Iran unveiled its latest ballistic missile Friday and said it tested it today, Reuters reports. State television carried footage of the test. Iran said it is capable of carrying multiple warheads, of flying 2,000 km is capable of hitting parts of the Middle East, including Israel, a key American ally, per the AP.
The Trump effect: This is a challenge to Trump, since Trump signed a bill imposing penalties on those involved in Tehran's ballistic missile program last month. (The U.S. has said Tehran's tests violate a UN resolution endorsing the Iran nuclear deal.)
Trump said Friday night that Sen. John McCain's "no" decision on Graham-Cassidy came as a "totally unexpected thing, terrible." Trump added that Sen. Luther Strange, who he's rallying for tonight in Alabama, said he would have his vote on health care.
Compared to his opponent, Roy Moore, Strange is the establishment candidate, but Trump told Alabama residents that Strange "is determined to drain that swamp." He added, referring to Republicans in Congress, Strange "doesn't know those people. He's never met them."
President Trump is known for his fiery, distinctive voice on Twitter, but he might have met his match. North Korea's state-run media arm, the Korean Central News Agency, often issues flamboyant threats to the United States.
Why it matters: The leaders of two nuclear-armed nations are engaged in a rhetorical game of chicken. While it has largely been limited to simple name-calling (think: Trump's nickname of "Rocket Man" for Kim), the childish aspects of their words risk spilling over into bona fide geopolitical and nuclear catastrophe.
Acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke is set to issue new, temporary restrictions on travel for foreign nationals coming to the U.S., which are tailored on a country-by-country basis, Trump administration officials told reporters on a call Friday. The Supreme Court is reviewing the travel ban October 10.
Why it matters: Trump's travel ban's 90-day review period is set to expire on Sunday. This effectively replaces it, although the officials on the call would not detail which countries are facing restrictions under the new country-specific standards. The WSJ reports the new country-specific restrictions will bring the list of countries facing restrictions from six (in the original ban) to around eight.
Sebastian Gorka delivered a fiery two-and-a-half hour (and reportedly classified) speech to students at the U.S. Army's Special Operations Center of Excellence a few weeks before he was ousted from the White House. Buzzfeed News first learned about the "secret" speech through documents obtained in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.
What they're saying: An officer at the Aug. 9 speech characterized it as a "tirade" about the war in Afghanistan, Sharia law, radical Islamic terrorism, and the Trump administration's aggressive plans to "defeat it all." Another U.S. Army special operations officer described it as "classic Gorka."
The Trump administration's initial travel ban is set to expire on Sunday. That executive order banned people from six majority-Muslim countries with no "bona fide relationship" to the United States from entering the country. There is increased speculation that President Trump might seek to modify or expand the ban after his tweets following last week's terrorist attack in London, per Bloomberg.
Why it matters: The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments surrounding the ban's current form on Oct. 10, but any modification or expansion of the ban would likely nullify the arguments in that case. It would allow the Court to dismiss or remand the case to a lower federal court, further delaying its consideration of one of Trump's most controversial policies.
President Trump kicked off his Friday morning tweets by warning Sen. Rand Paul and any GOP members that voting against Graham-Cassidy will earn them the label "the Republican who saved ObamaCare."
He also called Kim Jong Un "a madman" and threatened to test him "like never before," tweeted that the Facebook ads story is a sign the "Russia hoax continues," and claimed the "Fake News Media" influenced the 2016 election by "screaming for Crooked Hillary Clinton."
