• JD Vance told a Kansas City crowd to “vote against the crazy leadership in Washington, D.C.” — then quickly tried to walk it back
• The slip went viral as Democrats clipped the moment and posted it alongside images of Trump and Republican leadership
• A local Kansas City columnist also slammed Vance for being unprepared and dismissive of the city’s actual manufacturing community
• At the same event, Vance’s joke about Trump mocking his shamrock socks landed with a thud online
• Vance’s 2028 presidential ambitions loom over the whole trip, with Trump still refusing to endorse him

JD Vance went to Kansas City on Monday to sell the Trump administration’s manufacturing agenda. What he left with was a viral moment that had Democrats cheering and the internet in full roast mode.

Speaking at Milbank Manufacturing Company in Kansas City, Missouri, the 41-year-old vice president was rallying support ahead of the midterm elections when he delivered a line that stopped the room — and not in the way he intended.

“What I will ask you is if you want to make America great, if you want to protect your jobs and hopefully build jobs in this beautiful factory, if you want to make our streets even safer, if you want to rebuild the American dream for the next generation, vote against the crazy leadership in Washington, D.C.,” Vance told the crowd.

The crowd applauded. Then Vance paused. Then came the cleanup.

He quickly reframed the line, telling attendees he was referring to congressional Democrats: “Vote against the congressional leadership that will stand up and say ‘we care more about illegal aliens than we do American citizens,’ and vote for the leaders in Congress who have promised they are going to fight for you.”

But it was too late. The original clip was already out there.

The Internet Didn’t Miss It

Democrats clipped the moment and posted it on X alongside a photo of Donald Trump flanked by Republican lawmakers at the White House, captioned simply: “The crazy leadership in Washington, DC.” The thing spread fast.

“He’s right, Republicans control everything in Washington,” one person wrote. “Yes, vote against the crazy leadership. Who wrote this speech?” said another. A third kept it simple: “Thanks JD…heard loud and clear.”

Others went harder. “JD Vance calls Washington leadership ‘crazy’ and asks you to vote against it. He IS Washington’s leadership,” one user pointed out, before rattling off a list: “Under his watch: A war nobody asked for. Food prices at a four-year high. A president with 3,700 stock trades in three months. 55 midnight posts demanding arrests of political opponents.”

“Einstein not realizing his party controls the White House, the senate, and the house,” someone else added. “For someone who wrote a book, he definitely doesn’t understand the term ‘irony,'” cracked another.

“Is he campaigning for Democrats or Republicans?” was perhaps the most cutting question of the day.

Kansas City Wasn’t Exactly Charmed Either

The online mockery was one thing. But locally, the reception wasn’t much warmer. Kansas City Star opinion columnist Mará Rose Williams wrote a sharp takedown of the visit, arguing Vance had done almost no homework before showing up.

Vance claimed Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe had “moved quickly” to produce a Republican-friendly redistricting map following a Supreme Court ruling — but Williams noted that map was drawn a year ago. He also appeared not to know the name of Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, the Democrat who has represented Kansas City in Congress for over 20 years and won 11 consecutive elections.

“You mean to tell us that you came into our state, our city, and didn’t care enough to find out who represents us in Congress?” Williams wrote. “That would be lazy and dismissive.”

Perhaps more telling: Vance’s team never even reached out to Michael Eaton, the executive director of the Missouri Association of Manufacturers — the actual voice of the state’s manufacturing sector. Eaton said he hadn’t even known the vice president was coming to town.

“If I had JD Vance standing right in front of me, I would tell him we are the voice of manufacturing in Missouri,” Eaton told the columnist. “Where is their voice? You forgot to invite manufacturing to the table. We are never invited to the table. We are not even on your radar.”

Williams was blunt about what the visit actually was: “That plant just happened to be the backdrop for a campaign speech. It was never intended to be a ‘we really care what the workers need’ speech.”

Then There Was the Sock Joke

The “crazy leadership” line wasn’t even the only thing that backfired on Monday. Vance also tried his hand at some light comedy — and the internet had opinions about that too.

After complimenting Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins on his blazer, Vance launched into a story about Trump’s dress code preferences, explaining that the president notices when anyone strays from a “solid navy blue jacket.”

“I learned this the hard way,” Vance said. Last St. Patrick’s Day, as tradition dictates, he hosted Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin at the Naval Observatory before heading to the Oval Office for a meeting in front of roughly 100 TV cameras. Vance decided to mark the holiday with a little festive flair — shamrock socks.

“We’re sitting down in front of God and everybody and probably 100 TV cameras on a live press conference, and the President starts his remarks, and then he looks over and says, ‘What is going on with those socks?'”

The MAGA crowd laughed. The internet did not.

The sock story also fits a broader pattern around Trump’s well-documented sartorial standards — he’s reportedly been handing out $145 Florsheim leather oxford dress shoes to Cabinet members and White House advisers, telling “The Brian Kilmeade Show” in March, “I don’t want my Cabinet members wearing sneakers.”

“He didn’t learn from the ridiculous Home Alone joke that flopped in a crowd full of boomers in Maine,” wrote Mason, a political commentator and Iraq war veteran, on X. “He has the charm of a rattlesnake, and the same sense of humor,” added Paul Healey on X. On Bluesky, former NASA engineer and retired tech executive Lee Phillips put it most succinctly: “I got news for you J.D. The socks and suit aren’t the problem.”

It’s not the first time Vance’s attempts at humor have landed with a thud. Back in February, he tried to joke about Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at an event and was met with complete silence from the crowd.

All of This With 2028 Already Looming

The Kansas City trip comes as Vance’s name continues to circulate as a top Republican contender for the 2028 presidential race — a prospect that Trump himself has been toying with publicly, and not always kindly.

During a Fortune magazine interview on May 11, Trump was asked about the 2028 ticket — Vance, Marco Rubio, or Donald Trump Jr. — right as Vance walked into the room. Trump didn’t pick sides. “Whoever gets this job is going to be very important,” he said. “And if you get the wrong person: disaster.”

At a White House dinner during National Police Week, Trump conducted an impromptu audience poll, asking attendees to clap for either Vance or Rubio as their preferred 2028 candidate, then pulled back from endorsing either. “I do believe that’s a dream team,” Trump said. “But these are minor details. That does not mean you have my endorsement under any circumstance.”

Vance has tried to play it cool, likening Trump’s public polling to a reality show and joking that “it doesn’t sound right for the United States to have a televised competition for who would succeed him as his apprentice.” He’s also insisted he’s focused on the job he has now.

“I think the American people are so fed up with folks who are already running for the next job seven months into the current one,” Vance said. “There are a lot of great people. I think if I do end up running it’s not going to be given to me either on the Republican side or on the national side. So I’m just going to keep on working hard.”

For now, though, “vote against the crazy leadership in Washington, D.C.” is doing a lot of the talking for him.

The post JD Vance Tells Crowd to Vote Against ‘Crazy Leadership in DC’ appeared first on Cream.

• Trey Parker and Matt Stone visited Jimmy Kimmel Live! and revealed the prop behind South Park’s viral Trump moment
• The “deepfake AI rig” turned out to be a beige finger puppet with cartoon eyes drawn on it
• Kimmel told the duo he thought they were “being generous” with the prop’s size
• Parker and Stone also discussed turning JD Vance into Tattoo from Fantasy Island for Season 29
• The visit comes ahead of South Park‘s 29th season premiere

Trey Parker and Matt Stone promised Jimmy Kimmel a peek at their “deepfake AI rig” — and delivered one of the most gloriously low-tech reveals in late-night history.

The South Park creators stopped by Jimmy Kimmel Live! Monday night to talk about 28 seasons of the Comedy Central institution, and things got memorable fast. Parker teased that during their latest season, the show had pulled off a deepfake of the president that “kinda got famous” — then reached into his pocket to demonstrate exactly how they did it.

“We actually brought our deepfake AI rig to show you how we did Donald Trump’s wiener on the show,” Parker said, before producing a small beige finger puppet, complete with hand-drawn cartoon eyes in classic South Park style.

“For the show, we just put it on like this. And there’s his little guy. Can you believe we did that?” Parker said, wiggling the puppet at the audience.

Kimmel, who slipped it onto his own pinky later in the segment and greeted it with “Hello, little fella — why are you making so much trouble?” — had already weighed in on the prop’s proportions. “I think you’re being generous, I have to say,” he told Parker.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=y2IhrZH4mL8%3Frel%3D0%26enablejsapi%3D1

“If he doesn’t burn down the Smithsonian, I hope that that winds up in the Smithsonian one day,” Kimmel added — a line that landed a little differently given Kimmel’s own recent history with the Trump camp. The host has been in the crosshairs more than once lately, from weeks off the air after MAGA circles distorted a joke about the reaction to Charlie Kirk’s killing, to the more recent uproar when Trump and Melania publicly called for his firing after misreading a quip about the president dozing off in meetings.

The finger puppet made its debut last summer in one of South Park‘s most talked-about episodes, which ends with the residents of South Park settling a lawsuit with the president and agreeing to film pro-Trump PSAs. The final scene features a realistic deepfake of Trump tearing his clothes off in the desert, collapsing, and revealing the little finger puppet. It was exactly as chaotic as it sounds.

JD Vance as Tattoo, and 29 Seasons In

The finger puppet wasn’t the only thing Kimmel wanted to dig into. He also pressed Parker and Stone on their decision to reimagine Vice President JD Vance as Tattoo — the bewildered little character played by the late Hervé Villechaize on Fantasy Island — which has become one of the season’s running gags.

Parker said it started with Tattoo being one of the first impressions he ever did. “When I was like nine years old,” he said. The joke grew from a bit about Mar-a-Lago feeling like Fantasy Island, and Vance just… fit. “It was just gonna be a one-off joke,” Parker explained. “We were like, ‘Oh, we’re just gonna have him be Tattoo, and it’s gonna be one shot.’ And we all just loved it so much, and we loved him as a little character.”

The two also touched on 28 seasons at Comedy Central, their beloved Denver restaurant Casa Bonita, a 15th anniversary special for The Book of Mormon with original Broadway cast members, and the fact that the internet has apparently decided they’re the richest comedians in the world. (They did not confirm or deny.)

Season 29 of South Park is on the way — and if Monday night’s appearance is any indication, the finger puppet is just getting started.

The post South Park Creators Bring Trump’s ‘Little Guy’ to Kimmel appeared first on Cream.

• Sebastian Stan called out Trump at a Cannes press conference for his new film Fjord
• When journalists laughed at a question about The Apprentice, Stan shot back: “It’s not a laughing matter”
• He cited media consolidation, censorship, and endless threats as signs America is “in a really, really bad place”
• Fjord earned a 10-minute standing ovation at Cannes and is considered a Palme d’Or contender
• Trump previously tried to block The Apprentice from screening at Cannes 2024, calling it “garbage” and threatening a lawsuit

Sebastian Stan wasn’t in the mood for nervous laughter. At a Cannes press conference Monday for his new film Fjord, the actor was asked about The Apprentice — his 2024 Trump biopic — and what he makes of it now that the former subject of that film has been back in the White House for over a year. The journalists in the room chuckled. Stan didn’t.

“It’s not a laughing matter, to be honest,” he said, his tone unmistakably grave. “It isn’t.”

He kept going. “I think we’re in a really, really bad place. I really do. And to be honest with you, when you’re looking at what’s happening — if we’re talking about the consolidation of the media, censorship, threats, the supposed lawsuits that seemingly never end but don’t actually go anywhere. You know, the writing was on the wall. We encountered all that with the movie.”

The Apprentice Flashback: Three Days of Uncertainty

Stan was referring to the chaos that surrounded the Ali Abbasi-directed film’s world premiere at Cannes in 2024. Trump had threatened a lawsuit before the festival, calling the movie “garbage” and “pure fiction” — and for a moment, it wasn’t clear whether the film would screen at all.

“Three days before the festival, [we were] unsure if the movie was going to play the festival,” Stan said. “So maybe people are paying attention more to that film. I think it will stand the test of time for that. But we went through all of it, right before Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert and so on. So, I wish it wasn’t like that.”

That the experience of making and releasing The Apprentice now feels like a preview of a larger pattern — the threats, the legal noise, the pressure on media — is clearly something Stan has been sitting with.

Now Back at Cannes With a Different Kind of Film

This time around, Stan is at the festival for something very different. Fjord, directed by Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu, follows a devoutly religious Romanian family who have immigrated to a small Norwegian village. When bruises are discovered on their daughter’s body at school, all five of their children are removed by authorities — and what follows is a wrenching legal and emotional ordeal. Stan plays the father opposite Renate Reinsve.

The film received a 10-minute standing ovation at its Cannes premiere Monday night. That kind of reception at this festival means something, especially with this particular team attached.

Mungiu already has a Palme d’Or on his shelf — he won it in 2007 for 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, and Fjord is his seventh film to compete at the festival. Reinsve, for her part, won the Best Actress prize here for The Worst Person in the World, and was back at Cannes just last year with Sentimental Value, which took the Grand Prix and later won the Best International Feature Oscar. The combination of those three names makes Fjord one of the most serious Palme d’Or contenders of this year’s competition.

But it was Stan’s words about America — not the film’s accolades — that the room walked away thinking about. “I wish it wasn’t like that” might be the quietest, most honest thing said at Cannes this week.

The post Sebastian Stan on Trump: ‘We’re in a Really Bad Place’ appeared first on Cream.

• Ashley St. Clair, 27, posted a tell-all TikTok detailing her relationship with Elon Musk, the father of her son Romulus
• She claims Musk told her he wasn’t sure if he’d fathered Amber Heard’s children but admitted he’d asked Heard about it
• St. Clair says Musk talked about having a “legion of children” via surrogates before “the apocalypse or Civil War”
• She also alleges Musk was secretly supporting Donald Trump before publicly claiming the Butler assassination attempt changed his mind
• St. Clair separately blasted Musk on Instagram for tweeting about his transgender daughter Vivian, saying it’s “a promotion of violence”

Ashley St. Clair apparently didn’t sign an NDA — and she wants you to know it.

The 27-year-old former conservative influencer posted a lengthy “get ready with me” TikTok video on May 15 that is, by any measure, one of the most detailed public accounts of what it’s actually like to be in Elon Musk’s orbit. And she held almost nothing back — touching on Amber Heard paternity rumors, secret Trump political dealings, eugenics-adjacent baby talk, and what she describes as Musk’s casual, ongoing preparations for the end of civilization.

St. Clair, who welcomed a son named Romulus with Musk in September 2024, says their relationship began in 2023 when she was 25 and he was 52. It became, in her words, “emotionally intimate.” A trip to St. Barts is where things shifted.

“At that point in my life, because I’m involved in MAGA and the right wing and I’m already a single mom,” she explained in the video, “the chances of me getting married and the white picket fence and the white dress, I believed that was out the window for me because I was already ‘stained’ as a single mom. But I wanted nothing more than to be a mom. I wanted more kids.”

She says she was ovulating during the St. Barts trip, they agreed to have a child, and his resources — financial and otherwise — made the idea appealing. It wasn’t until after she got pregnant that things started getting, as she put it, “weird.”

What Elon Said About Amber Heard, Grimes, and Shivon Zilis

Before agreeing to have his child, St. Clair says she did her due diligence and asked Musk point-blank about the other women in his life. She says she never wanted to put another woman in a situation where they believed they were in a monogamous relationship.

According to St. Clair, Musk told her things were “good” with Grimes — whose real name is Claire Boucher and who shares three children with Musk — and that his relationship with Tesla exec Shivon Zilis, who has welcomed four children with Musk via IVF, was essentially a “financial agreement.”

Then came the Amber Heard question. Rumors have long swirled that Musk may be the biological father of Heard’s children — Heard, who dated Musk for about a year in 2017, welcomed a daughter via surrogate in 2021 and twins via IVF in 2024, and is raising all three as a single mother. Reports have previously speculated that the former couple created embryos together during their relationship.

St. Clair says she went straight to the source.

“I asked straight up about Amber Heard,” she said. “He’s like, ‘No, I actually asked her because I thought [her kids] were mine, but she says that they’re not.’ At least that’s what he told me, but he also has a complicated relationship with the truth, so who knows?”

So by St. Clair’s account, Musk himself suspected he might be the father — and had to ask Heard directly. Whether that’s the full truth is another matter entirely, and St. Clair’s own caveat about his relationship with honesty hangs over the whole thing.

The Trump Revelation

St. Clair didn’t stop at the personal. She also took aim at Musk’s public political narrative, claiming he was actively working to support Donald Trump long before he made his dramatic public declaration of loyalty following the Butler assassination attempt in July 2024.

“When Butler happened — the assassination attempt on Trump — Elon comes out, and he’s like, ‘It’s this moment I have no choice but to support Donald Trump,'” she recalled. “I’m like, dude, what the f**k? You’ve already been working on a PAC for him. Like, you were already supporting him. Why are you lying about this being the catalyst for supporting Trump?”

She described Musk as someone who is very willing to “lie publicly and privately about stupid s**t” and said his habit of “misrepresenting things” made her deeply uncomfortable — particularly while she was pregnant with his child.

“A Legion of Children” Before the Apocalypse

Perhaps the most jaw-dropping section of the video involves what St. Clair says Musk told her about his reasons for wanting more children. She had already heard the rumors about Musk allegedly maintaining a “harem” of women he hoped to have children with — and her account suggests those rumors may not be entirely unfounded.

She says Musk’s views on immigration leaned more toward a eugenics framework than any concern for national security, and that the baby conversations took a genuinely alarming turn.

“While I’m pregnant, he’s telling me we need to use surrogates if we want to have a legion of children before the apocalypse or before the Civil War in America,” she said.

He also allegedly told her she should have a C-section because it’s “better for the head and the brain size” of the baby.

Musk, for context, has 14 known children with four different women: ex-wife Justine Wilson, Grimes, Zilis, and St. Clair. St. Clair says she also received messages from X creator Tiffany Fong claiming Musk was attempting to have a child with her just months after Romulus was born.

St. Clair closed out the video by noting she has “a bunch of attorneys watching,” is currently in “three different courts,” and has “people following me all the time” — context that makes the timing of this video feel less like a content play and more like someone who has decided she has nothing left to lose by talking.

@ashstc

this is when i start to realize i am in too deep #grwm product list: •la roche posay c12 serum •tatcha dewy moisturizer •saie illuminator in starglow •tarte undereye corrector in light •hourglass skin tint shade 3 • rare bronzer stick in bright side • rare blush in wisdom •nars blush in dolce vita •hourglass concealer in stone (1.3) •one size under eye powder in ultra pink • charlotte tilbury airbrush pressed powder • rhode liner in press •CT lipstick in kim kw •buxom gloss in dolly light •one size powder melt spray

♬ original sound – ashley st. clair

The Transgender Daughter Dispute

The TikTok wasn’t the only place St. Clair went after Musk this weekend. On May 17, she took to her Instagram Stories to call him out over a post he made on X that read: “The woke mind virus killed my son.”

The comment was directed at Musk’s transgender daughter Vivian Wilson, who changed her name and gender in 2022. The two are estranged — Musk has previously said in interviews that he had “lost” her and that she was “dead” to him.

St. Clair was having none of it. “Stop tweeting about your children in this way,” she wrote. “This is just NOT OK and IMO a promotion of violence against trans individuals.”

She went further, drawing a direct line between Musk’s posts and the safety of people around him: “When [Elon] would talk about me online, the threats against my family have always increased. This is true whether it is negative or positive. Elon is aware that he has this impact, particularly on those he posts negative about. The guy has 24/7 security.”

It’s a striking turn for someone who built her platform in MAGA circles — and it points to just how completely her relationship with Musk, and apparently with the politics she once championed, has broken down. In January, St. Clair filed a lawsuit against Musk’s company xAI over sexualized deepfakes of her created on X using Grok. The legal battles, it seems, are far from over.

The post Ashley St. Clair Spills Everything on Elon Musk appeared first on Cream.

• Nicki Minaj says “many celebrities” secretly support Donald Trump but are afraid to say it publicly.
• She credits a 2025 swatting incident — and Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna’s response — as her breaking point.
• Minaj says she was “completely ignored” by California Gov. Gavin Newsom when she sought help with repeated swatting attacks.
• She also ties her political shift to disillusionment with Obama, resentment toward Jay-Z, and backlash over her 2021 vaccine comments.
• The rapper says she’s willing to campaign for Trump in the upcoming midterm elections.

Nicki Minaj has never been subtle about her support for Donald Trump — but in a new cover profile for TIME, conducted at Mar-a-Lago, the 43-year-old rapper goes further than she ever has before, claiming she’s just the visible tip of a much larger iceberg of celebrity MAGA sympathizers.

“Many celebrities feel the way I do, but they don’t say it,” Minaj told TIME’s Eric Cortellessa. “Sometimes you just need one brave person to get the brunt of the impact. I think I am the catalyst for that change. Hopefully, when they see me and hear me speak and feel my energy, that will make them say, ‘You know what: Who am I afraid of? What am I afraid of?'”

It’s a bold claim — and a revealing one. Because for years, Minaj says, she was one of those silent supporters herself.

“I felt that way already about him, just that I didn’t dare act like that publicly,” she said. “It’s been ingrained in everyone’s brain in the music business that we are supposed to be a Democratic family. I just knew they would not like me supporting Trump.”

The Swatting Incidents That Changed Everything

The moment that finally pushed Minaj to go public wasn’t a policy debate or a campaign rally. It was a terrifying, repeated pattern of swatting attacks on her Los Angeles home — and who showed up to help, and who didn’t.

When the “Super Bass” rapper reached out to California Governor Gavin Newsom via X for help dealing with the attacks, she says she got nothing back. “He just completely ignored me, with all the money I spent in taxes,” she recalled.

Then, after another swatting incident in April 2025, Republican U.S. Representative Anna Paulina Luna called her directly, connected her with law enforcement, and helped set her up with a private security firm.

“I was shocked,” Minaj said. “I’d never seen anyone in politics treat me that way. That’s what made me say that I don’t care to keep this a secret anymore.”

It’s a contrast she clearly still feels deeply — the Democratic governor who ignored her, versus the Republican congresswoman who picked up the phone.

Obama, Jay-Z, and a Long-Simmering Frustration

But the swatting incident didn’t create Minaj’s conservatism — it just unlocked it. She traces her disillusionment back further, to Barack Obama’s presidency and the unspoken expectation that Black entertainers fall in line politically.

“I just saw so many videos of Black men saying that they didn’t like the way they felt about that speech that Obama gave,” she said, referring to Obama’s 2024 appearance campaigning for Kamala Harris. “They felt like they weren’t being listened to.”

And then there’s Jay-Z — because of course there is. Minaj has been in a long-running war with Hov and Roc Nation, accusing the company of sabotaging her career and alleging he owes her somewhere between $100 and $200 million. In the TIME interview, she wove her Jay-Z grievances directly into her political worldview.

“I think Jay-Z ended up costing Obama a lot, whether he knows it or not,” she said. “Lots of rappers don’t like Jay-Z and were afraid to say it.”

The throughline she’s drawing: powerful people protecting their circles, leaving others out — and the music industry’s Democratic groupthink as just another version of that same dynamic.

The Vaccine Comments, Revisited

Minaj also addressed the moment that first put her in the crosshairs of the left: her 2021 tweet suggesting her cousin’s friend in Trinidad had experienced swollen testicles after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Trinidad and Tobago’s Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh publicly called the claim false, and Minaj faced widespread condemnation from Democrats and public health officials.

She’s not backing down. “I guess they had examined everyone’s testicles in Trinidad and came back to tell me that I was lying,” she told TIME.

She also pointed to that backlash as part of what accelerated her rightward drift — and suggested that critics may have overplayed their hand. “If they would have left me alone, maybe I would not have done so much,” she said.

From Fan to Front Lines

Since going public with her support, Minaj has moved quickly through the MAGA orbit. She appeared alongside Trump at the Trump Accounts Summit in January — where the president revealed she had invested “hundreds of thousands of dollars” in Trump Accounts — and attended the premiere of the Melania documentary at the Kennedy Center. She’s spoken at the United Nations about violence against Christians and appeared at a Turning Point USA event. She’s also flaunted a Trump Gold Card she says was gifted to her by the president, claiming it grants her citizenship.

At a January speech, she declared: “I am probably the President’s No. 1 fan. And that’s not going to change.”

She’s even found a way to frame Trump’s cultural pull in terms her fans might understand. “It’s the same way Marilyn Monroe represents a vibe,” she told TIME. “Donald Trump is his own vibe.”

As for what comes next, Minaj is clear: she’s in. “I’ll do whatever it is,” she said when asked about supporting Trump’s allies in the upcoming midterms. And on a more personal note, she added something that sounds like it’s about more than just politics. “I’ve never felt happier. I’ve never felt better. When you can be yourself, you’re happier.”

Whether other celebrities follow her lead — or stay quiet — is the question she’s now openly daring them to answer.

The post Nicki Minaj Says Many Celebs Secretly Back Trump appeared first on Cream.

• Jimmy Kimmel opened Disney’s 2026 upfront presentation with a 10-minute monologue roasting his own tumultuous year
• He joked that “the president has tried to f-k me twice” while crediting Trump for boosting his ratings
• Kimmel quipped ABC only pulls you off air if you “throw a chair at your Mormon boyfriend” — a dig at Taylor Frankie Paul’s Bachelorette fallout
• He admitted he’s cost Disney “billions” and called his hiring “the worst personnel decision” in company history
• The appearance came just a day after Kimmel joined fellow late-night hosts on Colbert’s show, where his two-word reaction to Melania’s callout was revealed

Jimmy Kimmel walked into Disney’s upfront presentation on Tuesday and did exactly what you’d expect from a man who’s spent the last year as a walking political lightning rod — he made it funny.

Introduced by Ryan Seacrest at the Javits Center in New York, Kimmel took the stage to big applause and immediately leaned into the absurdity of his situation. “I didn’t think I’d ever see you guys again either,” he told the assembled advertisers and Disney brass. “But the bad boy of data and measurement solutions is back.”

It set the tone for a roughly 10-minute monologue that was equal parts self-deprecating, politically sharp, and genuinely hilarious — the kind of performance that reminded everyone why ABC has kept him around for 24 years, even when keeping him around has gotten very expensive.

“The President Has Tried to Get Me Twice”

Kimmel didn’t dance around the drama. He went straight at it.

“The president has tried to f-k me twice over the last six months — that’s one way to look at it,” he said. “You could also say I’ve generated unparalleled engagement across a variety of platforms.”

He also took stock of the financial damage. “I cost our company a lot of money this year, billions,” Kimmel said. “It is very possible that no employee in the history of any company has cost their employer more. Hiring me 24 years ago, just from a purely mathematical standpoint, was the worst personnel decision that Disney Corporation has ever made. Not even the captain of the Exxon Valdez did more damage.”

His show’s ratings, though? Up. “Largely thanks to our partners in Washington,” he noted.

The backstory behind those jokes has been a genuinely wild ride. Last fall, Kimmel was briefly pulled off the air after comments he made about conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s killing. Then in late April, he performed a parody White House Correspondents’ Dinner roast in which he said Melania Trump had “a glow like an expectant widow” — a crack he’s since clarified was about the 23-year age gap between the president and first lady. The joke landed just days before a gunman attempted to storm the actual WHCD event at a Washington, D.C. hotel.

Melania fired back on X, calling Kimmel’s rhetoric “hateful and violent” and saying “people like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate.” Trump escalated on Truth Social: “This is something far beyond the pale. Jimmy Kimmel should be immediately fired by Disney and ABC.” The FCC, meanwhile, launched an accelerated licensing review of Disney-owned broadcast stations — which FCC chair Brendan Carr insists has nothing to do with displeasing the White House.

Disney has pushed back, saying the agency’s actions “threaten to upend decades of settled law and practice and chill critical protected speech.” And Kimmel, clearly, has not gone quietly.

The Taylor Frankie Paul Dig

He saved one of his sharpest lines for a more local target. Addressing the idea that ABC might pull him from the air, Kimmel quipped: “Usually in order for ABC to pull you off the air, you have to throw a chair at your Mormon boyfriend.”

The room got it immediately. It was a direct reference to Taylor Frankie Paul’s controversy — the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star whose season of The Bachelorette was shelved after a highly publicized incident with her boyfriend. The joke landed, by multiple accounts, very well.

Near the end of his set, Kimmel signed off with characteristic dry wit: “That’s it for me — probably forever.”

“Oh Boy” — The Two Words That Started It All

The upfront appearance came one day after Kimmel joined Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Seth Meyers, and Jimmy Fallon for a special episode of The Late Show — a reunion of the Strike Force Five podcast ahead of Colbert’s final episode on May 21.

It was Oliver who revealed how Kimmel first reacted when Melania’s post went live. After the first lady’s tweet hit, Kimmel sent two words to a group chat of his fellow comics: “Oh, boy.”

“It’s an amazing thing to get a text from Jimmy saying ‘Oh, boy,’ and then a picture of Melania mad at him,” Oliver said. “What a way to start the day!”

Fallon admitted he had a slightly different reaction. “And then I sent a text to you guys, and I said, ‘Hey, don’t be mad at me, but I liked it. I think she’s got a point.'”

When Colbert asked Kimmel how it feels to wake up to that kind of attention, Kimmel’s answer was perfectly, deflating-ly honest: “The saddest part of it is that I realize in those moments that the only four people who care are sitting right here. It takes 12 hours for the rest of the people in my life to even figure out that anything’s going on.”

He also got one good line in about Colbert’s impending exit — when the Late Show cancellation came up, Kimmel told him: “Don’t worry, give me a few months and it’ll be Strike Force Three.”

Back at the upfront, the message from Disney was clear: Kimmel is still their guy. The drama has quieted. The FCC review continues. And as of Tuesday, ABC’s most controversial employee was back on stage in New York, joking about how much it’s all cost — and getting a standing ovation for it.

The post Kimmel Owns His Trump Drama at Disney Upfront appeared first on Cream.

• Brett Ratner joined President Trump on Air Force One for the China trip to scout Rush Hour 4 filming locations
• Ratner will also meet with cast and crew while in China, according to his spokeswoman Victoria Palmer-Moore
• Trump has personally championed reviving the Rush Hour franchise, pushing ally Larry Ellison to make it happen
• Ratner previously directed the 2026 Amazon-backed Melania documentary following the First Lady’s White House return
• Rush Hour 4 would be the first entry in the buddy cop franchise in nearly 19 years

Brett Ratner is making the most of a presidential trip. The Rush Hour director flew to China aboard Air Force One with President Donald Trump this week, using the diplomatic visit to scout filming locations for Rush Hour 4 — the long-awaited sequel that’s been nearly two decades in the making.

Ratner’s spokeswoman Victoria Palmer-Moore confirmed to the New York Post that the director will also be meeting with potential cast and crew while in the country. It’s a busy itinerary for a man who’s quickly become one of the more unlikely figures in Trump’s orbit.

How Trump Became Rush Hour’s Biggest Champion

The sequel’s momentum traces directly back to the Oval Office. Trump has been openly vocal about wanting the franchise revived — and he’s put his connections to work on it. According to the New York Post, the president encouraged his billionaire ally Larry Ellison to resurrect the mismatched-buddy-cop series after Ellison’s Paramount Pictures acquired rights-holder Warner Bros. Discovery. That’s some serious executive producing energy from a sitting president.

The original Rush Hour trilogy — starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker — was a massive franchise for Warner Bros., with the last installment, Rush Hour 3, hitting theaters back in 2007. A fourth film has been rumored, teased, and hoped for by fans ever since. Now, with Trump in the mix and Ratner on a plane to Beijing, it’s starting to feel like something might actually happen.

Ratner’s Ties to the Trump World

This isn’t Ratner’s first project in Trump’s circle. He directed the 2026 Amazon-backed documentary Melania, which followed First Lady Melania Trump through her return to the White House for the president’s second term. That film put Ratner squarely in the administration’s good graces — and apparently earned him a seat on one of the world’s most exclusive aircraft.

The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Ratner’s inclusion in the delegation.

Ratner is traveling alongside some of America’s top business leaders as part of the broader U.S. delegation. But while the suits around him are likely talking trade deals, Ratner has his eye on something else entirely — the streets, skylines, and settings that could bring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker’s world back to the big screen.

Nearly 19 years after Rush Hour 3, the franchise’s fourth chapter might just get its start on a presidential trade mission to China. Stranger things have happened in Hollywood. Not many, but a few.

The post Brett Ratner Boards Air Force One to Scout Rush Hour 4 in China appeared first on Cream.

• Rod Stewart told King Charles “you put that little rat bag in his place” at a London gala Monday night
• The comment came at The King’s Trust 50th Anniversary Celebration at Royal Albert Hall
• Stewart, 81, was referencing Charles’ recent four-day state visit to the US, including a historic address to Congress
• Charles appeared to laugh off the remark as Ronnie Wood grinned alongside them
• Stewart and Trump were once friendly neighbors in Florida before their falling out last year

Rod Stewart has never been one to hold back — and Monday night at Royal Albert Hall was no exception. At The King’s Trust 50th Anniversary Celebration in London, the rock legend pulled King Charles aside on the receiving line and offered some very enthusiastic, very on-brand congratulations for his recent US state visit.

“May I say, well done in the Americas,” Stewart, 81, told the monarch. “You were superb. Absolutely superb. You put that little rat bag in his place.”

The remark — widely understood as a reference to President Donald Trump — was caught on video and shared by the Daily Mail’s Rebecca English. Charles, who by royal tradition is expected to remain politically neutral, didn’t visibly respond to the dig itself, but those nearby appeared to laugh. Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood was standing right there, grinning.

Stewart apparently kept going, adding: “Exactly, that’s it — it went right over his head, right over his head.” He then turned to Queen Camilla and said: “I was just congratulating your husband on his wonderful performance in the Americas, so great, so brave, so proud.”

https://x.com/RE_DailyMail/status/2053919996594864302?s=20

What Charles Actually Did in America

The praise, however colorfully delivered, wasn’t without basis. Charles and Camilla’s four-day US trip was widely regarded as a diplomatic high-wire act — and by most accounts, the King stuck the landing.

He made history with an address to a joint session of Congress, following in the footsteps of his late mother Queen Elizabeth, who did the same in 1991. He leaned into the humor of the moment — “King George never set foot in America and, please rest assured, I am not here as part of some cunning rearguard action!” — but also delivered some pointed substance, calling on America to continue defending Ukraine and stressing the importance of NATO, positions that have been notably at odds with the current White House.

“The challenges we face are too great for any one nation to bear alone,” Charles told Congress. “But in this unpredictable environment, our alliance cannot rest on past achievements, or assume that foundational principles simply endure.”

He described the present moment as “more volatile and more dangerous” than when his mother visited — and his visit came just days after the White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting, which he acknowledged from the podium.

At the state dinner hosted by the Trumps, Charles got off another memorable line: “If it wasn’t for us, you’d be speaking French!” Trump, for his part, told reporters afterward that the King “made a great speech” and that he was “very jealous.”

Washington-based royal biographer Sally Bedell Smith told People: “Politicians of every stripe saw King Charles in a new and more favorable light.”

Rod and Trump: It’s Complicated

Stewart’s swipe at Trump landed with a little extra context for anyone who knows their backstory. The two were once friendly — neighbors in Florida, even — but that relationship cooled significantly. In an interview with Radio Times last year, Stewart said he no longer considered Trump a friend, pointing to the administration’s arms sales to Israel amid the Gaza conflict.

“How’s that war ever gonna stop?” Stewart said at the time. He went further: “He’s always been a bit of a man’s man. I liked him for that. But he didn’t, as far as I’m concerned, treat women very well. But since he became President, he became another guy. Somebody I didn’t know.”

Monday night’s red carpet moment was just the latest proof that the old friendship is firmly in the rearview.

A Big Night for The King’s Trust

The gala itself was a celebration of 50 years of the King’s Trust, the youth charity Charles founded in 1976 that has helped more than 1.3 million young people across the UK. The evening at Royal Albert Hall featured performances from Rita Ora, Anne-Marie, Craig David, Skye Newman, and Jools Holland, with hosts Ant and Dec welcoming the royals on the red carpet. Benedict Cumberbatch, Idris Elba, George Clooney, and Amal Clooney were also among the guests.

The night had genuinely moving moments too — award winner Sahara gave an emotional speech thanking the trust for helping her after she had attempted to take her own life.

Charles closed out the evening with a joke at Ant and Dec’s expense: “I’ve always wondered whether someone would put Ant and Dec back in their box” — as the duo vacated the royal box and the King and Queen took the stage in their place.

Stewart’s rat bag comment will almost certainly be the clip that travels furthest. But then again, that’s usually how it goes when Rod Stewart gets a microphone — or a receiving line.

The post Rod Stewart Tells King Charles: ‘You Put That Little Rat Bag in His Place’ appeared first on Cream.

• A golden statue of Donald Trump unveiled at Trump National Doral Miami looks strikingly similar to a Homelander statue in The Boys Season 5.
• Showrunner Eric Kripke posted a side-by-side comparison on Instagram with the caption “Seriously, what the f***?”
• The Trump statue, dubbed “Don Colossus,” stands 22 feet tall and was commissioned by a group of crypto investors promoting a memecoin.
• This is at least the second time real-world Trump imagery has mirrored a Season 5 plot point before the episode even aired.
• Kripke has openly said he’s exhausted by how difficult it’s become to out-satire the current moment.

Eric Kripke is running out of ways to say “you can’t make this up” — because apparently, you don’t have to.

The showrunner of The Boys took to Instagram on Sunday with a meme image showing a side-by-side of two golden statues: one of Homelander, the show’s fascist superhero villain played by Antony Starr, erected in this week’s Season 5 episode — and one of President Donald Trump, unveiled last month at his Trump National Doral Miami golf course in Florida. “Seriously, what the f***?” Kripke wrote. It was about as much as anyone could say.

The Homelander statue appeared in the episode “Though the Heavens Fall,” which began streaming Wednesday on Prime Video. The Trump statue — a 22-foot bronze structure coated in gold leaf, weighing 3.1 tons and mounted on a 7-foot pedestal — had been installed at the Doral course just before the PGA Tour’s 2026 Cadillac Championship teed off there. It’s been dubbed “Don Colossus.”

Who’s Behind the Trump Statue — and Why It Got Complicated

The statue was commissioned by a group of crypto investors looking to promote their memecoin, $PATRIOT, and was sculpted by Alan Cottrill, an artist with experience creating presidential likenesses. It depicts Trump with his fist raised — a direct reference to his defiant pose after the assassination attempt on his life in Butler, Pennsylvania.

The road to installation wasn’t entirely smooth. Cottrill had previously voiced frustration over payment delays, at one point suggesting he’d hold the piece in a warehouse until he was paid. The investors disputed that, saying the work had been fully paid for a year ago. Either way, the statue made it to Doral.

The unveiling ceremony was led by Pastor Mark Burns of Pastors for Trump, who addressed the crowd while Trump himself called in via Burns’ cell phone to thank attendees. Burns pushed back hard on any biblical comparisons. “Let me be clear: this is not a golden calf,” he said. “This statue is a celebration of life. It is a symbol of resilience, freedom, patriotism, strength, and the will power to keep fighting for the future of America.”

Not everyone agreed. On X, theologian and pastor Reverend Benjamin Cremer shared a photo from the ceremony and wrote that “evangelical Christian leaders literally gathering around a gold statue of the president and celebrating it … is what idol worship looks like.” Burns fired back in his own X post: “This was not idol worship. This was honor. This was gratitude. This was patriotism.”

Kripke Has Been Here Before — and He’s Tired

For Kripke, this isn’t a one-off coincidence. It’s becoming a pattern.

Last month, Trump posted — and then deleted — an AI-generated image depicting himself as a Jesus-like figure. It went up just 48 hours before The Boys’ Season 5 episode “Every One of You Sons of Bitches” aired, which featured a storyline where Homelander declares himself a god. Kripke told Polygon at the time that his writing team had actually been nervous the plot point was too extreme to land with audiences.

“A month ago, when we were talking about marketing, I was like, ‘Homelander saying he’s God is so out there. We have to be careful about how we even introduce the idea to the public because they’ll say he’s gone too far,'” he said. “And here we are. It’s just really hard to out-satire this world.”

“I am really tired and weary of the world reflecting the show before we get a chance to do it,” he added. “I appreciate the marketing. I’m just like, can you just please give us a chance to put some absurd satire out there before you prove that it’s more realistic than we ever intended?”

Laz Alonso, who plays Mother’s Milk on the show, jumped into the comments on Kripke’s Instagram post with his own theory: “Someone had to have leaked our scripts to them.” Fans in the comments went further, comparing The Boys to The Simpsons and its legendary reputation for predicting the future.

It’s a comparison that’s getting harder to dismiss. The Boys has spent five seasons building Homelander into a portrait of unchecked power, ego, and nationalist spectacle — and Season 5, the show’s final run, has been pushing that portrait further than ever. The series finale is already set for a theatrical release before its Prime Video debut, a sign of just how much cultural weight the show is carrying into its ending.

For now, Kripke is left doing what any writer would do when reality keeps beating him to the punch: staring at the side-by-side and wondering what on earth comes next.

The post ‘The Boys’ EP Reacts to Trump’s Gold Statue Mirroring Homelander’s appeared first on Cream.

• Mark Hamill posted an AI-generated image of Trump lying in a grave on Bluesky, then deleted it
• The White House called Hamill “one sick individual” and linked the post to three assassination attempts on Trump
• Hamill, 74, apologized — sort of — saying he was “wishing him the opposite of dead”
• James Woods, Rob Schneider, and a sitting U.S. senator all piled on the Star Wars actor
• The post surfaced days after a man was arrested for allegedly trying to assassinate Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

Mark Hamill is in the middle of a full-blown political firestorm after the Star Wars icon shared — and then quickly deleted — an AI-generated image on Bluesky depicting President Donald Trump lying in a shallow grave, surrounded by daisies, with a headstone inscribed “Donald J. Trump 1946-2024.” The caption? Two words: “If Only.”

The White House did not hold back.

“.@MarkHamill is one sick individual,” the administration’s Rapid Response 47 account posted on X Thursday. “These Radical Left lunatics just can’t help themselves. This kind of rhetoric is exactly what has inspired three assassination attempts in two years against our President.”

Hamill, 74 and best known for playing Luke Skywalker across the Star Wars saga since 1977, posted the image Wednesday alongside a lengthy caption that went well beyond the grave visual. “He should live long enough to witness his inevitable devastating loss in the midterms, be held accountable for his unprecedented corruption, impeached, convicted & humiliated for his countless crimes,” the actor wrote. “Long enough to realize he’ll be disgraced in the history books, forevermore. #don_TheCON.”

By Thursday afternoon, the post was gone from his profile.

The Apology That Wasn’t Quite an Apology

Hamill returned to Bluesky with what he framed as a clarification. “Actually, I was wishing him the opposite of dead, but apologize if you found the image inappropriate,” he wrote. He offered what he called an “Accurate Edit for Clarity” — essentially stripping the post down to the line about Trump living long enough to face accountability for his alleged crimes.

A representative for Hamill pointed NBC News to that statement rather than offering any additional comment.

Trump himself has not directly addressed the post.

Hollywood and Capitol Hill Weigh In

The backlash spread fast — and it wasn’t just coming from the White House.

Actor James Woods, 79, reposted Hamill’s message on X with a pointed five-word verdict: “When they tell you who they are, believe them.”

Saturday Night Live alum and outspoken Trump ally Rob Schneider, 62, was blunter. “Mark Hamill is a sick demented” person “and a disgrace to decent Americans,” Schneider wrote.

Montana Sen. Tim Sheehy took a different angle — going after Hamill’s Hollywood legacy. “He had one role that made him a legend because he had Han Solo, Darth Vader, and Obi Wan carrying his baggage,” the 40-year-old senator wrote, accusing Hamill of suffering from an “extreme case” of what Trump allies call “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

Oklahoma congressional candidate Jackson Lahmeyer went further still, calling for Hamill to be “investigated and held accountable,” arguing that posts like his “create a culture where assassination attempts become inevitable.”

The Timing Made Everything Worse

The post landed at an especially charged moment. Just weeks ago, suspect Cole Tomas Allen, 31 — a teacher and engineer from California — was arrested after allegedly breaching a security checkpoint near the White House Correspondents’ Dinner while armed with multiple weapons. He’s been charged with attempting to assassinate the president and is expected back in court Monday for a preliminary hearing.

It’s the third alleged attempt on Trump’s life in two years. He was shot in the ear at a Pennsylvania rally in 2024 — the shooter was killed by the Secret Service — and a second suspect was convicted of attempted assassination in February after being found hiding in bushes near where Trump was golfing.

The moment also arrives as the Trump administration is already investigating former FBI Director James Comey over a separate social media post — a nearly year-old image of seashells spelling out “86 47” that Trump allies interpreted as a veiled call for violence against the 47th president.

Hamill’s Long History With Trump

None of this is new territory for Hamill, who has been one of Trump’s most reliably outspoken celebrity critics for years. After Trump’s 2024 re-election, he told The Times of London that he’d asked his wife to pick between moving to the UK or Ireland. She talked him out of it — but not with a direct argument. “She’s very clever. She didn’t respond right away, but a week later she said, ‘I’m surprised you would allow him to force you out of your own country,'” Hamill recalled. His response: “That son of a bitch, I thought. I’m not leaving.”

The White House trolled him for that too, joking that at least he wouldn’t have to share Ireland with Rosie O’Donnell.

About Trump’s second term, Hamill has been grimly candid. “The bullying, the incompetence, the people in place… The only way I can deal with it without going crazy and wanting to open my veins in a warm tub is to look at it like a thick, sprawling political novel,” he told The Times. “It’s entertaining in a way because this could actually be the end. Our status in the world has been crippled and that will reverberate for decades.”

The post also came just days after Hamill appeared alongside former President Barack Obama in Chicago to mark Star Wars Day on May 4, previewing Obama’s Presidential Center — a pairing that some Trump allies used to further amplify their outrage online.

Hamill has been here before, and he’ll likely be here again. But a deleted post and a half-apology probably won’t be the last word on this one.

The post White House Calls Mark Hamill ‘Sick’ Over Trump Grave Post appeared first on Cream.