<When former FBI Director James Comey was charged last month, prosecutors weren’t ready or willing to turn over the criminal case file to his lawyers.

As of Tuesday, after days of disputing what case documents they have to provide, prosecutors handed his lawyers what they needed to, a person familiar with the case told CNN.

Still, the back and forth over discovery this week highlights the growing tension between prosecutors’ approach to the Comey case — including these early attempts to delay turning over some evidence — and Judge Michael Nachmanoff’s efforts to get the former FBI director to trial in fewer than three months.

The brief but notable discovery standoff also has put more of a focus on the three weeks of leadership of interim Eastern District of Virginia US Attorney Lindsey Halligan, who has little courtroom experience but was named to the position by President Donald Trump, after she decided to override and sideline more experienced prosecutors who had doubts about the Comey case.

Prosecutors who Halligan brought in for the court proceedings told the judge at the arraignment last Wednesday that they were still “getting our hands around discovery” and working on the possibility of having classified information declassified for use in the case.

“In the ordinary course, prosecutors in a case like this would have all their ducks in a row before going to the grand jury,” Jessica Roth, a Benjamin N. Cardozo Law School professor who specializes in criminal law and ethics, told CNN about the case developments so far.

“There’s no signs that the government is interested in a quick trial,” she added. (Roth, earlier in her career, worked for Comey as a prosecutor. She and Comey are no longer in touch.)

Justice Department spokesman Chad Gilmartin on Tuesday defended Halligan’s work on the case. When asked about the office’s preparedness, he said she “has the full support of the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General to uphold the law and prosecute crime in the Eastern District of Virginia.”

Roth, however, noted the prosecutors on Comey’s case, including Halligan, all parachuted into it just days before the indictment in late September and the arraignment on October 8.

The two attorneys who had appeared at Comey’s arraignment came from a prosecutors’ office in North Carolina, after Attorney General Pam Bondi directed Justice leadership to send additional resources to Halligan for the effort around the case, according to a person familiar with the approach.

The DOJ approach, Roth said, “reflects the rushed nature of the case and [its] inverted nature.”

Nachmanoff, at Comey’s arraignment, registered his intent to have the case go to trial quickly.

“This does not appear to me to be an overly complicated case. There are two counts. It’s a discrete set of facts,” the judge said in Comey’s arraignment. “I’m not going to let things linger … I will not slow this case down because the government does not promptly turn everything over.”

Even after Comey’s first court appearance last week, prosecutors sought deadlines later in October for them to turn over evidence, while Comey’s team asked for records more quickly so they could meet upcoming deadlines for the judge.

Four days ago, Comey’s team told the judge they had received “one page of discovery.”...>

<....The Justice Department has said that part of the holdup was a lack of agreement over how the evidence would be protected from being shared outside the defense team. Prosecutors said the evidence in the case is “law enforcement sensitive, for official use only, includes private emails or texts, or is otherwise sensitive because of the private nature of information,” according to one recent court filing.

Protecting the evidence from public consumption also generally helps to ensure a fair trial, according to court papers and procedures.

Prosecutors also told the judge they wanted to prevent Comey himself from having “unfettered access” to the evidence in his case. They lost that battle with the judge and a court order that protects sensitive evidence from being shared widely is now in place.

At the hearing, Comey’s attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald, asked “forthwith” —lawyer-speak for immediately — for the appointment papers of Halligan. He noted most US attorneys’ appointment documents are just a page or two, and his team needed them immediately so they can finish writing their challenge to her prosecutorial authority, which is due on October 20.

Prosecutors said over the weekend they had turned a document on Halligan’s appointment over to Comey’s team.

Another possible hiccup to the judge’s speedy trial timeline still lingers: The amount of classified information the Justice Department wanted to include in the case file.

“How could you not have your arms around that already? That’s where I saw the tension arising at the arraignment,” Patrick Cotter, a white-collar defense lawyer with the law firm UB Greensfelder, recently told CNN.

The judge on Tuesday finalized a schedule for the court process of prosecutors potentially using classified information at trial, setting hearings in November and December that will keep the January 5 trial date on track, according to his latest order.

“We see this as a simple case as well, Your Honor,” Fitzgeralds aid in court at the arraignment, before he expressed his concern of “walking into a buzz saw of classified information the way other cases might.”

“Frankly, we would have thought in the normal course when the government brings a case, they address the classified information issues ahead of time, coordinate within the national security section, and have a plan. And, frankly, we feel like in this case, the cart may have been put before the horse,” Fitzgerald added.

Nachmanoff, too, urged the Justice Department to make decisions on the classified records quickly, and keep it simple.

“There should be no reason that this case gets off track because of the existence of some classified information,” the judge said. “Either it’s not relevant to the case or it can be declassified or we will go through the fastest CIPA (classified information protection) process you have ever seen in your lives.”>

<A MAGA media insider froze onstage when asked to condemn a cache of Nazi praising messages from a leaked Republican group chat, turning a Kennedy Center town hall into a very public cringe. Andrew Kolvet, a spokesperson for Turning Point USA and executive producer of The Charlie Kirk Show, was pressed multiple times to denounce thousands of vile texts allegedly exchanged among leaders in the Young Republican National Federation. The messages included slurs, references to gas chambers, and a blunt declaration, “I love Hitler.”

Kolvet was part of a NewsNation forum on political violence, a setting that practically begged for moral clarity. Instead, viewers got deflection. “We saw this Nazi group chat, which I am sure you condemn, right,” liberal social media personality Adam Mockler asked, as fellow panelists Bill O’Reilly and Stephen A. Smith looked on. “We can talk about it,” Kolvet replied. Mockler tried again, “Do you condemn it,” he asked. Kolvet repeated, “I want to talk about it,” a stall that landed like a siren.

Mockler compared Kolvet to Vice President JD Vance, who recently minimized the scandal after Politico reported on the leaked messages. Vance initially waved away the uproar as pearl clutching, then went further on The Charlie Kirk Show, calling the senders “a bunch of kids” and arguing that “young boys” tell “edgy, offensive jokes.” The vice president warned against “ruin[ing] their lives” over what he framed as immature humor. Kolvet, who helps run Kirk’s operation, offered the same dance, lots of talk about context, little appetite to simply say, this is wrong.

Politico obtained months of Telegram correspondence involving dozens of YRNF leaders in states like New York, Kansas, Arizona, and Vermont. The organization is supposed to be the GOP’s talent pipeline for members between 18 and 40, not a breeding ground for racist cosplay. After publication, Republican officials in several states quickly condemned the messages, and some of the figures named in the chat lost political jobs. The 15,000 member YRNF publicly called for resignations, branding the leaked language “vile and inexcusable.”

Which is why Kolvet’s dodge felt so glaring. This was not a trap question about arcane policy, it was a gimme, do you condemn a group chat that praises Hitler and jokes about killing opponents. In a room built for declarations, the closest thing to a full stop came from the audience’s collective wince.

On one side, a youth faction that keeps rolling off the moral cliff in pursuit of shock theater. On the other, party aligned media figures who cannot bring themselves to deliver a straight denunciation without asterisks. The MAGA defense reflex, attack the press, complain about cancel culture, call hate speech a bad joke, is running headlong into a broader electorate that knows exactly what Nazi memes mean.

Republicans who want nothing to do with this mess are saying the quiet part out loud, it is not just morally rotten, it is politically toxic. Apologies that frame slurs and genocidal references as edgy banter do not play with suburban voters, nor with the young conservatives who do not want their movement defined by Telegram trolls.

Kolvet had a chance to set a bright line in a high-profile forum. Instead, he reached for the fog machine. The YRNF has at least taken the step of demanding resignations. The question now is whether the party’s influencers, and the politicians who appear on their shows, can match that clarity. Condemnation does not require nuance, it requires a spine but appears to go against their political ethos.>

<Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is discovering that nothing unites Congress like a disaster check that won’t clear. A growing bloc of furious Republicans is blasting Noem for bottlenecking billions in FEMA recovery dollars, with one GOP lawmaker snarling that the secretary should show “more f—— respect” for the institution she once served. Their gripe is simple: towns are drowning in paperwork while Noem slow-walks approvals and ducks calls.

At the center of the revolt is a new DHS rule that routes any FEMA expense over $100,000 to Noem’s desk for personal sign-off. This change has gummed up even routine reimbursements, according to multiple outlets and state officials waiting on cash. Noem denies her policy is the problem, but critics say the numbers tell a different story, with preapproved projects gathering dust as local governments wait months for checks.

The backlash is especially sharp in North Carolina, where Hurricane Helene crushed mountain communities last year. Sen. Ted Budd, a Republican, has openly threatened to hold up DHS nominees until FEMA money starts flowing again, accusing Noem of creating a “bottleneck” by hoarding decisions at the top. The pressure campaign has pried loose some funds, but Budd says the pace remains “very slow,” and he’s keeping the screws on.

Inside the Capitol, aides describe radio silence from the secretary’s suite. “They’re very slow,” one senior Senate GOP staffer said of Noem’s office, adding that getting her on the phone is “basically impossible.” The sentiment tracks with a broader mood of exasperation on the Hill, where Republicans grumble that Noem is skipping routine oversight appearances while starring in glossy, taxpayer-funded videos about DHS priorities.

The optics have only grown worse. Noem is already facing heat from airports across the country for refusing to air a shutdown-era message that blamed Democrats for TSA workers missing paychecks. This move sparked fresh Hatch Act questions and drew new oversight demands from Senate Democrats. When even airport authorities are ghosting your video, the brand is struggling.

Meanwhile, watchdogs say the bottleneck mysteriously disappears for friends of the program. Public records obtained by investigative outlets show Noem fast-tracked more than $11 million to rebuild a Naples, Florida, pier after a political donor intervened, even as other communities waited. DHS insists the system is fair, but local officials see a two-track process: the preferred lane and everyone else.

Asked to explain the delays, a DHS spokesperson pointed at the previous administration and swiped at critics, saying some of the loudest voices are the same “Democrats who shut down the government.” The White House, for its part, is sticking with Noem, touting her “tremendous results” on border security, deportations, and community safety. None of that soothes mayors still waiting to replace bridges, pumps, and treatment plants.

Republican frustration isn’t just about cash flow; it’s about competence. Members say Noem’s insistence on signing every six-figure expense has paralyzed FEMA’s field tempo, turning emergency management into a permission slip process. One GOP lawmaker offered the most charitable spin, the department is so terrified of crossing new lines that “nobody wants to f— up,” so everything moves at a crawl. That would be alarming in normal times, and catastrophic during recovery.>

WTG, <animal killer>.

<Donald Trump has been condemning people who disagree with him for quite a while, but the president’s rhetoric about Democrats has taken a rather hysterical turn lately. Earlier this month, for example, the Republican thought it’d be a good idea to push an online item that called Democrats “the party of hate, evil, and Satan.” About a week later, he said Democrats “have the devil’s ideology.”

That was, of course, the kind of ridiculous rhetoric Americans have never heard from a sitting president, but his over-the-top slander of his political opposition is spreading. Take the latest rhetoric from his chief spokesperson, for example.

“[T]he Democrat [sic] Party’s main constituency are made up of Hamas terrorists, illegal aliens and violent criminals,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News, continuing her party’s tradition of getting the opposition party’s name wrong.

Around this time nine years ago, then-candidate Hillary Clinton delivered some unscripted comments about the most radical elements of Trump’s base. To be “grossly generalistic,” she said, “you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the ‘basket of deplorables.’”

More specifically, the former secretary of state lamented that so much of Trump’s core support was “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic [and] Islamaphobic” — an assessment that’s stood up pretty well to further scrutiny.

Nevertheless, Republicans became obsessed with Clinton’s phrase, and the media followed their lead. The conventional wisdom was that Clinton had gone too far: Criticizing rival candidates is fine, the argument went, but criticizing Americans (even bigoted Americans) was simply beyond the pale for someone in a position of leadership.

Nine years later, Trump thinks Democrats are the “party of Satan,” and the White House press secretary told a national television audience that the Democrats’ base is made up of terrorists and violent criminals (not to be confused with the violent felons her boss let out of prison just hours after his return to power).

What’s more, a year ago at this time, Trump hosted a hate-filled rally at Madison Square Garden, featuring a pro-Trump comedian who described Puerto Rico as “a floating island of garbage.” A couple of days later, Joe Biden commented on the controversy, telling a group of Latino voters, “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters’, his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American.”

Leavitt — at the time, a Trump campaign spokesperson — responded that the clumsy comment was proof that members of the Democratic White House “despise ... tens of millions of Americans.”

Evidently, now that it’s Leavitt doing the despising, she’s far less concerned.

Given Leavitt’s casual condemnation of tens of millions of Americans, one congressional Democrat, Rep. Greg Casar of Texas, said the White House press secretary “should resign,” adding, “They try to make us hate each other to distract from the fact that they’re robbing us all blind. It’s sick.”

A day later, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Leavitt is “out of control,” adding, “I’m not sure whether she’s just demented, ignorant, a stone-cold liar, or all of the above.”>

Y'all best maintain those two assets you possess, <karoliar>, cos you have nothing else in your corner.

<The Vermont state senator involved in the hate-filled Young Republican group chat uncovered by POLITICO announced his resignation Friday.

Sam Douglass, a state lawmaker who represented an area near the Canadian border, said in a statement that “if my Governor asks me to do something, I will act, because I believe in what he’s trying to do,” referring to Vermont Republican Governor Phil Scott’s call for Douglass to step down.

Douglass was the only elected official in the group chat, though four others worked for elected officials at the time the messages were being sent. Those officials include New York’s state senate minority leader and the Kansas attorney general. One member of the chat worked in President Donald Trump’s Small Business Administration.

“I know that this decision will upset many, and delight others, but in this political climate I must keep my family safe,” Douglass said, adding that his resignation will be effective Monday at noon. “Since the story broke, I have reached out to the majority of my Jewish and BIPOC friends and colleagues to ensure that they can be honest and upfront with me, and I know that as a young person I have a duty to set a good example for others.”

His lengthy statement also cites hateful messages he received from others in his state since the story broke.

Douglass’ resignation comes as at least six others in the chat are out of jobs since POLITICO began reporting on the exchanges. He served as the chair of Vermont’s Young Republicans organization.

In one portion of the chat, Douglass refers to an Indian woman as someone who “just didn’t bathe often.” In another instance, Brianna Douglass, Sam’s wife and the Vermont Young Republican’s national committee member, says her husband may have erred by “expecting the Jew to be honest.”

The Vermont state lawmaker initially resisted strident calls to resign from top state Republican leaders — including Scott and the GOP conferences in the state’s House and Senate.

One day after POLITICO published its initial story about the Telegram group, Douglass apologized for the chat, saying “I am weighing all my options.”

Douglass was a first-year lawmaker and said Friday he was proud to pass his first bill on agriculture and begin his work to reform the state’s welfare system.

“I will continue to do what I have done my entire life, the very reasons why I was elected; I will help others in my community, be active, foster communication, and look out for others,” he said.>

Goodbye, redneck slime!

<The ongoing debate over soon-to-expire Affordable Care Act insurance subsidies has reopened an old wound for Republicans: What should they do about the health care law they have railed against for more than a decade but has now taken root with their own constituents?

While some GOP hard-liners are again embracing repeal-and-replace rhetoric, the scars from the party's failed attempt to undo the ACA in 2017 have left a broader swath of Republicans extremely wary of trying to rip out the law — even as they continue to criticize it.

Instead, as Democrats put the ACA at the center of the ongoing government shutdown fight, Republican leaders and key senators are acknowledging the political reality that Obamacare, at least for the immediate future, is here to stay. Republicans are, instead, eyeing a bipartisan end-of-year health care push that could pair a conservative overhaul of the expiring subsidies with modest proposals that would tweak — but not fully uproot — the 2010 law.

Speaker Mike Johnson is downplaying prospects for nixing the ACA ahead of the midterms, saying this week he still has “PTSD” from the GOP’s 2017 repeal-and-replace debacle.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune made clear in an interview his members are making plans for a bigger health policy push, including “reforms” to the subsidies, in the next government funding package and potentially elsewhere before the end of the year.

“There’s some very interesting potential health care discussions and even solutions out there, and obviously reforms that need to be made to the Obamacare enhanced subsidies,” Thune said, adding that a bipartisan agreement could move as part of a “broader package” or "independently” after the shutdown ends.

The expiring tax credits, expanded by Democrats in 2021, are driving the desire to act on health care this year — millions could go uninsured come the new year without legislative action, according to the Congressional Budget Office. At the same time, Republicans have been discussing a menu of other options in the health care policy arena, both among themselves and with White House officials.

Ideas include overhauling the operation of drug intermediaries, known as pharmacy benefit managers; granting Americans additional options around Health Savings Accounts; and allowing more flexible employer-provided health insurance plans.

“Our members have been working on plans to reduce premiums for families for months now,“ House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said in an interview, mentioning HSAs and “things that are focused on reducing premiums.” But, he added, Republicans haven’t yet worked out how to bring those proposals to the floor.

Another big question is how much buy-in from Democrats those proposals might have. Republicans appear unlikely at this point to pursue a party-line reconciliation bill that would include health care policies — at one point a possibility following the success of the tax and spending megabill passed over the summer — which means some bipartisan support will be necessary to get any legislation passed in the Senate.

Senate Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo said in a brief interview that Senate Republicans have been discussing a year-end health care package, including on HSA flexibility, and “my hope is to have it be bipartisan.”

Asked about the possibility of linking that to a potential extension of the ACA tax credits, he said, “If we have a vehicle that's moving, I see no reason not to add it.”

But Democrats are already seizing on the repeal talk in some corners of the GOP, with Sen. Patty Murray of Washington comparing it to the cataclysmic sinking of the Titanic.

“It is bad enough so many of them can see the iceberg coming and are saying, ‘Ah, we'll worry about that after the ship goes down.’ But we've also got Republicans saying that you wish this ship had sunk earlier,” Murray, the Senate’s top Democratic appropriator, told reporters. She was referring to the GOP’s refusal to extend the Obamacare subsidies before Nov. 1, at which point notices will go out alerting enrollees to massive premium hikes....>

<....One favorite GOP proposal, known as a “CHOICE arrangement,” would allow employers to reimburse employees on a tax-free basis for health insurance premiums or medical expenses. It was one of several health policies that passed the House as part of the GOP megabill but didn’t get enacted in the final product.

House Republicans have indicated that there is appetite to revisit dropped policies such as this one, but a senior House Republican aide who works in health policy, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said it wouldn’t be enough to satisfy hard-liners.

“I don’t see an extension of the Obamacare subsidies happening without a bunch of reforms alongside conservative health care policy wins, and CHOICE arrangements alone is not enough,” the aide said. “That’s not getting members to vote for Obamacare.”

Nothing under serious discussion has so far come close to what some GOP lawmakers are most eager to discuss as the year-end deadline for the tax credits barrels closer: a complete reversal of the ACA. And while appetite within the GOP leadership for gutting the ACA is minimal at this point, vocal opponents of the law could have an influence in a narrowly-divided House Republican majority.

Rep. Rick Allen (R-Ga.) spoke up on a private House Republican call earlier this month in support of redoubling efforts to repeal Obamacare. And Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.), a member of the House Freedom Caucus, said during a teletown hall this week that Democrats’ calls for bipartisan negotiations around the fate of the subsidies are falling flat.

“Well, I've got a compromise for them: How about we repeal all of Obamacare?” he said, floating the prospect of a second reconciliation bill.

Conservative opponents of the tax credits say they are too costly and rife with waste, fraud and abuse.

Other Republicans are trying to urge their colleagues away from igniting a politically explosive debate just over a year out from the midterms, recalling the 2018 Democratic wave election that was attributable to backlash from the GOP repeal-and-replace efforts.

Even Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a longtime critic of the Democratic health law, stopped short when asked if he backed the call from some of his colleagues to nix Obamacare entirely.

"I just think we ought to focus on fixing it,” he said in a brief interview.

Johnson also warned this week that the ACA’s “roots are so deep” that many Republicans are wary of trying to “completely repeal and replace” it. The law now provides coverage for more than 20 million Americans and touches a significant segment of the economy.

"It was really sinister the way, in my view, the way it was created,” he said of the 2010 law. “I believe Obamacare was created to implode upon itself, to collapse upon itself."

Republicans are now also mired in internal discussions about whether to extend the ACA credits, and what changes they could make to the subsidies to appeal to a broader set of conservatives. They have floated ideas such as instituting new income caps, minimum co-pays, a cutoff for new enrollees and abortion restrictions.

Republicans insist those talks won’t get underway until after the shutdown ends, though some of them also warn negotiations will totally unravel if too many ambitious GOP policy proposals get added to the mix.

Sen. Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican who’s been tapped by the White House to work with Democrats on a shutdown offramp, said in an interview this week said the current imperative for government funding negotiations is to “keep it simple” with “some just very easy changes that both sides can agree to and then get in the weeds at a later date.”

“I’m afraid once we dive into health care,” Mullin added. “It's going to take a while to unpack that.”>

<President Donald Trump’s surprising performance among Black Americans and younger voters helped him win the popular vote in the 2024 election. Those constituencies are still waiting for a return on their investment.

The unemployment rate for Americans between the ages of 16 and 24 has jumped to 10.5 percent from 9 percent since Trump returned to the White House, a period that coincided with a marked decline in their participation in the labor force. Black joblessness has also climbed, with federal workforce cuts and a broad slowdown in hiring contributing to the rise. And both groups saw their paychecks drop through the first half of the year, despite an acceleration in weekly earnings for workers overall.

Trump notched impressive levels of support within those communities, including Hispanics, that have traditionally voted Democratic, but now his job-approval ratings are tumbling among all three groups. Those voters may be less likely to show up to back GOP congressional candidates next year if he fails to deliver on the high wages and work opportunities that he pledged throughout the campaign.

“Their overall performance [with] Black men, younger voters will holistically depend upon the overall health of the economy,” said Shermichael Singleton, a Republican strategist and former adviser to Dr. Ben Carson, Trump’s HUD secretary during his first term. “In terms of whether or not we can rely on those groups in November? I hope to God we can. And I’m hopeful that the economy will continue to improve. But I don’t know.”

Trump’s economy has defied gloomy forecasts that his costly new tariff regime and hardline immigration policies would trigger a slump. But its resilience has masked weaknesses that expose important elements of his political coalition to any future slowdown in employment and growth.

Public and private sector payroll growth fell sharply through the summer. Federal Reserve Gov. Stephen Miran — now on leave from his role as Trump’s chief economic adviser — has cautioned that the labor market is at risk of stalling without a drastic reduction in short-term borrowing costs. Kevin Hassett, who leads Trump’s National Economic Council, said earlier this month that he doesn’t expect to see improvement in the jobs picture until next year — an assessment that Trump says he shares.

Pierre Yared, the acting chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, told POLITICO that he expects the job market to improve — including for Blacks and younger Americans — because uncertainty around tax and trade policies has started to fade.

“Now that the [tax and spending] bill has been passed, now that there is no uncertainty regarding any possible retaliation with these trade deals, and now that we’re pushing for the deregulatory agenda, we anticipate that people who are looking for jobs will be able to get them,” Yared said.

The challenge for the Trump administration — and Republicans generally — will be in capturing the political upside if that occurs. The president’s economic approval ratings have been deep in negative territory for months. The latest Economist/YouGov poll found that his approval rating on the economy is sinking among Black voters. While Hispanic workers have notched higher wages since Trump’s inauguration, he’s increasingly viewed unfavorably. Younger voters, including those who said they voted for the president, have especially soured on his leadership since the beginning of his second term, according to a Pew Research Center survey.

“There’s a good bit of evidence that Trump is underwater on certain economic issues and underwater with young people,” said Milan Singh, the founder and director of the Yale Youth Poll. “The question is whether those two things are connected. My guess is that they are.”

In a statement, White House spokesman Kush Desai said that Trump’s “economic agenda during his first term unleashed historic working-class prosperity and the first reduction in wealth inequality in decades. As that same agenda of tax cuts, tariffs, deregulation, and energy abundance continues to take effect during President Trump’s second term, Americans can rest assured that the days of Joe Biden’s dead-end economy are coming to a close.”....>

<....Trump’s path to victory went through precincts that were traditionally Democratic strongholds. The post-pandemic inflation surge brought on by snarled supply chains and record fiscal spending contributed to the collapse of President Joe Biden’s popularity. While voters remained relatively sanguine about their own finances, widely cited sentiment and outlook gauges were stuck in the mud. Trump leveraged that anxiety throughout the campaign, gaining significant levels of support in majority-minority communities, working-class neighborhoods and younger enclaves like college campuses.

But his early agenda — which includes hefty tariffs and crackdowns on immigrant communities — has stoked uncertainty for businesses looking to increase headcount. Private sector hiring slowed. Meanwhile, the large reductions in force advanced by White House Budget Director Russ Vought and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency weakened an employment pipeline that has historically provided opportunities to Black Americans.

“A lot of Black people, men and women alike, moved up into the middle class as a result of federal jobs,” said Singleton, who is Black. “It’s not a big surprise — because of the elimination of a significant portion of federal jobs — that you would see a pretty big dent as it pertains to Black unemployment.”

The overall slowdown in hiring has also posed challenges to people who are entering the workforce or in the early stages of their careers. A new survey from the Democratic polling firm Global Strategy Group found that voters between the ages of 18 and 34 were almost twice as likely to identify “unemployment” as a top concern as other Americans. Roughly half said they expect their generation will be worse off financially compared to older people.

“They point to stagnant wages, they point to debt, they point to income inequality. They’re more likely to say that unemployment is a challenge facing the economy than older voters,” said Global Strategy Group’s Katie Drapcho, who previously led polling at a super PAC aligned with Biden and Kamala Harris. That should make them persuadable, she said, adding: “This is a generation of voters with pretty pronounced concerns when it comes to the economy.”

It also speaks to why Trump’s approval rating with younger voters has faded, and the weakening economic outlook for younger Americans has started to set off alarms among certain Trump allies.

Larry Kudlow, a confidant and former economic adviser to the president, cautioned on his Fox Business program last month that affordability concerns could cool the GOP’s appeal among younger voters.

CEOs of companies like Bank of America and Microsoft are increasingly boasting about their efforts to reduce headcount in favor of a leaner workforce, even as profits climb. Yared said he has seen studies linking the hiring slowdown to how companies are responding to advancements in artificial intelligence.

“I can’t say that we know for sure what’s going on there,” Yared said. But the administration is focused on creating a “lot of demand for workers. And our young, recent grads will find great jobs.”

Some Democrats — including longtime party strategist James Carville — say Trump’s dismal economic polling will create openings for the party in the midterm elections.

But if Trump’s approval rating is underwater, the opposition is scraping the ocean floor. Just 33 percent of voters have a favorable view of the Democratic Party, according to the RealClear Politics poll tracker. And the latest Reuters/Ipsos survey found that Republicans still have a 10-point advantage over the Democrats on which party has a better plan for the economy.

“There isn’t an alternative that is being presented in a unified manner by Democrats,” said Ron Bonjean, a GOP strategist and co-founder and partner of the public affairs and communications firm ROKK Solutions. Voters “may not be extremely happy about where the economy is at this point, but they can see that Trump is trying — and that the other side isn’t bringing a lot to bear.”>

<2021 was, unfortunately, a banner year for new barriers to the right to vote. Nineteen states enacted thirty-four laws restricting access to voting, far and away the most in any year in at least the past decade.

These laws impose a wide range of voter suppression measures, such as obstacles to voting by mail, new voter ID requirements, and limitations on what election officials can do to help promote voter access. They vary greatly in scope, from omnibus laws with multiple restrictive provisions to single-subject laws that create less obvious burdens.

The modern approach to voter suppression can often be characterized as death by a thousand cuts — seemingly minor rules about issues like voter ID, mail voting, resource allocation at polling places, and voter roll maintenance can add up to create significant burdens, particularly on communities of color.

It is thus often difficult to understand the full impact of new restrictive voting laws when looking at any one provision by itself. And new provisions that seem less burdensome at first glance are sometimes indicative of a broader push to sabotage election outcomes that may not be as obvious.

That said, some voting laws passed in 2021 stand out as particularly concerning on their face. The substance of these laws and the processes used to enact them should raise a red flag for anyone concerned about the health of our democracy. Here are five of the most concerning examples:

Florida Senate Bill 90: Broad restrictions on mail voting

After an election where Black voters in Florida cast mail ballots at a rate higher than in recent years, Florida enacted S.B. 90, which imposes a long list of new constraints on mail voting. The law severely limits the availability and accessibility of mail ballot drop boxes and requires voters to put their state ID number or Social Security Number on their mail ballot application without providing an alternative for voters who lack such information. It also limits who can assist voters with returning their mail ballots.

Georgia S.B. 202: A ban on food and water, plus subtle attacks on mail voting and local election officials

Georgia S.B. 202 gained national attention by making it a crime to distribute water or snacks to voters waiting in line, a response to a practice many voter participation groups use in this state with notoriously long wait times in some elections. While the food and water provision is the most blatantly outlandish, the law contains less obvious aspects that pose serious threats. It allows any voter to come to a county clerk’s office and challenge the voter registrations of as many people as they would like. And, after an election when Black voters voted by mail at a rate higher than ever before, it makes it more difficult to vote by mail in several ways. The law also sets up a process that could be used to remove professional election officials and replace them with more partisan actors.

Iowa Senate File 413: Criminalizing election officials for protecting voters

Iowa helped to start a national trend of laws targeting election officials with criminal penalties for expanding voting access by enacting S.F. 413. The law imposes a number of new penalties and restrictions on election officials, including a provision that refers county election officials for criminal prosecution if they do not implement the law’s aggressive new voter-roll purge provisions.

Montana House Bill 176: Ending a popular policy for partisan reasons

Montana H.B. 176 eliminated Election Day registration, a popular and effective policy that Montana voters have relied on for years. During debate over the law, a Republican state representative openly stated that he wanted to end election day registration because he believed it was used by young people who were “not on our side of the aisle.”

Texas S.B. 1: Targeting Election Workers and Restricting Mail Voting

After a lengthy legislative process that involved the speaker of the House asking legislators not to use the word “racism” when debating on the floor, Texas passed S.B. 1, a law so restrictive that the Brennan Center is challenging it in court.

Some of its most aggressive provisions target election officials and workers and make it harder to vote by mail. The law threatens election officials and workers with new criminal penalties for expanding voter access or even simply encouraging eligible voters to request mail ballots. For mail voting, it imposes new identification number requirements and new obstacles for voter assistance. It also empowers partisan poll watchers to harass voters and election workers. The changes have already reportedly led to astounding mail ballot rejection rates in some counties....>

<....What’s in store for 2022

State legislatures are not slowing down with their attempts to suppress the voices of certain voters. A stunning number of antidemocratic bills have already been pre-filed or introduced for 2022 legislative sessions. Here are some of the worst:

Arizona: Onerous proof of citizenship requirements

Arizona legislators have pre-filed two bills that would require voters to show proof of citizenship for all elections. Such rules have been struck down in Arizona and other states for various reasons, and they severely burden voters without doing anything to prevent fraud. Nevertheless, Arizona S.B. 1013 would require the secretary of state to ask for an exemption from the federal rules that bar proof of citizenship requirements to vote, and Arizona S.C.R. 1005 would initiate a ballot referendum to impose a new proof of citizenship requirement.

New Hampshire: Election sabotage

In New Hampshire, state legislators are jumping on the disturbing national trend of election sabotage legislation with three pre-filed bills that attack fair election administration in different ways. House Bill 1522 would allow any voter to conduct their own “citizen’s audit” of election results by personally viewing every ballot cast in an election, creating serious privacy problems and further undermining public confidence in elections. H.B. 1567 would allow any registered voter to sue to have an election official removed from office. And H.B. 1324 would allow the New Hampshire State Senate to initiate a dispute before the New Hampshire Supreme Court seeking to overturn the state’s results for a presidential election.>

<"I was playing online the other night. I was deep in a small stakes tournament. A player raised from the cutoff and I just called out of the big blind with Td-6d."

"Sounds fine so far."

"The board comes Th-7h-4d. I check. He bets 1/3rd pot. I call."

"Fine."

"The turn comes a 2d. I check. He bets 3/4ths pot. I call."

"So far, so good."

"The river comes an offsuit 2. I check. He moves all-in. It's about a pot-sized bet. I never know what to do here. What should I do?"

"It completely depends on the opponent. Did you have a HUD set up?"

"Yes."

"Then what you needed to do was look up his barrel frequencies. How often does he continuation bet? How often does he double barrel? How often does he triple barrel? If you see all of those numbers are above 60%, then you have a real case for calling."

"How do I use the river aggression frequency statistic?"

<For years she was one of Donald Trump’s most loyal foot soldiers. Marjorie Taylor Greene trafficked in racist statements, indicated support for executing Democrats and even floated conspiracy theories about Jewish space lasers. Beneath a red “Make America great again” cap she became an instantly recognisable face of the Maga movement.

Yet in recent months the Georgia congresswoman has surprised friend and foe alike. On issues ranging from healthcare to Gaza to the Jeffrey Epstein files, she has broken ranks with Republicans and won unlikely fans among Democrats. The streak of independence has stirred speculation about her motives – and future ambitions.

Notably, Greene has stopped short of directly criticising Trump himself and has so far avoided incurring the president’s wrath. But her willingness to dissent from the party line is all the more remarkable under a president who notoriously prizes loyalty and punishes critics.

“I was wrong about Marjorie Taylor Greene,” was the headline of an Atlanta Journal-Constitution article last week by political columnist Patricia Murphy, who wrote: “Even if you don’t agree with Greene on everything – or even most things – you have to admire her willingness in this moment to say what is true, even when other Republicans refuse to. Maybe it’s career suicide, or maybe it’s leadership.”

Greene long revelled in her role as a far-right provocateur. She led prison visits to rioters arrested after the January 6 insurrection, called for Joe Biden’s impeachment and, at last year’s State of the Union address, confronted Biden while wearing a Maga hat and heckled him during his speech.

But since Trump’s return to office, the 51-year-old has increasingly gone rogue on both domestic and foreign policy. She criticised White House plans to send “billions of dollars” worth of weapons to Ukraine and broke from the Republican party’s longstanding support for Israel by describing its war in Gaza as a “genocide”.

She was one of just four Republicans to sign on to a discharge petition to release files related to the sex offender Epstein, repeatedly dismissed by Trump as a “hoax”. Speaking at a press conference with Democratic congressman Ro Khanna, she insisted: “The truth needs to come out. And the government holds the truth.”

Greene has been among the most outspoken critics of House speaker Mike Johnson’s stance during the federal government shutdown, arguing that Republicans should be in Washington rather than indefinite recess and it is they who have the power to end the standoff.

She is also siding with Democrats in their drive to continue the pandemic-era temporary expansion of Affordable Care Act premium subsidies to help Americans pay for upcoming insurance rate hikes.

In a lengthy screed on social media, Greene wrote: “I’m going to go against everyone on this issue because when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children’s insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district.

“No I’m not towing the party line on this, or playing loyalty games. I’m a Republican and won’t vote for illegals to have any tax payer funded healthcare or benefits. I’m AMERICA ONLY!!! I’m carving my own lane.”

It is a battle over the meaning of Maga. Greene denies that she is turning against her own party. She told the Hill website this week: “I am 100% the same person today as I was when I ran for Congress.” Indeed, her voting record in Congress is still closely aligned with Trump. But she claims to be staying true to her populist roots by siding with her constituents against the elites.

Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, said: “Marjorie Taylor Greene is a very complex person and she’s a complex politician and it looks like she’s making interesting choices. Overall she is still very much a Maga-identified Trump-supporting Republican.

“That is what is giving her latitude to be able to deviate from the party line and to deviate from the Trump line when she thinks it is advantageous to do so. One of the things that’s interesting about how she’s doing it is that she invokes basically a delegate-style representation when she does this.”

The Guardian put Greene’s political instincts to the test in a series of interviews with voters and found concern about steep premium increases in health insurance if the subsidies lapse....>

<....Pete Van Horn, a retiree who is a Republican, said: “We’ve worked all our lives and them prices keep going up. That’s not right. We should get a break somewhere.”

Pat Hayman, a retired schoolteacher from Calhoun, Georgia, said of Greene: “She comes on a little hard but I basically agree with it. You know the healthcare system needs overhauling. I’m on Medicare and Blue Cross-Blue Shield, and we’re fine with that. But young couples? To me, it’s a business more so than taking care of [them].”

Michael Ross, an electrician from Floyd County, Georgia, laughed: “I think Marjorie Taylor Greene is hilarious. I’ll probably vote for her again. I’ll be honest with you. I don’t know what she thinks but I like to see s*** stirred up.”

He added: “I like her stirring the pot. Is she crazy? She might be crazy. I don’t know. She’s got more information than I got. Like I said: I like to see the pot stirred.”

To some observers, Greene’s position is not so surprising. They note that Republicans have never been as dedicated to small government as the mythology of Ronald Reagan implies. Greene, they argue, is in line with the modern Republican party’s economic populism, including Trump’s own thinking.

Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center thinktank in Washington, said: ‘There are certainly many smaller government conservatives but she’s far from being a lone wolf here.

“In the question of support for working-class and middle-class Americans through government action, she probably speaks for a very large segment of Republicans, and a large group of people who would be Maga as opposed to old guard Republicans.”

Others suggest that Greene might have more personal motives for speaking out. She reportedly began to explore the possibility of running for Georgia governor or senator next year, only to be knocked back by the White House on the basis of polling that showed her divisiveness would put statewide seats in jeopardy.

Jeff Timmer, executive director of the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, believes that Greene’s newfound willingness to speak out “can be attributed more to a woman scorned than the evolution of human goodness in Marjorie Taylor Greene”.

He said: “They didn’t want her to run; she’s getting a pound of flesh. ‘You wanted to put your thumb on me and thought I’d just play the loyal soldier? Well, I’m going to defy you on some key things like the Epstein files or healthcare and Medicaid.”

Yet Greene has been careful to continue expressing support for Trump. She has avoided – so far at least – an insult-laden rebuke on social media that could spell the beginning of the end of her career, as for so many Republicans during the president’s first term.

Her stance could embolden other Republicans to carefully test the boundaries of dissent. Maine senator Susan Collins has criticised the administration’s handling of the shutdown and taken aim at budget director Russ Vought for permanently laying off thousands of federal workers.

Texas senator Ted Cruz recently compared comments from the Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr – who hinted at punitive measures against broadcasters – to “mafia tactics”.

Beyond Capitol Hill, Oklahoma’s governor, Kevin Stitt, told the New York Times that he opposed Trump’s move to send Texas national guard troops to Illinois as a violation of “states’ rights”. And Utah’s governor, Spencer Cox, used X to register his own protest, condemning the administration’s cancellation of North America’s biggest solar project.

Gillespie of Emory University commented: “What Marjorie Taylor Greene presents is a challenge to the narrative that Republicans are a monolith at this point. Yes, Trump has consolidated power. The ideology in Maga, in the Republican coalition, has certainly shifted in a rightward direction and we have watched politicians adjust to that.

“But the Republican party still has some heterogeneity even as it is conservative and so you are going to see people deviate from the party. The question is: when and under what conditions do Republicans completely deviate from the Trump agenda and oppose the Trump administration in a way that lasts for more than a week or two?”>

<Last month, Donald Trump signed an Executive Order formally designating “antifa” a domestic terrorist organization.

Vowing to unleash the full might of unrestrained federal firepower against its members, organizers and funders, the president declared: “Antifa is a militarist, anarchist enterprise that explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government, law enforcement authorities, and our system of law.”

In follow up, last week Trump held an “antifa roundtable” at the White House to “brainstorm” for Fox News cameras about how Trump could use armed forces to bring “antifa” down. Trump invited right-wing media influencers to the meeting, including Andy Ngo, Jack Posobiec, Nick Sortor, and Brandi Kruse, to infuse them with manufactured outrage, knowing they would dutifully spread “antifa” panic among their millions of online followers.

The session’s rollcall readout reflects trademark sycophancy. After Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem thanked Trump for “focusing on Antifa and the terrorists that they are,” she told the influencers: “These individuals do not just want to threaten our law enforcement officers, threaten our journalists and the citizens of this country, they want to kill them.” FBI Director Kash Patel, not to be outdone, vowed “to bring down this network of organized criminal thugs, gangbangers and, yes, domestic terrorists because that's what they are.” Multiple members of Trump’s Dear Leader cabinet amplified these claims in turn, each upping the fear and drama from the speaker before.

A construct, not an organization

The problem with Trump’s EO and roundtable is that none of it was true. It’s time for someone to let Trump in on a little secret: most Americans know that Trump knows that we know there’s no such thing as “antifa,” and that what Trump is really trying to do is outlaw his political opposition.

Experts and security analysts from PBS, the Associated Press, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and the Anti-Defamation League have all confirmed that “antifa” is not an organization. It is, instead, a decentralized ideology based on anti-fascist principles.

There is no organization called “antifa.” There are no headquarters, membership rosters, dues, press releases, or rules. There is no leader, unless you count Aunt Tifa, who, in fairness to Trump, could be intimidating in her “Passion for knitting, cats, and taking down the patriarchy.” Aunt Tifa has 162 followers on Facebook, and admittedly, 162 pairs of knitting needles — or 162 cats for that matter — could intimidate ICE goons when they aren’t busy body slamming peaceful protesters.

“Antifa” is a concept, an idea, a decentralized belief that fascism is wrong.

Hitler was a fascist. Benito Mussolini was a fascist. The murderous sycophants surrounding them, enabling their blood lust, were fascists. In 1945, the world reeled from unspeakable horrors they orchestrated. Millions upon millions of people perished in WWII — 15 million soldiers were smeared across battlefields; 45 million civilians were killed, including 11 million Jews, gay people and other minorities who drew their last breath in Hitler’s death camps. Together, Hitler and Mussolini devised the most sinister means of slaughtering humans the world has ever seen.

In World War II, every soldier, sailor and pilot who fought on the side of the Allies — and every woman who stayed behind to work in the munitions factories — fought to defeat Hitler’s fascist machine. That means my grandfather, your grandfather, and everyone who fought against Axis powers in WWII was aligned with “antifa.”

Every man, woman and child who emerged from the carnage committed to a collective global defense to avoid Hitlers of the future was “antifa.” The North Atlantic Treaty that established NATO and gave teeth to a free world order against fascism and governed by the rule of law? “Antifa.” Prized for its armed deterrence, NATO delivered the somber recognition that although Hitler was gone, the power-lust, brutality and villainy that drives evil men like him would remain.

To Trump, ‘Antifa’ means opposition....>

<....For world leaders who pushed the NATO alliance, the question wasn’t if Hitler-caliber evil would reappear on the world stage, but when. Small wonder Trump is antagonistic toward NATO. Small wonder groups fighting fascism today scare Trump so much he needed a label to vilify them.

It should be clear by now that “antifa,” to Trump, means anyone who opposes him politically. Trump’s chief henchman Stephen Miller said as much on Fox when he said the Democratic Party is “an entity devoted exclusively to the defense of hardened criminals, gang-bangers, and illegal, alien killers and terrorists. The Democrat Party is not a political party. It is a domestic extremist organization.”

Miller called “Democrats” a domestic terrorist organization back in August, before the White House hatched the “antifa” plan in September.

Trump and Noem, aided by Fox News, are spreading panic and fear about “antifa” preparing to “kill” as a political strategy. If the public truly believes “antifa” threatens them, they will support Trump’s unwarranted aggression in rounding people up. If they truly believe “antifa” wants to kill them, they will be supportive when ICE and the National Guard start killing protestors.

Noem hit it home at the roundtable, telling the influencers: “This network of Antifa is just as sophisticated as MS-13, as TDA, as ISIS, as Hezbollah, as Hamas, as all of them. They are just as dangerous. They have an agenda to destroy us just like the other terrorists.”

“Antifa” is Trump’s rallying cry. When he calls Democrat-run cities a “war zone” before he invades them with occupying forces, understand that he is planning to turn them into one.>

<Even as the government shutdown stalls work in Washington, D.C., the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is taking additional steps to undermine its mission.

The primary federal agency charged by Congress with enforcing the federal employment discrimination laws recently made it easier for employers to discriminate against workers, according to a new internal memo, reported but not yet publicly released.

Since 1971, federal law prohibiting employment discrimination (as interpreted by the Supreme Court) has required employers to use hiring practices which accurately measure job applicants’ ability to do the job. This is to avoid barring people from jobs because of irrelevant characteristics such as their race or gender, even if such exclusion was not intended.

Referred to as the “disparate impact” rule, it enables workers to challenge employment practices that disproportionately exclude groups of people based on race, gender, or other protected, non-job-related characteristics, where those are not valid measures of who can do the job.

In short, it means that arbitrary hurdles for job applicants have historically been eliminated, and when they haven’t, workers have been able to bring a discrimination claim. That means the job market has a more level playing field for everyone.

For example, let’s say a job posting for a retail or entry-level administrative job requires job applicants to have a college degree. That college degree is likely not necessary to do the job, but workers without one are disproportionately denied the opportunity to be considered. Such workers would have the ability to bring a disparate impact claim against that company.

It’s not just about hiring. Employers who set pay for a position based on what people earned in their prior job — not on the value of the work being done — can also face disparate impact claims and be required to show that prior pay accurately differentiates the value of employees’ current work.

In an era where evidence of intentional discrimination is rarely shown, and employers incorporate increasingly advanced technology in decision making, disparate impact claims are more critical than ever to fight employment discrimination.

Employers are now frequently using AI to screen applicants, but AI tools may be modeled off the demographics of existing employees, and identify characteristics that are not job-related, like whether you played lacrosse in college.

AI hiring systems may even be a “black box” that does not identify to the employer what criteria it is using. The efficiency gained by using AI must not come at the expense of applicants receiving a fair evaluation on job-related criteria.

Nonetheless, the EEOC has recently begun rejecting all pending claims of disparate impact discrimination, without completing ongoing investigations. Just last month, a leaked internal memo revealed orders to EEOC staff to conclude all investigations into disparate impact claims by the end of September and to notify claimants by the end of October that they must file a lawsuit on their own if they want to continue pursuing their claims.

In doing this, the EEOC is failing to enforce the law that Congress enacted in 1964, which has forbidden employment practices having a disparate impact since at least 1971. There has been no notice posted on the EEOC website or any other form of communication explaining the EEOC’s about face.

Fortunately, these civil rights laws can also be enforced by lawyers in the private bar. As the Supreme Court recognized, the nation must rely in part on lawyers acting as a “‘private attorney general,’ vindicating [civil rights laws] that Congress considered of the highest priority.”

Workers who receive notices of a right to sue should know that the EEOC’s refusal to investigate their claims does not necessarily mean that there is no way forward. To the contrary: The courts are still enforcing the law, including the disparate impact rule. Courts are obliged to do so, as Congress enacted legislation in 1991 that specifically incorporated disparate impact as a form of prohibited employment discrimination.

But those workers who receive these notices from the EEOC will only have 90 days to file their own lawsuits, or else their claims may be forever time-barred. They should consult a lawyer as soon as possible with experience bringing disparate impact claims.

The EEOC may be abandoning decades of precedent, but the doors to courthouses remain open to workers with disparate impact claims. Do not be deterred by the EEOC’s action or its inaction. If you believe you have been the victim of a discriminatory practice in the workplace, even as a job applicant, there is still a path to justice.>

<Last weekend at the Naval Station in Norfolk, Virginia, at a uniform-mandatory commemoration of the Navy’s 250th anniversary, Donald Trump addressed the troops as if it were a MAGA rally. He told hundreds of sailors, SEALS and Marines that the nation had to “take care” of this “little gnat on our shoulder called the Democrats,” then proceeded to disparage Democrats to cheers and applause from the assembled troops.

His comments drew criticism because the US military is a non-political fighting force, kept that way to protect the nation. But his Norfolk appearance followed a similar speech in Quantico, Virginia, where he informed 800 ranked officers from all fighting units that they’d soon be let loose on “the enemy within,” meaning, again, Democrats.

It is extraordinary, but not hyperbole, to say that Trump is conditioning all branches of the US military to devalue citizens who do not support him politically. As he sends red-state National Guardsmen into blue states against their wishes, Civil War style, Trump is reshaping historically apolitical forces into his own image, turning armed soldiers against Americans they have sworn an oath to protect.

The rule of law is holding. Barely and unpromisingly.

Trump’s authorization for the use of excessive force in ICE raids in Chicago, LA, and DC—resulting in several deaths—is well documented. In Portland, a Trump-appointed judge cited the disconnect between violence Trump claims is happening on the ground, and the largely peaceful protests occurring in reality.

It is clear to everyone outside the Fox News bubble that Trump is trying to destabilize Democrat-run cities, as he encourages the use of tear gas and pepper spray to create the appearance of mayhem. His goal is to provoke violent reactions and civil unrest, which will allow him to declare martial law to keep himself in power.

Legal challenges to these actions are stacking up across the country, and so far, judges at the federal district court level are holding the line. However, after the Supreme Court just eviscerated the 4th Amendment by allowing Trump’s masked agents to harass and detain people based on race, the hope that the judiciary will save us is fading.

Whether the same Republican justices will let Trump continue to terrorize the nation with armed military forces is unclear, but so far, in Trump 2.0, they have sided with Trump on 21 out of 23 emergency applications. It does not look good. However they ultimately rule on Posse Comitatus, they have already enabled a rogue president with malice and criminal intent toward half the nation.

Trump has broken the social contract under which law-abiding citizens pay their federal taxes

Trump’s violence against Democrat-run cities is consistent with his goal of strangling them financially. Although it is grossly unconstitutional to condition the receipt of federal tax-funded resources on political affiliation, Trump weaponizes government resources like a mob boss. Small wonder some taxpayers question whether they should fund their own destruction.

After already withholding billions from states governed by Democrats, Trump is now using the government shutdown as a pretext to withhold even more federal funds from them, even though blue states disproportionately fund the federal government compared to red states. Last week he threatened to use the shutdown to cut “many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM.”

Senator Chris Murphy summed the situation up frankly: “Let’s open our eyes. This isn’t a functioning democracy any longer when — in the middle of a high stakes funding fight — the President illegally suspends federal projects in states run by Democrats as a way to punish the political opposition.”....>

<....Why buy the guns aimed at our heads?

By all indications, Trump wants to cleave our nation in half to stay in power past his expiration date. But by withholding federal resources from Democrat-run states as political retribution, Trump is also building a permission structure for people living in those states to question their own federal taxation, asking why they should pay for the guns pointed at their own heads.

No lawyer worth their salt would advise people to break the law by not paying federal taxes that are due. However, while tax evasion is illegal, tax avoidance is not. Trump, who calls himself “smart” for his own history of tax avoidance, is now literally waging war on Democrats as they foot the bill for the violence.

Americans pay federal taxes under a social and legal contract. While we often disagree with our presidents, every 8 years, there’s a new one. Some will be conservative, some will be liberal, and over time, it balances. But now we have a president teasing a 3rd term after he tried to violently block the transfer of power the last time he lost an election, backed by a corrupt Supreme Court as he turns cities into war zones to stay in power.

Ezra Klein, no fan of Democrats, writes, “Democrats, morally speaking, should not fund a government that Trump is turning into a tool of personal enrichment and power… The machinery of the state is being organized to entrench Republican power … to create a masked paramilitary force roaming the streets and carrying out Trump’s commands. Do you just let that roll forward and hope for the best?”

Do you?>

<President Donald Trump on Tuesday pressured Republican senators at the White House to change a long-standing Senate practice to get his U.S. attorney nominees confirmed.

“You know, I have 10 U.S. attorneys who are phenomenal,” Trump said at lunch at the Rose Garden club. “And the problem is, they’re not going to ever be confirmed, I guess. I put them in, they’ll be there for three or four months, whatever it is, and then they have to leave.”

The president bemoaned the custom of home-state senators being able to essentially veto nominees to district courts and U.S. attorneys’ offices by not returning a so-called blue slip.

“Anytime you have a Democrat senator, not even two, just one, they’ll say, because of the time we’re in, ‘we’re not approving that person,’” Trump went on, calling it an unfair practice because he won the 2024 election “in a landslide.”

Senate Republicans confirmed Trump’s Cabinet nominees at a speedy clip, largely because they remained aligned and Democrats had no tool to block them. When it comes to the U.S. attorney nominees, Democrats have deployed the blue slips.

“Because of blue slip, I have to tell the person after three months, I’m sorry you’ll have to leave and I’ll put someone else in,” Trump said. “This is not constitutional. And I really, I hope you can look at that blue slip thing.”

Trump ramped up his criticism of blue slips in August.

He suggested at the time that he would file a lawsuit on blue slips and he called out Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) for not overhauling the process after New Jersey Democratic Sens. Cory Booker and Andy Kim opposed Alina Habba’s nomination to serve as federal prosecutor in their home state.

Grassley has pushed back, raising concerns about giving the same power to a future Democratic administration.

“Under my leadership the [Judiciary Committee] is processing U.S. Attorney nominees at a rate nearly 2 times faster than in the first [year] of the Biden administration,” Grassley wrote Monday on X.>

<A sign carried by protesters outside the North Carolina Legislature this week put it best: “We the People, Not the Maps.”

But inside the General Assembly, Republican lawmakers weren’t thinking about the people, they were thinking about the power.

As part of a broad, multistate effort by allies of President Donald Trump, the swing state’s Republicans have taken the dramatic step to try to redraw their already gerrymandered congressional districts 5 years before the normal end-of-decade cycle.

The goal is to secure one more Republican U.S. House seat in a desperate attempt to hang onto the House majority and protect Trump from political consequences.

Keep in mind, this map was already unfairly drawn up. The Princeton Gerrymandering Project gave it an “F,” with only one competitive district, 10 safe Republican seats and 3 safe Democratic seats. The new map would be even worse.

This is happening all over the country. From Texas, where lawmakers passed a new map at Trump’s behest, to Missouri, where organizers are trying to put an initiative on the ballot to overturn a recent gerrymander, to Indiana, where party leaders admitted this week they may not have the votes.

Republicans wouldn’t be trying this if they were confident they could win in 2026. But rather than trying to persuade the American people that they have better ideas, they are trying to rig it so that they can win anyway.

When people see these fights play out, the question they often ask is the right one: How is this legal? The answer lies not in what has been created, but in what has been dismantled.

For nearly 50 years, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 stood as American democracy’s great firewall. Its Section 5 “preclearance” rule required states with histories of racial discrimination, including North Carolina, to get federal approval before changing their election laws or district lines. It was not perfect, but it worked. It stopped discriminatory maps before they took effect and ensured that states could not quietly redraw the shape of democracy itself....>