Stacking Stories

An exercise while reading the news tonight.

Every editor or producer faces the challenge of stacking stories in order of their relevance—and deciding what constitutes relevance and why one story matters more than another.¹

Among the things you can evaluate are the actuality of harm— concrete measurable harm versus possible harm in the future— the scale of the impact of harm, the severity, and the systemic importance. Is it a one off, or are we talking about a core societal system? And there are questions of geographic reach, whether something is a precedent or not, and then timeliness (The dreaded news peg.)

In limited venues like a television broadcast, or what we used to call a print magazine, you only have so much time or space. So, with that in mind, I read and rewrote tonight’s news (not all news) and ordered the top five stories at the end of the day (not the top stories for all time or in America today; that’s another experiment). My reasoning in footnotes. Play along on #5. (Or pick your own #5 from today’s developments).

1. ²Operation Metro Surge & Minnesota Standoff: A constitutional fight over 2,000 federal agents deployed to Minneapolis (pop. 425,000; #78 on cities with undocumented migrants).Today, border czar Tom Homan (in for Bovino, who was reassigned after the shooting) issued an ultimatum: federal forces draw down if local officials increase “cooperation.” Chief U.S. District Judge Patrick Schiltz, who summoned acting ICE Director Todd Lyons for contempt, found ICE ignored 96 court orders this month. Key issue: ICE’s refusal to release detainees even after judges had ordered them freed. Schiltz: “[ICE] likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence.” New witness testimony alleges federal agents “played with” nurse Alex Pretti’s body, laughed, and counted his wounds instead of providing aid. Minnesota’s lawsuit argues agents are a tool for political retribution, and violate 10th Amendment right to local policing control. Case will test: Can a president act against a state’s will? Senate Democrats are blocking DHS funding specifically over these tactics, threatening a Saturday partial government shutdown. Late Thursday Trump–Schumer move toward a shutdown-avoidance deal that would split off DHS and renegotiate immigration limits

2. ³2020 Election "Fraud" Investigation: DNI Tulsi Gabbard (whose role, established after 9/11, is focused on foreign threats and coordination of intelligence) personally attended a Wednesday FBI raid on the Fulton County Election Hub. The administration justifies her presence by alleging foreign interference in 2020. The seizure occurs despite the fact that Georgia’s 2020 results were counted three times—including a full manual hand tally of 5 million ballots—and have been the subject of over 60 failed lawsuits and numerous independent audits, all of which found no evidence of widespread fraud. Gabbard was joined by Deputy FBI Director Andrew Bailey and a fleet of moving trucks which took away 700 boxes of 2020 material—all 523,000 physical ballots, tabulator tapes, and voter rolls from the Democratic stronghold⁴ —and transported them to the FBI Central Records Complex in Virginia. The warrant cites potential violations of voter intimidation and records retention laws. Senator Jon Ossoff labeled it a "sore loser’s crusade" using the DNI as a political prop. Case will test: Can federal intelligence power be used to re-litigate a settled state election?

3. ⁵4. U.S.-Iran Military Build-up: In June 2025 B-2 bombers dropped 12 bunker-buster bombs on Iranian nuclear sites. President Trump is now promising “far worse” than Operation Midnight Hammer. (Midnight Hammer and Anvil?) Drones are surveying Iranian defenses as a “massive armada” (TM Trump) led by the nuclear-powered USS Abraham Lincoln enters the region, plus three guided-missile destroyers. Rubio revoked travel privileges for Iranian officials today. parallel: Turkey detained six people for spying for Iran while attempting to mediate the crisis. The Repercussions: Experts warn an attack could trigger a Strait of Hormuz blockade (stifling 20% of global oil) and a regional “12-Day War” redux where Iran retaliates with its 1,000 newly-acquired drones and 550+ ballistic missiles. The Big Questions: Can a “surgical strike” actually end a nuclear program, or does it merely drive it underground to sites like the newly-discovered Pickaxe Mountain?

4. ⁶Federal Reserve Leadership Execution: Today, while on the “black carpet” for the Melania premiere, Trump announced he will name a new Fed Chair Friday morning to replace Powell in May. Fed held rates steady yesterday (10-2 vote) to balance “sticky” 2.7% inflation against 4.4% unemployment—ending a three-cut streak. Powell: “The economy has once again surprised us with its strength.” Also Powell: A pending Supreme Court case over removing Governor Lisa Cook is the “most important legal case in the 113-year history of the Fed” due to its threat to independence.⁷

5. What would your fifth be?

   1. 5. Presidential Lawsuit Against the IRS: President Trump, his two eldest sons, and the Trump Organization filed a $10 billion lawsuit today against the IRS and Treasury Department in a Miami federal court. The complaint alleges the agencies failed to take “mandatory precautions” to prevent former contractor Charles Littlejohn from leaking Trump’s tax returns to “leftist media outlets” like the New York Times and ProPublica in 2019 and 2020.

   2. NATO Military Defiance: For the first time in its 77-year history, NATO began its largest military exercise, Steadfast Dart, without the participation of the United States. The 10,000-person drill, led by Germany, is a deliberate test of "European Strategic Autonomy" and follows President Trump’s recent characterization of the alliance as a "burden." Context: The U.S. absence coincides with a diplomatic rift over Trump’s interest in acquiring Greenland and his administration’s pivot toward a "Monroe Doctrine" strategy that prioritizes homeland defense over regional European security. The Stakes: Analysts call it a "trial separation" for the alliance. Case will test: Can Europe maintain a credible defense posture if its most powerful partner officially walks away?⁸

1. Not every editor, of course. Some encourage the idea that more than 47 seconds of this kind of intentional weighing stuff is a party pooper move cool people don’t bother with.

2. Why First: This story holds the top spot because it combines active human harm with a fundamental systemic crisis. It carries the highest “Systemic Importance” as it forces a literal constitutional showdown over the 10th Amendment, testing whether a president can seize local police powers over a governor’s explicit objection and a conflict between the executive and the judiciary as ICE blows off judicial orders.

3. Why Second: It lacks the human component of the MN standoff, but the seizure of 523,000 ballots from Georgia’s largest Democratic stronghold breaks some new ground. It represents the first time the DNI—an office created for international intelligence—has been used to personally oversee a domestic police raid on local election records that have already been audited three times. Given sweeping effort to sow doubt about 2026, this re-litigation of the past should be seen in that context. (UPDATE: 1/30/26: What I mean is that given the president’s other efforts to sow doubt about the present, this raid arguably is more about creating a storm of “confusion” around elections that works on the present rather than the past. Evidence for this take comes in the president’s social media post where he forwarded a peanut cluster of conspiracy theories with no association to the human experience as it has been lived to this date. We’re in China has no windmills territory. It doesn’t matter. If confusion is your goal, the crazier the theories, the more debunking they’ll promote which means more coverage, which means more “confusion,” about matters over which there is no confusion.)

4. Site of Trump’s 2023 RICO indictment for trying to “find” 11,780 votes.

5. Why Third: The harm is currently potential rather than actual. This cold be a bluff. Alternatively: Trump did attack before. Regional war and a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which could paralyze 20% of global oil transit makes this a story of global consequence involving multiple major institutions (White House, Navy, IRGC).

6. Why Fourth: Mostly this is Wednesday news, so it has a weak peg. (If you could have a footnote to a footnote, I would argue that the news peg is at once a villain because the immediacy of news does not correlate with its importance, but the peg is also a reality. Colin, time and attention are not inexhaustible, and the peg helps in prioritization.) But this holds the fourth spot because it concerns the stability of a core societal system: the global economy. While “Human Impact” (in the form of mortgage rates and inflation) is indirect, the “Severity of Impact” on the Fed’s 113-year independence could be larger. The timing—naming a successor only hours after Powell defied a presidential demand for a rate cut—elevates it to a top-tier story about the limits of executive power over independent agencies and Trump’s specific responses to those he does not like. (Also Powell’s comments about Cook sound like a person announcing they see the ground shifting beneath them which is ominous, but it’s also a guess. Guesses are ranked lower!)

7. An independent Fed means the person in charge of your mortgage rates doesn’t have to worry about getting fired for making a president look bad before an election. Without that shield, politicians could force rates down to create a “fake” boom today that leads to a price-hike disaster tomorrow.

8. My choice. Here’s why:

• Scale of Impact: While the $10 billion IRS lawsuit is significant, it is a personal/financial grievance for the President. Steadfast Dart involves 11 nations and represents a systemic shift in global security that affects millions.

• Actuality of Harm: The IRS suit is about past leaks; the NATO move is an active, current break in a core societal system (international stability).

• Precedent: A President suing the IRS is rare, but the U.S. being excluded from—or opting out of—the largest NATO exercise of the year is a “first” of its kind that fundamentally redefines the 21st-century power structure.