anyone who has knowledge of what happened," Schiff told Kristen Welker. That is a subpoena list in waiting.
Elsewhere in the politics roundup, Democrats asked a federal judge to dismiss the Trump administration's challenge to Alaska's Senate race, and Trump cast his early ballot on Saturday, saying he voted for all Republicans in Florida before heading to a rally in Georgia. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, meanwhile, said Republicans "don't have a plan" to lower costs and pushed back on Michelle Obama's comment from last year that voters aren't ready to elect a woman president.
Paris Burns, Tallahassee Bleeds, Milwaukee Gets a Gift
The rest of the weekend was a reminder that the world does not pause for our midterms. More than 100,000 people marched in Paris on Saturday over school funding and soaring living costs, challenging Emmanuel Macron's government. It was largely peaceful until some demonstrators threw bottles and rocks near the end point, and police answered with tear gas and water cannons. NBC News witnessed no looting.
In Tallahassee, twelve people were injured in a shooting near Florida A&M University's Bragg Memorial Stadium during homecoming. Eleven were shot, three seriously, and six of the injured are under 18. Police said a fight may have come first. No arrests have been reported.
And in baseball, the Milwaukee Brewers are two wins from their first World Series title after a disputed check-swing call ended Game 2 against the Rays with Milwaukee up 5-4. Somewhere in America, a man is screaming at a television about a curveball. Good for him.
The Dingo Take
Picture this. A former Republican president takes the stage on the campaign trail and says a Democratic White House looks like a dictator's theme restaurant. Cable news would run it on a loop until Thanksgiving, and a congressional hearing would be scheduled by lunch. Now flip it the other way: a Democratic Senate nominee gets called a "jihadist" and a "violent terrorist" by a Democratic president, and his opponent shrugs that he personally never used the word. Nobody would let that shrug stand for ten seconds.
That is the double standard running underneath this whole weekend. Obama told a joke about gold-plated ballrooms and gets treated as the one being rude. Trump labels a candidate a terrorist, and the Republican running against him gets to wash his hands on national television. Mike Rogers is happy to collect the benefit of the smear while keeping his own fingerprints off it. That isn't principle. It's laundering.
And then there's the Iran memo, which should be the biggest story in the building. The nation's top intelligence official says deadly plotting against Americans has reached advanced stages, that the danger reaches more people than are cleared to hear about it, and the same government is shrinking its footprint and pulling diplomats out of the region. Maybe there's a plan. Nobody has said so out loud. If you want to know why Democrats feel good about November, start with a government that keeps asking for your trust while handing you nothing to trust it with.
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