The federal government ran a $345 billion deficit for the month of August, according to a monthly report from the U.S. Treasury Thursday.

The figure exceeded expectations, as economists had forecast a shortfall of about $300 billion, according to CNBC. In reality, the government spent $689 billion while taking in $344 billion, including $30 billion from tariffs: a monthly record that still was woefully inadequate to close up the budget gap, as August saw the third-largest deficit on record this year.

In the fiscal year thus far, the United States has racked up a deficit of $1.973 trillion. That figure is $76 billion higher than it was at the same time last year, and, according to Bloomberg, is surpassed only by the years 2020 and 2021, when the U.S. was “spending extraordinary amounts to cope with the Covid crisis.”

Some House Republicans are pushing for Charlie Kirk to get a statue in the Capitol, and equating his impact to that of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. in the process.

NOTUS’s Reese Gorman posted on X that far-right Representative Anna Paulina Luna is collecting signatures for a letter addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson, calling for him to erect a statue of Kirk in the Capitol Building.

“To honor this legacy, we call upon you to direct that a statue of Charlie Kirk be placed in the United States Capitol,” the letter reads. “This is not a symbolic gesture, but a permanent testament to his life’s work, his courage, and his sacrifice.”

Kirk was shot and killed at an event at Utah Valley University Wednesday afternoon. The FBI has identified a person of interest, but no suspect is currently in custody.

Kirk founded the conservative group Turning Point USA and was an active presence on the right, taking his influence all the way to the White House, as an advocate and unofficial adviser to President Donald Trump.

Gorman asked Georgia Representative Andrew Clyde—who once described the January 6 insurrection as “tourism”—about Luna’s letter. Clyde agreed with the idea, saying, “We have a statue of MLK in the Capitol, don’t we?”

King is known for fighting for African Americans to be treated like full human beings, spreading a theology of peaceful civil disobedience, and being one of the most powerful orators ever.

Kirk, for his part, is known for his online debates, right-wing views that include banning abortion with no exceptions and unconditional support for the Second Amendment, and starting a conservative movement on college campuses throughout the country in reaction to what he saw as an environment that was too liberal and too empathetic. The comparisons between him and MLK Jr. are perplexing, to say the least.

Kirk held particularly negative views about MLK Jr. and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which King fought tirelessly for, and he wasn’t shy about sharing them.

“MLK was awful,” Kirk said at America Fest, a political convention, in 2023. “He’s not a good person.” Later, at the same festival, Kirk described passing the Civil Rights Act in the 1960s as a “huge mistake.”

Kirk criticized King last year on his podcast as well, saying, “This guy is not worthy of a national holiday. He is not worthy of godlike status. In fact, I think it’s really harmful.”

And on the anniversary of King’s birthday in 2024, Kirk posted on X: “Who was MLK? A myth has been created and it has grown out of control … while he was alive most people disliked him, yet today he is the most honored, worshipped, even deified person of the 20th century.”

Now conservatives are trying to deify Kirk in the same way because of their similarly brutal deaths. But the lives they lived couldn’t have been more different.

Shortly after receiving an ultimatum from a frustrated North Carolina Republican, the Trump administration Thursday announced millions in federal disaster aid to the Tar Heel State for last year’s Hurricane Helene.

“I am proud to approve nearly $32 Million Dollars [sic] in assistance for the Great State of North Carolina,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

The president also announced disaster aid to Kansas, Wisconsin, and South Dakota. In each post, he was sure to note that the funds were going to states in which he’s had electoral successes in the past. In North Carolina, for example, he wrote, “I WON BIG all six times” (six, that is, because he included Republican primaries in his count). Notably, in his post about Wisconsin, Trump repeated his false assertions that he actually won the state in 2020.

Trump credited North Carolina Republicans such as Senator Ted Budd for requesting the aid. Two days prior, Budd had skewered Kristi Noem’s Department of Homeland Security for delays in the disbursement of $5.95 billion in Federal Emergency Management Agency funds—$4.2 billion of which the state was reportedly still waiting for as of June.

“Here we are, nine months later, we still haven’t seen the reimbursements,” Budd told CNN Tuesday. The senator assigned significant blame to Noem, citing her controversial policy requiring all DHS expenditures exceeding $100,000 to receive her approval.

“We’ve let leadership know we’re going to place holds on all DHS nominees until we get an appropriate dialog and response on the outstanding invoices that have not been paid to........

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