<The Supreme Court issued a striking rebuke against a Trump-backed fringe legal theory that state legislatures can operate virtually unabated in setting up federal elections.

In a 6-3 ruling authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, a broad coalition of justices ruled that the Elections Clause in the US Consitution does not give state legislatures "unchecked" by state courts.

"If the Elections Clause had vested exclusive authority in state legislatures, unchecked by state courts enforcing provisions of state constitutions, these clauses would have been unenforceable from the start," Roberts wrote for the court.

Roberts was joined by two of the court's conservatives, Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, in the majority, a sign that there is a broader coalition on the court that was ready to reject a theory that could have fundamentally upended US elections.

Then-President Donald Trump and his allies helped elevate the once-fringe election theory in the wake of the 2020 presidential election. His allies previously argued to the court that the theory allowed for state legislatures to appoint pro-Trump electors even if the legally certified election results called for Biden electors. In effect, it meant that state legislatures could nullify their own state's presidential election results, disenfranchising potentially millions of Americans in the process.

For these reasons, J. Michael Luttig, a retired federal judge and conservative legal icon, wrote in The Atlantic before the decision that the case was the most important "for American democracy in the almost two and a half centuries since America's founding."

Luttig, who roundly rejected the theory, warned that if advocates of the fringe theory had won it would have fundamentally changed how congressional maps are drawn and presidential electors are appointed.

The court's liberal bloc, Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson also joined the majority. Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, he was joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch. Justice Samuel Alito also joined part of Thomas' opinion.

Thomas took particular issue with the high court ruling issuing a sweeping ruling on the case after the North Carolina Supreme Court overturned the underlying ruling that was at the heart of the case, Moore v. Harper.

But Roberts made clear that the court was not convinced by such a view.

"In other words, although partisan gerrymandering claims are no longer viable under the North Carolina Constitution, the North Carolina Supreme Court has done nothing to alter the effect of the judgment in Harper I enjoining the use of the 2021 maps," the chief justice wrote.

Roberts said that the high court's decision does not mean that state supreme courts have "free rein" in ruling on election laws. Among the limits are when questions about state law deal with questions of federal authority or law, as applies in topics far beyond election-related laws.

The chief justice conceded that some of these questions are very complicated and sought to limit the ruling from imposing any "tests" by which state courts can interpret the US Constitution's Election Clause.

"We hold only that state courts may not transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that they arrogate to themselves the power vested in state legislatures to regulate federal elections," he concluded.>

Suck scum, dictators!!!!!

<Even Donald Trump’s inner circle didn’t buy the former president's claims that the 2020 election was rigged, according to a mountain of evidence built by Special Prosecutor Jack Smith.

Emails and interviews gathered from multiple members of Trump’s team suggest that many knew the election fraud claims were a lie even as they pushed them, a Washington Post report on Smith's investigation into efforts to overturn President Joe Biden's election revealed.

The evidence also suggests those pushing adverts designed to sow doubt in the veracity of the election knew they were based on false information.

In one email obtained by Smith’s team, Trump adviser Jason Miller told an executive at the firm that produced Trump’s campaign ads: “The campaign’s own legal team and date experts cannot verify the b– s— being beamed down from the mothership,” the Post reported.

Smith’s investigation has a trove of evidence that shares similar sentiments.

“Prosecutors have sought and obtained some evidence that there was widespread disbelief even among members of the president’s inner circle about the claims of extensive voter fraud, according to subpoenas reviewed by The Post and interviews with people familiar with witness testimony,” the newspaper reported.

“When Trump wanted to release a press statement saying a single report of fraud was the “tip of the iceberg,” campaign advisers argued internally against using that language, because they believed there was no evidence for such a claim. The claim went into the news release anyway, according to people familiar with the matter.”

The fact that Trump and his campaign pushed forward despite so much doubt concerning the truth of what he was saying has become a core focus for Smith, the Post reported.

“Each track poses potential legal peril for those under scrutiny, but also raises tricky questions about where the line should be drawn between political activity, legal advocacy and criminal conspiracy,” the Post said.

Particular focus is on lawyers who worked to try to convince state and federal officials that Trump was the legitimate winner.

”Investigators have sought to determine to what degree these lawyers — particularly Rudy Giuliani, Jenna Ellis, John Eastman, Kurt Olsen and Kenneth Chesebro, as well as then-Justice Department lawyer Jeffrey Clark — were following specific instructions from Trump or others, and what those instructions were,” the Post said.

Smith’s Jan. 6 investigation is separate from the classified documents one that saw Trump arraigned on 37 federal counts earlier this month.

Speaking to the Post, Trump spokesman Steven Cheung called the information “out-of-context” and said the Department of Justice had “no case whatsoever.”

“Further, the DOJ has no place inserting itself into reviewing campaign communications and their meddling in such matters represents a grave danger to the First Amendment and should seriously concern all campaigns and Americans,” he said.>

<On Tuesday, Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama celebrated the fact that his state will receive $1.4 billion in federal funding to expand access to the internet statewide.

"Broadband is vital for the success of our rural communities and for our entire economy," he wrote. "Great to see Alabama receive crucial funds to boost ongoing broadband efforts."

The wrinkle: nearly two years ago, Tuberville voted against the bill that's providing that money.

The funding comes from the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program, an initiative established under the Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration and authorized by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which was signed into law in late 2021.

On Monday, the White House announced state allocations for more than $42 billion in funding, allowing states to administer grants to develop high-speed internet.

At $1.4 billion, Alabama is receiving more than all but six states in funding under the program.

Tuberville joined most other Senate Republicans in opposing the bipartisan infrastructure law in 2021, declaring in a statement that his state "needs a robust investment in real infrastructure" but that the bill is "loaded with giveaways to big cities and pet projects that have little to do with real infrastructure."

"I've said all along I'd be for a bill that invests every penny of every dollar in improvements to our roads, bridges, waterways, and rural broadband," Tuberville said at the time. "Unfortunately, Democrats have missed an opportunity to deliver the bill that the American people truly need."

Democratic Rep. Terri Sewell of Alabama — the only member of the delegation to vote for the 2021 bill — was quick to note the apparent hypocrisy.

But Tuberville spokesman Steven Stafford argued that the senator simply wants his state to get their "fair share" of federal funding, now that the bill has become law.

"Coach voted against the infrastructure bill because it wasted Alabamians' tax dollars. It spent too much to get too little in return for Alabama," said Stafford. "But now that it is [the] law of the land, the people of Alabama deserve their fair share. Coach is proud to advocate for this funding to go to Alabama."

Tuberville has long styled himself as a proponent for rural broadband.

He's advocated for including expanding rural broadband as part of an upcoming farm bill, and he introduced legislation earlier this year to shield broadband grants from being taxed as income.

In a recent floor speech, Tuberville said that his top priority as the ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee's Subcommittee on Rural Development and Energy is "expanding broadband access to unserved populations who need it most so our rural communities are not left behind.">

<On March 25, 1945, the United States Army issued “Fact Sheet #64: Fascism!” to promote discussions amongst American troops about fascism as the war in Europe wound down to a close. Discussion leaders were alerted “Fascism is not the easiest thing to identify and analyze; nor, once in power, is it easy to destroy. It is important for our future and that of the world that as many of us as possible understand the causes and practices of fascism, in order to combat it.”

It is worth revisiting the Army’s warnings as Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans denounce legal due process and threaten civil war.

Four key points were addressed in the Army fact sheet to be included in discussions.

(1) Fascism is more apt to come to power at a time of economic crisis;

(2) Fascism inevitably leads to war;

(3) It can come to any country;

(4) We can best combat it by making our democracy work.

The fact sheet described findings by war correspondent Cecil Brown who toured the United States after leaving Europe. Brown discovered that most Americans he talked with were “vague about just what fascism really means. He found few Americans who were confident they would recognize a fascist if they saw one.” The War Department was concerned that ignorance about fascism could make it possible for it to emerge in the United States and issued recommendations for how to prevent it.

As a simple definition, the War Department described fascism as the “opposite of democracy. The people run democratic governments, but fascist governments run the people. Fascism is government by the few and for the few.” Fascists remain in power through “skillful manipulation of fear and hate, and by false promise of security . . . At the very time that the fascists proclaimed that their party was the party of the ‘average citizen,’ they were in the pay of certain big industrialists and financiers . . . They played political, religious, social, and economic groups against each other and seized power while these groups struggled against each other.”

The War Department acknowledged that the United States had:

"native fascists who say that they are ‘100 percent American’ . . . [A]t various times and places in our history, we have had sorry instances of mob sadism, lynchings, vigilantism, terror, and suppression of civil liberties. We have had our hooded gangs, Black Legions, Silver Shirts, and racial and religious bigots. All of them, in the name of Americanism, have used undemocratic methods and doctrines which experience has shown can be properly identified as ‘fascist’."

The War Department warned:

"An American fascist seeking power would not proclaim that he is a fascist. Fascism always camouflages its plans and purposes . . . Any fascist attempt to gain power in America would not use the exact Hitler pattern. It would work under the guise of ‘super-patriotism’ and ‘super-American- ism’."....>

<....The War Department identified three attitudes and practices that fascists share in common.

Fascists pit “religious, racial, and economic groups against one another in order to break down national unity . . . In the United States, native fascists have often been anti-Catholic, anti-Jew, anti-Negro, anti-Labor, anti- foreign-born.”

Fascists also “deny the need for international cooperation” and that “all people — regardless of color, race, creed, or nationality have rights.” They “substitute a perverted sort of ultra-nationalism which tells their people that they are the only people in the world who count.”

Finally, for fascists, the “[i]ndiscriminate pinning of the label ‘Red’ on people and proposals which one opposes is a common political device.”

Learning to identify American fascists and detect their techniques was not going to be easy, but

"it is vitally important to learn to spot them, even though they adopt names and slogans with popular appeal, drape themselves with the American flag, and attempt to carry out their program in the name of the democracy they are trying to destroy . . . In its bid for power, it is ready to drive wedges that will disunite the people and weaken the nation. It supplies the scapegoat — Catholics, Jews, Negroes, labor unions, big business — any group upon which the insecure and unemployed"

are willing to blame.

"They become frightened, angry, desperate, confused. Many, in their misery, seek to find somebody to blame . . . The resentment may be directed against minorities — especially if undemocratic organizations with power and money can direct our emotions and thinking along these lines."

The goal of the fascist doctrine is to prevent “men from seeking the real cause and a democratic solution to the problem.”

Fascists may talk about freedom, but

"freedom . . . involves being alert and on guard against the infringement not only of our own freedom but the freedom of every American. If we permit discrimination, prejudice, or hate to rob anyone of his democratic rights, our own freedom and all democracy is threatened.">

<Former Congresswoman Liz Cheney thinks that US politics is fundamentally broken at a time when the nation faces critical challenges.

"What we've done in our politics is create a situation where we're electing idiots," Cheney told David Rubenstein during a Monday conversation at 92nd in New York.

Rubenstein pressed Cheney on if she would run for president as an independent if it meant that she could hurt former President Donald Trump's chances of retaking the White House. Cheney, who has been unsparing in her criticisms of Trump, did not directly address that tantalizing possibility.

"I don't look at it through the lens of this is what I should or shouldn't do, I look through it through the lens of, how do we elect serious people?" she responded. "Electing serious people can't be partisan. Because of the situation we're in where we have a major party candidate that is trying to undermine our democracy, and I don't say that lightly, we have to think about the kinds of alliances necessary to defeat him."

Cheney made it clear that amid talk of a potential third-party bid, she has absolutely no interest in doing "anything that could help Donald Trump."

Once thought of as a potential House Speaker, Cheney was booted from office after her 37-point drubbing at the hands of now-Rep. Harriet Hageman in the Republican primary. Trump and other senior Republicans, including now-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy strongly supported Hageman's challenge. Cheney alienated many in her party by voting in favor of Trump's second impeachment and later agreeing to serve on the House January 6 committee. She remains unrepentant about either of those decisions.

As for Trump, Cheney continues to believe the 45th President of the United States is a danger both to his party and the nation as a whole. A daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, the former congresswoman thinks the party of Lincoln will crumble if the GOP renominates Trump as its presidential nominee.

"We're at a moment in our country where there is a tectonic shift going on in our politics," Liz Cheney said. "And, I think in particular if the Republican Party — I'm not sure if it is salvageable now — if the Republican Party nominates Donald Trump it will shatter and we will have a whole new politics, as we should.">

<As detailed in historian George Fredrickson's landmark book "Racism: A Short History," there is a complex and overlapping relationship between the "religious" antisemitism of the European Middle Ages, the racist and white supremacist project of white-on-black chattel slavery, colonialism, imperialism, and then the Nazism and racial antisemitism of the 20th century. This translates into a type of path dependency, if not inevitable outcome: As the "conservative" movement becomes increasingly racist and white supremacist, it then becomes increasingly antisemitic.

On this, Halie Soifer wrote in a 2022 essay at Haaretz that:

Where antisemitic hate speech once triggered near-universal and immediate condemnation across the political spectrum, that is no longer the case. Today's rise of antisemitism has been largely met with silence, or worse, an embrace or tacit acceptance by the Republican Party.

We saw this after Trump's ominous warning to Jews in mid-October to "get their act together…before it's too late," which not one Republican condemned. Shortly thereafter, Business Insider contacted 38 Republicans, in and out of Congress, to ask why they have been unwilling to publicly reject antisemitism. Their responses included "silence, deflection, and rehashing old statements," generously summarized as "minimal outcry."

While extremism may have once been relegated to the fringes of American society, today it has found a political home in the Republican Party.

Racism is not some type of buffet to be picked and chosen from or a value and belief that can be siloed or neatly switched on and off when convenient. In reality, racism is a way of thinking and being in the world that has a profound influence, both consciously and subconsciously, across a range of behaviors. Public opinion research, for instance, has repeatedly shown that white racial resentment heavily influences support for Republican candidates. Moreover, social scientists have also shown that a given white person's feeling of warmth and closeness to Black and brown people is one of the defining factors that influence support for the Democratic Party. The Republican Party and Donald Trump benefit from the opposite dynamic, whereby a white person's hostility and antipathy towards Black and brown people is predictive of support.

Of critical importance is how in response to the victories of the Civil Rights movement and Black Freedom Struggle, the Republican Party embraced what is known as the Southern Strategy, which involves racist "dog whistles" as well as more overt appeals to white racism and racial resentment as a way of winning over and keeping white voters.

As Donald Trump finally faces serious consequences for his decades-long crime spree, he has become more antisemitic. This is true more generally for the MAGA movement, the Republican Party, and the larger right wing during the Trumpocene – but especially since the coup attempt on Jan. 6, and now the indictments of Donald Trump and his cabal for his and their crimes against democracy and society. Trump will only become more bold and gross as the 2024 presidential election approaches and the walls of justice close in.

Antisemitism, like other forms of racism and white supremacy, must be exposed and directly engaged if it is to be driven out of American life.

Following his arrest and indictment in Miami for allegedly violating the Espionage Act, Donald Trump flew back to his golf resort in New Jersey, where in a speech to his MAGA cultists, the traitor ex-president railed against special counsel Jack Smith with racist and antisemitic tropes and stereotypes, as Chris Walker detailed in Truthout:

Citing the special counsel's remarkable legal bona fides, Trump somehow spun those attributes to formulate an attack against Smith that only his supporters would seemingly understand. He even appeared to suggest that Smith's work at the International Criminal Court was somehow indicative of his failings as a lawyer.

"It's no wonder this raging lunatic was shipped off to The Hague to prosecute warfare rules using globalist tribunals not beholden to the Constitution, or the rule of law," Trump told his adoring supporters.

Notably, Trump's criticism of Smith included the antisemitic "globalist" terminology, which alludes to a conspiracy theory that alleges Jewish elites are trying to run the affairs of the world behind the scenes. The anti-Jewish attacks against Smith, whose religious faith is not well-documented, isn't new territory for Trump, writer David Margolick, writing an op-ed for The Nation earlier this year, has noted.

Trump has attacked Smith many times by insinuating his real name isn't actually "Smith," and that he changed it — a charge that could be construed as an anti-Jewish dog whistle, Margolick said, noting that historically, bigots have viewed Jews changing their names as "evidence of a plot."....>

<....Indeed, Trump has used the attack before: in 2013, he used similar language to malign comedian Jon Stewart, to suggest he shouldn't be viewed as a trustworthy news source. "If Jon Stewart is so above it all & legit, why did he change his name from Jonathan Leibowitz[?]" Trump asked on social media at the time.

Trump's fundraising emails and other communications are also filled with antisemitic themes and threats that mirror the infamous Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other racist and white supremacist hate tracts. Such themes in Trump's and his allies' messaging include the conspiracy lie that there is a "deep state" that controls "the Democrats" and "the liberal media" through "globalist" "puppet masters" who are secretly "pulling the strings" and controlling the world and forcing the "Woke agenda" on "patriotic" Americans with the goal of making the country "socialist" or "communist"." Trump and the larger right-wing are also obsessed with George Soros (a Democratic Party donor who happens to be Jewish and a Holocaust survivor) and routinely launch antisemitic attacks on him.

Donald Trump and other leading Republicans have associated with and given other aid and comfort to neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other antisemites. Such hatemongers now claim today's Republican Party as their natural home.

At the Guardian, Moustafa Bayoumi summarizes:

Who remembers how, in 2018 and just days before the deadliest attack on Jewish people in US history, a prominent US politician tweeted: "We cannot allow Soros, Steyer, and Bloomberg to BUY this election!"? The tweet was widely – and correctly – understood as dangerously antisemitic, particularly heinous in a period of rising anti-Jewish hatred. And whose tweet was this? If you thought the answer was Minnesota's Democratic representative Ilhan Omar then, well, you'd be wrong. The author was none other than the House majority leader at the time, Republican Kevin McCarthy.

And who can forget when Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has tweeted that "Joe Biden is Hitler", speculated that the wildfires in California were caused by a beam from "space solar generators" linked to "Rothschild, Inc.", a clear wink to bizarre antisemitic conspiracy theories. Incidentally, Greene, who has a long record of antisemitic and anti-Muslim statements, has been recently appointed, by the same Kevin McCarthy, now speaker of the House, to the homeland security committee.

Then there's former president Donald Trump, who dines with Holocaust deniers like Nick Fuentes and antisemites like Ye. In stereotypically anti-Jewish moves, Trump has repeatedly called the loyalty of Jewish Americans into question. Just this past October, he wrote that "U.S. Jews have to get their act together and appreciate what they have in Israel – Before it is too late!"

In case it's not obvious, let me state it plainly. Today's Republican party has a serious antisemitism problem. The easy acceptance and amplification of all sorts of anti-Jewish hate that party leaders engage in emboldens all the worst bigots, raving racists, and far-right extremists across the globe, all the while threatening Jewish people here and everywhere....>

<....Trump's "America First" MAGA movement slogan has its origins in the American Nazi movement of the 1930s, as New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait recounts:

Trump resurrected Buchanan's strain of populist nationalism. He's always nurtured business relations and personal ties with Jewish people, but his revival of "America First" — both the slogan and the ideas surrounding it — inevitably excited antisemites. In 2016, he tweeted out an image using a Star of David to symbolize Hillary Clinton's "corruption." The Trump campaign tweeted an altered version after an outcry but then ran an ad in the campaign's closing days decrying "a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities" coupled with images of Janet Yellen, George Soros, and Lloyd Blankfein — all of whom are financial figures who happen to be Jewish.

In the United States, antisemitism has been especially deadly in the Age of Trump and beyond. Hate crimes against the Jewish community are at their highest in decades. A mass shooter who targeted the Jewish community was convicted this month in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. The Department of Homeland Security and other law enforcement continue to warn that white supremacist and other right-wing extremists pose the greatest threat to the country's domestic safety. To wit, neo-Nazis and other racial fascists played a prominent role in the Jan. 6 coup attempt and attack on the Capitol.

Antisemitism has become such a public danger in the Age of Trump and beyond that President Biden recently announced the first ever national strategy to confront such prejudice and hatred.

"It sends a clear and forceful message. In America, evil will not win. Hate will not prevail," the president said. "The venom and violence of antisemitism will not be the story of our time."

A 2022 Quinnipiac University public opinion poll shows that despite the rise in antisemitic violence and other forms of hostility, a majority of Republicans do not believe that antisemitism is a threat to Jewish people in America. By comparison, a large majority of Democrats believe that it is. Relatedly, a majority of white Republicans (particularly Trump supporters) believe in the absurd white supremacist conspiracy theory that white people are being "replaced" or are in danger of "extinction" by non-white people in America and Europe as orchestrated by "globalists" and "elites". Likewise, a majority of white Republican voters, Trump supporters, and right-leaning independents also believe that white people — and not Black and brown people — are somehow the "real victims" of racism in America.

Antisemitism, like other forms of racism and white supremacy, must be exposed and directly engaged if it is to be driven out of American life. When Trump or one of his MAGA spokespeople or some other member of today's right-wing "conservative" movement summons up language about "the globalists" and/or "George Soros" and "the deep state" and "puppet masters," simply replace those words and phrases with "Jews." Their claims and language still cohere but the antisemitic intent and menace behind them are revealed. Naked without the camouflage of rhetorical evasion or semantic smokescreens, the implicit and implied are made explicit and clear.>

<Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has rolled out a new campaign proposal in his attempt to outflank former President Donald Trump from the right: abolish birthright citizenship, or the principle that those born in the United States are citizens of the United States regardless of their parents' status.

The problem is, that's actually a constitutional protection, not a law that can be summarily repealed — and even DeSantis' move to push the issue can hurt him with voters — according to an analysis by the Miami Herald.

"Legal experts — and even some Republicans — are skeptical of the proposal, which would likely run into legal hurdles," reported Max Greenwood and Ana Ceballos. "'It’s unrealistic,' Republican former U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo, who condemned Trump’s proposal in 2018, told the Herald. 'It wouldn’t even solve much considering most people who immigrate illegally are seeking economic opportunity — not the opportunity to birth citizens.' He warned that 'It can get you some attention in a GOP primary, but it will have a cost with Hispanic voters and swing voters in a general election.' And even Sen. Rick Scott, DeSantis' predecessor, dodged the question of whether he supports ending birthright citizenship, saying securing the border should be the priority."

Birthright citizenship around the world varies, but broadly speaking, most countries in the western hemisphere guarantee birthright citizenship, while most countries in the eastern hemisphere do not — a practice that dates back to the European empires creating legal incentives for people to move to their colonial holdings in the New World. In the United States, however, birthright citizenship comes from the 14th Amendment, which was passed by Congress in the aftermath of the Civil War to overturn the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision, which held that Black people in America are not citizens and lack standing to sue for their rights.

DeSantis has claimed that the amendment was not intended to also automatically apply to the children of immigrants; but experts have broadly said this is wrong. A review of the congressional debate surrounding the 14th Amendment's adoption in 1866 shows that lawmakers were clearly aware the amendment would impact immigration as well, with some nativist senators like Edgar Cowan (D-PA) opposing the amendment for that very reason.

In order to end birthright citizenship, noted the report, DeSantis "will have to face the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states that 'all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.'" University of Miami law professor Kunal Parker told the Herald that the language of the 14th Amendment is "actually pretty clear," and "said that doing away with birthright citizenship would likely require amending the U.S. Constitution," which takes two-thirds of Congress to approve and three-quarters of states to ratify.

Trump himself has previously pledged he would end birthright citizenship if re-elected, but similarly didn't offer clear details. In 2019, while in office, he claimed he was looking at abolishing the right, but the matter never went anywhere after that.>

<Former President Donald Trump filed a new lawsuit against E. Jean Carroll this week, claiming that the writer defamed him by saying that he raped her after a civil jury "only" found him liable for sexual abuse, rather than rape, in her previous defamation suit against him.

However, this case will be a nonstarter, argued former federal prosecutor Shan Wu on CNN Wednesday.

"Do you think Trump has a case here?" asked anchor Bianna Golodryga.

"No. That is a frivolous lawsuit," said Wu, adding, "It is surprising his lawyers would advise him or let him do that. I mean, it is a very silly distinction. It is the equivalent of saying, the jury found that I was dumb. She's calling me stupid. I'm not stupid. They said I was dumb. That is a meaningless distinction."

Moreover, Wu continued, this lawsuit could backfire on Trump by opening him up to more legal challenges against himself — particularly as Carroll herself weighs a second defamation suit of her own against the former president, after he used his recent CNN town hall in New Hampshire to repeat several of the claims against her that the jury found false.

"It is simply opening him up to relitigate the entire sexual abuse issue," said Wu. "And frankly, with the statements he's probably going to make to support this, opens him up to more defamation claims too.">

<Lawmakers are looking ahead to the 2024 election as a pivotal opportunity to shape the future of the Supreme Court because of the possibility that conservative Justices Clarence Thomas, 75, and Samuel Alito, 73, could retire.

Democrats are worried that if Biden loses and the GOP wins the Senate majority, it could allow a GOP president to replace both men with younger conservatives who could rule far into the future.

“It’s critical. President Biden, who I feel confident will be reelected, needs to be able to put more judges on the bench, federal judges, including Supreme Court. It is absolutely critical that the Senate remain in Democratic hands,” said Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), who will retire at the end of next year.

Stabenow warned that if Republicans flip the White House and Senate and replace Thomas and Alito with younger conservatives, “it would be devastating for anyone who cares about privacy and their own personal freedom,” alluding to last year’s 6-3 Supreme Court opinion that overturned the constitutional right to an abortion and raised questions about other rights protected by the 14th Amendment.

Republicans also see high stakes in next year’s elections because of the court.

“Probably the next president will have a chance to appoint another member of the court,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “I expect that you’d see, over the course between now and the end of the next [presidential] term, probably another retirement or two.”

Hawley said replacing older conservatives such as Thomas and Alito with younger ones could create an “enduring majority,” but he cautioned that it’s tough to predict how a justice’s opinions might evolve over years on the Supreme Court.

“Republicans have had the majority of Supreme Court appointments for decades now and have not succeeded in getting a stable conservative majority on that court until very recently,” he said. “Does the next election matter for the court? I think it really does. I don’t know how much of a [conservative] majority it is. I don’t know how stable it is.”

Republican appointees now hold a 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court, with Chief Justice John Roberts, 68, emerging as the most likely swing vote since the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy in 2018.

Among the Democratic appointees, Obama-nominated Justice Sonia Sotomayor, 69, is the oldest. Justice Elena Kagan, another Obama appointee, is 63 and Ketanji Brown Jackson, whom President Biden put on the court, is 52.

The remaining three justices, Neil Gorsuch, 55, Brett Kavanaugh, 58, and Amy Coney Barrett, 51, were appointed by former President Trump.

The Supreme Court’s importance to the balance of political power in the United States was underscored once again Tuesday, when a 6-3 majority ruled to reject a legal theory that would have given state legislatures nearly unlimited power to set rules for federal elections, without judicial restraint.

It was another decision that showed justices don’t always march in line with the party of the president who appointed them. Roberts wrote the majority opinion, which was joined by the court’s three liberals as well as Coney Barrett and Kavanaugh. Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch dissented.

The conservative majority now on the court is likely to be there for some time, regardless of what happens with Alito and Thomas.

An analysis of the court’s projected composition by academics at three prestigious schools suggested the next time the majority of justices will be appointed by a Democrat is likely to be around 2065.

It found that the Democrats’ failure to confirm Obama-nominee Merrick Garland in 2016, combined with the death in 2016 of liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who was quickly replaced by Trump, “reduced its likely control of the court by about 19 years out of the next 100 and increased the number of years until the party takes control again by 36 years.” ....>

<....The study caught the attention of judicial reform advocates on both sides of the ideological spectrum who say it further highlights the stakes of next year’s presidential and Senate races.

“I do think that the 2024 election is important. I do think Alito and Thomas will be getting up there in age, and there’s quite a real possibility that replacements for them could be in order in the next four-year presidential window,” said Brian Fallon, co-founder and executive director of Demand Justice, which seeks to restore “ideological balance and legitimacy” to the courts.

Fallon noted that prominent Republicans dropped hints about wanting to see Thomas retire while Trump was president.

“It’s hugely important to win the upcoming election, and I think the court will be more salient of an issue than ever,” he said. “It’s important to win the next election because if there is going be an opportunity to replace a Thomas or Alito, you don’t want to miss it by not winning a Senate race here or there and preventing us from filling a seat. But we shouldn’t delude ourselves into thinking that the court’s balance is going to be shifted anytime soon just by winning a few elections.”

Carrie Campbell Severino, the president of JCN, a conservative advocacy group that favors “the Founders’ vision of a nation of limited government” observed that “if the next president has the opportunity to appoint a Supreme Court justice, that person could easily serve another 30 years.”

She also questioned whether a conservative majority on the Supreme Court will really last as long as some studies have predicted. “It strikes me as pretty optimistic,” she said.

Senate Democrats have an uphill battle to keep their majority after the 2024 election; they have to defend three highly vulnerable seats in Ohio, Montana and West Virginia, while Republicans don’t have any seats in real danger of flipping.

Democrats also have to worry about the future of independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s (Ariz.) seat, which now counts in the Democrats’ column for the purpose of determining the majority. She hasn’t said whether she will run for reelection.

The battle for the White House is also seen as a jump ball.

A Morning Consult poll published Tuesday showed Trump leading Biden in a hypothetical matchup for the first time, 44% to 41%.

The same poll showed Trump trouncing his nearest Republican rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, 57% to 19%, among 3,650 potential Republican primary voters nationwide.

A Morning Consult poll in April showed Biden leading Trump by 1 percentage point.>

Or not; but I will behave with flagrant disregard for laws:

<In audio evidence subpoenaed by special counsel Jack Smith, Donald Trump can be heard discussing what he called a “highly confidential” and “secret” document related to a potential attack on Iran. Trump acknowledges on the recording that as an ex-president he no longer had the authority to declassify the information.

Federal prosecutors included portions of that transcribed conversation in their indictment of the former president earlier this month. On Tuesday, CNN obtained and broadcast the audio. It was Mark Meadows, Trump’s final White House chief of staff, however, who first acknowledged the existence of the documents in questions.

Meadows wrote about it in his book published in December of 2021. In his memoir, “The Chief’s Chief,” Meadows writes that U.S. Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, accused Trump of seeking war with Iran as part of a plot of to extend his presidency. Meadows maintains that it was Milley, and not Trump, who was eager for war. Public assertions to the contrary, he writes, are part of the general’s ongoing effort to “trash” Trump.

For proof, Meadows refers to a “plan to attack Iran” drawn up by Milley, and while he writes that Trump acknowledged the existence of such a document, the former chief of staff makes no mention of whether it remained classified.

“The president recalls a four-page report typed up by Mark Milley himself. It contained the general’s own plan to attack Iran, deploying massive numbers of troops, something he urged President Trump to do more than once during his presidency,” Meadows wrote.

In a recording of that conversation, the former president did more than just recall such a document. He allegedly produced it. “He said that I wanted to attack Iran, isn’t it amazing?” Trump said of Milley as shuffling paper can be heard. “I have a big pile of papers, this thing just came up. Look. This was him. They presented me this – this is off the record but – they presented me this. This was him. This was the Defense Department and him.”

“This was done by the military and given to me,” Trump can be heard saying. Then he acknowledged that the document remained classified. “See as president I could have declassified it,” he said. “Now I can’t, you know, but this is still a secret.”

According to the indictment, the conversation took place at Trump’s Bedminster resort in July of 2021 when the former president spoke to an unnamed writer, a publisher, and two Trump staffers. The special counsel alleges that each was shown classified information. CNN later reported that the writer in question was a ghost writer employed by Meadows.

That account largely coincides with what Meadows published in his memoir, although he makes no mention of staff or ghost writers. He indicates that he spoke in person with the former president personally, noting for instance that “the sound of children laughing” could be heard “from the club’s pool.” He added of that conversation that “a few minutes in, I realized that refuting” criticism of Trump’s time in office point-by-point would have been impossible.

A founder of the staunchly conservative House Freedom Caucus, Meadows became a close ally of Trump while in Congress before resigning his seat to join the administration and serve as his final White House chief of staff. According to recent reports, however, Trump’s inner circle has grown distrustful and wary that Meadows is cooperating with federal investigators. For his part, the South Carolina Republican has increasingly kept a low profile.

Meadows told RealClearPolitics in a June 2021 interview that his relationship with Trump was healthy. “I'm one that talks to the president,” he said just one month before the recording of Trump at Bedminster was made, “more than just about anybody.”....>

<....Out of office, the former chief of staff and the president shared a particular distaste for one specific individual. “President Trump did,” Meadows writes, “reserve special scorn for General Mark Milley, who, as of this writing, is still on his apology tour of the country, trashing the president.”

And Meadows takes care throughout the memoir to recount several moments from the Trump administration where Milley was allegedly working to undercut the White House.

The former chief of staff writes that Trump requested one thing from him as Meadows wrote his memoir. “The president asked only that I get the truth out with this book,” he writes. “That’s what I’m attempting to do.”

The New York Times reported that Margot Martin, a longtime Trump aide, confirmed that a meeting had occurred under questioning by a grand jury. The special counsel, according to the Times, later subpoenaed her copy of the tape.

The Trump campaign insisted after the audio was released that it proved “once again, that President Trump did nothing wrong at all.” In an interview with Bret Baier of Fox News last week, Trump insisted that there was no classified information shared during the meeting, just news articles.

“There was no document,” Trump told Baier. “That was a massive amount of papers and everything else talking about Iran and other things. And it may have been held up or may not, but that was not a document.”

“I didn’t have a document per se. There was nothing to declassify,” he continued. “These were newspaper stories, magazine stories and articles.”

Meadows did not return RCP requests for an on-the-record comment. It is not unusual, however, for former administration officials to submit books and publications for review by the National Security Council. Such a process is meant to prevent the possibility of improperly revealing classified information. It is not known whether Meadows underwent such a process.

The former chief of staff is clear on one point. He closes the prologue of his 2021 memoir by writing that Trump’s return to politics was imminent “and I don’t envy anyone who dares stand against him.”>

<For years, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, has crusaded for stakeholder capitalism, the idea that business leaders should value the well-being of people and the planet along with the interests of shareholders.

These “woke” beliefs – Salesforce offered to relocate employees concerned about being able to get an abortion in Texas, stopped selling software to retailers that stock military-style rifles and Benioff spoke out against Georgia and North Carolina for passing laws that would allow LGBTQ+ discrimination – have gotten this activist CEO in hot water with conservatives who say he’s sacrificing profits for politics.

But Benioff hasn’t backed off. Last fall, Salesforce sided with Harvard University and the University of North Carolina in a pair of cases before the Supreme Court challenging the practice of considering race in admissions to build diversity on college campuses.

Start the day smarter. Get all the news you need in your inbox each morning.

In a 6-3 decision written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the high court on Thursday struck down affirmative action in college admissions.

The decision is limited to higher education and won’t directly affect employers like Salesforce, which are governed by a different statute. But the ripple effects from the ruling could come quickly, starting with a decline in college graduates from underrepresented backgrounds, meaning the loss of "a pipeline of highly qualified future workers and business leaders," companies from Google to General Electric warned the Supreme Court.

Legal experts say the move to restrict affirmative action could also lead to more challenges in how corporations make hiring and promotion decisions.

What’s more, the affirmative action reversal could emerge as the latest flashpoint in the nation's culture wars. Observers expect the ruling to embolden attacks on corporate diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives as tensions rise over how corporate America should address lingering workplace inequality.

In response, companies are holding discussions and contemplating changes to diversity programs. Some are second-guessing setting public targets for racial diversity in their executive ranks or running leadership training programs exclusively for underrepresented groups. Others are wondering if they should remove “diversity” from job titles to avoid scrutiny.

But many employers – including Salesforce – say they plan to stay the course.

The company says one of its core values is equality and it has built diversity initiatives from recruiting individuals from underrepresented backgrounds to creating an employee advocacy program for people of color that take into account that talent is spread evenly but opportunity is not.

“We don’t waver,” Salesforce Chief Equality Officer Lori Castillo Martinez told USA TODAY. “Equality is our value and that is something we will continue to focus on, especially in these challenging times.”....>

<....Affirmative action decision will increase scrutiny of diversity programs Coming as conservative groups push back against diversity programs and consumers vent frustrations over corporations becoming more vocal on progressive issues like LGBTQ+ rights, abortion and racial equity, the Supreme Court decision will likely invite greater scrutiny of the strategies companies use to increase diversity, according to Andrew Turnbull, a labor and employment partner at law firm Morrison & Foerster.

Federal law prohibits employers from considering race and other protected characteristics in employment decisions. Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, on the other hand, help employers make their workforces less homogeneous and their workplaces more inclusive by casting a wide net for qualified workers from different backgrounds, Turnbull said.

“We may see an increase in challenges to those programs because some employees may incorrectly assume this means that their employers can no longer have workplace affirmative action or DEI programs,” he said.

The debate swirling around diversity programs has increased the possibility that corporations will be hit with discrimination lawsuits – from those who support these initiatives and those who oppose them.

In the decade from 2011 to 2021, the number of reverse discrimination claims filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dropped from about 4,000 to 2,000 a year, according to data USA TODAY obtained from the EEOC. While white people account for about two-thirds of U.S. workers, those claims made up about 10% of overall race-based discrimination claims.

Lawyers see an uptick in reverse discrimination claims as GOP backlash escalates

But Turnbull says lawyers are seeing an uptick in reverse discrimination claims. Earlier this month, a federal jury in New Jersey ordered Starbucks to pay $25.6 million to a former regional manager after determining that the company fired her because she was white.

As the GOP backlash increasingly targets the private sector, legislative challenges to diversity policies in red states are also proliferating, Turnbull said.

Much depends on how employers respond to the ruling, said Stanford law professor Richard Thompson Ford. Robert's majority opinion leaves room for colleges to consider how race affected an applicant's life.

"As far as I know workplace DEI is individualized so even if the court’s logic were applied to workplace programs, it would not seem to prohibit the kinds of policies most employers use," he said.

Few employers engage in the type of affirmative action that was used by selective colleges and universities, according to Ford.

“It is lawful for employers to affirmatively recruit people so that they have the widest range of applicants and pick the most talented candidates,” said Amalea Smirniotopoulos, senior policy counsel at NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “I don’t think that will change.”

Affirmative action is latest GOP target after CRT and ESG

Corporations have turned to diversity programs to right decades of lost opportunities for Black people and other groups who have been historically underrepresented, especially in leadership roles. Those efforts intensified following the 2020 killing of George Floyd.

Pledges from corporations to address racial inequities drew a sharp backlash, from legislation in GOP-controlled state houses restricting how corporations talk to employees about racism to the targeting of trillions of dollars in investments that take into account ESG, short for environmental, social and governance principles.

If there is any sense in these C-suites, companies will take this as the catalyst, the catapult, the warning they need to get back to not discriminating.

The Supreme Court ruling is a warning to corporate elites to stop foisting their liberal agenda on the nation, said Scott Shepard, director of the National Center for Public Policy Research’s Free Enterprise Project....>

<....In August, the conservative think tank sued Starbucks executives and directors on behalf of a Starbucks shareholder, claiming that by setting hiring goals for Black people and other people of color, awarding contracts to diverse suppliers and tying executive pay to diversity, the coffee chain is engaging in racial discrimination.

Stephen Miller’s America First Legal has filed complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission asking for investigations into the hiring and employment practices at companies including Starbucks, McDonald's and Morgan Stanley.

“If there is any sense in these C-suites, companies will take this as the catalyst, the catapult, the warning they need to get back to not discriminating,” Shepard said.

Affirmative action ruling chilling effect? ‘I’m already seeing this downturn in DEI’

Natalie Gillard, who created Factuality – an employee training tool used by companies such as Google, Nike and American Express – says she’s worried the affirmative action decision will have a chilling effect, much like President Trump’s 2020 executive order banning the U.S. government and federal contractors from teaching employees about systemic racism caused some private employers to pause training.

“I'm already seeing this downturn around DEI efforts in institutions, organizations and corporations,” said Gillard, who has lost business in Florida and Texas where public universities are barred from spending money on diversity programs.

Alvin B. Tillery Jr., director of the Center for the Study of Democracy and Diversity at Northwestern University, says he’s concerned about what conservatives may have planned next. He expects they will double down on efforts to rid the public sector of affirmative action, from government hiring to contracting.

“Supplier diversity programs and federal contracting, that’s the big prize,” said Tillery, founder of the 2040 Strategy Group, which works closely with Fortune 500 clients. “It's really about taking away set-aside programs and racial equity programs, including at the local government level. Those are things that have a much bigger impact on society than affirmative action at colleges.”

Will big businesses like Apple, Google, Nike and Starbucks back off diversity efforts?

Last fall, some of the nation’s largest companies, including Apple, Google parent Alphabet and Starbucks, filed briefs siding with colleges and universities that consider race as one of the factors in their admissions process....>

<...."Racial and ethnic diversity enhance business performance," the companies told the Supreme Court. "Research and experience demonstrate that racial diversity improves decision-making by increasing creativity, communication, and accuracy within teams."

Our clients are coming to us, not saying how do we stop this, but saying, how do we educate our team around why this is still important.

Will corporate America shrink from diversity initiatives under growing pressure from the political right? Evelyn Carter, president of diversity firm Paradigm, doubts it.

A Bain & Company survey of CEOs showed that 85% of the nearly 300 business leaders view social issues − labor standards, human rights, DEI, health; and product safety − as “urgent” concerns for their companies. When asked about the primary role of their business, 60% said either creating “positive outcomes for society” or “balancing the needs of all stakeholders.”

“Our clients are coming to us, not saying how do we stop this, but saying, how do we educate our team around why this is still important,” Carter said.

Corporations are just starting to see the benefits from the progress they’ve made in diversifying their workforces and leadership, said Lanaya Irvin, CEO of Coqual, a think tank that researches workplace diversity, equity and inclusion.

Data shows that corporate America still has very little diversity, especially at the top.

White men represent 7 in 10 executives at the very top of the nation’s 100 largest publicly traded companies, according to a USA TODAY analysis of named executive officers. In fact, they are even more likely today than their grandfathers to be managers despite a diversifying workforce.

“It’s definitely not time to take one’s foot off the gas or to retrench,” Irvin said.

Nike CEO John Donahoe recently commended Bob Iger for standing up Walt Disney’s values in a spat over LGBTQ legislation with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who announced his presidential campaign late last month.

Corporations should pick their battles but speak out on issues that are “core to who you are,” Donahoe said.

For Nike, that means standing up for the values of racial and social justice, according to Donahoe.

“Our core consumer for the Nike brand, the Jordan Brand, the converse brand, are urban Black and brown communities – that’s where sneaker culture started,” Donahoe said during the CNBC CEO Council Summit last month. “We listen to our athletes and to our consumer about what they care about and they care about racial and social justice and so we view that as core to who we are, core to our identity.”>

<Former Vice President Mike Pence bizarrely pointed to his own white family of college graduates while praising the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision Thursday to end affirmative action across most institutions of higher education.

Colleges and universities across the country have had affirmative action policies in place for decades in order to promote more racially diverse student bodies.

Speaking from Ukraine on Thursday, the 2024 Republican presidential contender told MSNBC’s Dasha Burns that he was “grateful to see the conservative majority that we helped build on the Supreme Court of the United States bring an end to most of affirmative action.”

“There may have been a time 50 years ago when we needed to affirmatively take steps to correct long-term racial bias in institutions of higher education,” Pence added. “But I can tell you, as the father of three college graduates, those days are long over.”

“And I’m grateful today that the Supreme Court took us one step back to that America that will judge every man and woman on the content of their character and on their own achievement, and leave race out of consideration of admissions to higher education,” Pence said.

Proponents of affirmative action largely envision a future when such corrective policies are no longer needed. But critics of the Supreme Court decision — including the high court’s liberal justices — firmly argue that time has not yet come and that Thursday’s decision will only serve to hinder progress toward racial equality in the United States. The president of the American Medical Association, for example, said the decision “undermines the health of our nation” by making it more difficult to raise the numbers of nonwhite medical students; nonwhite medical professionals have been shown to help alleviate health care inequities among marginalized groups.

The Supreme Court’s opinions left open the possibility of implementing affirmative action in military academy admissions. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts argued in a footnote that military schools likely have “potentially distinct interests” from most others, a point Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson called “particularly awkward.” >

<Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) issued a letter Thursday to House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer (R-KY) debunking the claim the Republican has spent the past six months making that President Joe Biden is linked to a Ukraine bribery scheme involving his son.

Raskin, who serves as the ranking member on the Oversight Committee, confirmed previous Raw Story reporting that Rudy Giuliani was likely the source of a tip given to the FBI that became a central focus of Comer's probe which attempted to link the Bidens to bribery payments made by Mykola Zlochevsky, the Ukrainian founder of oil and gas company Burisma holdings.

“Despite being interviewed as part of a campaign by Mr. Giuliani and his proxies in 2019 and 2020 to procure damaging information about the Biden family, Mr. Zlochevsky, explicitly and unequivocally, denied those allegations," Raskin said in the letter.

"Specifically, Mr. Zlochevsky denied (1) that anyone at Burisma had 'any contacts' with then former Vice President Biden or his representatives while Hunter Biden served on the Burisma board, and (2) that former Vice President Biden or his staff ‘in any way’ assisted Mr. Zlochevsky or Burisma,” Raskin said in the letter.

There were two CEOs of Burisma, Zlochevsky and Mykola Lisin. As Raw Story pointed out, Lisin died in a car accident in 2011, long before President Joe Biden's son Hunter was named to the board of Burisma.

Giuliani claimed on Newsmax that his death was under "suspicious circumstances."

Comer and his Senate ally Chuck Grassley (R-IA) have been hammering for the release of the FD-1023, a form the FBI uses to record unverified tips, saying that the "tip" proves something untoward happened. The form alleges that there were 17 tapes that were being held by Burisma staff to use against the Bidens in the event they them for "protection."

Using Bill Barr's autobiography and Rudy Giuliani's own statements, Raw Story put together that Giuliani was the likely source of the "tip" to the FBI in early June..

Two weeks after Raw Story's first report, Giuliani himself appeared on Newsmax to claim that the owner of the alleged tapes was the wife of the former CEO, who died in 2011. He claimed that she was a financial staffer or auditor of some kind. He then claimed she was dead, also of "mysterious circumstances" and that she was the one who had "the tapes."

Rep. Raskin is now calling the GOP's bluff on the matter.

“For this reason, the full factual context surrounding the form — including Mr. Zlochevsky’s statements contradicting the reported information — is crucial to properly understanding these allegations. In this case, that context includes not just repeated and failed efforts in 2019 and 2020 by Mr. Giuliani, Senate Republicans, and Trump’s Justice Department to find support for these allegations, but also clear evidence that then-Vice President Biden’s actions carried out the policy of the United States, its allies, and its international partners to combat corruption in Ukraine,” wrote Raskin.

As both the FBI and Mr. Giuliani himself stated, the unverified, second-hand allegations in the June 2020 Form FD-1023 largely repeated allegations Mr. Giuliani shared previously with the FBI.

Mr. Zlochevsky’s statements are recorded in a written document that was produced by Mr. Giuliani’s associate, Lev Parnas, to the House Committees overseeing former President Trump’s first impeachment inquiry in January 2020, including the Oversight Committee, and was made available to both Democratic and Republican Members. The Department of Justice has been in possession of the document since the FBI seized Parnas’ phone with a warrant in 2019.>

<New details are continuing to emerge about the investigation into former president Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of our nation’s most-classified secrets.

The investigation primarily focused on Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s official residence in Florida, where he absconded in failed hopes of escaping legal charges related to an alleged payoff to an adult film actress during the 2016 presidential campaign.

But a new report from The New York Times reveals that investigators also quietly focused on Trump’s golf property in Bedminster, New Jersey, where he was recorded showcasing a highly classified plan to attack Iran to people who lacked the necessary security clearances.

“On the recording, Mr. Trump can be heard rustling through papers and describing for his guests a ‘secret’ plan regarding Iran that he said had been drawn up by Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Defense Department,” The Times reported. “Mr. Trump was describing the document in an effort to rebut an account that General Milley feared having to keep him from manufacturing a crisis with Iran in the period after Mr. Trump lost his re-election bid in late 2020.”

According to two Times sources, federal investigators also weighed executing a warrant on the Bedminster property in the hunt for stolen classified documents. One source, however, said that investigators lacked the probable cause needed for a judge to sign off on the warrant.

“Every single story about Trump investigations always reveals that the initial bombshell revelation is supplanted by far wider and deeper revelations on top. May as well wait for the 7368th shoe to drop,” one person tweeted.

“Nakedly political persecution. It’s the Forever Government warning everyone to never, ever challenge it,” wrote one dissenting voice.

“How about some coverage of the Biden influence peddling as well?” asked another person.

“A normal person would have understood a long time ago that it was time to be quiet and withdraw, especially if they were old enough,” said one Twitter user.

“He’s a spoiled rich kid,” said another.>

<Donald Trump prosecutor Jack Smith is reportedly considering slapping the ex-president and his allies with additional charges in connection to the classified documents investigation, RadarOnline.com has learned.

In the latest development to come nearly one month after the former president was hit with a 37-count indictment on June 8, sources familiar with the case revealed that Smith might file a “superseding indictment” against Trump after new evidence was discovered.

Also surprising are reports that multiple figures in Trump’s orbit, such as Rudy Giuliani, may also be indicted in connection to the classified documents case. That is the revelation shared in a report published by the Independent on Thursday.

According to the outlet, Smith is currently prepared to add "30 to 45 charges” in addition to the 37-count indictment already brought against Trump earlier this month.

Smith’s decision will reportedly depend on whether the Trump-appointed district judge overseeing the case, Judge Aileen Cannon, is providing “undue deference” to the former president.

The Special Counsel prosecuting Trump is also reportedly contemplating whether to slap the former president with a superseding indictment in the Southern District of Florida court or file a regular indictment against Trump in a different federal judicial district.

According to the Independent, a superseding indictment is “a second set of charges against an already-indicted defendant that could include more serious crimes.”

Meanwhile, Smith is reportedly preparing to bring charges against Giuliani and other Trump attorneys in connection to the classified documents probe and a separate investigation connected to Trump’s alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Giuliani reportedly recently met with Smith’s team and allegedly agreed to cooperate with the Special Counsel’s investigations.

Ted Goodman, Giuliani’s political advisor, said the former New York City mayor’s recent interview with Smith’s team was “entirely voluntary and conducted in a professional manner.”

“There's nothing more to say on this matter,” Goodman said when asked whether Giuliani made a deal with the Special Counsel.

Still, one source familiar with the recent meeting said that Smith’s office will “most definitely” file “some” charges against Giuliani for his alleged role in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election between November 2020 and the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol building.

As RadarOnline.com reported, it is also suspected that Mark Meadows – Trump’s former White House chief of staff – provided evidence and testimony to Smith’s team in exchange for less severe federal charges when he is inevitably indicted.>

<On the morning of Dec. 14, 2012, Adam Lanza pulled a rifle from the closet and shot his mother in the head.

Then he grabbed four more firearms and headed to the local elementary school in Sandy Hook, Connecticut. It took him 11 minutes, using a semi-automatic rifle, to kill 26 people—20 of them only 6 or 7 years old.

Clearly, Lanza was not a typical young man. But he was a typical mass shooter. Because while assuredly not every domestic abuser is a terrorist or mass shooter, the vast majority of terrorists and mass shooters have a history of committing domestic violence, from Osama bin Laden and Pulse nightclub shooter Omar Mateen to white supremacists Anders Breivik and James Alex Fields (who mowed down Heather Heyer during the Charlottesville nationalist rally) to Uvalde school shooter Salvador Ramos. Indeed, a 2021 Johns Hopkins study of mass shootings between 2014 and 2019 found that in 68 percent of cases, the killer had a history of domestic violence. When it comes to terrorism, the percentage is even higher.

“If we ask what mass killers have in common, we note that they are almost all men, and that they have a history of controlling and abusing their wives and girlfriends—and sometimes other family members—before ‘graduating’ to mass killings,” Lisa Fontes, a researcher, recently told CBS news.

So let’s be clear: the U.S. Supreme Court decision last week to consider the case of United States v. Rahimi, determining whether someone with a history of domestic violence may own a gun, is about far more than domestic abuse and its victims. It’s about America’s national security. Our national security.

In truth, most mass shootings—shootings in which at least four people besides the gunman are killed—are directly related to domestic disputes. Often, bystanders or other family members may be shot as well, either as part of a deliberate playing-out of an abuser’s vendetta or tragic cases of simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The history is known. The numbers are clear and well recognized.

But less well recognized is why this connection is so strong The answer to that is based in the psyches of men for whom violence is a form of power, a means to force respect; who view guns as symbols of manhood, and manhood as requiring power over women. Machismo, male supremacy, guns, violence, power, and respect are all interlinked, so that, for such men, neither respect nor power nor manhood can be achieved without violence, and the use of violence against those—especially women, but also nonwhites and other minorities—over whom they demand power. (Without which, to complete the circle, they cannot truly be men.) And guns, with all their phallic force, are the best possible means. Not for nothing has the Anti-Defamation League declared misogyny the “gateway” to white supremacy....>

<....Now, with a Supreme Court majority that echoes these misogynistic views and that has already issued decisions that threaten the lives of women, their decision in this case could put all our lives at risk. The case the court has agreed to hear has been brought by Zackey Rahimi, now serving a six-year sentence in a Texas prison, who is contesting whether he deserved to end up there.

Granted, Rahimi is neither a mass murderer nor a terrorist. But he did, in 2019, threaten his then-girlfriend with a gun, and was seen dragging her into his car at a public parking lot before firing a gun at an eyewitness. Soon after, in February 2020, his girlfriend, who had ended the relationship, filed a restraining order against him.

Yet despite laws barring those under such orders from owning or using a firearm, he continued using his, shooting at strangers in episodes of road rage, threatening a new girlfriend, and firing shots in the air when he felt thwarted, such as when a companion’s credit card was declined. Both literally and figuratively, Rahimi was making it clear: He called the shots. Except legally, he didn’t. In May 2021, Rahimi pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm while under a restraining order.

Then last February, the U.S. 5th Circuit reversed the decision, based on new Supreme Court rulings that expanded rights to gun ownership to those “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.” Since the Founding Fathers hadn’t specifically mentioned domestic violence, they argued, domestic abusers should be free to own the weapons of their choice.

In response, the Biden administration objected, noting that historically, government has refused arms to people who pose a public danger.

So now it is up to the Supreme Court—the same Supreme Court that includes one judge credibly accused of sexual assault, another with a history of sexual harassment, and a third whose Pentecostal religion holds that women are to obey the demands and orders of men—to decide. It is also the same Supreme Court that has loosened gun restrictions already, and that so mercilessly overturned Roe v. Wade, putting the lives of countless American women at risk.

But the point is not the women, or that two-thirds of women killed by a partner are murdered by gun—nearly two every day in America, or that, according to the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, “a woman is five times more likely to be murdered when her abuser has access to guns.”

The point is that while not every domestic abuser becomes a mass shooter or terrorist, there is no easy way to identify the ones who would. But there is something incredibly simple that could be done to stop them: Don’t let domestic abusers own guns. The question now is whether the judges on this Supreme Court understand this—and whether or not they care.>