Supreme Court clerks hit with nondisclosure contracts amid panic over leaks: report

“Don’t know if you are still on this bbm but heard from The Duke that you have had a baby boy,” Ferguson allegedly wrote. “Even though you never kept in touch, I still am here with love, friendship and congratulations on your baby boy. Sarah xx.”

Epstein was not known to have fathered any children, though reports suggest that he “hoped to seed the human race with his DNA by impregnating women,” The New York Times reported in 2019. If Ferguson’s alleged claim is accurate, Epstein’s son would be around 15 years old today.

Less than 10 minutes after her first email, Ferguson allegedly sent another email to chastise Epstein for having “disappeared” from her life.

“I did not even know you were having a baby,” Ferguson allegedly wrote. “It was s00000 crystal clear to me that you were only friends with me to get to Andrew. And that really hurt me deeply. More than you will know.”

"I think they need to develop a plan," Napolitano said. "They need to begin removing all of the agents that were not originally assigned to Minnesota back to their home stations. Part of the problem here was the size of the operation. You had thousands of ICE agents and another 800 or 900 from Border Patrol, and in a city that you could drive across in 15 or 20 minutes and that only has 600 officers on its own police force! You know, that is an intensity that we haven’t seen in any of the other operations they’ve done so far this year."

She said the Trump administration keeps repeating the same mistakes in each of its immigration surges.

"Well, not only the sheer volume, but the lack of seeming planning and coordination, and combined with that was the pattern they’d already set in Los Angeles and in Chicago, in terms of how they were operating, and the lack of real guidance from their leadership," Napolitano said.

"In fact, the guidance and language being used by [Greg] Bovino and Secretary Noem and by the White House and by [Kash] Patel at the FBI, really served to escalate the situation, not to solve a problem. I mean, the problem they were there to solve was they wanted to pick up undocumented individuals living in the Minneapolis Twin Cities area."

"But the way they went about it was so contra best practices in any law enforcement operation that they created this mess," she added.

Noem has never reached out to her for guidance, Napolitano said, but she offered some unsolicited advice to her and the White House.

"Well, the first thing they should be doing is directing all appointed officials in the government to hold their powder dry," Napolitano said. "This rush to statements on social media, calling people domestic terrorists when we can see the videos by ourselves. They must have made those statements without seeing any of the video. Or else they don’t think we can believe what we see with our own eyes. But it has totally undercut their credibility."

Those social media statements and attacks only make the problem worse, she said.

"Their language almost gives permission to the agents in the field to keep operating the way they’ve been operating," Napolitano said, "and I don’t think, as I said before, it’s done them any good. I don’t think it’s done the federal government any good. I don’t think it’s done the president any good."

Napolitano praised the president's move to put his border czar Tom Homan in charge of Minneapolis instead of Border Patrol commander Bovino or Noem, whom she called incompetent.

"Oh, yeah – yeah, she clearly is out of her depth," Napolitano said.

"History shows Trump’s worst impulses may backfire on him," the article proclaimed.

In a recent interview with the Times, Trump listed constraints on his authority as, "My own morality. My own mind. It's the only thing that can stop me."

But Ben-Ghiat warned that mindset is exactly what has ended authoritarian leaders before him — and it might already be too late for Trump.
This pattern reflects what scholars term "autocratic backfire." Authoritarian leaders construct personality cults proclaiming infallibility while surrounding themselves with loyalists who suppress contrary information, she wrote. Isolated from objective feedback and expert counsel, such leaders implement unexamined policies that fail.

"As autocrats surround themselves with loyalists who praise them and party functionaries who repeat their lies, leaders can start to believe their own hype. As they cut themselves off from expert advice and objective feedback, they start to promulgate unscrutinized policies that fail," she wrote.

"Rather than course correct, such leaders often double down and engage in even riskier behavior — starting wars or escalating involvement in military conflicts that eventually reveal the human and financial tolls of their corruption and incompetence. The result: a disillusioned population that loses faith in the leader and elites who begin to rethink their support

Historical precedent illustrates this dynamic. Mussolini declared: "I follow my instincts, and I am never wrong" before invading Ethiopia in 1935. His generals observed that "the password among high-ranking Fascists became, 'Tell Mussolini what he wants to hear.'" He continued escalating military commitments despite mounting losses, eventually leading Italy to bankruptcy and his own execution in 1945.

Russia's Vladimir Putin similarly overreached. When he invaded Ukraine in February 2022, he possessed significant regional power and influence. However, the conflict exposed Russian institutional weaknesses, forcing recruitment of foreign fighters and consuming nearly a quarter of Russia's liquid assets in 2024. Former U.S. Ambassador Michael McFaul observed: "His autocracy at home and imperialism abroad has set them back decades."

Trump exhibits comparable patterns, Ben-Ghiat wrote. He has prioritized Greenland acquisition, White House renovations, Caribbean military operations, and immigration enforcement over addressing affordability and employment—issues that determine electoral outcomes. Republican strategists express dismay at his reduced popularity.

But, critically, Trump operates within a functioning democracy, unlike Mussolini or Putin. He failed to consolidate power before declining in popularity and faces unlikely recovery prospects, wrote Ben-Ghiat. Americans reject his Greenland efforts and Ukraine policy approach. Aggressive Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations register as unpopular.

"So it’s no surprise that the signs of a potential backfire are growing," Ben-Ghiat wrote.

"Unlike Mussolini and Mr. Putin, Mr. Trump still operates in a democracy. He was unable to consolidate power before becoming unpopular, and he seems unlikely to recover his higher approval ratings. A majority of Americans don’t support his efforts to gain control of Greenland and how he is handling the war in Ukraine. The brutality and thuggishness of masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are also unpopular.

"Mr. Trump’s behavior during a recent address to the nation suggests he is aware of cooling public sentiment. He shouted at times, as though he felt fewer people were listening. He repeated old lines about fixing the messes of others and newer lines about being a peacemaker, but the magic that brought so many to him may be dissipating. “Confidence fading. Can’t lie through the reality anymore,” Owen Shroyer, a former Infowars host whom Mr. Trump pardoned for his activities on Jan. 6, commented on X. “His base has turned. He knows it. Ego damaged. Swagger lost.”

"It is well documented that strongmen are at their most dangerous when they feel threatened. That is why, as popular discontent with the Trump administration’s actions deepens, Americans should brace for heightened militarized domestic repression and more imperialist aggression abroad.

"The rules of autocratic backfire are clear. Even if a struggling strongman manages to stay in power, once his carefully crafted image is tarnished, a collective reckoning can begin with the costs of his corruption and lying. Once a leader proclaims, “I am the only one that matters” and sits alone at the top of the pinnacle of power, it is hard for him to escape blame, no matter how many officials and former friends he purges. He is more vulnerable to being removed or, at the very least, judged — by lawmakers, by courts, at the polls and, perhaps most lastingly, by history."