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Leigh Ann Caldwell, Peter Hamby, Julia Ioffe, Marianna Sotomayor, John Heilemann, & Abby Livingston
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Sunday through Thursday
Puck’s daily political newsletter from Washington—featuring Leigh Ann Caldwell, Peter Hamby, Marianna Sotomayor, Julia Ioffe, John Heilemann, and Abby Livingston—on what’s really happening in this town, from the White House to the Pentagon to Capitol Hill, K Street, the campaign trail, and beyond.
THE LATEST ARTICLES
Julia Ioffe
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September 11, 2025
No Man’s Poland
Having had his way with Trump, Putin is testing NATO’s mettle with over a dozen drones in Polish airspace. Is it an invasion, a provocation, or simply a way to highlight America’s hollow institutions and empty promises?
Julia Ioffe
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August 28, 2025
Anchorage Away
U.S.-Russia relations are largely unchanged, and the future of Ukraine is just as uncertain, following the Trump-Putin photo op in Alaska. Meanwhile, among the Russian elite, there is an obvious eagerness to get the “Ukrainian crisis” over with so they can get back to the real business of making money.
Julia Ioffe
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August 21, 2025
Getting to Nyet
In recent days, Trump and his team have announced a series of breakthroughs in Russia-Ukraine negotiations, only to find out they’ve misunderstood the Russian position. Now it seems the only security guarantees Ukraine will get are none at all.
Julia Ioffe & Ian Krietzberg
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August 17, 2025
Mr. Altman Goes to Washington
A candid conversation about what it means to potentially introduce novel A.I. tools across the federal government, what’s in it for the U.S. taxpayer, and, of course, the long game for Sam Altman and OpenAI.
Julia Ioffe
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August 14, 2025
Anchorage Man
Putin is swaggering into his meeting with Trump, brimming with arrogance as state propaganda hammers the idea that Russia is on the cusp of victory. As one person close to Putin told me, however, there’s a case for cautious optimism that the summit in Alaska could be the beginning of the war’s end.
Julia Ioffe
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August 7, 2025
The Coming MAGA Israel Battle
Like the Democrats before them, the empowered MAGA movement finds itself fighting over U.S. support for Israel, with some of its loudest voices questioning a once sacrosanct relationship.
Julia Ioffe
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July 31, 2025
Lew’s Clues
Lew Olowski, the State Department’s newish head of H.R., is a RIF-happy, Christian evangelizing MAGA warrior with an axe to grind. Worse, according to his fellow diplomats, he’s just plain weird.
Julia Ioffe
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July 24, 2025
Operation Midnight Gabbard
Tulsi Gabbard has been on the outs with Trump ever since their clash over Iran. But through the conspiracy alchemy of Epstein and Russiagate, she’s seizing her chance to come in from the cold.
Julia Ioffe
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July 17, 2025
State Expectations
Guess what: The mass firing of 1,300 career State Department officials has resulted in the predictable chaos, anger, recriminations, and occasional bouts of gallows humor at town halls and on message boards. Naturally, everyone inside Foggy Bottom only expects things to get worse.
Julia Ioffe
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July 10, 2025
What Is Marco Rubio Doing?
Marco Rubio’s appointment at Foggy Bottom was greeted with optimism in the building, where staffers saw him as a serious foreign policy person. But their hope quickly died as America’s chief diplomat instead became a mute accessory to Trump.