NY Times - In Iowa, Presiden Trump’s choice for governor was defeated in a Republican primary. In Washington, Trump faced a revolt over his choice for acting director of national intelligence, while a handful of lawmakers from his party are feeling newly emboldened to buck him.
In the Middle East, the war between the United States and Iran grinded on as confusion persisted about a possible peace deal. Americans, unhappy with high gas prices, remain sour on the conflict — and on Trump.
Trump has had a rough start to the month of June, after a spring in which he won crushing victories over Republicans who have crossed him and watched his party gain an edge in the national redistricting war.
This week, he addressed the latest spike in prices, and gave a remark that doubled as a gift to Democratic ad makers. “I love it, the numbers were great,” Trump told reporters. “I love the inflation.”
June 13, 2026
Why no impeachment drive?
Ralph Nader - The majority of people favor firing Trump and the massive number of blatant, impeachable acts by the lawless, corrupt, violent, unstable, dangerous Tyrant Trump increases by the day. If it helps the passive Democratic Party leadership, constitutional law specialists agree that were the Founding Fathers (who signed the Declaration of Independence and crafted the Constitution against would-be monarchs) here today, not one would oppose Impeachment.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries and Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Party’s leaders in the House and Senate respectively, know all the ways Trump is wrecking America. They know that the Democrats in the House and Senate overwhelmingly want to impeach Trump. So, what’s the problem with these two men, and their weak Democratic National Committee?
Why do they constantly whine, “Now is not the Time,” “We don’t have the votes,” “Wait until after the midterm elections” which they know Trump has his Trumpsters working overtime to disrupt? These are not the real reasons; they are pretexts. Trump, the burgeoning arsonist of our Republic and the Constitution for which it stands, should not be given one day more without being confronted by a fast-rising national impeachment movement. Along with a growing majority of Americans, the powerful New York City Bar Task Force declared in a March 9, 2026 report that Trump should be immediately impeached. This from a Bar dominated by corporate lawyers, no less.
Why then is the Party leadership so cowardly and corrupt?
1. They are antidemocratic control freaks quite comfortable contracting out their campaigns to corporate-conflicted, incompetent consultants. This is a long-building drive of political immolation. Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich said “…The Democratic Party. It’s Dead,” after the 2000 election in a Washington Post op-ed.
These control freaks have excluded the input and voter turnout proposals of progressive citizen groups and progressive labor unions, which could have shown them how to landslide the worst GOP ever in election after election.
2. By definition, control freaks do not like electoral mandates from the public. These Democrats want to win elections their way — raise lots of money, including from corporate PACs and Wall Street, run on a very few issues distinguishing them from the Republicans, and declare they are NOT Trump the vengeful, wild outlaw. People want candidates who are fighters, specifically for their rights and interests not slick politicians giving them double talk.
Imagine if Democratic candidates pushed for “Medicare for All” instead of inadequate Obamacare or fought for an adequate living wage instead of not even raising the federal minimum wage when the Dems controlled both houses of Congress and had a Democratic president?
3. The Articles of Impeachment (H.Res.1155) introduced by Representative John Larson (D-CT)—viewed hostilely by Jeffries—offer a mechanism to check Trump’s unbridled destruction of our democracy and “kitchen-table” necessities. Impeachment shines a spotlight on a host of reform agendas that the ossified Democratic leadership does not want to address, unlike restive younger Democratic candidates, some of whom are winning upset primaries. For example, Trump is starting his own wars, without the authority of Congress — a prime impeachable offense. However, AIPAC, the Israeli-government-can-do-no-wrong lobby embedded in the Party, and the giant weapons manufacturers like Boeing, General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin support Trump’s war making abuses. While pocketing campaign donations from these lobbies, the Democratic Party has no interest in Mr. Larson’s Article of Impeachment regarding Trump unconstitutionally initiating war as a belligerent or co-belligerent against Iran, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Nigeria, and Gaza without constitutionally required congressional authorization.
A similar aversion extends to the “take care that the laws be faithfully executed” clause of the Constitution. This would open up a can of worms for The Democrats because Democratic Presidents have failed to faithfully execute the law by ignoring waves of corporate crime, hundreds of billions of dollars in commercial billing fraud, including on Medicare and Medicaid, refusing to push for adequate corporate enforcement budgets, bankrolling huge corporate welfare schemes and allowing the tax code to be turned into Swiss cheese riddled with loopholes for the rich and powerful, and supporting the construction of nuclear power plants that are targets for terrorists, hazardous, and extremely costly compared to renewable wind, solar and geothermal energy.
The Democratic leadership doesn’t want the November election to be about the concentration of power abuses by plutocrats who have been inflicting so many injustices, crimes and anxieties on the American people, reducing their livelihoods and public services...
Small wonder that the huge number of Americans who despise Trump also do not trust the Democratic Party, which the media describes month-after-month as being in disarray. Repeatedly, people ask “What does the Democratic Party stand for?” ...
Court cases
NY Times - The Trump administration was indefinitely barred on Friday from setting up a $1.8 billion fund to compensate people claiming they were persecuted by the government. A federal judge said her order was needed because of mixed messages from the government over the fund. Read more ›
Once again. . .
NY Times - Officials in Washington and Tehran say they’re close to reaching a deal to end the war in Iran. President Trump indicated that a signing ceremony could happen as soon as this weekend.
Climate
Inside Climate News - A federal judge in South Carolina ruled this week that the Trump administration’s termination of environmental justice grants was unlawful.
Federal judge okays reality in national parks
The Hill - A federal judge in Massachusetts has ordered the Trump administration to reinstall displays it removed from National Parks sites over the past year as part of a crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) content and climate change information.
A group of park advocacy organizations sued the Interior Department, National Park Service and its leaders in February over what they described as an effort to “erase history and undermine science” at national parks across the country.
Judge Angel Kelley sided with the challengers on Friday, finding that the federal government’s action “sets a dangerous precedent of censorship and sanitization” while undermining the “integrity” of the National Parks system.
“The Government’s stewardship of these park sites thus carries a responsibility to present history in full rather than in favored fragments. Unfortunately, the Government has disregarded these principles,” Kelley wrote in a 63-page order.
“Under the guise of promoting American dignity, this Administration seeks to share a limited history by ordering the removal of all signs, displays, and interpretive exhibits at National Parks that do not align with its preferred narrative, thereby telling half-truths.”
.... The order deals a blow to President Trump’s effort to exert broader control over what is displayed at federal cultural institutions and historical sites, which he has accused of promoting “divisive narratives” of U.S. history.
The president signed an executive order last March directing Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to take steps to purge “descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living” from all public monuments, memorials and statues.
The lawsuit filed earlier this year claimed the administration had subsequently identified and started to remove hundreds of signs from national parks, including exhibits regarding slavery at Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park and signage detailing climate threats at Fort Sumter in South Carolina — an environmentally endangered site where the first shots of the Civil War were fired.
Kelley’s ruling also cited dozens of other examples in which information regarding the environment, abolition, immigration, labor, women’s suffrage and civil rights had been removed.
Polls
Newsweek - Harris has 27 percent of the hypothetical vote compared to Newsom's 14 percent. Buttigieg landed 11 percent, Ocasio-Cortez has 8 percent and both Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear have 2 percent. The poll notes that 17 percent were not sure.
- Public opinion among: Israelis | Palestinians | Americans
- Are the sides doing enough to avoid civilian casualties?
- How do Israelis and Palestinians feel about their safety?
The danger to Social Security and Medicare
Roll Call - The financial health of Social Security and Medicare has worsened over the past year, with the programs’ trust funds expected to run dry three months sooner than anticipated, according to reports issued Tuesday by the programs’ trustees.
Without any changes, the main Social Security trust fund would be depleted in the fourth quarter of 2032, one quarter earlier than projected last year, the Social Security trustees said in their report.
Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund would be depleted in the second quarter of 2033, which is likewise three months earlier than projected last year, the Medicare report said.
Under the latest projections from the Social Security trustees, Social Security retirement benefits will face a 22 percent cut six years from now, while Medicare hospital insurance benefits, which cover inpatient hospital care, will be cut by 11 percent in seven years.
By law, those cuts will take place unless Congress restructures the programs through higher taxes, benefit cuts, a combination of both, or borrows more money to sustain the program
Tales from the attic: Retrieving the republic
Thirteen years ago, and several years before Trump became president, your editor wrote a piece about recovering from the sad condition of our republic. Here is one of a number of excerpts we will be running.
Face the facts -The First American Republic is over. The Constitution is being trashed by both major parties. We are incapable of responding to the environmental crisis. Liberals can't tell the difference between being elite and being extinct. We're in the most expensive wars of no purpose in our history. Both major parties have moved steadily to the right over the past thirty years. Both have never been so corrupt. Ethnic prejudice is at an overt level unseen since the days of the civil rights struggles. The economy is still in the pits. Thanks to Citizens United, money has replaced votes as dominant political campaign objective. Our creative culture has been reduced to the likes of Lady Gaga, Desperate Houswives, the Kardashians and Jersey Shore. And Barack Obama has turned out to be the Bernie Madoff of the Democratic Party - successfully conning America's liberals out of their hope and spare change.
Work around it - If a hurricane comes to your neighborhood, you don't just sit around the kitchen table complaining about it; you do things to help your survival. The same is true of the great storm of American disintegration. We have clearly lost what we have lost. We can give up our futile efforts to preserve the illusion and turn our energies instead to the construction of a new time. It is this willingness to walk away from the seductive power of the present that first divides the mere reformer from the rebel -- the courage to emigrate from one's own ways in order to meet the future not as an entitlement but as a frontier.
June 12, 2026
Donald Trump's sexual history
Sam Smith - At least 28 women have publicly accused Donald Trump of sexual misconduct since the 1970s, including allegations of rape, forcible kissing, groping, and unwanted touching.
The media fails to remind its viewers and readers of them. Here, in contrast, is Wikipedia's description of Trump's treatment of E Jean Carroll, the court case that resulted, and the amount Trump was ruled he had to pay, namely $88 million. For an account of other cases go this Wikipedia account
College students losing reading skills
Futurism - In a new essay for The Chronicle Higher Education, university-level literature and writing instructor Tyler Jagt recalls how not a single one of his students could get through an assigned 20-page article, something that he had read “without complaint” as an undergraduate a decade ago.
One student confessed that the reason they didn’t finish was that they kept losing track of what the paper was about. And there’s no doubt that they’re not alone.
Jagt cites the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress reading assessment results released last year. It showed that 12th grade reading scores were at the lowest level since the assessment began in 1992. Nearly a third of those 12th graders scored below the assessment’s “basic” level in reading, meaning they likely “cannot draw general conclusions based on concepts presented explicitly in a text.” Younger children aren’t better off: a recent report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation found that 70 percent of fourth graders, or around two million kids, can’t read at a proficient level.
“What I am seeing in my classroom is no longer a hunch,” Jagt writes. “There is a measurable, generational collapse in sustained reading and writing, and the academy is responding to it with improvisation and exhaustion rather than the structural overhaul it requires.
Switzerland to vote on a cap for its population
New Yorker - On June 14th, Switzerland will vote on whether to become the only country in the world to officially cap its population, with a limit of ten million people until 2050. (The current population is 9.1 million.) The initiative, which was put forward by the Swiss People’s Party (S.V.P.) and in recent polls has been supported by as many as fifty-two per cent of respondents, would require the government to curb growth through two main measures.
The first, triggered as soon as Switzerland exceeds 9.5 million inhabitants, would lead to restrictions in the areas of asylum and family reunification. If the population surpasses ten million for two consecutive years, the second measure would kick in, requiring the termination of the Free Movement of Persons agreement, which allows citizens of the European Union to work, study, and live in Switzerland (and vice versa). This move would rupture Switzerland’s relations with the E.U., its closest partner in trade and security. “The whole package of bilateral agreements would be at stake,” Michael Siegenthaler, a labor economist at the public university E.T.H. Zurich, said. “It’s quite likely that the European Union would cancel all of them.” A population ceiling is more or less unprecedented; the closest comparison might be conservation laws that limit human settlement in ecologically fragile places like the Galápagos Islands.
Housing
Time - According to a recent report by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, California saw a 2.8% decrease in its population experiencing homelessness year over year, marking the first decline since 2018 and one of the largest drops in the country. Although California still has the largest number of people experiencing homelessness in the nation, the state's rate dipped from 48 per 10,000 people to 46 per 10,000.
The decline appears to have been driven by a mix of policies, according to organizations that work closely with the state government to address the crisis: prevention programs, supportive housing and mental health services, and more aggressive encampment cleanup operations.
What's really happened to Social Security
Robert Reich - The common understanding is that Social Security’s shortfall is due to the huge postwar baby boom, now retiring, and to America’s increasing life expectancy. The usual recommended fix is to reduce Social Security benefits or raise the age of eligibility. As Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, warned Monday, “entitlement programs” like Social Security “have to be adjusted and fixed.” He said Republicans will introduce a plan to do that. Brace yourselves.
I used to be a Social Security trustee, and I call bullsh*t. The baby boom can’t be blamed for Social Security’s shortfall. The Greenspan Commission, which in 1983 recommended the reforms that Congress then made — raising Social Security payroll taxes and also raising the eligibility age for collecting Social Security benefits — knew all about the baby boom and figured it into its calculations. (Early boomers like me can now start collecting full benefits at age 66; late boomers born after 1960 have to wait until they’re 67 to collect full benefits.)
Americans’ increasing life expectancy isn’t at fault, either. While wealthier Americans are living longer, that’s not the case for lower-income Americans. The Urban Institute estimates that life expectancy in the top 20 percent of income-earners is 91 years for people born in the 1990s, four years more than people born in the 1950s. Yet the life expectancy in the lowest 20 percent of income-earners is fewer than 80 years.
So what’s the real cause of the Social Security shortfall? What did Greenspan’s commission fail to predict? Widening inequality.
Remember, the Social Security payroll tax applies only to earnings up to a certain cap. This year, that cap is $184,500. Earnings at or below this amount are taxed at 12.4 percent. The cap rises every year according to a formula roughly matching inflation.
Back in 1983, the cap was set so the Social Security payroll tax would hit 90 percent of total income in America. That 90 percent figure was built into the Greenspan Commission’s fixes. The Greenspan commission assumed that, as the cap rose with inflation, the Social Security payroll tax would continue to hit 90 percent of total income.
Today, though, the Social Security payroll tax hits only about 83 percent of total income in America. It went from 90 percent to 83 percent because a steadily larger portion of the nation’s total income has gone to the top.
In 1983, the richest 1 percent of Americans got 11.6 percent of total income. Today, the top 1 percent takes in more than 20 percent.
Trump regime
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| Elizabeth Warren |
Democracy Forward, a legal nonprofit representing the plaintiffs, confirmed Brinkema’s ruling from the bench.
“This ruling is a significant victory for the Constitution, the rule of law, and people in America,” Skye Perryman, the group’s president and CEO, said in a statement.
“The court recognized the serious legal concerns raised by the Trump-Vance administration’s attempt to create a secretive, taxpayer-funded compensation program operating outside the constitutional safeguards that govern public spending. Despite the administration’s shifting explanations about the future of the slush fund, the court’s order ensures that taxpayer dollars cannot be distributed through this unlawful scheme while the courts fully consider the serious constitutional issues at stake. We look forward to continuing this challenge on behalf of our clients.”
Health
Axios - PwC yesterday estimated that medical costs will go up by 9% in the employer market next year, and by 8.5% in the individual market. One of the largest drivers is providers' use of AI-enabled software and scribes that more thoroughly document the care that's delivered. Such tools are being used "to capture greater billing complexity, and plans are absorbing the cost," per the report.
PwC said the financial impact isn't so much due to people using more medical services as "changes in coded severity, case mix and paid amount per claim."
Donald Trump
NY Times - A federal judge on Friday barred the Trump administration until further notice from setting up a $1.8 billion fund to compensate people claiming to have been unfairly prosecuted by the government, saying that her order was needed because of mixed messages about the scheme from President Trump.
The ruling by the judge, Leonie M. Brinkema, was the strongest effort to date by anyone in government to hold the administration to its word that the proposal to create the fund had actually been set aside. While Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, told Congress last week that the fund would not move forward, Mr. Trump has been much more circumspect, insisting that he still loves the idea and believes that people who suffered in court at the hands of the government should get financial compensation.
A measure to expunge Trump’s 2019 and 2021 impeachments likely wouldn’t be considered until after the midterm elections, people familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal Thursday night.
“It should be done because I did nothing wrong,” Trump told the Journal. “It was a rigged deal—it was a whole rigged situation.” Experts said that the resolution would have little legal weight considering that the Constitution has no mechanism for expunging impeachments, and Republican lawmakers noted that it wouldn’t be easy to get enough support to pass the bill.
The president’s plan to erase his impeachments gained new momentum in April, after the Trump administration published new documents related to his first impeachment that MAGA claimed undermined the credibility of the witnesses.
Federal judge blocks lawsuit against ActBlue
The Hill - A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled Thursday that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) cannot move forward with a donation-vetting lawsuit against progressive fundraising platform ActBlue. District Judge Richard G. Stearns blocked Paxton from “continuing to litigate” the case, finding that ActBlue was likely to succeed in its claims that the action infringed on its First Amendment’s free-speech protections.
The court sided with ActBlue’s argument that the lawsuit amounted to “retaliation” for its role in fundraising for Democratic candidates, namely Paxton’s opponent in the Texas Senate race, state Rep. James Talarico (D).
“The lawsuit in Texas is undoubtedly an adverse action,” Stearns, an appointee of former President Clinton, wrote in a 15-page order. “And having previously found bad faith, the court agrees with ActBlue that the evidence in the record compels the conclusion that, far from protecting Texas consumers, the action was filed in retaliation for ActBlue’s fundraising on behalf of Talarico, Paxton’s current political rival for the Senate seat.”
The court sided with ActBlue’s argument that the lawsuit amounted to “retaliation” for its role in fundraising for Democratic candidates, namely Paxton’s opponent in the Texas Senate race, state Rep. James Talarico (D).
“The lawsuit in Texas is undoubtedly an adverse action,” Stearns, an appointee of former President Clinton, wrote in a 15-page order. “And having previously found bad faith, the court agrees with ActBlue that the evidence in the record compels the conclusion that, far from protecting Texas consumers, the action was filed in retaliation for ActBlue’s fundraising on behalf of Talarico, Paxton’s current political rival for the Senate seat.”
Bad Weather
Bloomberg - The US declared a power emergency in the southeast as forecasters warned of dangerous heat that’s likely to stress power grids. Chicago was placed under a tornado warning on Thursday night, and disruptions to air travel and power supply persisted after the storm moved through. As of 11 p.m. ET, 1,474 flights were canceled and nearly 600,000 homes and businesses were without power.
NPR - The Trump administration is trying to downsize the U.S. Forest Service and eliminate wildfire and smoke research, just as the American West faces a potentially epic summer fire season. The administration has identified 90 research stations for closure as part of its Forest Service reorganization plan, which includes relocating its headquarters from Washington, D.C., to Utah and consolidating regional offices into individual state facilities. U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz has defended the proposed reorganization, noting it has been considered by previous administrations since 2006. If Congress approves Trump's proposed budget for the agency, the U.S. Forest Service would be a skeleton of its former self, just as climate change is accelerating the frequency and severity of wildfires.
SpaceX
NBC News - SpaceX is set to begin trading on the stock market today at a valuation of $1.77 trillion — the largest ever initial public offering.
The IPO, which could be a referendum on Elon Musk, is also going to be the latest major test of red-hot demand for the artificial intelligence boom. Yesterday, the company locked in its final IPO price of $135, making it the largest stock debut ever.
The implications of this IPO stretch far beyond the opening trade.
For years, SpaceX was largely accessible only to venture capital firms, institutional investors and a small group of private shareholders. Now, ordinary investors will have their first chance to buy into the company — whether they realize it or not. Recent changes made by major stock exchanges mean SpaceX could be added to passive index funds almost immediately.
In addition, buying the stock also means investing by proxy in Musk, the company’s controlling shareholder. He’s already the world’s richest person but is poised to become the world’s first trillionaire when Space X goes public. To put that into perspective, it would take the average U.S. household nearly 12 million years to accumulate that much wealth.
Still can't wrap your head around how much 1,000,000,000,000 really is? These interactive graphics will help you visualize it.
The IPO, which could be a referendum on Elon Musk, is also going to be the latest major test of red-hot demand for the artificial intelligence boom. Yesterday, the company locked in its final IPO price of $135, making it the largest stock debut ever.
The implications of this IPO stretch far beyond the opening trade.
For years, SpaceX was largely accessible only to venture capital firms, institutional investors and a small group of private shareholders. Now, ordinary investors will have their first chance to buy into the company — whether they realize it or not. Recent changes made by major stock exchanges mean SpaceX could be added to passive index funds almost immediately.
In addition, buying the stock also means investing by proxy in Musk, the company’s controlling shareholder. He’s already the world’s richest person but is poised to become the world’s first trillionaire when Space X goes public. To put that into perspective, it would take the average U.S. household nearly 12 million years to accumulate that much wealth.
Still can't wrap your head around how much 1,000,000,000,000 really is? These interactive graphics will help you visualize it.
Middle East
NPR - In another whiplash decision, President Trump announced yesterday that he canceled new attacks in Iran, after announcing earlier in the day that more strikes were coming if the country didn't agree to a peace deal. The president signaled that the two countries had "conceptually" secured an agreement on nuclear issues and could sign a peace deal in the next few days, but Iran's foreign ministry says a deal hasn't been finalized. Trump wants this war to end, NPR's Aya Batrawy tells Up First. It's unpopular among Americans, who saw inflation surge to its highest level in several years. Arab Gulf countries are also hurting as the war drags on. Batrawy says a call between Trump and Qatar's emir yesterday, in which messages from Iran were exchanged, could have led Trump to call off more attacks. The United Arab Emirates has also shifted its tone from being hawkish on Iran to aligning more with Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt about ending the war. That leaves Israel as the only country railing against a diplomatic approach. |
New execution system
The Guardian- The US’s newest execution method, nitrogen gas, appears headed toward a legal showdown amid a widening controversy over whether it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. The supreme court late on Thursday rejected the state of Alabama’s request to execute prisoner Jeffrey Lee with nitrogen gas, and the rebuke culminates a week of setbacks for Alabama. The method has raised concerns for its apparent brutality. Eugene Smith, the first person to die by nitrogen hypoxia, thrashed and writhed on the gurney, according to witnesses. The last nitrogen execution, of Anthony Boyd, appeared to take more than 30 minutes as Boyd shuddered and gasped.
New alcohol studies
NY Times - A government alcohol study published on Tuesday concluded that the health risks of alcohol start at a single drink a day. The report was caught up in controversy after drawing the ire of the alcohol industry. For people who have one drink a day on average, the researchers found, there was an increased risk of premature death from an illness or injury directly attributable to alcohol, though it was small — one in 1,000 people. But the risk of premature death jumped to one in 25 for those who had two drinks a day, a level long considered safe for men, according to the study, which was published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
The second report’s finding was more palatable to the alcohol industry, which had called the Alcohol Intake and Health Study ideologically driven and scientifically flawed, and said it had communicated its concerns repeatedly to government officials over a period of several years.
The Alcohol Intake and Health Study was one of two reports commissioned during the Biden administration to inform an update to the U.S. dietary guidelines.
The second report, from a panel appointed by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, or NASEM, came to very different conclusions. It suggested that moderate drinking (up to two drinks a day for men and one for women) was healthier than not drinking at all, although it noted that moderate drinking was also linked to a higher breast cancer risk. Some of the panelists behind that report had financial ties to the alcohol industry.
The second report’s finding was more palatable to the alcohol industry, which had called the Alcohol Intake and Health Study ideologically driven and scientifically flawed, and said it had communicated its concerns repeatedly to government officials over a period of several years.
June 11, 2026
Voting
Alternet - President Donald Trump's administration has spent months trying to get voter lists, particularly from blue states. Now, Trump is threatening to deny mailing ballots through the USPS if those states don't turn over the lists.
"That dilemma stems from newly proposed USPS rules that seek to comply with an executive order President Donald Trump signed this spring to crack down on mail-in voting," reported CNN. "If courts let the order stand, it would give the federal government an unprecedented role in elections — and could put even more voter data in the hands of Trump officials searching for supposed election fraud."
Trump's rules lay out new demands for mail-in ballots that states must meet if they intend to conduct an election by mail. Some states, like Colorado and seven others, with the District of Columbia, have all-mail elections. Twenty-three states and D.C. have decided to sue over the threat.
The Justice Department cleared a legal hurdle in May when a federal judge in Washington refused to block Trump’s executive order, allowing the Postal Service to begin enforcing it. Democratic groups are seeking an appeal and warn voters will be disenfranchised in November if mailed-in ballots are banned.
Democratic Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, whose state is part of the coalition challenging the order in Boston, told CNN in an interview that if courts rule in favor of the Trump administration, it would be “a virtual elimination of mail-in voting, unless the states supply voter lists to the federal government.”
ICE
Ximena Bustillo, NPR - Republicans in Congress voted to send tens of billions of dollars to two agencies - Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol. This includes $38 billion just for ICE, which is a bit over three times the previous annual budget Congress had approved. It also includes money to hire more Border Patrol agents and for border security technology. Congress was originally on track to fund these parts of DHS, along with many other parts of the federal government, through its normal appropriations process, but Senate Democrats pulled their support for that measure and for all of DHS funding after DHS agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January.
Donald Trump
Independent - The Trump administration requested National Park visitors report exhibits deemed "negative" about Americans, aiming to restore sites as "uplifting public monuments." An analysis of 35,000 public comments, disclosed through a Sierra Club lawsuit, revealed that the vast majority sharply criticized the administration's initiative, with many calling it "un-American."
Newsbreak - President Trump on Wednesday applauded the latest inflation spike, saying the numbers are "great" and "I love the inflation" because the U.S. is "taking out" what he called "millions" of barrels of Iranian oil through the Strait of Hormuz and because once the conflict is over, he said oil prices and inflation will drop rapidly.
A reporter asked the president in the Oval Office Wednesday if he's concerned that the Consumer Price Index rose at an annual rate of 4.2%, up from 3.8% in the prior month and marking the highest level since April 2023. The new inflation numbers were released earlier Wednesday.
"No, I love it," the president said. "The numbers were great. You know what I really love? I love the inflation. You know why? Because as soon as this war is over. You know, I can say it now, something you didn't know. Did you know we've been taking out millions of barrels of oil? Nobody knows it. You know who doesn't know about it? Iran, until right now. We took out the other night, 22 ships. Late at night, with no lights. Because they don't have any radar because we blasted the crap out of it. We took out. That's why oil's $85 a barrel."
President Donald Trump appears to have set a new bar: 22 medical specialists assessed him as part of his latest checkup, according to a medical report recently released by the White House. That figure is nearly double the number of specialists who assessed Trump for his past medical checkups as president, according to a review of publicly available statements by Trump’s doctors.
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