Good Evening, this is the Commonwealth Report. News for the public, not the powerful.
Did Democrats Just Pull the Trigger on the 25th Amendment?
Fifty House Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin, filed a bill Tuesday to create a seventeen-member commission empowered to examine Donald Trump’s mental and physical fitness for office. The bill invokes Section 4 of the 25th Amendment and would create what it calls a “Commission on Presidential Capacity to Discharge the Powers and Duties of the Office.” It would order a full medical and neuropsychological examination of the president. The commission is designed to work around JD Vance by using Congress’s authority to create “such other body” as the law provides. But here’s the reality check. Even if the bill somehow cleared a Republican-controlled Congress, Vance would still have to agree to remove Trump temporarily. After that, two-thirds of both chambers would have to vote to make it permanent. More than 85 Democrats have now called for Trump’s removal since he threatened that a “whole civilization will die tonight” during his Iran standoff. It’s a long shot. But a democracy that doesn’t even try isn’t much of one.
Will Trump’s Iran War Blow Up the Global Economy?
The International Monetary Fund dropped its verdict Tuesday, and it’s ugly. The IMF cut its 2026 global growth forecast and issued a stark warning: Trump’s war in Iran is pushing the world economy toward the edge of recession. In the best case, if the conflict ends quickly, global growth falls to 3.1 percent. In a prolonged war scenario, it drops to 2.5 percent. And in the worst case, with oil averaging $110 a barrel this year and $125 next, global growth collapses to just 2 percent. That’s the recession threshold. It’s only happened four times since 1980, most recently during COVID. Qatar’s economy is forecast to shrink by 8.6 percent this year. Iraq by 6.8 percent. Iran by 6.1 percent. The IMF titled its report “Global Economy in the Shadow of War.” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent dismissed the damage as “a small bit of economic pain.” Tell that to working families already getting crushed at the pump and the grocery store.
Trump Turns on Meloni and Torches His Last European Friend
He called her “a great leader” just one month ago. Now he says he was wrong about her. Donald Trump savaged Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in an interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera Tuesday, saying he was “shocked” by her and that he thought she had courage but didn’t. What set him off? Meloni refused to let US warplanes use a Sicilian airbase for combat operations against Iran. She suspended Italy’s defense pact with Israel. And when Trump attacked the new Pope Leo XIV on social media, she publicly called his conduct “unacceptable.” Trump fired back that she was the one who was unacceptable, claiming she doesn’t care whether Iran gets a nuclear weapon. Meloni was the only European leader who attended Trump’s inauguration. She spent years acting as his bridge to Europe. Now that bridge is ash. When a US president has burned through every ally he ever had, the world takes notice. And not in a good way.
Voters Crush Moms for Liberty in School Board Sweep Across America
While Washington descends into chaos, something important happened at the grassroots level. On April 7th, liberal candidates swept school board elections in politically contested districts across Wisconsin, Missouri, Alaska, and Oklahoma. The races centered on book bans, gender identity policies, and school prayer disputes. Voters chose the side that wasn’t trying to yank Toni Morrison off the shelves. Moms for Liberty, the organization the Southern Poverty Law Center classifies as an anti-government extremist group, backed candidates across all those states. They lost. This is part of a sustained pattern. Conservative school board candidates have been getting routed in election after election since their initial surge in 2021 and 2022, when they rode mask-mandate outrage all the way to the school board table. School boards control curriculum, hiring, library access, and school safety. When book-banners run them, kids pay the price. When communities push back, democracy works. And right now, it’s working.
NYC Mayor Mamdani Bets Big on City-Run Grocery Stores
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani marked his first 100 days in office Sunday with one of the boldest proposals any American city has put forward in years. He’s moving forward with his campaign promise to open five city-run grocery stores, one in each borough, by the end of his term. The first will be built at La Marqueta, a historic public market in East Harlem, where nearly 40 percent of households receive public assistance or SNAP benefits. The first store carries a price tag of around $30 million and is expected to open by the end of 2027. The city owns the land, so there’s no rent and no property taxes, and Mamdani says those savings get passed directly to consumers in lower prices on eggs, bread, and everyday staples. Billionaire supermarket owners are already screaming socialism. But when one in four children in New York City goes hungry, you have to ask a simple question. Who is the market actually working for?
Is DeSantis Running a Food Tour While Trump Leaks Brain Matter?
And finally, some political theater to close out your morning. Ron DeSantis is apparently plotting his comeback, and he’s doing it one plate of chicken wings at a time. The Florida governor ends his term in January 2027, and he’s now posting a web series on X called “Diners, Drive-Ins and DeSantis.” He drives around Florida eating at local hot spots in what one analyst called a “low-rent version of the Food Network.” Analysts say he’s quietly positioning himself for a 2028 presidential run, betting that voters will eventually want what one writer called a “boring polo-and-khakis conservative” once the Trump era finally ends. And that era may be ending faster than anyone expected. Sources close to Trump world have reportedly described the current president as “leaking brain matter.” The Iran threats, the attacks on the Pope, the assault on Meloni. While all of that is burning, DeSantis is somewhere in Naples, Florida, ordering the grouper sandwich. Remarkable times.
And that’s the way it is, Tonight Tuesday, April 14, 2026. I’m Thom Hartmann.
