In another shocked-but-not-surprised disclosure related to President Trump’s election integrity executive order, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin just revealed that several states shared sensitive motor vehicle information with non-governmental groups prior to the 2020 presidential election. Archived with a group formed by Pew Charitable Trust, private data including social security and drivers license numbers were then shared with a nonprofit named after the wife of Mark Zuckerberg; the then-Facebook founder led a $400 million nationwide operation to boost voter registration favoring Democratic candidates, particularly Joe Biden, that year.

“This sharing and resharing of Motor Vehicle Agency data among NGOs may not qualify as a permissible use of [that] data,” Mullin explained to Attorney General Todd Blanche in a letter last week. “This category of data regarding potential voters is extremely valuable to political parties and campaigns.”

But my, how times have changed.

Some of those same states are currently fighting the administration’s attempt to obtain millions of files related to the holders of commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs). For example, Mullin busted Colorado, Washington, and Pennsylvania for sharing motor vehicle and voter registration files in order to register non-qualified residents including illegals—but those states now are parties in a blue-state lawsuit to prevent the Department of Transportation from acquiring a database containing the files of 17 million truck drivers. The move is the latest in the DOT’s crusade to rid highways of unsafe, and in some instances illegal, truck drivers behind the wheel of 80,000-pound rigs; Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy initiated the effort following the deaths of several American citizens by illegal immigrants.

Who Owns the Data?

In June, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), a subsidiary agency of the DOT, sent a letter to a nationwide nonprofit that manages motor vehicle records to ask for identifying information pertaining to all commercial drivers license (CDL) holders across the country. That request was accompanied by a subpoena for the same information by the Department of Homeland Security the following month; the nonprofit, the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA), indicated it would cooperate. The subpoena was withdrawn.

But after several weeks of foot-dragging by AAMVA, who insisted individual states deserved a say in the matter, DOT officials pushed back. “States have no veto over the production of records that AAMVA is holding on DOT’s behalf, that DOT has statutory authority and responsibility to maintain, and that are urgently needed for the federal government to help prevent fatal trucking accidents involving the many drivers to whom States have improperly issued Commercial Driver’s Licenses,” a DOT lawyer wrote on August 11. “This is not ‘state data,’ and State laws and choices cannot override DOT’s statutory authority or AAMVA’s obligation to produce DOT’s own records to DOT.” The previously-withdrawn subpoena was re-issued and DOT threatened to pull $10 million in federal funds that pays for the very same database that the federal government wants access to. (All correspondence is here.)

In response, 22 states and the District of Columbia filed a lawsuit to halt the production of the requested records. “If…AAMVA were to yield to the threat and turn over the sensitive personal information of millions of drivers, that disclosure would breach the confidentiality of millions of individuals by divulging personal information that Plaintiff States promised to keep private, subject to narrow exceptions, damaging public trust in the States and foreseeably deterring many people from applying for CDLs, which would deprive the States of revenue and potentially cause some to attempt to drive without valid licenses,” the August 13 lawsuit warned.

That same day, Virginia Judge Anthony Trenga—a George W. Bush appointee who has ruled against the Trump administration at least a dozen times since 2025—halted the production of the data. Trenga then issued a temporary restraining order claiming that while the AAMVA holds all CDL records, the data is “owned by the states.” Trenga now is considering a preliminary injunction to further delay the process.

Duffy opposes the preliminary injunction on a number of grounds including jurisdiction and Trenga’s claims that the request related to immigration policy. “[The] Court’s conclusion that DOT’s request was a pretext for immigration enforcement ignored the agency’s genuine interest in promoting commercial motor vehicle safety and unfairly faulted it for having ‘other unstated [or stated] reasons’ for acting.”

The fight for CDL records comes on the heels of another spate of fatalities caused by non-domiciled long haulers. An illegal from India killed an Ohio woman in a head-on crash last week; it appears a non-domiciled CDL holder killed a New York woman in a separate crash over the weekend after he attempted to back up on a busy highway.

More here:

As I have been covering for months, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy is leading a nationwide effort to remove dangerous truck drivers from American roadways. The deaths of several American citizens at the hands of illegal truck drivers prompted Duffy to initiate a full scale audit into the practices of several states, mostly blue, related to the issuance of commercial drivers licenses (CDL) and learning permits, particularly to noncitizens.

Duffy’s final rule, which drastically tightened the requirements for noncitizens to receive a CDL, took effect earlier this year after a court battle over a lawsuit brought by a few CDL holders and union organizations. (That battle is not quite over, more to come.) Some states have refused to cooperate with the DOT, resulting in threats to cut federal highways funds and even the revocation of the state’s entire CDL program.

But Duffy’s hands were tied in terms of holding drivers, their employers, and state licensing agencies accountable. Until today.

During a press conference in Detroit this morning, Duffy—joined by Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration chief Derek Barrs, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, and White House Fraud task force vice chairman Andrew Ferguson—announced the creation of an interagency group to expose fraud in the nation’s trucking industry. Those agencies include the Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, and Homeland Security Investigation.

“The initiative focuses on CDL fraud, unauthorized employment, identity-document fraud, financial crime, money laundering, labor exploitation, and potential links to human smuggling, drug trafficking, and cartel activity,” Duffy said. The press conference coincided with a “synchronized surge” at more than 200 driving schools across 23 states to ensure the schools were following federal law; the DOT has already shut down hundreds of CDL schools for issuing permits drivers who did not meet English proficiency standards or employing unqualified instructors.

Since early 2025, according to Duffy, the DOT has removed 28,000 truck drivers from the roads for failing to speak English, a federal requirement. The move followed an executive order issued by President Trump last year to enforce the English language law for truck drivers.

A separate initiative entitled “Crossroads of America” focuses on four states: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio. All nine U.S. Attorneys from those states will task investigators and prosecutors with enforcing the laws and bringing charges if needed. Jerome Gorgon, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, pointed to the busy nexus of I-75, I-65, and I-94 stretching from Ohio to Illinois as a hot spot to find illegal truck drivers, with more than 2 million trucks passing through each year. “Many of these trucks are driven by foreign nationals and illegal aliens who lack the proper training to safely drive 40 tons of truck and cargo across America on our highways,” Gorgon said.

More clips of today’s presser here:

Vice President JD Vance also weighed in:

“I’ve done this a long time and haven’t seen one quite like this one, I have to say.”

So said U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth, who has sat on the D.C. federal court bench since Ronald Reagan appointed him in 1987, last April.

What exactly stumped the senior judge that day? Another pending mistrial in the government’s prosecution of two of MS-13’s most notorious gang leaders.

For the second time in five months, a D.C. jury refused to convict Moises Rivera-Luna and Tokiro Ramirez on two racketeering conspiracy counts originating from a 2011 federal indictment (read: brought by the Obama DOJ, not Trump’s) for criminal gang activity in Washington, D.C. and surrounding areas. It appears from the official court docket that the pair became fugitives before the case could go to trial back then.

But in March 2025, the Trump administration extradited Rivera-Luna from Guatemala to finally face his day in court; Ramirez had been extradited from Honduras in 2022.

“Rivera-Luna is alleged to be an international leader of MS-13 who was sending orders and advice to an MS-13 clique operating in the Washington area via cellular telephone calls from his prison cell in El Salvador,” a March 2025 DOJ press release stated. “The indictment alleges that he and another alleged MS-13 leader… also incarcerated in El Salvador directed a coalition of MS-13 cliques to be formed in the Washington area. They advised local clique members that the coalition’s aim was to seek and kill MS-13 members who were found to be cooperating with law enforcement officials.” The indictment also accused the defendants of “narcotics distribution, extortion, [and] robberies.”

Both men pleaded not guilty; the first trial began on December 2, 2025, just a few weeks after the shooting of two D.C. National Guardsmen, which resulted in the death of one, amid strong public opposition of the Guard’s presence in the nation’s capital. The start of the trial also coincided with nationwide anti-ICE protests including in Washington. And a group called “Free DC” at the time was hosting online seminars as part of its Trump 2.0 resistance operation, advising D.C. residents how to serve on juries to “influence outcomes and help create a more equitable legal process.”

Free MS-13 to Show Trump!

Jury deliberations in the Rivera/Ramirez case began December 15, 2025. In a note to Judge Lamberth the following day, the foreperson informed the judge that despite “robust debate,” the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict. “One juror has expressed an inability to be impartial in their review of the facts and an unwillingness to continue deliberations in a productive manner,” the foreperson disclosed.

Lamberth declared a mistrial on December 17, 2025. Vive la résistance!

Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, immediately sought to retry the pair. The second trial started on April; jury deliberations began on April 15. History, however, would repeat itself with a note from the jury foreperson just a few hours later, disclosing that the panel was “divided and unable to come to a consensus.” They continued to debate but the situation worsened in the jury room:

Lamberth responded with bewilderment, admitting the situation raised profound legal questions. “It’s an odd note because their disclosure of the split, assuming that’s what it is, is disclosing jury misconduct that would entitle an inquiry into the misconduct of the juror and possible replacement and restart of jury deliberations,” he told prosecutors and defense attorneys during an April 17 hearing. “A juror who says at the outset they will not have any problem with never agreeing on a verdict has a problem with me.”

The judge released the jury for the weekend and asked both sides to research how to handle such an impasse. But the jury came back with another blow to the government on April 20:

Lamberth called the foreperson into the courtroom to ask what was going on. “For one of the counts, we were in agreement and then this morning, we weren’t,” the foreperson disclosed. “And then I know we have one juror who is very firm on their stance and doesn’t really want to deliberate further on the others. But there are two different jurors, if that makes sense.”

Lamberth declared another mistrial that day.

Pirro v Graves: Not Even Close…and Lamberth Knows Exactly Why

So despite breathless headlines declaring Pirro a loser in court once again, it appears the jury in both cases was prepared to convict but prevented from doing so by activist jurors who unabashedly declared their intention to sabotage a guilty verdict. (It is unclear why Lamberth, seeing this happen yet again in the case, did not make an Allen charge to the jury or open an investigation into the rogue jurors. But as part of the ongoing judicial coup against the president, Lamberth possibly wanted to hand the Trump administration another loss.)

Further, Lamberth knows exactly why he hasn’t seen “one quite like this.” Because it never happened prior to Trump winning the 2024 election and proceeding to use his DOJ, rather than being hijacked by saboteurs like the first time around, to pursue his policy agenda and round up bad guys, white collar and otherwise.

Compare the outcome of Pirro’s cases before DC juries to the track record of Matthew Graves, her predecessor in the Biden administration. Not only did Graves secure a 100 percent conviction rate of January 6 defendants before DC juries, those guilty verdicts were returned in record time. Graves won easy convictions in the misdemeanor cases against Trump advisors Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, resulting in prison time for both.

But the same office now struggles to win convictions in those same courtrooms—and the only thing that has changed is the name on the letterhead. Not only have DC juries acquitted or declared a hung jury in at least seven federal cases since her tenure began (not including this one), the DC grand jury has rejected Pirro’s pursuit of several indictments including charges against the so-called “Seditious Six.”

And no one knows this massive disparity more than Judge Lamberth, who presided over dozens of J6 cases and sent many to federal prison. His feigned shock as to why juries--both grand and petit--are letting criminals off the hook is nothing more than a hollow attempt to pretend the judicial system in Washington, DC resembles anything close to fair, apolitical proceedings.

Lamberth, and Pirro, will get another chance to convict the dangerous gang lords next month. Is the third time a charm? Inside the grotesquely partisan courthouse sitting in the heart of the nation’s capital, the answer is probably, no.

Regardless of what one thinks about the Department of Justice’s prosecution of disgraced former FBI Director James Comey over posting a threatening seashell formation in May 2025—gotta admit, this case is pretty wild so far.

And it’s fitting for Comey, who has a flair for the dramatic. From hiding in a set of blue curtains in the White House to try to “avoid” President Trump and producing cheesy videos professing his love of Taylor Swift (among other embarrassments) to using his besties to plant positive news stories about himself to complicit reporters, Comey craves attention just like all good megalomaniacs do; Showtime even turned his 2018 memoir into a mini series, where veteran actor Jeff Daniels played the role of Comey. (Remember when Comey was busted for using the name of 20th Century theologian Reinhold Niebuhr for his anonymous email account?)

So it’s only appropriate that the federal criminal case against him now involves a former mob boss; a disgruntled relative cooperating with the government; and revelations that, contrary to Comey’s story, he and his wife likely made the shell formation rather than “stumbled” upon it during a beach walk. In fact, one of his fiction books—where some character usually represents a far better version of Comey himself—is part of the case, with prosecutors tying parts of the plotline to the threat-by-shell.

Another Comey Fabrication? No Way!

The drama began on May 15, 2025. Comey and his wife, Patrice, were vacationing in North Carolina and decided to go for a stroll along the seashore when, low and behold!, the Comeys just happened to notice a bunch of shells assembled to make “86 47.” Comey took a photo of the formation and posted it on his Instagram account—where all totally normal 65-year-old men play on social media—with the caption, “Cool formation on my beach walk.”

The post, according to new disclosures, prompted an unidentified relative of Patrice to finally cut them off.

Comey, allegedly in response to the relative’s text and growing outrage on social media, deleted the post later that day, professing he meant no harm. But the DOJ nonetheless opened an investigation; last April, a grand jury in North Carolina returned a two-count indictment charging Comey with making threats against the president. He was arrested on April 29, 2026.

Comey had this to say in response:

But Comey’s account of what happened that day always sounded suspicious—largely due to the fact it was coming out of Comey’s mouth. (Keep in mind—all of this went down just a few days before the release of Comey’s latest book, “FDR Drive.” The stunt and resulting hubbub resulted in sweet TV appearances so he could plus his latest.)

A filing by the DOJ this week appears to suggest the Comeys may have made the shell formation after going to a remote area of the shore to do so. “[There] is also reason to doubt his story and therefore his overarching credibility,” prosecutors wrote in an August 18 filing to oppose Comey’s request for a special hearing on the lead FBI investigator. “The shells were located four miles down the beach from the beachfront property where Comey was staying, in an area separated from the ocean by a sand dune. And there is no evidence that anyone else arranged, photographed, or even saw the shells.”

Wait, you mean JIM COMEY LIED ABOUT SOMETHING? Impossible.

Further, evidence collected off the Comeys devices showed that Patrice—a hardcore Democrat and bona fide Trump hater who attended the Women’s March in January 2017 with their daughters to protest the the new president despite the fact her husband was FBI Director at the time—looked up the slang definition for “86” and sent a screenshot of it to her husband.

Two minutes later, Comey made his infamous Instagram post.

Comey’s all-star legal team now is asking U.S. District Court Judge Louise Flanagan, a George W. Bush appointee, to dismiss the case on the basis the indictment represents a selective and vindictive prosecution and a omits a “true threat.” (Those defense motions are here and here.) Defense attorneys also pushed back on any suggestion the Comeys made the formation: “Although Mr. Comey did not know who created the arrangement, Mr. Comey came to understand the phrase ‘86 47’ as a clever way of expressing political opposition to President Trump. Mr. Comey’s description of the shell formation as ‘[c]ool’ communicated his admiration for the way in which an anonymous person criticized President Trump.”

Suuuure.

Bring in the Bull

In an interesting twist, the FBI interviewed Salvatore “Sammy the Bull” Gravano in May seeking his opinion as to whether Comey would have known “86” represented a threat against the president. Gravano was once the underboss of the Gambino mob family; Comey and his now defense attorney Patrick Fitzgerald led the government’s case against John Gambino as prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York in the 1990s. Gravano turned on the family and became a cooperating witness.

But he had plenty to say about Comey’s potential foreknowledge about the meaning of “86”, which strangely was included in a defense motion. “Mr. Gravano stated his belief that Mr. Comey had to know what the term ‘86’ meant ‘as it related to killing someone,’” Fitzgerald wrote in a July affidavit. “Gravano also stated that he was ‘fairly certain it would be difficult to find the term ‘86’ documented in law enforcement/FBI files because members of organized crime families refrained from using terms such as ‘86’ that were commonly used in day-to-day business in the presence of law enforcement officers.”

Gravano told investigators Comey’s “post was a call for violence against President Trump,” he did not believe the post meant “Mr. Comey would personally kill President Trump.”

Gravano, who left the witness protection program in 1995 then got himself arrested and sent to prison again, is now a podcaster.

With such a cast of characters—Comey’s lawyers also attempted to discredit Patrice’s unidentified relative as being a recent rehab patient—one can only imagine the circus that will be Comey’s October trial in North Carolina.

And the attention-starved former fed wouldn’t want it any other way.

It is impossible to calculate how much precious time was squandered during President Trump’s first term as he and his administration fought off bogus allegations of criminal behavior by the president himself, his family, his closest aides, and his Cabinet members. One can safely argue that the first half of Trump 45—from Inauguration Day through the closing of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation in April 2019—was incapacitated by internal saboteurs, working hand in glove with the media, to falsely portray Trump as a Russian stooge doing the bidding of Vladimir Putin at the expense of the nation’s security.

The treachery began with the opening of Crossfire Hurricane in July 2016—a multi-national, interagency FBI operation that planted the seeds of bogus Trump-Russia election collusion right before the 2016 presidential election. But recently declassified documents released by the White House Government Transparency Task Force, led by longtime investigative reporter John Solomon, reveal the existence of two additional criminal investigations into Trump World intended to result in Trump’s removal from office along with several top officials. And the bureau’s subterfuge continued until the president’s final days in office.

In May 2017, based on nothing more than a letter by two Democratic senators and the FBI’s desire to destroy top Trump officials, the notoriously corrupt Washington (FBI) field office opened a criminal investigation into Attorney General Jeff Sessions for allegedly lying to Congress about his communications with Russian officials. Code named “March Toll” and initiated by the disgraced James Comey a month prior, the investigation centered on Sessions’ Congressional testimony where he (accurately) denied meeting with Russians in 2016 to discuss the presidential campaign. Sessions—who unfortunately recused himself from all Russia related matters on March 2, 2017 under immense pressure from lawmakers and the media—had spoken with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak (whom I contend to this day had acted as an informant for the Obama administration, which I covered here in 2019) twice prior to Election Day: once briefly during the Republican National Convention in July 2016 and once during a meeting in his Senate office in September 2016.

Although Sessions insisted his discussions with Kislyak did not involve politics or the campaign, the FBI nonetheless claimed those brief encounters represented “an activity constituting a federal crime or a threat to national security.” The basis for “March Toll,” which began the day after Comey was fired on May 9, 2017, can be found here. Mueller’s office ended the investigation without bringing charges against Sessions on May 8, 2019, two months after the special counsel’s office was shut down. Sessions had resigned in November 2018 after Comey and company succeeded in destroying his reputation; Sessions lost a bid for re-election to the U.S. Senate in 2020.

Comey’s Minions Continued His Bidding After His Overdue Firing

But Sessions—along with Michael Flynn, George Papadopoulos, Carter Page, and Paul Manafort, the original targets of Crossfire Hurricane—wasn’t the only suspected Russian asset lurking around the White House. A week after Trump fired Comey, two of the FBIs sleaziest characters—FBI general counsel James Baker and FBI counterintelligence chief Bill Priestap—opened “Oxferd Comma,” a criminal investigation into the sitting president of the United States for acting as a Russian agent in booting Comey. “The FBI is opening a full investigation based on an articulable factual basis that reasonably indicates that President Donald J. Trump may be or has been, wittingly or unwittingly, involved in activities for or on behalf of the Government of the Russian Federation which may constitute violations of federal criminal law or threats to the national security of the United States,” the pair wrote on May 16. (The opening electronic communication is here.)

That same day, acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe and acting Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, replacing Sessions in all things Russia, met to discuss the probe. That was the same day Rosenstein suggested to McCabe that the feds could “wire him up” to record conversations with the president.

But contrary to the stated reason for “Oxferd Comma,” no “articulable factual basis” existed. The evidence consisted of rehashed allegations in the debunked Steele dossier and a series of “memos” recorded by Comey following private meetings with the president between January and April 2017. Comey, through his bestie Dan Richman, had leaked those memos to the New York Times shortly after he was fired, which resulted in a May 11, 2017 article disclosing details of his conversations with Trump. Comey later admitted he leaked the memos, some of which the DOJ Inspector General later determined had contained classified information, to prompt the appointment of a special counsel.

Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller on May 17, 2017.

More Grist for the ‘Permanent Coup’

Even after the Mueller report landed with a thud two years later—and Mueller’s July 2019 congressional appearance showed a feeble, forgetful geezer with no apparent grasp of the destructive investigation that had proceeded under his name—the FBI figured it had a surefire winner in branding Republican officials and their alleged media supporters as Russian cutouts.

So to cover up for the international crime family known as the Bidens prior to the 2020 election, the FBI concocted another scary Russian plot. “Round River,” a secret counterintelligence operation, claimed the Russians were using “conduits” (Republicans) to smear “targets” (Democrats) with disinformation about Hunter Biden, Burisma, and a host of other family scandals to promote what the FBI called the “Ukraine Narrative.” According to the new documents, the effort was led by the Foreign Influence Task Force (FITF), created by former FBI Director Chris Wray in 2017 to perpetuate the idea that enemy states, particularly Russia, were successfully meddling in U.S. elections.

Here is an assessment of the operation contained in the latest document dump:

Prior to Election Day, FBI officials gave what they called “defensive briefings” to members of Congress to warn about the latest version of Russian chicanery. Outrageously, the FBI had designated lawmakers including Republican Senators Charles Grassley and Ron Johnson and House Republicans Devin Nunes and James Jordan as Russian “conduits” peddling “disinformation” about the Biden scandals. A spreadsheet, linked here, created by the FBI listed the purported bad guys and their victims.

In fact, the FBI went so far as to dispatch Nikki Flores, head of the FITF, to meet with Grassley and Johnson in August 2020 under the guise of providing a defensive briefing—right before the release of their damning report on Hunter Biden’s financial dealings with foreign countries and companies. But Grassley and Johnson were not fooled. “With respect to the substance of the briefing, it consisted primarily of information that we already knew and information unconnected to our Biden investigation,” they wrote to Floris in 2022, demanding answers about the probe. “We made clear to you at the briefing that it was not relevant to the substance of our work. In response, you stated that the FBI is not attempting to ‘quash, curtail, or interfere’ in the investigation in any way.”

(A few days after the Floris briefing, Lawfare blog ran the first in a series of articles accusing Johnson of acting as an “enabler of Russian disinformation.”)

The latest Transparency Task Force disclosures also include a letter from FBI Director Kash Patel confirming the use of at least 53 confidential human sources (informants) in “Round River,” 14 of whom reported derogatory information about Hunter Biden. “At my direction, this FBI will take the unprecedented step of providing you with the source reporting from all 53 sources so you can finally see the facts,” Patel wrote to the White House this week. He disbanded the FITF last year.

So what does all this mean? It means the treachery of the DOJ and FBI were far worse than anyone imagined, even those of us reporting on it at the time. It means Attorney General Todd Blanche and Patel are still dealing with a systemically corrupt Department of Justice still heavily populated with Comey, Wray, McCabe, and Floris wannabes. It means President Trump was robbed not only of the first two years of his first term but a run for re-election uninhibited by the same bad actors in 2020.

And unfortunately it means they will all get away with it.

More on “Round River” here:

Sometimes (most of the time?) in politics, the bad guys win.

Such is the case with outgoing Senators Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas). Blinded by bitterness, revenge, and hypocrisy, the pair of sore losers—Tillis last year abandoned his re-election bid amid fear he would lose a Republican primary over his criticism of President Trump, a fate inflicted on Cornyn, who lost his primary election in May after Trump endorsed his opponent—recently joined forces to block the confirmation of acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley twice postponed confirmation votes—Tillis and Cornyn sit on the powerful committee—in the face of threats by both senators to vote “no” on Blanche’s nomination.

The reason for the hold-up related to the so-called “anti-weaponization fund” established by the president to compensate American citizens, particularly the participants of the January 6 protest, targeted by the Biden Department of Justice over their political beliefs. Blanche announced the creation of the $1.766 billion fund in May as part of a settlement in response to a lawsuit filed by the president and the Trump Organization for the illegal leaking of his tax documents right before the 2020 presidential election. “The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American, and it is this Department’s intention to make right the wrongs that were previously done while ensuring this never happens again,” Blanche said in a press release. “As part of this settlement, we are setting up a lawful process for victims of lawfare and weaponization to be heard and seek redress.”

Democrats and some Republicans, including Tillis, immediately denounced the fund, which the lame duck describes as a “payout for punks.”

Cornyn, who is somehow impossibly dumber than Tillis, went so far as to cancel a face-to-face meeting with Blanche. (The four-term senator hasn’t received this level of attention from the Washington press corps since he last time he snuggled up to Volodymyr Zelensky.)

Trump responded last week to Cornyn’s pouting:

For Tillis’s part, as I wrote here, he had pledged to block any nominee who “defended” the events of January 6; he successfully scuttled the confirmation of acting D.C. U.S. Attorney Ed Martin last year.

So rather than do something constructive for the country, and for their constituents, in the waning months of their forgettable Senate careers, Tillis and Cornyn instead chose to make Blanche their whipping boy. The milquetoast mates—who never met a Ukraine aid package they didn’t support—found their inner mafiosos and made an “or else” offer the administration could not refuse.

On Monday, Blanche confirmed in writing the fund had been shut down for good:

Tillis and Cornyn quickly gloated. (The agreement also limits the IRS’ ability to audit other Trump World figures aside from those named in the lawsuit.)

A committee vote to confirm Blanche is set for Tuesday morning.

But Garland and Monaco Were A-Ok

Their opposition to Blanche not only represented a public relations stunt but also a stunning example of D.C.-level political hypocrisy.

First, as I noted on X, both men voted to confirm Merrick Garland as attorney general. Cornyn offered a full-throated endorsement of Garland on the Senate floor, snookered by Garland’s promises to end the politicization of the DOJ. (His remarks came at the same time Biden’s DOJ began rounding up Cornyn’s constituents for even minor involvement in the Capitol protest.)

Both men also voted to confirm Trump-Russia collusion mastermind Lisa Monaco as deputy attorney general in April 2021; shortly after her confirmation, I described the 98-2 Senate vote as handing matches to an arsonist. Monaco proceeded to not only manage day-to-day management of the sprawling J6 prosecution but both investigations into President Trump including the plans to conduct an armed raid of Mar-a-Lago in August 2022.

Second, Tillis admitted in a recent X post that many J6ers had been mistreated by the Biden DOJ:

So if, as Tillis acknowledged, the Biden DOJ pursued “vindictive prosecutions,” what is the remedy for the Americans targeted and nearly destroyed in the process? What sort of restitution is due to J6ers investigated, charged, convicted, and imprisoned on the bogus obstruction of an official proceeding statute—overturned by the Supreme Court in June 2024? Or the J6ers sentenced to excessive jail time, from months in federal prison for misdemeanors to 22 years on bogus “seditious conspiracy” convictions? (A charge I strongly believe also would have been overturned by SCOTUS had the case made it to the highest court.)

If Tillis believes the Biden DOJ broke the law by pursuing “vindictive” and politically motivated prosecutions, he should help Blanche make those people whole, not sabotage their last chance for much-deserved relief.

But alas, the final act for Tillis and Cornyn—who once begged former FBI Director Christopher Wray to think up harsher charges for J6ers—represents yet another betrayal of their own constituents in exchange for taking once last whack at the president. In the end, however, Trump gets his attorney general pick and the country gets a hard-charging leader at the top of the DOJ to continue cleaning house, rounding up bad guys, and exposing rampant government fraud.

Hi all - You may have noticed a slight downturn in the number of articles I’ve have posted lately. And I am sorry for slacking and always appreciate your patience and support!

The reason why I’ve been quieter than usual is because I’ve been busy preparing for the launch of my husband’s campaign for Chicago mayor!

He officially announced his candidacy this week. We feel good about our chances, but it will be a grind! At least eight other candidates are in the race now with more to come; John is running on a law and order platform to make Chicago safe, clean, and attractive to business once again. He is also ready to take on the powerful Chicago teachers union, which has a stranglehold on the city’s political system.

Here is his launch video followed by a recent interview for Chicago’s NBC station. I am also adding his new social media accounts (he has never been on any platform, so we are trying to build his following) if you can kindly add his account to your lists.

I will keep you posted from the campaign trail! And I will continue to cover my usual topics including DOJ reforms and radical judges.

Website: https://johnkellyforchi.com/

Please follow:

X: https://x.com/jkellyformayor/status/2082515969801437569?s=20

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jkellyformayor/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@jkellyformayor

My very first article condemning the reckless “science” behind the first round of Covid-related lockdowns appeared in American Greatness on March 19, 2020. Entitled “Dangerous Curves,” linked here, my piece reviewed historical flu data and warned about the threat of locking everyone and everything down with the promise of stopping the spread of the virus. “Americans are willingly surrendering to government their freedom, their livelihood, their long-term economic security, and their mental well-being over unjustified panic about a virus that might have already spread and now is abating. If this is the new normal, where incomplete data and media-fueled panic rule the day, that is an even more frightening prospect than what’s happening right now,” I wrote.

For months, I joined a tiny handful of reporters and influencers challenging the data, the messaging, the media coverage, and the so-called mitigation measures promoted by Dr. Anthony Fauci and others including Dr. Deborah Birx. A few more of my early pieces calling out the shifting goalposts can be found here, here, and here.

In July 2020, I wrote about Fauci’s “fatal conceit”—something that rears its ugly head time and again in Senator Rand Paul’s release of Fauci’s diary entries dating back to December 2019. I wanted to pass along the full 1,141-page document here. And Sen. Paul’s X thread begins here.

What we also knew at the time—but that his diary demonstrates in bright stage lights—is how the fawning, fallacious, feckless (sorry for the alliteration) media conspired with Fauci to perpetuate the most destructive “public health” propaganda campaign in American history.

Just lookie here:

But perhaps no two people became closer during the period of social distancing than Fauci and CNN’s Jake Tapper. Tapper’s name appears 41 times in Fauci’s diary; not only did Fauci appear on his show dozens of times, the pair was building a “friendship,” Fauci noted, exchanging private dinners at each other’s homes in 2020.

July 2020: “Had dinner over Jake Tapper and Jen Tapper’s home in DC. Terrific couple. Friendship building.”

October 2020: “Had dinner at my home with Jake and Jennifer Tapper. Relaxed, good time. Jake clearly believes that Trump is totally nuts.”

Tapper even stroked Fauci’s insatiable ego when duty called. “Hard to believe Paura (sic) Ingraham went to Dartmouth, isn’t it. All of us alumni are very proud,” Tapper texted Fauci in April 2020 after Fauci appeared on her show.

“Jake Tapper woke me up at 11:23 AM (I went to bed early) furius at POTUS for tweeting about the fact that Jake severly questioned Brett Giroir on SOTU CNN show today. Jake was really pissed at the craziness of it all,” he wrote in July 2020. (And yes, Fauci’s diary is filled with misspelled words.)

Here are just a few flashbacks from the coosome twosome:

Fauci received one of Joe Biden’s infamous autopen pardons stretching all the way back to 2014. But of course that won’t shield Fauci from any false statements he may make during his sworn testimony on Wednesday. It would be a travesty of justice if Fauci gets away with destroying the lives of millions, especially children, bankrupting businesses, forcing the dying to die alone, suspending personal freedoms, torching the credibility of the public health/science sector, and significantly altering our way of life—some of which continues to this day.

Hell isn’t hot enough.

Jack Smith, the disgraced former special counsel, is lawyering up and lashing out.

The man often described by the media as “fearless,” “calm,” and “apolitical” during his two-year reign of terror as Merrick Garland’s handpicked lawfare goon is tipping his highly partisan and somewhat jittery hand as Republicans in Washington set their sights on him. Smith’s veil of mystery—CNN actually covered his trip to D.C. Subway shop in July 2023 as “breaking news”—has been voluntarily lifted as he faces Congressional and possible criminal investigations into his handling of numerous inquiries, which ensnared the private communications of sitting members of Congress.

A cleaned-up Smith, who typically presents a raggedy beard and pallid complexion, recently commiserated with MS-NOW’s Nicolle Wallace on a number of topics, including the (LOL) weaponization of the Department of Justice:

Jack Smith is one of the biggest losers (in terms of court rulings) in DOJ history…

The man who has been obsessed with Donald Trump for almost four years claims he doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about Donald Trump…

Mr. Tough Guy…

But Smith’s victim routine isn’t fooling Republican leaders on Capitol Hill. On July 22, House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Jordan sent a criminal referral to the Department of Justice accusing Smith of misleading Congressional investigators when he denied that the special counsel’s office had obtained text messages belonging to members of Congress. “While testifying under oath, Mr. Smith seemingly made willfully and intentionally false statements of material fact that contradict new documents obtained by the Committee from the Department of Justice (DOJ),” Jordan wrote to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. “The Committee is providing this information for the DOJ to investigate a potential violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001.”

Text Messages? What Text Messages?

At issue is Smith’s December 2025 too-cute-by-half testimony related to his subpoenas for the toll records of several Republicans lawmakers. (Toll records show cell phone activity but not the nature of conversations or content of texts.) While Smith accurately answered direct questions about obtaining text messages—texts belonging to 44 members of Congress were swept up in Smith’s collection of messages sent or received by dozens of Trump White House aides, handed over without a fight by the National Archives in 2023—the shady prosecutor failed to separately disclose that fact to investigators:

“The responses provided by Mr. Smith gave the impression that neither Mr. Smith nor his team had access to the content of Members’ privileged text messages. We now know this to be false,” Jordan wrote.

The Ohio Republican reminded Smith that he “was advised of his obligation to provide all necessary information that would make his responses truthful. The Committee specifically instructed him that he could not tell half-truths or exclude information necessary to make statements accurate, and that a deliberate failure to disclose information could constitute a false statement.”

Bring in the Fixers

Smith’s criminal defense team—which includes former Clinton fixer Lanny Breuer, who brought Smith on board as head of the DOJ’s public integrity unit in 2010 during his stint at the Obama DOJ—quickly fired back. “This referral reflects a chilling eagerness to weaponize the justice system by attacking a career, nonpartisan public servant who faithfully and fearlessly performed his duties by following the facts and the law,” Smith’s attorneys wrote to Jordan and Blanche. More LOL.

While Smith, his lawyers, and their accomplices in the media want all of this to look like the latest example of Trump using the DOJ to “retaliate” or seek “retribution” against his political enemies, at least one Democrat has expressed concern over Smith’s reckless handling of investigations into his colleagues. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) conceded that Republicans are “rightly concerned about the possible breach of norms and improper access to email [sic].” Documents also revealed that Smith’s team mishandled privileged material while intentionally ignoring Speech or Debate Clause protections in the collection of members’ cell content—a pattern of misconduct demonstrated by the Special Counsel’s team in the classified documents case and the seizure of Rep. Scott Perry’s cell phone records in 2023.

Jordan’s referral now sits on Blanche’s desk. So, too, does a separate referral against Thomas Windom, Smith’s top henchman in the J6 indictment against the president, for obstruction of Congress related to his stonewalling during a deposition last year.

And while skepticism as to whether anything will happen to either one is certainly warranted—especially considering the hostile grand jury environment Trump’s DOJ faces in the nation’s capital—the fact that Smith is paying high-priced lawyers and groveling to cable news hosts is a gratifying scene for now.

Irony, to no one’s surprise, appears lost on some of the biggest perpetrators of the decade-long lawfare against President Trump, his allies, and the MAGA movement. Those same saboteurs are now attempting to block Senate confirmation of Todd Blanche, President Trump’s former criminal defense attorney, as attorney general.

For example, more than 1,200 former Department of Justice employees signed a letter earlier this month opposing Blanche’s confirmation; the president nominated Blanche, currently the acting attorney general, to permanently fill the position following the firing of Pamela Bondi in April.

The opposition’s letter—released by a group called “Justice Connection,” which, among other things, provides counseling services to recently-terminated DOJ employees—blamed Blanche for unspecified “corruption and abuses” at the department under his leadership. Accusing Blanche of the “degradation of DOJ’s apolitical career workforce” (LOL), the former employees claimed Blanche is “demonizing career employees, undermining their work, and driving them out of the department.” (As I have covered extensively, the dramatic departures of top DOJ and FBI employees over the past 18 months—either forced or voluntarily—have exposed the highly partisan nature of the establishment DOJ.)

Perhaps the most amusing, and encouraging, passage of the letter lamented the fact that roughly 16,000 of the DOJ’s 100,000+ workforce have left since the start of Trump’s term—as the old joke goes about lawyers at the bottom of the ocean, a good start. But not for the signers of the Justice Connection letter, many of whom left the DOJ more than 30 to 40 years ago. “The consequences of Blanche’s attacks on DOJ’s apolitical workforce radiate beyond the halls of Main Justice, affecting the entire country. They’ve meant that much of the department’s vital work isn’t being done, or isn’t being done as well–leaving communities less safe, Americans’ rights less protected, and our national security more vulnerable.” (The missive also again proves that most lawyers are terrible writers.)

Which is rich coming from individuals most responsible for torching the public’s trust in the DOJ by abusing their power in an attempt to destroy Donald Trump and everyone around him—and in the process, redirecting resources away from the real work Americans expect the DOJ and FBI to do.

A DOJ Hall of Shame

Signers of the letter included JP Cooney, Molly Gaston, and David Rody, three of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s top henchmen; Peter Carr, former spokesman for the DC US Attorney’s office and chief propagandist of J6 investigations; Greg Rosen, the former “Capitol Siege” unit chief; Mike Feinberg, a former FBI agent and BFF of disgraced FBI attorney Peter Strzok; J6 prosecutors Mike Gordon and Sara Levine; David Laufman, who helped tank Clinton email investigation and participated in Brett Kavanaugh character assassination campaign; Lisa Monaco senior counsel David Smith; Robert Mueller henchman Aaron Zelinsky; and Biden autopen pardon attorney Liz Oyer.

In fact, Oyer is scheduled to testify this week during Blanche’s confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee; Blanche fired Oyer in March 2025 after she refused a directive by Blanche’s office to restore the gun rights of actor Mel Gibson, who lost that privilege following a misdemeanor domestic battery plea agreement. Oyer, who only offered faint criticism of her former boss’s last minute clemency announcements, including commuting the death sentences of 37 federal inmates and reducing prison time for hundreds of violent criminals, will share her sob story on Thursday. “Through unchecked bullying, the political leaders of the department are forcing out career staff, ripping away ethical guardrails, and offering priority access to government benefits to loyalists and friends,” Oyer wrote after she was shown the door at Main Justice. “I am deeply concerned that the institution created to uphold our laws and protect our civil rights is being destroyed from within by those entrusted to protect it.”

Of course, all of these former DOJ apparatchiks had no concerns when the Biden DOJ under Merrick Garland and Lisa Monaco applied the full force and weight of the nation’s most powerful law enforcement agency against Americans who protested at the U.S. Capitol on January 6. No qualms about “civil rights being destroyed from within” during the Biden DOJ’s unprecedented four-year crusade to round up nearly 1,600 individuals, charge them with phony crimes, and throw them in federal prison for years for exercising their 1A rights to demonstrate on public property on a Wednesday afternoon.

Gratuitous Politicking (Again) By Obama Judge

And it’s not just ex-DOJ lifers targeting Blanche. This week, in a flagrant political move intended to provide question fodder for committee Democrats, a federal judge in Florida took several shots at Blanche related to the now-dismissed settlement between the Trump Organization and the IRS for the unlawful leaking of the president’s tax returns right before the 2020 election. Judge Kathleen Williams, an Obama appointee, in May took the rare step of granting a request by 35 former judges—including perpetual Trump grievance peddlers Michael Luttig and Nancy Gertner—who are not parties in the matter to reopen the case based on allegations of misconduct by the DOJ in the original settlement agreement and the now-defunct “Anti Weaponization Fund.”

Williams has since used her bully bench to lob all sorts of accusations at Trump’s DOJ. Her 56-page order issued Monday gratuitously cited Blanche 30 times, even suggesting at one point he committed perjury during recent Congressional testimony. “The Court is extremely troubled by the testimony given by Acting Attorney General Blanche on May 19, 2026,” Williams wrote. “In response to why the ‘settlement agreement’ had not been submitted to this Court for review, he stated that there is no judge’ because the case had been dismissed and, therefore, there was “no mechanism” for reviewing the agreement. While temporally accurate, this answer is, at best, misleading and, at worst, disingenuous.”

HUH?

Williams then instructed the court’s clerk to send her slanderous diatribe to the New York State and DC Bar associations to review Blanche’s conduct.

Despite the onslaught of belly-whining and pearl-clutching, Blanche appears headed for confirmation. Under his leadership, the DOJ is returning to its core mission—from enforcing immigration law and catching human smugglers to combating fraud and reducing the bloated ranks of the department—and Blanche is on track to do what his predecessors in both Trump administrations failed to do: earn back lost trust in the nation’s most powerful law enforcement agency and institute reforms that won’t be easily undone under a future Democratic administration.

According to the Department of Homeland Security, Bon entered the U.S. during the Biden Administration in 2024 as a parolee. His parole ended in June 2025 but Bon remained in the country; that same month, Bon received a non-domiciled commercial driver’s license (CDL) by the state of Massachusetts in June 2025. “This tragedy NEVER should have happened. Our prayers are with Trooper Pahira’s family, friends, and loved ones during this time,” DHS’s social media account posted on July 6.

Video of grunting Bon being hauled into a police vehicle went viral:

The president of the Pennsylvania State Troopers Association, Stephen Polishan, issued a statement following Bon’s arrest. “This is not about politics. This is about right versus wrong. Trooper Pahira was a hero, and his family, fellow troopers and the public deserve answers. They need to know why the person accused of this senseless killing, who was in the United States illegally, had been granted a commercial driver’s license in Massachusetts. This individual should never have been driving such a dangerous vehicle on our highways. But he was, and now a good man is dead. Trooper Pahira should be alive today.”

Polishan’s sentiments echo across the country as the death toll of American citizens killed by illegal immigrants driving 80,000-pound death machines continues to rise. The Trump administration, led by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, is rolling back lax federal and state laws that allow noncitizens, including illegal immigrants, to obtain non-domiciled CDLs and commercial learning permits. Last year, Duffy issued a number of reforms aimed at improving truck safety including the announcement of an emergency rule to drastically limit the categories of non-citizens eligible for such licenses. (My backgrounder on this issue is here.) But two Democratic appellate judges in D.C. put a hold on Duffy’s rule in November 2025; as I noted on X, Pahira might be alive today had the judges not intervened in the matter. (Bon’s CDL was renewed in February.)

More Young Men Dead as Blue State Authorities Turn a Blind Eye

Sadly, Pahira’s death is one in another recent spate of tragedies caused by noncitizen truck drivers. A truck driver from Uzbekistan rammed into a vehicle driven by Toby Forsythe, a 21-year-old college soccer star, in Ohio on Sunday, killing him instantly. The driver, Bekhzod Asrarov, failed an English proficiency field test; he also ripped out his dash cam and smashed three cell phones in an attempt to conceal the evidence. Asarov arrived in the U.S. under Joe Biden’s “Diversity Visa Lottery” and obtained a CDL in Ohio. He currently faced one charge of destroying evidence as the investigation continues.

Cook County (IL) sheriff’s police arrested an Indian national on June 29 for killing 23-year-old Sebastian Stone on an Illinois highway as Stone attempted to change his tire. According to news reports, Kuljeet Kang was driving recklessly before he crashed into Stone, “weaving between the second and third lane of travel” then driving on the shoulder of the busy highway where Stone was “struck by the suspect’s front passenger wheel, and dragged under the semi, before being run over by the rear trailer wheels.” Kang fled the scene, increasing his speed as he left Stone to die on the Illinois interstate. (Shocking no one, Chicago area media describes Kang as a “Palatine man.”)

Federal sources told Libs of Tik Tok that Kang’s Illinois CDL had been renewed two months ago. An audit performed by the Federal Motor Safety Carrier Administration concluded earlier this year that one-in-five non-domiciled CDLs issued by the Illinois Secretary of State’s office were done so illegally. (Some reports indicate Kang held a green card, which means he likely obtained a standard rather than a non-domiciled CDL.) However, Kang’s social media posts suggest he may not speak or understand English:

The good news, according to Border Czar Tom Homan, thousands of CDLs across the country have been revoked over the past few months:

The bad news is that hundreds of thousands of noncitizen drivers remain on America’s roads as the administration faces pushback from blue states, unions, and other pro-immigrant interests. In fact, the D.C. appellate court will hold oral arguments in September on a lawsuit seeking to overturn Duffy’s rule; given the Democratic composition and open hostility to the Trump administration on the D.C. appellate court, this fight to remove noncitizens and illegal immigrants truck drivers is not over yet.

More information here from Shannon Everett:

Two years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a pair of rulings that represented back-to-back defeats for the federal circuit court in Washington, D.C.. In Fischer v. U.S., the Supreme Court determined nearly every D.C. district court judge and two appellate judges had unlawfully applied a corporate fraud statute to help the Biden Department of Justice turn more than 300 January 6 protesters into lifelong felons. The ruling gutted the heart of the DOJ’s J6 prosecution and threw the D.C. courthouse into immediate chaos as defendants, some in federal prison on the charge at the time, and their attorneys sought to vacate convictions and plea agreements.

A few days later, in a landmark ruling on the final day of the term, SCOTUS established a broad swath of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution; four D.C. judges—District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan and three D.C. appellate court judges—had denied all of President Trump’s immunity arguments related to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s J6-indictment, which covered the president’s waning weeks in office. Chief Justice John Roberts took a few shots at the D.C. bench in his accompanying opinion: “Despite the unprecedented nature of this case, and the very significant constitutional questions that it raises, the lower courts rendered their decisions on a highly expedited basis,” Roberts wrote on July 1, 2024.

Deja Vu?

History, in a way, is repeating itself. A pair of SCOTUS decisions handed down in this final week of the October 2025 term again reined in judicial overreach by arguably the most powerful district court in the country.

In a 6-3 decision (the Lilith Fair cohort to no one’s surprise represented the dissent), the Court reversed D.C. Judge Ana Reyes’ halt to end temporary (emphasis added) protected status for Haitian refugees; then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristy Noem had announced Haitians’ TPS status—enacted following a devastating earthquake in 2010 and extended on numerous occasions—would expire on February 3, 2026, the last day of the most recent extension. Five Haitians immediately filed suit claiming the decision was based on “racial animus” and violated federal law. (The Haitian plaintiffs, as I noted on X, included a doctor, a software engineer, and a nurse, specialties desperately needed back in their homeland.)

They asked Reyes to prevent the administration from ending the program and initiating deportation proceedings, which the Biden appointee did in her typical inflammatory fashion. Lamenting that President Trump “expressed little regard for Haiti and Haitians,” when taking office the first time in 2017, Reyes accused the president and the administration of unfairly targeting Haitians based on race. “President Trump has made—freely, at times even boastfully—several derogatory statements about Haitians and other nonwhite foreigners,” Reyes wrote in an 83-page diatribe one day before the TPS status expired. Reyes further stated that “no one rationally could” defend the president’s “derogatory statements” about Haiti, including his description of the lawless island nation as a “shithole.”

She did, however, offer a full-throated defense of those who have overstayed their welcome. “The Government does not cite any reason termination must occur post haste. Secretary Noem complains of strains unlawful immigrants place on our immigration-enforcement system. Her answer? Turn 352,959 lawful immigrants into unlawful immigrants overnight. She complains of strains to our economy. Her answer? Turn employed lawful immigrants who contribute billions in taxes into the legally unemployable. She complains of strains to our healthcare system. Her answer? Turn the insured into the uninsured. This approach is many things—in the public interest is not one of them.”

A 2-1 panel of the D.C. appellate court quickly backed Reyes’ decision; two Biden appointees echoed Reyes’ sentiments in the matter, claiming “the termination of TPS would have ‘devastating’ consequences for the plaintiffs, including risk of detention and deportation, separation from family members, and loss of work authorization.” Trump appointee Justin Walker dissented, noting the statute prohibits “judicial review of any determination of the [Secretary] with respect to the designation, or termination or extension of a designation, of a foreign state.”

Last week, SCOTUS agreed with Walker. Not only did Justice Samuel Alito, who authored the opinion, acknowledge the “judicial-review bar” on such executive branch determinations, he concluded that “[none] of the cited statements by either the President or the Secretary was overtly racial, and in substance all ex pressed policy views that could rest on race-neutral justifications.” (Full opinion, including Lilith Fair dissent, is here.) The case now goes back to Reyes, who must reconsider the lawsuit outside of the scope of judicial review or equal protection arguments.

A couple of washed up and washed out Ohio Republicans took great umbrage:

Good Riddance to Bad Case Law

On Monday, SCOTUS handed the D.C. court another L—and in the process, the high court finally inflicted a death blow to Humphrey’s Executor, the SCOTUS decision that recently has been cited, unsuccessfully, by multiple presidential appointees fired by President Trump. (Brief explainer here.) In doing so, the justices re-established executive authority and disabused those who envision a non-existent fourth branch of government that operates “independently” of the Constitutionally-established three.

After the president removed her from the Federal Trade Commission last year, Biden-appointee Rebecca Slaughter filed a lawsuit to keep her position for the remaining six years of her term. Slaughter had argued the president did not follow Humphrey’s Executor guidance by failing to explain any “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office” that prompted her firing.

In July 2025, D.C. Judge Loren AliKhan, another Biden appointee, reinstated Slaughter to the FTC, describing the commission as a “specially crafted independent agency.” (Her opinion is here.) Another 2-1 panel of majority Obama-appointed judges endorsed AliKhan’s view and denied the administration’s request to put a hold on her order. “The government has no likelihood of success on appeal given controlling and directly on point Supreme Court precedent,” Judges Patricia Millett and Cornelia Pillard wrote in July 2025. “Specifically, ninety years ago, a unanimous Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Federal Trade Commission Act’s for-cause removal protection for Federal Trade Commissioners,” referring to Humphrey’s Executor.

Millett and Pillard were once again wrong. In another 6-3 decision, SCOTUS reversed the Democratic judges: “Although it is up to the Senate to decide whether to confirm those with whom the President would prefer to work, neither Congress nor the courts may saddle him with those with whom he cannot work,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority. “Subordinates who exercise the President’s power are subject to removal by him. Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people.” He continued. “If anything more is left of Humphrey’s, we overrule it. Humphrey’s has for decades been a result in search of a rationale.”

Sort of like the D.C. court system.

So, how many of these wrongheaded decisions will it take before Republicans act? The encroachment by the judiciary onto executive branch authority is most prevalent in Washington courtrooms; their decisions have drastically stymied the president’s agenda on a number of fronts including immigration, the federal workforce, the military, entitlement programs, and foreign affairs.

And no amount of SCOTUS reversals can get that stolen time back.

Schiltz order:

Read more

Apparently the Southern Poverty Law Center isn’t just the most influential and well-funded (for now) AstroTurfed “racial justice” racket in the country, it’s a great place to meet one’s potential soulmate.

According to a bombshell report in the New York Post this week, a top SPLC official hooked up with one of the organization’s “sources” who was tied to a neo-Nazi group that the SPLC claimed to “monitor” and used to raise donations. The unidentified source—essentially an informant—earned $1.2 million from the SPLC over a 20-year period; at least $140,000 of that donor money ended up in a joint account held by the source and Heidi Beirich, the SPLC’s intelligence director from 2012 to 2019.

The lovebirds shared a home and two bank accounts at the same time “the unnamed informant was also raising money for the National Alliance and helping to ‘carry out its extremist activities,’” the Post reported.

Beirich was front and center in promoting the alleged scourge of “black hate” during her tenure at the SPLC. (She was ousted during an organizational shakeup; Beirich then co-founded the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, which offered assistance to the January 6 Select Committee related to the “extremism” posed by groups such as the Proud Boys.)

The juicy tidbits related to the Beirich/neo-Nazi coupling were disclosed in a superseding federal indictment—the Department of Justice first brought charges against the SPLC in April—handed down earlier this month in the middle district of Alabama, where the nonprofit is based. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel announced the initial set of charges, accusing the SPLC of opening fake entities that acted as conduits to funnel donor funds to the “sources,” who in turn helped bolster the group’s claims of a persistent “white supremacy” threat in the country. “The SPLC’s paid informants (“field sources”) engaged in the active promotion of racist groups at the same time that the SPLC was denouncing the same groups on its website,” the indictment alleged.

But the latest indictment reveals even more details as to how the SPLC—whose work is frequently cited in the media, Congressional reports, and even federal indictments as the “expert” in all things race-related—uses paid informants to ratchet up its bogus warnings about white supremacy and stoke fear among the public. For example, the SPLC currently claims there are 152 active “white supremacy” groups and 1,263 active “hate” groups, whatever that means, in America right now.

The ‘Hard Right’ Responsible for One of the Most Unsafe Years Ever, Says SPLC

The sources/informants, however, are key in propping up the SPLC’s nearly $1 billion race-baiting operation, which in reality is nothing more than a vile smear campaign against the political Right and President Trump in particular.

The year 2025, according to the SPLC’s annual report on “hate and extremism,” was one of the worst years on record. “Ultimately, 2025 was the year that the hard right powerfully brought its agenda to life through our institutions at the expense of Black and Brown people, immigrants, women, LGBTQ+ people, families with low incomes and everyone who benefits from an inclusive democracy,” the group’s director, Rachel Carroll Rivas, wrote in a June 3 post. “2025 was a turbulent year marked by injustice, social upheaval and stark new threats from a hard-right movement rapidly establishing its power across institutions. The hard right effectively seized the power of government as a messenger for extremist rhetoric and a tool to dictate policies affecting the everyday lives of millions of people.”

The “stark new threats” appear to be coming from inside the house, according to the latest indictment. In addition to the Beirich/neo-Nazi affair, the indictment describes the activity of eight SPLC informants, some of whom received six-figure payouts via the fake entities created by the SPLC to conceal the compensation.

For example:

• The SPLC source recruited by an unnamed SPLC employee to instigate the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville received more than $300,000 in donor money between 2014 and 2023. The individual, identified as “F-37”—the SPLC used the letter “F” to denote “field” source (LOL) and added a number—led rally leadership chats, promoted the event extensively on social media, and drove participants to the August 2017 protest. The event resulted in a firestorm of controversy for the Trump administration and produced one of the most infamous, and inaccurate, quotes of the president’s first term in office—the “very fine people on both sides” quip still cherry-picked to this day to suggest the president supported the more violent protesters who clashed with police and counter protesters over that fateful weekend. The public may never know whether “F-37” was directly involved in fueling any of the violence, which resulted in the death of 32-year-old Heather Heyer.

• Two sources, F-30 (a member of both the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan Nations) and F-42 (former chairman of the National Alliance, a neo-Nazi organization) were paid by the SPLC to add to their ranks of racists so SPLC could flag the groups on its “Extremist File” to use as fundraising tools. F-30, paid at least $70,000, “publish[ed] racist and extremist material for the purpose of recruiting new members, both inside and outside prison, and create racist paraphernalia to sell at rallies to raise more money for his extremist organization.” (In a humorous twist, F-30 complained that the SPLC’s harsh description of his group scared off potential members so the SPLC toned down the language.) F-42 received $155,000 between 2016 and 2023.

• When two members of the Ku Klux Klan sought help from the SPLC to exit the group, SPLC officials instead encouraged the pair to remain in the movement. Not only did they receive monthly compensation, the sources, identified as F-31 and F-32, were reimbursed for purchasing material to make KKK garments and “for all expenses incurred for cross-burning events to include the wood and fuel used.”

Patel put it in stark terms:

Instigators, Not Informants

Much of this is reminiscent of tactics used by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in recent years to substantiate former FBI Director Chris Wray’s unsubstantiated warnings about “domestic violent extremism,” i.e., Trump supporters. As I covered for years, the FBI used several informants and at least three undercover FBI agents to concoct the Whitmer fednapping hoax (a thorough report by yours truly here) to make it appear that “white supremacist” supporters of Donald Trump plotted to kidnap and kill Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer right before the 2020 presidential election.

At least three informants were paid handsomely (in cash, per FBI policy) for luring the men into the trap. The main informant, Dan Chappel, received at least $60,000 in cash and gifts over a ten-month period; perhaps he can hook up with the SPLC to keep his profitable gig going?

Court proceedings in the trials of the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and Three Percenters related to the events of January 6 revealed the presence of numerous FBI informants in each group before and on that day. FBI informants were caught doing the same thing as SPLC informants; talking smack in group chats, organizing and attending rallies, and participating in the January 6 protest.

All told, the collaboration between the government and nonprofits such as SPLC represent a massive campaign of deception to drastically inflate the danger of “white supremacy” and attach the imaginary threat to Trump and the MAGA movement as a whole. (Last year, Patel formally cut ties between the FBI and SPLC, accurately calling it a “partisan smear machine.”) And while the SPLC now insists it is the victim of a “vindictive” prosecution, the reality is that the SPLC is the vindictive party, shamefully stoking the flames of racial and political discord to boost its bottom line.

Nothing more hateful than that.

The latest wave of “RESIST” yard signs appearing in neighborhoods across America reflects more than ordinary political disagreement. As the above photograph illustrates, the signs are often displayed alongside slogans such as “No ICE” and “Resist Fascism,” suggesting that opposition to immigration enforcement has become a defining rallying cry of the political left.

Yet the message raises an important question: What exactly is being resisted?

The “RESIST” signs are the grassroots counterpart of the broader “Resistance” movement that organized nationwide “No Kings” demonstrations and counter-events to the recent White House UFC celebration, all premised on the notion that President Trump’s exercise of authority is somehow inherently illegitimate.

Yet Trump was elected after making immigration enforcement one of the central themes of his campaign. Voters were not left guessing about his intentions. He promised stricter border security, increased deportations of individuals unlawfully present in the country, and renewed enforcement of existing immigration laws. Whether one agrees with those policies or not, they were presented to the electorate openly and repeatedly.

In a constitutional republic, elections have consequences. Citizens debate competing visions, cast their ballots, and then accept the outcome—even when their preferred candidates lose. That principle lies at the heart of democratic self-government.

The “Resist” movement appears to reject that understanding. Rather than accepting the legitimacy of policies enacted through democratic processes, its adherents often portray enforcement of duly enacted immigration laws as inherently illegitimate. The implication is that a president elected on a promise to enforce those laws should nevertheless be prevented from doing so.

That position is difficult to reconcile with the traditional democratic principle that policy disputes should be resolved at the ballot box. If voters disagree with immigration enforcement, they are free to elect different representatives and a different president. What they are not entitled to do is treat the outcome of a lawful election as presumptively illegitimate simply because it produced policies they dislike.

Who are the Real Fascists?

The rhetoric surrounding the movement also reveals a striking irony. The signs frequently invoke “fascism,” accusing immigration authorities and the Trump administration of authoritarian behavior. But the accusation often amounts to a projection of tactics historically associated with authoritarian movements.

Fascism was characterized not merely by strong government action, but by the refusal to accept political opposition as legitimate. Fascist movements sought to delegitimize elections they lost, suppress dissenting viewpoints, and mobilize extra-political pressure to prevent opponents from governing. They treated political adversaries not as fellow citizens with differing views, but as existential threats whose exercise of lawful authority could not be tolerated.

Take, for example, this little ditty by the once great Bette Midler. Her performance was part of a “resistance” event last weekend to counter the president’s UFC extravaganza at the White House:

What in the world?

By contrast, enforcing immigration laws enacted by Congress and signed by elected presidents is a routine function of constitutional government. Immigration officers carrying out statutory duties are not acting outside the law; they are executing it. Courts remain available to review unlawful actions, Congress retains authority to amend the law, and voters remain free to change course at the next election.

The distinction matters. A constitutional democracy depends on citizens recognizing the difference between opposition to a policy and opposition to the legitimacy of the political system itself. The former is healthy and necessary. The latter can become corrosive.

Ten Years of Resistance and All I Got Was This Lousy Ensemble

None of this means Americans must support President Trump’s immigration policies. Vigorous debate over border security, deportation priorities, asylum procedures, and immigration levels is entirely appropriate. But debate is different from resistance to the lawful operation of government.

The image of “RESIST” signs planted in front yards may be intended as a declaration of civic virtue. Yet it also conveys something deeper: an unwillingness to accept that millions of fellow Americans voted for a different set of policies and expected those policies to be implemented.

More from the “Riseupsingout” spectacle:

The impulse behind the modern “Resist” movement bears an uncomfortable resemblance to South Carolina’s reaction to Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860. South Carolina did not merely oppose Lincoln’s policies; it rejected the legitimacy of allowing those policies to be implemented after a lawful election. Today’s immigration “resisters” similarly insist that policies openly promised during a presidential campaign should not be carried out even after voters endorsed them at the ballot box. The stakes and circumstances are obviously different, but the underlying principle is the same: a refusal to accept that electoral defeat carries political consequences.

Democracy requires more than winning elections. It also requires accepting the results when one loses a lawfully-conducted free and fair election. A movement dedicated to perpetual “resistance” against policies endorsed by voters risks undermining that principle. And when its participants label ordinary law enforcement as “fascism,” they may be obscuring rather than illuminating the real lessons of history.

The challenge for a free society is not to resist democratic outcomes. It is to persuade fellow citizens, win the next election, and govern in turn. That is how constitutional self-government works—and always has. The Left’s latest “Resist” propaganda campaign risks destroying that vital principle.

Meanwhile, here is Julia Roberts from the same event:

Dr. John Eastman is a Senior Fellow at The Claremont Institute, and former professor of constitutional law and law school Dean. He represented President Trump in several challenges to illegality in the conduct of the 2020 election.

The start of meteorological summer is well underway—a time when many normal Americans clock off early on Fridays to make the most of what seems like a shorter and shorter summer season each year (this could be my age, of course.)

As families headed to lake houses or prepared for weekend barbecues or tuned into the World Cup action, the anti-Trump establishment instead fixated on a building situated on the Potomac River in the nation’s capital: The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

In response to a court order issued last month by D.C. District Court Judge Christopher Cooper, who called the Center “a living memorial” to Kennedy, the current president’s name was set to stripped from the front of the iconic building on Friday afternoon. A Trump-appointed board last December voted to add the president’s name to the center; his name was placed before that of the 35th president’s name.

An ex-officio board member immediately filed a lawsuit to remove Trump’s name, arguing the institution had been created by statute and adding the current president’s name represented a violation of the law. (The lawsuit, filed by Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, the ex-officio board member, also sought to halt the temporary closure of the building during much-needed repairs and renovations, which even Cooper admitted were necessary and consistent with recent Congressional funding.)

In a last-ditch effort, the Department of Justice asked Cooper on Thursday to delay his order pending the outcome of an emergency appeal before the D.C. Circuit court. Cooper quickly denied the motion—so Trump haters and reporters (I repeat myself) stood watch. Former CNN reporter Jim Acosta started his disheveled coverage this morning:

Others did the same. MS-NOW covered the event LIVE as if reporting on the ground from the beaches of Normandy:

Work paused temporarily due to inclement weather—but the skies cleared around the same time the D.C. Circuit court on Friday evening denied the administration’s emergency request, permitting the removal of Trump’s name to proceed for now.

And the news made the anti-Trump establishment as buzzed as the first sip of a pinot grigio on a perfect Friday summer eve in Georgetown. “Breaking news,” CNN declared on Friday evening, along with an X post by Kaitlin Collins.

People with apparently nothing better to do on a lovely summer weekend night gathered round to watch the event:

Observers noted a RAINBOW appeared as the work resumed, as if Mother Nature herself (sorry, itself) consented to the shedding of Trump’s name, symbolizing something much, much bigger ahead!

And no one was happier over that development than Scott MacFarlane, the oleaginous reporter now with the MeidasTouch website. (MacFarlane sashayed through the hallways of the D.C. courthouse for years covering J6 cases for CBS News.) He’s been bleating about this for days.

Democratic members of Congress acted as if the removal of the president’s name meant something more than…the temporary removal of his name on a building.

Beatty relished in her 15 minutes of fame:

Litigation will continue; as far as Cooper is concerned, he is the subject of a misconduct complaint for handling the case despite his wife’s representation of anti-Trump clients including Joe Biden in his recent attempt to prevent the release of recordings between himself and his ghostwriter. (Complaint is here.) As I urged for years, Cooper should have recused from all Trump-related cases, including the dozens of J6 cases he handled, due to his wife’s participation in the lawfare against the president. (Cooper and his wife, Amy Jeffress, were married by former Attorney General Merrick Garland. She also represented former FBI lawyer Lisa Page.)

As this matter moves through the D.C. appellate court—just be glad you have better things to do on a summer Friday than wait for letters to be hammered off a public building.

Last year, the international sports world sat on edge for weeks waiting for Alexander Ovechkin, captain of the Washington Nationals professional hockey team, to surpass the all-time scoring record held for 26 years by Wayne Gretzky, nicknamed “The Great One.” When Ovechkin scored his 895th goal on April 6, 2025, hockey fans and sports enthusiasts around the world cheered the Russian’s history-making achievement; the National Hockey League proclaimed in a social media post the “passing of the torch” from Ovechkin to Gretzky, a consummate gentleman and sportsman who had attended the game to watch the moment in real time.

Commentators did not question whether Ovechkin should have received such glowing accolades as his homeland continued to attack Ukraine in a conflict Russia initiated in 2022. Competitors and teammates did not refuse to shake his hand over the war—or over his personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom he calls “my president.” (Ovechkin’s Instagram profile photo is of himself and Putin.) To the contrary, athletes and celebrities fawned over Ovechkin’s feat in a video montage. “I’m very happy for you,” said tennis great Roger Federer, who won the men’s Roland Garros title in 2009. “I hope you can hold the record forever.”

There is no indication, however, that Federer has offered a word of congratulations to Mirra Andreeva, the Russian teenager who won the women’s title at Roland Garros last weekend. Not only was Andreeva, 19, denied anything close to the Ovechkin treatment by her colleagues, celebrities, and the sports media, she was snubbed by her Ukrainian competitors and tournament organizers in general.

Sniping over the war proved as problematic for the prestigious two-week tournament, considered one of the four “Grand Slams” in tennis, as the withdrawal of fan favorite Carlos Alcarez and the early exit by top-ranked men’s player Jannik Sinner—and the tension appears contained to the women’s side since seven of the top 20 women’s players are of either Russian or Ukrainian descent. (I can’t find any evidence of men tennis players refusing to shake the hand of Russia’s Danill Medvedev, the 8th ranked men’s player in the world.)

It represents an ongoing cat fight that has no place in professional sports.

And How Exactly Will This End the War?

Following a policy enacted by each professional tennis organization shortly after the start of the war in 2022, the Russian flag could not be displayed next to the name of Russian players, including Belarus-born Aryna Sabalenka, the world’s number one women’s player, during any Roland Garros broadcast. (This is true of every televised tennis tournament.) Displaying the Russian flag is verboten on professional tennis websites; during Andreeva’s trophy-winning match at Court Philippe-Chatrier in Paris on Saturday, stadium officials seized Russian flags being waved by a few spectators.

After her decisive victory, the French Tennis Federation refused to play Andreeva’s national anthem, a tradition at Roland Garros, to honor the Russian’s achievement. (She is the first teen to win the tournament since Monica Seles in 1992.) And so far, Novak Djokovic and Maria Sharapova are the only tennis greats on record praising Andreeva’s win.

Unfortunately, antics by Ukrainian players continue to threaten the watchability of what is currently one of the most exciting periods in the sport, especially for women players. There is nothing wrong—in fact, it’s entirely appropriate—for an athlete to use his or her stardom to advance a political viewpoint or defend their homeland off the court: donate their winnings, meet with officials in their own government, visit front-line fighters, produce ads blasting the bad guys, plead for peace. All good.

What’s wholly inappropriate is an athlete personally attacking competitors whose only tie to the war is their place of birth. Take, for example, comments made on May 27 by Oleksandra Oliynykova, who suggested Russian-born players are Putin propagandists. (She sounds like a Democratic member of Congress!):

Time for a Warning From the Chair for Unsportsmanlike Conduct

One of the worst offenders is Marta Kostyuk, the Ukrainian-born world ranked #12 who currently lives in Monte Carlo. Similar to Oliynkova, Kostyuk just accused Russian players of aiding the war:

She refuses to shake the hand, another tennis tradition, of any player tied to Russia after a match. After Andreeva beat her in the Roland Garros semi-finals on June 4, Kostyuk walked off the court without acknowledging her opponent.

Kostyuk did the same in Brisbane earlier this year after she beat Andreeva.

In 2022, shortly after the war began, Kostyuk suggested she wanted to “physically” harm her Russian competitors:

The current eight-ranked women’s player in the world, Elina Svitolina, also of Ukraine, is helping fuel the controversy. Svitolina, who also refuses to shake the hands of her Russian opponents, had this to say:

All the drama recently forced Sabalenka, perhaps the most popular player on the tour, to defend herself:

So, what gives? The generous explanation is that Ukrainian (women) players truly want to use their platform to denounce a war with no end in sight. The more sinister explanation is these same players are using the conflict to get into the heads of their fiercest competitors, put Russian players (and others) on the defensive, and poison public sentiment against popular players.

Whatever the case—each tennis organization and tournament should put an end to such antics before the general public switches off. At least the women’s matches.

President Trump ended a testy (is there any other type?) interview this weekend with Kristen Welker, the host of NBC News’ '“Meet the Press.” The pair clashed over the prosecution of January 6 protesters and whether any or all are entitled to some form of restitution for being politically targeted by Joe Biden’s Department of Justice for four years. Last week, Senate leaders again reiterated their opposition to the “anti-weaponization” fund announced by the administration in May; Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters the fund is “off the table.”

Read more

Read more

Sympathy poured in from all corners of the press and social media Thursday on behalf of E. Jean Carroll, the crazy woman who accused the president of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s. (I won’t get into the details of her alleged account or her successful lawsuits but plenty on the public record for those interested or uninformed.)

Last night, CNN posted an “exclusive” report claiming Carroll is the subject of a Department of Justice investigation based out of the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois (Chicago) office. “The investigation is focused on whether Carroll committed perjury in testimony tied to her two civil lawsuits against the president,” three CNN reporters wrote in a May 27 article. “Prosecutors’ theory hinges on a 2022 deposition statement by Carroll, 82, that she received no outside funding for her lawsuit, though it was later revealed that billionaire Reid Hoffman had paid some legal fees and expenses.” The reporters further claimed that acting Attorney General Todd Blanche recused himself from the matter since he had handled appeals related to the Carroll case.

CNN’s claims immediately spread like a Karen Bass-style California wildfire on X-verse and cable news. Roger Parloff, a legal analyst for Lawfare blog, run by Trump hater and James Comey whisperer Ben Wittes, lamented the cruelty of it all. “Doesn’t get worse than this. DOJ probes 82 yo who is enemy & adjudicated victim of Trump,” Parloff posted on Thursday morning. Never mind that President Trump was indicted twice at age 77 by the Biden DOJ and, had Parloff gotten his way and the president had lost the election, he very well could have been imprisoned at age 80 on Jack Smith’s J6 indictment.

Every major news organization followed hot on CNN’s trail. The New York Times described the investigation into Carroll as “the latest chapter in Mr. Trump’s retribution campaign, which has been carried out by Justice Department officials.” ABC News, Reuters, Time magazine (yes, it’s still around), the Associated Press, “Good Morning America,” and local Chicago press diligently regurgitated the reporting. Democratic lawmakers and their influencers pack piled on:

The most gullible and eager NeverTrumper also preached about the injustice of it all:

Even Mark Zaid, the Disney-loving attorney who imagines a crime in every Trump move, defended Carroll:

You get the drift.

But on Thursday evening, U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros shot down those claims:

Boutros, a Trump appointee, made for an easy target of the anti-Trump machine. He has been the subject of recent media fire for his office’s handling of the so-called “Broadview Six” case brought against several anti-ICE protesters last year. Although the investigation was apparently mishandled by a longtime DOJ prosecutor who quickly left the office post-indictment and then detailed to the Democratic side of the Senate Judiciary Committee (and just fired for her role in the questionable grand jury proceedings called out by a Chicago judge as I posted here), the media is making Boutros the fall guy. (In response to what he’s uncovered at his office, Boutros this week announced a series of reforms.)

After Boutros’ statement, the media backtracked. Turns out, the investigation is targeting longtime Trump nemesis Reid Hoffman—the billionaire founder of LinkedIn and funder of several anti-Trump causes—who bankrolled Carroll’s lawsuits to the tune of $7 million. His “nonprofit,” as the media generously describes it, is based in Chicago. CNBC reported Hoffman is the subject of a money-laundering operation.

CBS News best demonstrated the change in tone of the inquiry, as I posted here:

‘Some” of her legal expenses?? Hoffman has boasted about his funding of the case:

And Carroll, once again, blamed her faulty memory for the “oversight” of Hoffman’s financial backing:

So what to make of this media op? A set up by the DOJ to smoke out leakers? A coordinated effort to redirect attention away from Hoffman, a generous benefactor to the lawfare against the president, and immediately discredit the investigation by claiming it’s aimed at one of Trump’s “perceived enemies?” Just another example of a dangerous and dishonest echo chamber not just to damage the DOJ but contribute to what we know is ongoing jury nullification in big cities?

Further, this is not to say Carroll’s false statements are not under review by another jurisdiction. Even an all-Democratic appellate panel in 2024 acknowledged her “misstatements” but determined they were irrelevant. (Opinion here.)

As we await more developments, this onslaught is yet another example of the media’s complicity and corruption.