Trump Admits on Live TV That He Told CEO to Give Him Piece of Company

At a White House press conference Thursday announcing lower costs for weight-loss drugs, Donald Trump decided to ask for part of a company. 

Trump was sitting at his desk in the Oval Office surrounded by health officials from his administration, as well as executives from pharmaceutical companies Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly. When a reporter asked the president about Novo Nordisk’s acquisition of an obesity biotech company, Trump quipped to CEO Maziar Mike Doustdar, “Maybe you should give us a piece of the company like I’ve been asking for, give the United States a nice big chunk of the company.”  

Doustdar chuckled but ignored the president’s suggestion and went on to explain the acquisition. It’s unclear how serious Trump is about asking for a piece of the pharmaceutical giant, but his government has already taken stakes in several American companies, including U.S. Steel, Intel, Trilogy Metals, Lithium Americas, and MP Materials. 

If not for a patient on Eli Lilly’s GLP-1 medication physically collapsing during the press conference, Trump’s open desire for a piece of Novo Nordisk might have been the headline from the meeting, and not the supposed goal of lowering drug prices. The president has repeatedly claimed that he would lower drug prices (often by mathematically impossible amounts) and announced that the government would launch a website to sell prescription drugs directly to the American people.

If Trump decides to go ahead and pursue a piece of Novo Nordisk, he would be under more public pressure to successfully lower the cost of prescriptions. However, his ill-advised tariff policies feeding into his poor handling of the economy might undermine that goal. 

A federal judge called out Border Protection Commander Gregory Bovino on Thursday for lying on the stand, before issuing a preliminary injunction against federal law enforcement using force against protesters and journalists.

During a hearing, U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis said that Bovino had plainly lied about deploying tear gas on protesters while leading an immigration operation in Chicago’s Little Village earlier this month.

The CBP chief had originally claimed that Bovino deployed tear gas canisters after he was hit in the head by a rock, but in his hourslong deposition, Bovino “admitted that he lied about whether a rock hit him before he deployed tear gas in Little Village,” Ellis said, according to Jon Seidal of the Chicago Sun Times.

Ellis said she’d reviewed video evidence that “disproved” his prior claim, as well as seen a mountain of evidence that federal agents in Chicago had used force against protesters, in violation of protesters’ First Amendment rights and contrary to the government’s claims. “I find the defendant’s evidence simply not credible,” Ellis said.

“Agents pushed, shoved, tackled protesters, pointed guns at them, threw tear gas and deployed smoke canisters. Everyone that agents detained [was] released by the FBI, and none of them are currently charged with assault,” she said, according to Seidal.

Ellis refuted the government’s claim that protesters weren’t practicing free speech because they’d intermingled with some individuals acting unlawfully. “But as I’ve previously stated,” Ellis said, “I don’t find defendants’ version of events credible.”

Ultimately, the judge moved forward with a preliminary injunction in line with her previous temporary restraining order, barring the use of force against protesters “unless such force is objectively necessary to stop an immediate threat.”

The injunction will require officers to issue two clear warnings before administering crowd-control measures, to place identifiers conspicuously on their person, and to wear a body camera. In line with her request from a previous hearing, the government’s lawyer confirmed that Bovino would now wear a body camera.

A Senate subcommittee hearing on the Affordable Care Act devolved into a shouting match Thursday, with one lawmaker focused on providing affordable health care solutions to millions of Americans while another was fixated on small pleasantries.

Republican Chairman Ron Johnson excoriated ranking member Richard Blumenthal in a sprawling rant that transformed the hearing—formed to “assess the damage done by Obamacare”—into a contentious back-and-forth more fixated on decorum than tangible solutions.

The Wisconsin lawmaker was obviously irate that Blumenthal had dared to make the case for salvaging the ACA by delivering an “eight-minute” opening statement, calling multiple witnesses, and accusing Johnson of “trying to muzzle” him from “calling attention to the facts” of the federally subsidized health care marketplace.

“The ranking member has been incredibly disrespectful of these hearings,” Johnson said. “He was going to filibuster for about 30 minutes.”

“May I just say, I wish I had a half an hour more, but there’s no way that I did,” Blumenthal interjected.

“Again you are just being rude,” Johnson cut back in. “You have been rude as ranking member since I took over the chair. It’s unfortunate, but I’d appreciate it if you’d stop being rude, follow the norms of this committee, and if you want an extra witness, request it beforehand. And please, keep your opening statements to a reasonable length of time.”

The government shut down more than 36 days ago—the longest federal suspension in U.S. history—in large part over a debate on the merits of the ACA’s enhanced premium tax credits, which assist individuals making upward of 400 percent of the federal poverty level. Still, neither national political party appears willing to shatter Congress’s stalemate on how to fund Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful” budget, which included details to slice billions from Obamacare subsidies and Medicaid.

A record 24 million Americans signed up for coverage through the ACA marketplace at the beginning of this year, roughly double the number of people who enrolled just four years earlier amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

President Trump took time out of his Thursday press conference to fat-shame his own staff for taking Ozempic, the popular weight-loss drug. 

The press conference, which featured multiple Cabinet members, including Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, was to announce a deal with drug manufacturers Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly—who make Ozempic and Zepbound—that would lower the cost of their popular weight-loss drugs to around $150 per month (they currently cost around $350 per month).

“Secretary Howard Lutnick. You take any of this stuff, Howard?” Trump asked while making the announcement. 

“Not yet,” Lutnick replied. 

“OK, good,” Trump said before going back to reading names of people on his team. “CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz, he doesn’t take it. Food and Drug Administrator, Commissioner Marty Makary, and Director of Medicare Chris Klomp. And we have Steve.… Where’s Steve? Is he here? Head of public relations for the White House? He’s taking it.” 

Now the entire country knows (or at least believes) that Steven Cheung, 43, a longtime comms staffer and attack dog for Trump who once called Florida Governor Ron DeSantis a “desperate eunuch,” is on Ozempic.  

Ozempic has grown increasingly popular as Americans of all demographics look for a simpler way to cut weight. Nearly half of adults age 40–59 are considered obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

Former Justice Department paralegal Sean Dunn, who went viral this summer for chucking a Subway sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent during President Trump’s federal takeover of Washington, D.C., has been found not guilty on misdemeanor charges.

Dunn walks free on Thursday after countless attempts from the Trump administration to prosecute him both federally and criminally.

The man known locally and nationally as the “D.C. Sandwich Guy” reportedly called the heavily armed officers “fucking fascists,” and yelled “I don’t want you in my city!” before hurling the wrapped sandwich straight at CPB agent Gregory Lairmore’s chest. The agent was obviously unharmed. Dunn fled the scene but was caught, later saying, “I did it. I threw a sandwich.”

The next evening, Dunn was arrested at his apartment by multiple federal agents in a dramatic operation the Trump administration posted on all platforms.

Lairmore, who was in a bulletproof vest, testified in court that the sandwich “kind of exploded” on him. “I could smell the onions and mustard,” he said.

“This is an example of the Deep State we have been up against for seven months as we work to refocus DOJ,” Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote in August, after the bloodless incident. “You will NOT work in this administration while disrespecting our government and law enforcement.” Dunn was then fired from his job. (Bondi’s post ignored that at least one January 6 insurrectionist who was openly hostile to law enforcement currently has a job within the Trump administration.)

Dunn was first tried on a felony assault, but federal prosecutors failed to convince grand jurors that throwing a sandwich qualified—an embarrassing outcome that rarely occurs given how skewed federal grand juries usually are in favor of the government. They then moved on to charging Dunn with one count of misdemeanor assault, which again failed miserably on Thursday.

“I’m relieved and looking forward to moving on with my life,” Dunn said, after the verdict.

The DOJ spent months of its resources and days in court just for multiple judges to tell it that its desired charges for Dunn—from felony assault to a misdemeanor—were completely absurd. This wasn’t the only example of the Trump administration trying and failing to make an example out of someone standing up against the unprecedented influx of armed federal troops into the nation’s capital. It also gave up on charging D.C. woman Sidney Lori Reid with a felony after it couldn’t convince three different grand juries that she deserved eight years in prison for allegedly placing herself between ICE agents and someone they were detaining.

This story has been updated.