Donald Trump’s unhinged newest: Sadiq Khan assault, ‘ended wars’ not ended and Hegseth’s AI military

All Americans want Trump to do is make their shopping cheaper. And all he wants to do is stop wars that aren’t actually stopping, shout at Marjorie Taylor Greene and Sadiq Khan and give AI to soldiers

Donald Trump is heading into the Christmas season with historically miserable poll numbers – a lot of which is fuelled by American’s being increasingly upset about his handling of the economy. Which is understandable, given how expensive the holidays are at the best of times, let alone at times when a Tonka Truck is $10 more expensive than it was a year ago due to tariffs. And it doesn’t help that Trump keeps going on TV and telling Americans who literally can’t afford things that people who complain about “affordability” are perpetuating a Democrat hoax. Today, in an interview with Politico, Trump was hit with a question about one of his supporters who gave him an “A+++++” rating – except on the economy, because things keep getting more expensive for them and it’s hard to keep up. Trump basically replied that the person was wrong and must be imagining it, because prices are “coming down”. He then compounded the insult by saying he wanted to talk about the “real economy” – and the (manifestly untrue) level of investment coming in because of tariffs. $18 trillion, he claims (this time. The number keeps changing). Which would be a good trick, considering the entire US economy is only $30 trillion. And even if his numbers were true, which they’re not, it’s pretty insulting to tell someone who can’t scrape together enough cash to buy milk or heat their home that everything’s great and that their problems aren’t part of the “real economy.”

Meanwhile, in Trumpworld

• Trump claims he prevented World War 3
• He has another pop at Sadiq Khan
• Two of the wars he “ended” are very much still happening
• But it’s OK, because Pete Hegseth is giving soldiers Google AI

Here’s everything you need to know

1. It’s war, I tell ya

During his lengthy sit-down with Politico’s Dasha Burns, Trump claimed the Ukraine war could have been much worse, without really explaining why.

“It’s a war that should’ve never happened. Frankly, it wouldn’t have happened if I were president, and it didn’t happen for four years,” he said, as he always does.

“I watched that taking place, and I said, wow, they’re gonna cause some problems here. And it started and it, uh, could’ve evolved into, uh, World War III, frankly. I think it’s probably not gonna be happening now. I think if I weren’t president, you could’ve had World War III. I think you would’ve had a much bigger problem than you have right now, but right now it’s a big problem. It’s a big problem for Europe. And they’re not handling it well.”

2. He made another vile attack on Sadiq Khan

Trump, who has a long running feud with London Mayor Sadiq Khan, went on a rant about immigrants “from all parts of the world “coming to Europe and claimed that the continent’s leaders “want to be politically correct”.

He said: “If you take a look at Paris, it’s a much different place. I loved Paris. Uh, it’s a much different place than it was. If you take a look at London, you have a mayor named Khan. He’s a horrible mayor.

“He’s an incompetent mayor, but he’s a horrible, vicious, disgusting mayor. I think he’s done a terrible job. London’s a different place. I love London. I love London. And I hate to see it happen. You know, my roots are in Europe, as you know.”

Mr Trump also branded Sir Sadiq a “disaster” and suggested he only got elected because of migrants in London. He said: “Your mayor of London. He’s a disaster. He’s a disaster. He’s got a totally different ideology of what he’s supposed to have. And he gets elected because so many people have come in. They vote for him now because you know, it’s like … it’s uh, one of those things. But I hate what’s happened to London, and I hate what’s happened to Paris. I hate when I see it.”

3. ‘The babies of slaves’

Trump claimed repeatedly during the interview that the right of “birthright citizenship” – meaning people born in the US are automatically citizens – was only supposed to apply to the “babies of slaves”.

This is, of course, abject nonsense. The point of the 14th amendment wasn’t intended to allow a specific group to become citizens, it was to overturn a law that banned black people from being citizens.

Over more than a century, countless courts have confirmed the intention was for the amendment to apply to pretty much all babies born in the United States.

On the other hand Republicans have long argued Birthright Citizenship leads to undocumented immigrants having “anchor babies” – a truly unpleasant term suggesting some people have children to make them harder to deport.

4. 11,888 Murderers

During one of his frequent rants about immigration – on this occasion, in a bid to swerve questions about Venezuelan boat bombings – Trump claimed some 11,888 murderers had entered the United States during the Biden administration.

It’s not entirely clear from his words, but he might think they were all from Venezuela.

“But … but let me tell you what they do do,” he said. “They send really, really bad people into our country, and they’ve done it better than anybody else. They emptied their prisons into our country, and these prisoners are seriously tough. They entered … uh, all of their prisons have been emptied into the United States of America. Murderers, 11,888 murderers.”

“Eleven thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight murderers were entered into our country, and stupid Joe took all those people. And now we’re getting them out. We’re finding ’em. We found a lot of ’em and we’re getting them out or we’re putting them in jail. Some are so dangerous and so bad that we don’t want to put them back to their country ’cause they’ll find a way to get back in. But these are stone-cold murderers.”

To be clear, this figure is entirely made up. Hogwash. Nonsense. Absolutely untrue.

He’s previously used the figure of “13,099 convicted murderers” which was also nonsense.

The number appears to have originated with a real fact, though. In the entire United States, in 2024, there were 13,099 non-citizens who had a murder conviction, and who were not being detained by ICE. The vast majority of these murderers entered the country prior to the Biden administration, and many of them were in prison long before Trump took office.

The figure also includes people who entered the country legally, such as green card holders and people with legal visas. So no, Venezuela did not send America 11,088 murderers in the space of four years.

5. Chat GPeTe (Hegseth)

Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of War, published a Twitter video proudly announcing the US government had hooked up with Google to give troops access to its Gemini AI chatbot. You know, in case there’s an urgent combat need for a recipe for chicken chasseur, or for an essay to be rewritten, or for your ex-boyfriend to be removed from all your photos or something.

We’re going to leave the national security implications of on-the-ground military personnel typing god knows what into a chatbot run by a nongovernmental private company to one side for a minute. And also that – while Trump claims to have prevented World War III, the military becoming best friends with AI is what starts World War III in a whole bunch of Sci Fi movies. Any second now Arnie is going to turn up in a flash of blue light, butt naked, and demand Hegseth’s clothes, his boots and his motorcycle.

Because on top of all that, the video itself is so shiny and smooth, it looks kinda like Hegseth made it with AI.

Also, when people tried to go on the website after the video went out, they got a server error. So top work all round.

6. Marjorie Taylor Greene pities Trump

On Sunday, Marjorie Taylor Greene did an interview with CBS’ 60 minutes, doubling down on her criticism of the President – and sending him into a fury, during which he posted on Truth Social demanding an apology from the Broadcaster.

She said Republicans make fun of Trump behind his back, that his policies are not “America First” and that his criticism of her had “directly fuelled” death threats against her son.

Trump, shot back on Truth social: “The only reason Marjorie “Traitor” Brown (Green turns Brown under stress!) went BAD is that she was JILTED by the President of the United States (Certainly not the first time she has been jilted!).”

And today we had another salvo in the other war Trump can’t seem to end, when MTG went on CNN.

“I feel very sorry for President Trump,” she said. “I genuinely do. It has to be a hard place for someone that is constantly so hateful and puts so much vitriol, name calling, and really tells lies about people in order to try to get his way.”

7. Meanwhile two wars Trump ‘ended’ haven’t actually ended at all

Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the US is concerned by an uptick in fighting between Cambodia and Thailand along their contested border.

Not least, presumably, because the conflict is one of the eight Trump claims to have “solved”, after the two countries signed a peace dal pushed for by him.

“We strongly urge the immediate cessation of hostilities, the protection of civilians, and for both sides to return to the de-escalatory measures outlined in the October 26 Kuala Lumpur Peace Accords signed by the Prime Ministers of Cambodia and Thailand and witnessed by President Trump and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim,” Rubio said in a statement.

Meanwhile, concerns are also rising about a surge of violence in the Rwanda-Congo conflict, which Trump also claims to have ended. In a joint statement released on Tuesday, members of the International Contact Group for the Great Lakes expressed “profound concern” over recent developments in Congo’s South Kivu region where new deadly violence blamed on the Rwandan-backed M23 militia group has exploded in recent days.

The group, which includes Belgium, Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, the United States and the European Union, urged all sides “to uphold their commitments under the Washington Accords of 4 December 2025 and immediately deescalate the situation.”

8. Epstein files

A federal judge says the Justice Department can publicly release investigative materials from a sex trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s fixer. Judge Paul A. Engelmayer ruled after the Justice Department in November asked two judges in New York to unseal grand jury transcripts and exhibits, along with investigative materials that could amount to hundreds or thousands of previously unreleased documents. He’s the second judge to allow the Justice Department to publicly disclose previously secret Epstein-related records. Last week, a judge in Florida granted the department’s request to release transcripts from an abandoned federal grand jury investigation into Epstein in the 2000s. A request to release records from Epstein’s 2019 sex trafficking case is still pending. The Justice Department said Congress intended the unsealing when it passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law last month.