Aman Batheja

Kamala Harris records robocall for Jasmine Crockett The call gives Crockett a jolt of support from one of her party’s biggest stars in the home stretch of her Senate Democratic primary against state Rep. James Talarico.

Kamala Harris has recorded a robocall for Jasmine Crockett, with days to go before the Texas primary.

“Jasmine has the experience and record to hold Donald Trump and his billionaire cronies accountable,” Harris says in the call.

'The Pitt's' Rape Kit Storyline is Quietly Revolutionary The show’s real-time storytelling gives viewers a startling look at a process rarely captured on TV.

One thing I appreciate about The Pitt is its thoughtfulness in using the real-time format to reframe the tropes of the medical drama. The past two episodes' painstaking account of a sexual assault exam is a remarkable example.

Inside James Talarico's Bid to Flip Texas Talarico is in a fierce primary for Senate against Jasmine Crockett. He spoke to TIME between campaign stops in an area Trump won by 40 points

Inside James Talarico's bid to flip Texas.

The prospect of Talarico winning Tuesday's primary over Jasmine Crockett has Republicans in Washington worried.

"One GOP lawmaker keeping a close eye on the midterm map summed up his view in five words: 'She can’t win. He can.'"

Talarico is leaning into that idea of inclusion, hard. “This campaign is rooted in a fierce aggressive kind of love because in my experience, when you extend an open hand rather than a closed fist, you'll be surprised by who takes that hand,” he says. “If you hate politics and you've never voted before, you have a place in this campaign. If you have voted for Democrats but you're tired of Democrats always folding, you have a place in this campaign. And if you voted for Donald Trump, but you are fed up with the extremism and the corruption in our government, you also have a place in this campaign,” he says at his Lubbock rally.

Talarico is pushing hard to build a big-tent coalition.
time.com/7381394/jame...

Inside James Talarico's Bid to Flip Texas Talarico is in a fierce primary for Senate against Jasmine Crockett. He spoke to TIME between campaign stops in an area Trump won by 40 points

Inside James Talarico's bid to flip Texas.

The prospect of Talarico winning Tuesday's primary over Jasmine Crockett has Republicans in Washington worried.

"One GOP lawmaker keeping a close eye on the midterm map summed up his view in five words: 'She can’t win. He can.'"

Manhattan DA drops assault charge in Washington Square Park snowball fight Influencer Gusmane Coulibaly now faces a misdemeanor count of obstructing government administration and a harassment violation, not assault, in the viral park incident.

Washington Square Park Snowball Fight sounds like a Vampire Weekend deep cut

Inside James Talarico's Bid to Flip Texas Talarico is in a fierce primary for Senate against Jasmine Crockett. He spoke to TIME between campaign stops in an area Trump won by 40 points

Jasmine Crockett’s strategy is to flip Texas by boosting Black turnout “may deliver success in a Democratic primary, but longtime Texas political observers see it as a recipe for disaster in a head-to-head against the eventual GOP nominee. The math simply doesn’t math.”

Thomas Massie Is Testing Whether a Trump Nemesis Can Win a Republican Primary Thomas Massie has never been more influential, taking down foreign leaders with the Epstein files. But his independence from Trump could hurt him at home. “I'd call him a Judas,” his primary challenge...

“I want to tell y’all something about President Trump: He looks 20 years younger in person. I don’t know what the heck is going on with them cameras. I don’t know if the Chinese or somebody is doing something behind the scenes.”

--Ed Gallrein, Thomas Massie's primary challenger

Al Green Ejected From State of the Union, Held 'Black People Aren't Apes' Sign Green shouted at Trump as Republicans jeered, some attempting to pull the sign from his hands

"Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar...shouted, 'You killed Americans!'...Later, they shouted at Trump to release [the Epstein files].
"Trump pointed toward the Democratic side of the chamber and responded: 'These people are crazy"'..as Republicans applauded and most Democrats sat stone-faced."

Trump’s State of the Union Struggled to Land its Points Trump struggled to find a coherent message or tone, and spent much of the speech attacking and sneering at Democrats

"As Trump was finishing his speech, Democratic candidates in three more special elections won in Pennsylvania and Maine."
time.com/7381021/trum...

Al Green Ejected From State of the Union, Held 'Black People Aren't Apes' Sign Green shouted at Trump as Republicans jeered, some attempting to pull the sign from his hands

"Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar...shouted, 'You killed Americans!'...Later, they shouted at Trump to release [the Epstein files].
"Trump pointed toward the Democratic side of the chamber and responded: 'These people are crazy"'..as Republicans applauded and most Democrats sat stone-faced."

The same four Justices who attended the last State of the Union are the ones in attendance tonight: Roberts, Kagan, Kavanaugh and Coney Barrett

This story is absolutely going to be a TV show or movie.

A married couple is running for the same local office from different parties. The Republican incumbent thinks it’s a plot to get rid of him.

Anthropic Drops Flagship Safety Pledge In an abrupt shift, the company may release future AI models without safety guarantees

“Anthropic, the wildly successful AI company that has cast itself as the most safety-conscious of the top research labs, is dropping the central pledge of its flagship safety policy, company officials tell TIME.”
Via @billyperrigo.bsky.social

Tourists Stranded in Mexico After Cartel Violence Erupts The violence in Puerto Vallarta followed a military crackdown on a drug cartel network and the killing of its leader known as "El Mencho."

The scene in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico: "From his hotel room, a Canadian traveler staying close to the city’s port watched the chaos unfold below. He had been preparing to leave for the airport when the first car exploded outside the lobby."

Trump to Deliver State of the Union Amid Low Polls and Deep Divisions When Trump last addressed Congress, his approval rating was near a career high. Now it's near record lows.

“When Trump last addressed Congress in March 2025, his approval rating was near a career high. Now, it’s near record lows”

“He is expected to frame the address as both a defense of his first year and a campaign-style rallying cry…He may once again blame his Joe Biden for lingering economic pain”

The Democrats' Blue-Collar Brigade How the party is trying to rebrand by turning to tough guys

"If 2018 was the Democrats’ year of the woman, 2026 may be the year of the tatted-up tough guy."

time.com/7379790/demo...

They honored Johnny Gaudreau, the late Columbus Blue Jackets forward who, as a seven-time All Star, almost certainly would have been on this team, had he and his brother, Matt, a minor league player who starred at Boston College, hadn’t been tragically killed in the summer of 2024; a suspected drunk driver stuck their bikes on the eve of their sister’s wedding. Larkin and Zach Werenski, Gaudreau’s teammate with Columbus, brought Johnny Gaudreau’s children onto the ice after Jack Hughes’ golden goal gave the U.S. its first Olympic gold medal since the Miracle On Ice in 1980.

Lovely, heartbreaking coda to that U.S. Men’s hockey win

time.com/7380395/usa-...

Trump aides struggle with how to spend $500 billion more on military Some senior officials resisted the decision to approve the major military spending increase, people familiar with the matter said.

SCOOP: Trump aides are struggling to spend an extra $500 billion on the military, delaying budget

Trump agreed to Hegseth’s bid for *~50%~* military spending boost

Vought & others objected internally

It’s so much $ they can’t figure out how to spend it

www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

The Democrats’ decision to put politics over public safety, for a third time this Congress, has forced the Department to direct its components to take the following measures effective at 6 AM ET, February 22, 2026:   Halting all non-disaster-related Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) response efforts to prioritize disaster response; Ending Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Global Entry service; Suspending all courtesy and family police escorts at airports for Members of Congress, which is drawing staff away from the critical mission of getting passengers screened.   “This is the third time that Democrat politicians have shut down this department during the 119th Congress,” said Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

DHS rewrote their press release from this morning to remove the mention of TSA Precheck being suspended

Note the change in the second item on the list

Yes the shutdown

Along with shutting down TSA precheck, Homeland Security says it’s also “suspending all courtesy and family police escorts at airports for Members of Congress” to save manpower

Talarico and Crockett Test How to Convert Huge TikTok Accounts Into Votes The two Texas Democrats have the largest TikTok followings of any candidates in competitive statewide races, according to a TIME analysis

Talarico and Crockett Test How to Convert Huge TikTok Followings Into Votes
time.com/7379755/jame...

A card that reads “Greetings from DC” over a drawing of the capital. National guard holding guns near an armored car are in front of it.

Spotted in the cards section of DC’s Politics and Prose

Trump saved some of his harshest words for Gorsuch and Barrett—the two Justices he appointed who sided with the majority—calling them "an embarrassment to their families"

"I guess it has to get litigated for the next two years" -- Trump on being asked whether the US will have to refund $175 billion in tariffs that were just struck down. A minute later, he talked about "being in court for the next five years"

I just did the dumbest thing of my entire career to prove a much more serious point.

I tricked ChatGPT and Google, and made them tell other users I’m a competitive hot-dog-eating world champion

People are using this trick on a massive scale to make AI tell you lies. I’ll explain how I did it

In four days, Trump is set to deliver his State of the Union to a joint session of Congress. If history holds, all nine Supreme Court Justices will also be there, seated prominently and in Trump's direct line of sight.

Supreme Court Rules Most of Trump's Tariffs Are Illegal In a 6-to-3 decision that cut across ideological lines, the Justices ruled that Trump lacked the authority to impose sweeping import taxes by claiming a national emergency

"The ruling immediately invalidates a broad set of tariffs that Trump imposed last year on nearly all imports"

The 6-3 ruling cut across the court's ideological lines

time.com/7380033/supr...

Talarico and Crockett Test How to Convert Huge TikTok Accounts Into Votes The two Texas Democrats have the largest TikTok followings of any candidates in competitive statewide races, according to a TIME analysis

James Talarico and Jasmine Crockett have the largest TikTok followings of any candidates in competitive statewide races this year, and it’s not even close.

Talarico has 1.6 million followers. Crockett has 2.4 million.