Good afternoon — urgent update. Something deeply abnormal and alarming is happening: Pete Hegseth has ordered the senior leadership of the U.S. military — hundreds of generals and admirals — to assemble at Quantico next week with no public explanation. Senior officers are calling it “general squid games.” That label isn’t flippant: it captures the confusion and growing alarm inside the Pentagon as tensions with Russia and NATO spike in Eastern Europe. This is a moment that deserves scrutiny, not secrecy.

At the same time I’m under relentless attack from people tied to the White House — public calls for my arrest and detention came after I interviewed Vice President Kamala Harris last night. Make no mistake: these are intimidation tactics aimed at silencing scrutiny.

May be a Twitter screenshot of 1 person and text that says 'Paul A. Szypula @Bubblebathgirl X.com Anyone alerting Leftists in advance of ICE movements needs to get decades in jail. Start by arresting @AaronParnas, he's been broadcasting ICE locations and threatening their lives. Try him for treason.'

Here’s where I stand: I will not be silenced. I will keep reporting, asking the hard questions, and following the facts wherever they lead. But independent coverage like this only survives with your support. If you believe in accountability and in journalism that won’t bow to pressure, subscribe today and help keep this platform strong.

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With that, here’s what you missed:

  • Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has abruptly ordered hundreds of U.S. generals and admirals from around the world to assemble at a Marine Corps base in Virginia next week without explanation, sparking confusion and alarm amid a year of senior Pentagon firings.
  • According to CNN, this meeting could be anything from a physical training test for all of the senior United States military leaders to an update about the Department of Defense to a mass firing of the military leaders. As one Department of Defense official told CNN, its “general squid games.”
  • The U.S. and Canada deployed fighter jets after NORAD detected two Russian Tu-95 bombers and two Su-35 fighter jets operating in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone.
  • While the aircraft stayed in international airspace and never entered U.S. or Canadian territory, NORAD scrambled an E-3 surveillance plane, four F-16 fighters, and four KC-135 tankers to intercept and monitor them. The zone, which surrounds Alaska, requires all aircraft to be identified for security reasons, and the incursion heightened concerns about Moscow’s recent pattern of testing NATO defenses.
  • Recent weeks have seen multiple Russian incursions into NATO territory: three MiG-31s violated Estonian airspace for 12 minutes before being escorted out, about 20 drones crossed into Poland leading NATO jets to shoot some down, and Denmark reported suspicious drone activity at several airports that officials suspect was carried out by a professional operator, though Moscow denies responsibility.
  • German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius warned that Russia’s expanding space activities pose a growing security threat, citing Russian satellites shadowing Intelsat systems used by German forces. He noted that both Russia and China now have the ability to disrupt, blind, manipulate, or destroy satellites, and called for discussions on developing offensive space capabilities as a deterrent.
  • The White House has instructed federal agencies to prepare for mass firings of workers if a government shutdown occurs next week, a break from past practice of furloughs, drawing Democratic accusations that Trump is using intimidation tactics in the spending standoff.
  • Federal prosecutors are preparing to seek an indictment against former FBI director James Comey for allegedly giving false testimony to Congress about the 2016 election probe, even as internal memos flag concerns over insufficient evidence.
  • Disney is facing pressure from a group of investors over its decision to temporarily suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show. The coalition — which includes lawyers representing the American Federation of Teachers and Reporters Without Borders — sent a letter demanding that the company hand over documents explaining how and why the suspension was made. They argue that the move suggested Disney may have “succumbed” to censorship pressures, raising questions about corporate governance and free expression.
  • George Soros’s Open Society Foundations denounced the Trump administration for waging “politically motivated attacks on civil society” after reports that the Justice Department instructed federal prosecutors to explore charges such as racketeering and wire fraud against the philanthropy.
  • Microsoft blocked the Israeli military’s Unit 8200 from using its cloud services after uncovering that the unit was storing data from a surveillance system that intercepted millions of Palestinian phone calls in Gaza and the West Bank, in violation of company policies.
  • Hackers reportedly stole the personal details of about 8,000 children from the Kido nursery chain, which operates sites in London as well as the US, India, and China, and have demanded a ransom from the company.
  • Amazon will pay $2.5 billion to settle a U.S. Federal Trade Commission lawsuit alleging it enrolled millions into Prime without consent and made cancellations difficult, with $1.5 billion set aside to reimburse affected subscribers and $1 billion as a civil penalty.
  • Elon Musk’s AI company xAI has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it stole trade secrets by hiring away former xAI employees to gain inside knowledge about its Grok chatbot, part of what Musk claims is a broader pattern of unfair competition in the race to build advanced AI.
  • Widespread 911 outages have hit Louisiana and Mississippi, including New Orleans and Jackson, after a severed fiber cable disrupted emergency services, with similar issues also reported in Illinois.
  • A Delta Boeing 737 aborted takeoff from Minneapolis to Las Vegas after a cockpit window popped open at low speed; passengers later departed on a different plane with about a two-hour delay.
  • The Trump administration is withholding $24 million in federal grants from New York City, Chicago, and Fairfax County schools after the districts refused to roll back policies allowing transgender students access to bathrooms and locker rooms matching their gender identity, with officials also demanding changes to athletics and academic programs.
  • The CDC warns that more children are becoming severely ill or dying from the flu as vaccination rates decline, with cases of rare flu-related brain complications rising and last season marking the deadliest for U.S. pediatric flu deaths in 15 years.
  • Senate Democrats are pressing the Justice Department to release files on White House border czar Tom Homan, who was investigated for allegedly taking $50,000 from undercover FBI agents in a bribery sting, raising concerns the Trump administration shut down the probe to protect him.

    • See you in the morning.

    — Aaron