The A.W.I.’s two-week hiatus—hereby concluded—means that the results we’re about to report amount to a distant memory, almost as far away as that feeling we all used to get now and then … What was it called? Op … op … optimism. That’s it: optimism. In any event, Donald Trump won that mid-June round of voting with 38.7 percent. (Why? The military parade, ignoring Juneteenth, the Trump smartphone, “We are not a king”— you remember.) Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez were a solid second (30.4 percent) on the strength of just the run-up to their wedding.
But enough reminiscing. Elite A.W.I. mainstays know no downtime, and they remained busy throughout the break: there was that low-key Venice wedding we just mentioned, yet another Meghan Markle product relaunch, national-intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard’s segueing from “Iran is not building a nuclear weapon” to “[Iran] can produce a nuclear weapon within weeks” once it became clear that her boss was itching to do some bombing, and so on. With the competition now in full swing again, who will prevail?
But first this:
“It’s the most popular bill ever signed in the history of our country.”
—Donald Trump on his “Big beautiful bill”
The nominees in this week’s edition of the Attention-Whore Index Poll are …
1.
DONALD TRUMP
The pathetically vainglorious president continued to stick imaginary feathers into his cap and preen, pursuing his mission to obliterate—that word, in this instance, used accurately—our democracy, the environment, education, our national parks, public health, and basic human decency. He got his “big, beautiful” (if you’re extremely wealthy) bill passed; he bombed Iran (“And I want to just thank everybody and in particular, God. I want to just say we love you, God”), and then criticized its leader for showing insufficient gratitude for having been bombed (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Trump announced, should have said, “THANK YOU, PRESIDENT TRUMP!”); weighed in on New York City’s mayoral election (Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani is “a 100% Communist Lunatic.... He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he’s not very smart”); resumed weaponizing tariffs, notably against Brazil if it didn’t “IMMEDIATELY” drop the “Witch Hunt” charges against former president Jair Bolsonaro, who is facing trial for—hmm—allegedly trying to stage a coup to remain in power after losing the election in 2022. However, he infuriated MAGA by pledging more aid to Ukraine and—worse—failing to produce the Jeffrey Epstein client list. No worry. He’s sure to win them back with his latest grift: “Trump Fragrances are here. They’re called ‘Victory 45-47’ because they’re all about Winning, Strength, and Success.... Get yourself a bottle, and don’t forget one for your loved ones too.” The cost? $249 per bottle. Only 1,287 days to go.
2.
ELISE STEFANIK
The representative from New York (and discarded onetime nominee for ambassador to the United Nations) is getting noisier in anticipation of her all-but-announced run for governor. She has raised millions; branded the incumbent, Kathy Hochul, “the worst governor in America”—actually, “the Worst Governor in America,” Stefanik’s fealty to Trump extending even to decisions regarding the upper- and lowercasing of letters—and wasted no time calling Mamdani “a radical, Defund-the-Police, Communist, raging Antisemite.” So do you think this will get better, or worse?
3.
MINERVA MONDEJAR STEINER
Mondejar Steiner, a millionaire Swiss art-gallery owner and a sponsor of the Royal Charity Polo Cup, was reported by The Sunday Times of London to have made a “strictly private and confidential” offer to special Polo Cup patrons as a perk for their $27,000 donation: not only the chance to schmooze with “ultra-high-net-worth individuals, cultural icons and luxury leaders” but “full access plus a private audience with Prince William and Princess Catherine.” The Waleses, reportedly unaware that they were being dangled as a royal door prize, have cut ties with Mondejar Steiner.
4.
Emmanuel Macron
The French president will want to remember his three-day state visit to the U.K. for its diplomacy and pomp—the warm welcome from King Charles, schmoozing with the Princess of Wales, Mick Jagger, and Elton John, etc. But the British press’s attention was mostly elsewhere: Brigitte Macron’s apparent refusal to take her husband’s hand as they disembarked on the tarmac (France’s first couple seem to have trouble exiting planes without incident). The presidential luggage bouncing elegantly out of a left-open trunk as the French delegation sped away from Windsor Castle. The “long, sticky speech to parliament … a gorge-tester of a performance … properly shuddersome” (Daily Mail). The jokes about Macron being “the latest in a long line of vertically challenged French presidents,” and how when he arrived—very late—to give that speech, “the room rose to greet him, which was a shame, as instantly no one could see him” (The Times of London).
5.
ELON MUSK
Remember him? The scourge of government waste (and Tesla profits), having briefly re-engaged with his former best friend the president for a social-media skirmish, announced that if Trump’s spending bill passed he would form a new political party—the “America Party.” He’s already received a coveted endorsement from you-know-who: “I am saddened to watch Elon Musk go completely ‘off the rails,’ essentially becoming a TRAIN WRECK over the past five weeks.” The C.E.O. of X, Linda Yaccarino, resigned after two years. A judge ruled that the former CNN host Don Lemon could proceed with his lawsuit against Musk, Yaccarino, and X over the cancellation of his show. Meanwhile, Musk’s artificial-intelligence chatbot, Grok, began responding to user queries with anti-Semitic remarks, including praising Adolf Hitler.
6.
KRISTI NOEM
Her benefactor has gutted the National Weather Service, and (CNN reported) her insistence on signing off on all expenditures slowed FEMA’s response, but Noem nevertheless found a silver lining in Texas’s horrifically deadly flash floods. “We needed to renew this ancient system that has been left in place with the federal government for many, many years,” said Noem. “And that is the reforms that are ongoing there.” She promised that the “neglected” forecasting system is one the president would “fix.” But first, a little holiday golf at his Bedminster, New Jersey, club. “Our Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, will be [in Texas] shortly,” Trump posted last weekend. “Melania and I are praying for all of the families impacted by this horrible tragedy.... GOD BLESS THE FAMILIES, AND GOD BLESS TEXAS!”
7.
ERIC TRUMP
He’s long been especially clueless even by Trump standards—The Independent once noted that “Eric Trump demonstrates in 30 seconds he doesn’t have a clue how tariffs work.” Still, the younger Trump’s occasional feeble attempts to counter that narrative continue. Not very long ago, he declared to a U.K. interviewer that “the days of America being stupid are over.” More recently, he confessed to the Financial Times that, should he ever want to, “the political path would be an easy one, meaning, I think I could do it.” At least we’d know what we’d be in for, dynastically. “If there’s one family that hasn’t profited off politics,” he said, “it’s the Trump family.” Is that a whiff of Victory 45-47 we just detected, or something even worse?
George Kalogerakis, a Writer at Large at AIR MAIL, worked at Spy, Vanity Fair, and The New York Times, where he was deputy op-ed editor. He is a co-author of Spy: The Funny Years and a co-editor of Disunion: A History of the Civil War
