Hegseth, Pete

• Pentagon Defends Restrictions on Media Outlets - The purpose of the new rules is to “stop activity that could compromise national security,” the Defense Department said in response to a New York Times lawsuit.
• Pentagon Tells 1,500 Troops to Prepare for Possible Deployment to Minnesota - But President Trump has already backed away from a threat to invoke the Insurrection Act in response to protests against the killing of a woman by a federal immigration agent.
• U.S. Attacked Boat With Aircraft That Looked Like a Civilian Plane - Even accepting the Trump administration’s claim that there is an armed conflict with suspected drug runners, the laws of war bar “perfidy.”
• Kelly Sues Pentagon Over Threats of Punishment From Hegseth - Senator Mark Kelly, Democrat of Arizona, asked a federal judge to block the Trump administration from disciplining him for a video warning about illegal military orders.
• Inside ‘Operation Absolute Resolve,’ the U.S. Effort to Capture Maduro - The tactically precise operation successfully extracted Mr. Maduro with no loss of American life, a result heralded by President Trump amid larger questions about the legality and rationale for the U.S. actions in Venezuela.
• Coast Guard Suspends Search for Survivors of Latest Boat Strikes - The service said that conditions in the area where the search was taking place included nine-foot seas and winds approaching 50 miles per hour.
• The 2025 Politics Yearbook: Most Likely to Be Extreme and Chaotic - How much more chaotic could a second Trump term be? 2025 did not disappoint.
• 6 Takeaways on the Unwinding U.S.-Ukraine Alliance - A Times investigation reveals the inside story of the Trump administration’s chaotic push for a peace deal and its erratic role in the war.
• U.S. Kills 2 in Strike in Pacific, as Trump Pressures Venezuela - The attack was the 30th announced by the U.S. military since early September. It came days after President Trump said the U.S. had struck a coastal site related to drugs and Venezuela.
• Grim Evidence of Trump’s Boat Strikes Washes Ashore on a Colombian Peninsula - First came the scorched boat. Then the mangled bodies. Then the packets with traces of marijuana. Now, fishermen fear the ocean that feeds them.