Page F7From§Eachthe noon edition — 30 September 2026
As it ran on the front
On Thursday, September 24, the Senate defeated a House-passed resolution directing President Trump to withdraw U.S. troops from the fight with Iran. Four Republicans crossed over to join nearly the whole Democratic caucus. The measure still failed. A war resolution that loses on the floor changes nothing about the war underneath it.
Five days later, on Tuesday, September 29, Sens. Patty Murray and Chris Murphy sent Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin a letter. They asked him to address several questions about the department's funds, after reports that Department of Homeland Security money had gone into television advertising promoting the president. The letter poses questions. It does not, in the receipts available that day, come with answers attached.…
…(cont) One day after that, on Wednesday, September 30, a second resolution reached the floor, this one aimed at denouncing the ad spending directly. Sen. Cynthia Lummis blocked it before it could come to a vote. Asked about the ads, she called them a public service. Count the days from the Iran vote to the Lummis block: six.
Here is the reconciliation, hon. Two resolutions moved through the Senate this month. The Iran resolution reached a vote and lost. The ad resolution did not reach a vote at all, stopped by one senator's objection before it could. Different mechanisms, same result: the underlying spending stands undisturbed either way.
The letter to Secretary Mullin asks where the money came from. The receipts do not yet show where it lands. What is not in dispute is that the advertising described in that letter kept running through both procedural outcomes this week, the one that got an up-or-down vote and the one that got a single objection instead. Whichever door the Senate tries, the account on one side and the ad buy on the other show the same balance leaving as before anybody asked.
“Six days, two tries, zero votes on where the ad money actually went — that's not gridlock, that's the design: lose the recorded vote on the war, kill the unrecorded one on the ad buy, and either way the checks for those commercials keep clearing. The guy whose face is on the ads doesn't have to answer a single question about who paid for them until somebody makes him, and right now nobody can.”
“Look, agencies run public-awareness spots all the time, seatbelts, hurricane prep, that sort of thing. So if Homeland Security wants Americans to know who's technically in charge — did I say technically? Strike that — it's necessary communication, and Senator Lummis is right to call it a public service, or at least I assume she has her reasons, which I am not going to itemize.”
Earlier in this story
The receipts
Trump promised taxpayers wouldn't pay "one dime" for his ballroom - Republicans then proposed $1 billion in taxpayer funds for it, which Congress rejected NBC News, May 2026
GOP Senator Cynthia Lummis Blocks Toothless Resolution Denouncing Trump’s Taxpayer-Funded Ads‘It’s a public service’
Republicans' reconciliation package puts $70 billion into ICE's department NBC News, May 2026
Senate Democrats rip DHS over diverted funding for campaign-style Trump adsTwo Democratic senators are demanding answers following reports that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funds were used to run TV advertisements promoting President Trump. In a Tuesday letter addressed to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Sens. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) asked him to address several questions…
· Senate GOP defeats resolution directing Trump to end Iran war as more Republicans sour on conflict from the morgue, 24 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.