Yearly Archives: 2024

The U.S. Supreme Court issued two rulings in less than 24 hours, ultimately allowing Texas' border bill, SB 4, to go into effect. The opinion sends the case back to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to hear the case on the merits.

On Monday, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito issued a third extended stay on the initial stay he ordered on March 4 to prevent the law from going into effect on March 5 until the court could rule on the matter.

Alito first stayed a Fifth Circuit ruling that was issued for two consolidated lawsuits filed by the Department of Justice and El Paso County and nonprofit organizations, respectively. The two lawsuits were filed after Gov. Greg Abbott signed SB 4 into law, which makes illegal entry into Texas from a foreign nation a state crime.

In February, U.S. District Judge David Ezra ruled against the law. On March 5, the Fifth Circuit overturned his ruling and the consolidated cases were appealed to the Supreme Court. The high court was asked to block the law from going into effect as the Fifth Circuit heard the case on the merits.

The Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision, denied their request, allowing the law to go into effect.

In response to the ruling, Gov. Greg Abbott said, "In a 6-3 decision SCOTUS allows Texas to begin enforcing SB4 that allows the arrest of illegal immigrants. We still have to have hearings in the 5th circuit federal court of appeals. But this is clearly a positive development."

The ruling states, "the applications to vacate presented to Justice Alito and by him referred to the Court are denied. The orders heretofore entered by Justice Alito are vacated."

Justice Amy Coney Barrett, joined by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, wrote a five-page ruling for the majority. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justice Ketanji Jackson, wrote a 10-page dissent. Justice Elena Kagan wrote a two-page dissent.

The ruling centers around the legality of issuing an administrative stay and does not address the case's merits, punting the case back to the Fifth Circuit.

If the Fifth Circuit had issued a stay pending appeal, Barrett wrote, the Supreme Court would have applied a four-factor test to rule on the case. But because it exercised its docket management authority to issue a temporary administrative stay and deferred the stay motion to a merits panel, she said, the court "has not yet rendered a decision on whether a stay pending appeal is warranted. That puts this case in a very unusual procedural posture."

She then went on to describe the process of administrative stays and the hesitation to rule on a case due to procedural reasons.

"So far as I know, this court has never reviewed the decision of a Court of Appeals to enter — or not enter — an administrative stay," she said. "I would not get into the business. When entered, an administrative stay is supposed to be short-lived prelude to the main event: a ruling on the motion for a stay pending appeal. I think it unwise to invite emergency litigation in this court about whether a court of appeals abused its discretion at this preliminary step—for example, by misjudging whether an administrative stay is the best way to minimize harm while the court deliberates."

Sotomayor and Jackson said the decision "invites further chaos and crisis in immigration enforcement," and the Fifth Circuit issued its ruling "with no reasoned analysis."

"Texas can now immediately enforce its own law imposing criminal liability on thousands of noncitizens and requiring their removal to Mexico," they lamented. As a result, the Supreme Court gave "a green light to a law that will upend the longstanding federal-state balance of power and sow chaos, when the only court to consider the law concluded that it is likely unconstitutional."

While they debated aspects of administrative stays and attacked the merits of Texas' law, they also attacked the Fifth Circuit. They said, "Texas's novel scheme requires careful and reasoned consideration in the courts. The District Court gave S. B. 4 careful consideration and found that it was likely unconstitutional. The Fifth Circuit has not yet weighed in, but nevertheless issued a one-sentence administrative order that is maximally disruptive to foreign relations, national security, the federal-state balance of power, and the lives of noncitizens. The Court should not permit this state of affairs."

Justice Kagan said she didn't think the Fifth Circuit's use of an administrative stay versus a stay pending appeal "should matter. … But a court's unreasoned decision to impose one for more than a month, rather than answer the stay pending appeal issue before it, should not spell the difference between respecting and revoking long-settled immigration law."

When signing SB 4 into law, Gov. Abbott said President Joe Biden's "deliberate inaction has left Texas to fend for itself," pointing to Article 1 Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution, which empowers states "to take action to defend themselves and that is exactly what Texas is doing."

The law stipulates that repeat offenders who illegally reenter Texas can face a prison sentence of up to 20 years. It also gives law enforcement officials the authority to return illegal foreign nationals to a port of entry and/or arrest them for unlawful entry.

(The Center Square) – The former Milwaukee election manager who sent three fake military ballots to a state lawmaker back in 2022 is claiming to be a whistleblower, but the lawmaker who got those ballots isn’t sure.

Kimberly Zapata’s trial began this week. She’s the former Milwaukee Election Commission supervisor charged with official misconduct after she mailed three military ballots to state Rep. Janel Brandtjen ahead of the 2022 election.

Zapata’s lawyers said she is “political whistleblower” who simply wanted to ensure a “fair and secure” election.

“I had never met or known Kim Zapata. Her case makes it abundantly clear that the online WISvote system allows anyone, under indefinitely-confined, overseas or military ballots to request and receive a ballot, without security. In addition, the system allows ballot requests with a VPN, meaning the persons who request a ballot may never be known,” Brandtjen, R-Menomonee Falls, told The Center Square. “If Ms. Zapata had wanted to point out a concern in the election process, she could have anonymously picked up the phone rather than put her job and her reputation at risk.”

Brandtjen has been one of the loudest critics of Wisconsin’s electoral system.

She led the legislative investigation in 2021 into the lingering questions about the 2020 presidential election in the state. Her focus on possible election fraud eventually led to her falling out with top Republican leaders.

Brandtjen continues to be critical of how the Republican-controlled legislature has not closed the military ballot loophole that Zapata is accused of using to send Brandtjen those three ballots.

“Neither the legislature, governor, Republican or Democrat parties have addressed the fact that military ballots requests are not being confirmed which is required by law,” Brandtjen said. “And the online WISvote System allows anyone to request and send some types of ballots without confirmed identity.”

Zapata’s trail is expected to take the rest of the week, and reports suggest she won’t call any witnesses in her own defense.

Brandtjen said she’s not sure what to make of Zapata’s defense.

“I cannot speak to the intent of Kim Zapata since I have never spoken to her. It was my report to the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department that asked for an investigation of who requested the ballots, since one of those ballots had my last name attached. I was never contacted by WEC or any investigators,” she said. “If Kim Zapata had used a VPN, and not come forward, I would have been under suspicion of creating my own ballot requests, which I never could have disproved.”

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on Monday about whether the government can persuade social media companies to remove content from platforms.

The Biden administration appealed to the nation's highest court after a ruling by the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals last September that stated Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, the White House, the FBI and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention violated the First Amendment by influencing social media companies in moderating content on COVID-19 and the 2020 election.

More than 50 individuals and organizations filed legal briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court in Murthy v. Missouri. The case was originally known as Missouri v. Biden.

Last July, U.S. District Court Judge Terry Doughty ruled against the Biden administration and issued an injunction requested by Republican Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey to stop nine government agencies and their leaders and employees from specific actions and interactions with social media companies. The case was originally filed by then-Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, now a U.S. Senator. Bailey, the former chief counsel for Republican Gov. Mike Parson, was appointed by Parson after Schmitt's election in 2022.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the government’s appeal on the question of whether the “government’s challenged conduct transformed private social-media companies’ content-moderation decisions into state action” and violated the First Amendment, according to the document granting the case.

In the government’s brief, it disagreed with arguments "government officials transformed private platforms into state actors subject to First Amendment constraints merely by speaking to the public on matters of public concern or seeking to influence or inform the platforms’ editorial decisions. The Court should reject that radical expansion of the state-action doctrine, which would ‘eviscerate certain private entities’ rights to exercise editorial control over speech and speakers on their properties or platforms.’”

Missouri’s brief highlights “103 pages of factual findings, supported by 591 footnotes” compiled in the district court’s ruling against the government.

“These unrebutted findings demonstrate ‘a broad pressure campaign designed to coerce social media companies into suppressing speakers, viewpoints, and content disfavored by the government,’” the brief states.

Eight of the briefs weren’t in support of either side, including one jointly filed from Netchoice, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, Chamber of Progress and the Cato Institute. It highlighted the concept of “jawboning,” defined by the Cato Institute as “when a government official threatens to use his or her power – be it the power to prosecute, regulate, or legislate – to compel someone to take actions that the state official cannot.”

“The Court should ensure that its decision does not permit the government to do indirectly what it cannot do directly – undermine digital services’ rights to curate and disseminate content,” the brief stated. “And the Court should clarify that there is no requirement of a predicate showing of state action for a jawboning claim against the government.”

The brief also asked the court to explain that any lawsuits from “jawboning” must be filed against the government and not the social media entity to be consistent with legal precedent.

Unless Congress and policymakers understand how weaponized migration is being used against the U.S., they won’t be able to solve the problem, foreign policy analysts warn.

More than 11 million foreign nationals, including gotaways, illegally entering the U.S. from all over the world is not an accident, military and foreign policy experts have warned. It’s called migrant warfare, The Center Square first reported. The European Commission, United Nations, NATO, and foreign policy institutes have identified hybrid warfare being used in Europe, including migrant warfare, to shape national and international policies.

The United States is also being targeted by foreign adversaries through “weaponized migration,” Kelly Greenhill, a senior research scholar at MIT Center for International Studies and author of “Weapons of Mass Migration,” wrote in an analysis.

“The United States has been an especially frequent target, with the tactic used against nearly every U.S. administration from Dwight Eisenhower’s in the 1950s through George W Bush’s in the first decade of this century,” she wrote. Western governments do not appear to understand how migrant warfare is used to exploit “political divisions that exist within the targeted states.” Engineering the movement of people across international borders “has long been a distressingly effective policy instrument, and it is unlikely to go away anytime soon,” she said. “Unless policymakers begin to confront the forces that enable weaponized migration, the favored policy responses seem destined to increase, rather than curtail.”

She highlighted examples of how weaponized migration has been used to achieve desired outcomes in multiple countries, noting that Cuba and Haiti have used the tactic against the U.S. for decades.

“When weaponized migration is used, it is often successful,” she wrote. Of the 81 cases she identified worldwide since 1951, the tactic achieved the anticipated objective. Targets are disproportionately liberal democracies, she noted, and the effectiveness of weaponized migration “as a method of coercive statecraft depends on the attitude and politics of the targeted country.”

The policies of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas have been made clear in three key documents: the U.S. Strategy for Addressing the Root Causes of Migration in Central America, the Collaborative Migration Management Strategy, and the Los Angeles Declaration of Migration and Protection, which 21 countries endorsed in June 2022. The Los Angeles Declaration “specifically lays out the goal of collectively expanding access to regular pathways for migrants and refugees into the United States,” the Department of Justice states in a February 2023 “Circumvention of Lawful Pathways” rule published in the Federal Register.

Through the Los Angeles Declaration, in June 2022, the U.S. committed to resettle 20,000 “refugees” from the Americas during fiscal years 2023 and 2024. In fiscal 2022, the federal government issued more than 19,000 H-2 visas to Guatemalans, Hondurans and Salvadorans, a 94% increase from the previous fiscal year.

The rule explains how more Cubans and Nicaraguans were arriving at the southwest border in the fall of 2022 “because neither country accepts removals of their nationals at the rate that the United States seeks to remove them.” As a result, “these challenges” prompted Mayorkas in January 2023 to adopt new parole processes for Cubans, Haitians and Nicaraguans to process them into, not remove from, the United States.

Twenty states sued over Mayorkas’ “lawful pathways” parole programs and lost their first round in court. The U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security identified over a dozen parole programs as illegal and as part of its evidence to impeach Mayorkas.

The DOJ rule also states that “applicants who do not qualify for asylum in Mexico are automatically considered for complementary protection in the United States,” and describes how the State Department is partnering with Guatemala and other countries to move foreign nationals into the United States. On March 15, 2022, the U.S. and the government of Costa Rica signed a migration arrangement to “collaboratively manage migration and expand legal pathways and access to protection,” for example.

Mayorkas created “refugee processing centers” in other countries for the first time in U.S. history, The Center Square first reported. He also expanded processing facilities along the southwest border. In January 2021, DHS allocated $669 million to build and operate 10 soft-sided processing facilities and transferred 10,000 federal personnel from other agencies to them to help move more foreign nationals into the country.

With unprecedented numbers of people from all over the world arriving at U.S. borders in response to Mayorkas’ policies, U.S. Border Patrol chiefs have explained how transnational criminal organizations facilitate illegal activity and pull agents from their primary mission of border security. As a result, retired FBI counterintelligence and the FBI director have repeatedly warned a terrorist attack is more likely to occur.

House Republicans argue Mayorkas has created the border crisis and his recent funding request and the Senate border bill will only facilitate these policies, The Center Square has reported.

By contrast, Texas counties that have declared an invasion, argued safeguarding the constitutional sovereign authority of states must be prioritized to protect citizens.

School districts around the country are facing issues with how they handle their social media accounts, and the debate has reached the U.S. Supreme Court.

Denver Public Schools recently reviewed its social media policy that doesn’t allow employees to restrict comments on social media or limit who can see them.

The Denver school district's policy was reviewed earlier this month by the school board and states that neither the school, school board members, nor district employees can restrict a person’s ability to view, post, comment, restrict, or delete comments from any public social media pages that are maintained or operated by the district.

The document further states that doing so goes against a person’s speech protected by the First Amendment or the Colorado Constitution.

In Oregon, a school district is being accused of unconstitutionally violating a mother’s First Amendment rights by suppressing her speech online and at public meetings.

The Liberty Justice Center, a nonpartisan, nonprofit public-interest law firm dedicated to protecting the freedom of speech, has released a letter sent to the Gladstone School District, demanding it make its social media and public comment policies compliant with the First Amendment by removing any restrictions on Glenda Scherer, and allow her to speak openly about the district and the policies.

“The First Amendment protects Americans’ vital right to publicly voice their concerns and prohibits government officials from censoring speech they disagree with,” said Educational Freedom Attorney Dean McGee in the press release. “The district cannot silence parents for its own convenience—public comment is essential to the betterment of public schools.”

Scherer, a mother of two and an education advocate, is arguing that the Gladstone School District is continuously blocking her ability to post on a publicly accessible Facebook group provided for communication between parents and the school.

Scherer is claiming that her posts are only allowed to be posted after administrators have approved them.

“The Liberty Justice Center’s letter to the school district raises alarming allegations that the district repeatedly went out of its way to suppress a parent’s constitutionally protected speech," FIRE Director of Public Advocacy Aaron Terr said in an email to The Center Square. "The First Amendment requires government officials to tolerate criticism of their policies and performance. Instead of muzzling critics, school officials should welcome candid feedback from parents and community members, which could ultimately improve students’ educational experience.”

Scherer also claims that the district requires her to submit any comments and questions to be pre-screened by the board before any open meetings. The press release also states that the district has attempted to ban her from attending any school board meetings in person without prior approval from the superintendent.

The debate about whether blocking individuals from private accounts does, in fact, suppress one's First Amendment is also being heard in San Diego County, California, according to documents.

Two members of the Poway Unified School District Board of Trustees used personal Facebook and X accounts to communicate with the community and parents of children attending the district and blocked those who repeatedly criticized them.

The U.S. Supreme Court cases of O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier and Lindke v. Freed question whether someone has First Amendment free speech rights involving a public official using their personal social media account.

On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Lindke v. Freed that public officials can block critics on their personal social media accounts.

“The distinction between private conduct and state action turns on substance, not labels: Private parties can act with the authority of the State, and state officials have private lives and their own constitutional rights,” the court stated in its opinion.

The court gave an example as to the difference between a public official acting in the role of his duty and that of a private citizen.

“Consider a hypothetical from the offline world,” the court wrote. “A school board president announces at a school board meeting that the board has lifted pandemic-era restrictions on public schools. The next evening, at a backyard barbecue with friends whose children attend public schools, he shares that the board has lifted the pandemic-era restrictions. The former is state action taken in his official capacity as school board president; the latter is private action taken in his personal capacity as a friend and neighbor. While the substance of the announcement is the same, the context—an official meeting versus a private event—differs. He invoked his official authority only when he acted as school board president.”

The Gladstone School District and Denver Public schools did not respond to emails or phone call seeking comment.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on Monday about whether the government can persuade social media companies to remove content from platforms.

The Biden administration appealed to the nation's highest court after a ruling by the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals last September that stated Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, the White House, the FBI and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention violated the First Amendment by influencing social media companies in moderating content on COVID-19 and the 2020 election.

More than 50 individuals and organizations filed legal briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court in Murthy v. Missouri. The case was originally known as Missouri v. Biden.

Last July, U.S. District Court Judge Terry Doughty ruled against the Biden administration and issued an injunction requested by Republican Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey to stop nine government agencies and their leaders and employees from specific actions and interactions with social media companies. The case was originally filed by then-Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, now a U.S. Senator. Bailey, the former chief counsel for Republican Gov. Mike Parson, was appointed by Parson after Schmitt's election in 2022.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the government’s appeal on the question of whether the “government’s challenged conduct transformed private social-media companies’ content-moderation decisions into state action” and violated the First Amendment, according to the document granting the case.

In the government’s brief, it disagreed with arguments "government officials transformed private platforms into state actors subject to First Amendment constraints merely by speaking to the public on matters of public concern or seeking to influence or inform the platforms’ editorial decisions. The Court should reject that radical expansion of the state-action doctrine, which would ‘eviscerate certain private entities’ rights to exercise editorial control over speech and speakers on their properties or platforms.’”

Missouri’s brief highlights “103 pages of factual findings, supported by 591 footnotes” compiled in the district court’s ruling against the government.

“These unrebutted findings demonstrate ‘a broad pressure campaign designed to coerce social media companies into suppressing speakers, viewpoints, and content disfavored by the government,’” the brief states.

Eight of the briefs weren’t in support of either side, including one jointly filed from Netchoice, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, Chamber of Progress and the Cato Institute. It highlighted the concept of “jawboning,” defined by the Cato Institute as “when a government official threatens to use his or her power – be it the power to prosecute, regulate, or legislate – to compel someone to take actions that the state official cannot.”

“The Court should ensure that its decision does not permit the government to do indirectly what it cannot do directly – undermine digital services’ rights to curate and disseminate content,” the brief stated. “And the Court should clarify that there is no requirement of a predicate showing of state action for a jawboning claim against the government.”

The brief also asked the court to explain that any lawsuits from “jawboning” must be filed against the government and not the social media entity to be consistent with legal precedent.

Judge Scott McAfee, the judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s Georgia election interference racketeering case, ruled Friday that despite allegations of misconduct, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Democrat, can remain on Trump’s case.

McAfee ruled, however, that Willis must remove legal counsel Nathan Wade, with whom she had an affair and allegedly misused taxpayer dollars for, from the case. Willis could also withdraw from the case, and Wade would then be allowed to remain.

Willis has been accused of overpaying Wade, whom she has had a romantic relationship with, using taxpayer dollars. Willis hired Wade to work on the Trump case, but the allegations fueled a push to have her removed from the case.

One of Trump’s lawyers blasted the decision.

“While respecting the Court’s decision, we believe that the Court did not afford appropriate significance to the prosecutorial misconduct of Willis and Wade, including the financial benefits, testifying untruthfully about when their personal relationship began, as well as Willis’ extrajudicial MLK ‘church speech,’ where she played the race card and falsely accused the defendants and their counsel of racism,” top Trump lawyer Steve Sadow said in a statement, according to The Hill.

“We will use all legal options available as we continue to fight to end this case, which should never have been brought in the first place,” he added.

McAfee earlier this week threw out a few of the charges against Trump and some of his alleged co-conspirators, but dozens still remain. Overall, Trump faces nearly 90 criminal charges across several states.

“Whether this case ends in convictions, acquittals, or something in between, the result should be one that instills confidence in the process,” McAfee said in the ruling. “A reasonable observer unburdened by partisan blinders should believe the law was impartially applied, that those accused of crimes had a fair opportunity to present their defenses, and that any verdict was based on our criminal justice system’s best efforts at ascertaining the truth.”

McAfee did say there is not enough evidence to prove a conflict of interest.

“After consideration of the record established on these motions, the Court finds the allegations and evidence legally insufficient to support a finding of an actual conflict of interest,” McAfee said in the ruling. “However, the appearance of impropriety remains and must be handled as previously outlined before the prosecution can proceed. The Defendants’ motions are therefore granted in part and denied in part.”

Trump has repeatedly attacked Willis and the other cases against him.

“The things that took place at the Manhattan D.A.’s office, in conjunction with people from the DOJ put in charge of ‘getting TRUMP,’ are truly a sight to behold,” Trump wrote on TruthSocial Thursday. “They illegally withheld thousands of pages of documents. Then you have the really shady ‘Pomerantz’ issue, and wow, people have never seen anything like this one. This will make Fani and her ‘lover’ look like small potatoes!!!”

(The Center Square) – Money is becoming an issue in Wisconsin’s race for the U.S. Senate.

Republican Eric Hovde is launching a new ad today where he promises not to accept money from political action committees and promises to not take a Senate salary if elected.

“Washington has become corrupt career politicians sell themselves to special interest and end up working for them and not you I've worked hard been fortunate I don't need their special interest money and I won't take it if you decide to like me is your next senator I'll donate my entire salary to Wisconsin charity every year,” Hovde said in the new 30 second ad.

Hovde’s campaign is making it clear that Hovde’s own charity, The Hovde Foundation, will not get any of those salary donations.

Hovde’s new ad comes as Democrats in Wisconsin are blasting him as a millionaire and continue to hammer that he owns a home in California.

“Senate candidate Eric Hovde *said* he supported Dem proposals to put a minimum global tax on corporations, [but] *did* invest tens of millions of $$ in insurance companies HQ’d in Bermuda to avoid US taxes,” Wisconsin Democratic chair Ben Wikler said on social media Thursday.

A report in Politico noted Hovde’s asset management firm, Hovde Capital, reported non-controlling investments in up to $74 million in Bermuda-based insurance companies between 2003 and 2013.

Non-controlling investments mean essentially a minority ownership stake and mean Hovde would not have had a vote or any say on corporate decisions in those companies.

Hovde has promised he will self-fund most of his campaign but has been clear he will accept donations from Wisconsin voters.

Democrats in Wisconsin have also tried to make that an issue, saying Hovde will likely have to spend $20 million of his own money in the contest.

Hovde’s campaign is not saying how much money they are putting behind the new ad or where in Wisconsin it will run.

The 2024 presidential election has grabbed most of the headlines recently, but the U.S. Senate races are taking shape under the radar. Here is a preview of the 10 most likely to flip.

West Virginia – Open (D): It’s not that often that every elections analyst in the country concurs on something, but I suspect you will get unanimous agreement that this seat is far and away the most likely Senate seat to flip. Joe Manchin is a Democrat who has basically been swimming against a Republican tide since he won the seat in a 2010 special election. Two years prior, John McCain carried the state by 12 points over Barack Obama. Donald Trump won it by almost 40 points in 2020. It’s unlikely that even the popular Manchin, who won narrowly in the good Democratic year of 2018, could emerge victorious, but with his retirement, the seat is just gone.

Montana – Jon Tester (D): Reasonable minds can disagree about whether Montana or Ohio is the more vulnerable seat. Tester is probably a better ideological match for his state than Sen. Sherrod Brown is for Ohio, but Montana will probably go for Donald Trump by 20 points rather than the 10 or so points by which he seems likely to carry Ohio. Tester’s preferred opponent, Matt Rosendale, dropped out of the race, giving Tester a more mainstream opponent. Even Rosendale had made a race out of it in the bad GOP year of 2018, but this time, Tester will likely have to convince one out of every six Trump voters to cross over for him. That’s no easy task.

Ohio – Sherrod Brown (D): Brown is probably too liberal for the modern Buckeye State, and he’ll have to convince around one in 10 Trump voters to split their tickets. This is within tolerance – Susan Collins pulled this off in reverse in 2020 – but it is still rare. Brown only won by seven points against an underfunded opponent in 2018, but whoever the GOP candidate is will probably not have to worry about money. Trump endorsed businessman Bernie Moreno, much to the state GOP’s dismay, but this is a state that voted for a similarly untested, controversial candidate in 2022 over Brown’s political heir. Brown can win, but he’s in trouble.

Michigan – Open (D): I have to make at least one controversial call, so why not here? To be clear, all of the remaining races at least lean toward the party that currently holds them. Why put this above more popular picks like Nevada, Arizona, or Wisconsin? The reason has less to do with this race than with the dynamics of the other races (discussed below). The Democratic Party has coalesced around Rep. Elissa Slotkin, which is good for the party. But there is a bit of schism within the Democratic Party right now over the Biden administration’s support of Israel in its war in Gaza. Trump has also been polling well in the state. A lot will depend on who emerges from the state’s crowded GOP primary, but remember, Trump nearly pulled now-Rep. John James across the finish line in 2020.

Texas – Ted Cruz (R): Another controversial call, I suspect. I’ve gone into this in greater detail elsewhere, but this is a state that is swinging leftward, and it wouldn’t take a particularly bad showing by Donald Trump nationally for it to flip. Not only that, but Cruz is, well, Cruz, and is not particularly well-liked. He almost lost in 2018, and while the environment is better for him this year, the state is worse. Again, this isn’t a tossup, but his edge is less pronounced than the remaining Democrats on this list.

Arizona – Open (D): Given Kari Lake’s post-election behavior and the presence of an abortion-rights referendum on the ballot, I’m skeptical that she is well-positioned to make this race competitive. It’s also why I’m somewhat skeptical about Donald Trump’s current polling lead against President Biden.

Nevada – Jacky Rosen (D): It’s not that the incumbent is particularly weak. Nor is the GOP field particularly strong. And the presence of an abortion-rights referendum will probably help Rosen. We’re starting to get into genuine long-shot territory here, but this is a state Donald Trump really might carry handily. We’ll see what comes out of the GOP primary.

Wisconsin – Baldwin (D): I don’t really think Tammy Baldwin is likely to lose. The danger to her comes if Donald Trump breaks out in the state and turns out to have coattails. But I promised 10 seats, and I aim to deliver 10.

Pennsylvania – Bob Casey (D): The GOP has its preferred candidate here, Dave McCormick (which it didn’t in 2022 when Oz Mehmet edged McCormick out in the primary), and Casey has never really had a tough challenge before. But he’s got a famous last name, and I think Trump has less chance of winning here than in Wisconsin. If Trump does pull ahead strongly, however, he probably has a better chance of bringing McCormick with him than he does in Wisconsin – whomever Republicans nominate in the Badger State.

Maryland – Open (D): I had to pick a race here. It was either this or New Jersey or Florida. I chose this one because GOP candidate Larry Hogan was a popular governor, is still well regarded in the state, and is probably the strongest challenger in the bunch. But Maryland is exceedingly blue and is really, really unlikely to flip.

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.

A swimmer who competed at N.C. State is among 16 collegiate athletes, including 12-time All-American Riley Gaines, suing the NCAA for letting men who say they are women compete against them and use the same locker rooms.

Kylee Alons, a two-time national champion and 31-time All-American for the Wolfpack, in the summer of 2023 told her story of being forced to share a locker room and “compete against a male athlete” at the NCAA championships. In a social media post last September, she wrote, “I’ll be the first to admit that speaking up about this issue is hard, but it is essential to protect women’s privacy, safety, and integrity of competition.”

Gaines, who competed at Kentucky, and Pennsylvania swimmer Paula Scanlan have led the effort nationally to save women’s sports. Gaines was at the North Carolina General Assembly last summer as lawmakers passed Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, legislation initially vetoed by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper but later put into law by a veto override.

The litigation, a 156-page filing on Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division, says the NCAA and event host Georgia Tech knew they were in violation of Title IX. That’s the 1972 landmark statute guaranteeing equal opportunities for men and women in programs and activities that receive federal financial assistance.

The suit includes four unnamed athletes, two who competed in Division I swimming, the others in Division II volleyball and Division III track. Also in the suit with Alons and Gaines are Olympian swimmer Reka Gyorgy of Virginia Tech; Kentucky swimmer Kaitlynn Wheeler and tennis schoolmate Ellie Eades; soccer and track athlete Ainsley Erzen of Arkansas; and six swimmers from Virginia’s Division III Roanoke College – Lily Mullens, Kate Pearson, Susanna Price, Carter Satterfield, Katie Blakenship and Julianna Morrow.

Alons is from Raleigh, Satterfield from Cary and Morrow from Mooresville.

Bill Bock, who resigned from the NCAA Committee on Infractions last month, is lead attorney in the class-action suit. He’s a former U.S. Anti-Doping Agency general counsel. The Independent Council on Women’s Sports, commonly known as ICONS, is providing funding.

In a release, ICONS co-founder Marshi Smith said, “This lawsuit against the NCAA isn’t just about competition; it’s a fight for the very essence of women’s sports. We’re standing up for justice and the rights of female athletes to compete on a level playing field. It’s about preserving the legacy of Title IX and ensuring that the future of women’s sports is as bright as its past.”

“We’re sending a clear message,” said ICONS co-founder Kim Jones. “The integrity of women’s sports is nonnegotiable.”

Alons gave insight to what happened at the 2022 NCAA championships in an interview with Outkick, and later met with U.S. Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla. Lia Thomas, previously a swimmer for the Penn men’s team three years, was using the same locker room as the women and Alons opted to change in a storage closet instead of the same locker room with Thomas.

Her Wolfpack teammates did likewise.

Alons, in the release, said she doesn’t want another woman to be exposed to the same situation she faced.

“The NCAA has put women in an impossible situation both in competition and in the locker room,” she said.

In a U.S. Senate hearing in June, Gaines at one point countered Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., saying, “Senator Durbin, in your opening statement you had mentioned this rhetoric, you mentioned ‘what message does it send to trans individuals?’ and my combat to that is what message does it send to women, to young girls who are denied these opportunities? So easily their rights to privacy and safety thrown out the window to protect a small population, to protect one group as long as they’re happy. What about us? That is the overall consensus of how we all felt inside that locker room.”

(The Center Square) – The Wisconsin Supreme Court is reopening the debate over ballot drop boxes.

The liberal-majority court accepted a case that looks to overturn Wisconsin’s current ban on ballot drop boxes.

The former conservative-majority court, ruled Wisconsin law does not allow for ballot drop boxes at any place except the election clerk’s office.

"[The Wisconsin Elections Commission] staff may have been trying to make voting as easy as possible during the pandemic,” conservative Justice Rebecca Bradley wrote in 2022. “But whatever their motivations, WEC must follow Wisconsin statutes. Good intentions never override the law."

But Democrats and activists argued state law didn’t specifically ban them, and Wisconsin’s liberal justices argued that a ban on drop boxes was tantamount to voter suppression.

"Although it pays lip service to the import of the right to vote, the majority/lead opinion has the practical effect of making it more difficult to exercise it. Such a result, although lamentable, is not a surprise from this court," Justice Ann Walsh Bradley wrote in her dissent.

The court’s new case argues ballot drop boxes are “critical for voters … who are unable to vote in person because of disability, scheduling conflicts, lack of transportation, or other hardship."

Conservative Justice Rebecca Bradley wrote Tuesday the liberal-majority court is, once again, trying to play political games.

"By granting this petition to bypass, the majority again aims to increase the electoral prospects of its preferred political party," Bradley wrote. "Finding the decision politically inconvenient, and emboldened by a new makeup of the court, this new majority embraces the opportunity to overturn (the 2022 ruling in Teigen v. Wisconsin Elections Commission). The majority's decision to do so will upset the status quo of election administration mere months before a presidential election and lead to chaos and confusion for Wisconsin voters and election officials."

The court will hear oral arguments in the new challenge in May.

Republican lawmakers have tried to ban the use of ballot drop boxes in Wisconsin, but Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed those attempts.

A state judge on Wednesday dismissed some of the charges against former President Donald Trump in the Georgia case that accuses the former president of trying to interfere with the 2020 election.

Judge Scott McAfee dismissed six charges in the indictment, including three against Trump due to a lack of detail that he said was "fatal." But the ruling doesn't end the case against Trump. Trump still faces criminal charges, including Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act charges that underpin the prosecution's case.

"The Court's concern is less that the State has failed to allege sufficient conduct of the Defendants – in fact it has alleged an abundance," McAfee wrote. "However, the lack of detail concerning an essential legal element is, in the undersigned's opinion, fatal."

However, the judge wrote that the case was far from over.

"This does not mean the entire indictment is dismissed," he wrote in a footnote. "The State may also seek a re-indictment supplementing these six counts. Even if the statute of limitations has expired, the State receives a six-month extension from the date of this Order to resubmit the case to a grand jury."

McAfee's latest ruling did not address the potential disqualification brought against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and prosecutor Nathan Wade by the defendants. The judge said he would rule on that issue by the end of the week.

Defense attorneys have argued that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis had an improper relationship with an attorney she hired to prosecute the state's election interference case against Trump and should be disqualified. Willis and prosecutor Nathan Wade said they had a personal relationship that started after Willis hired Wade to prosecute the case.

One witness told the judge the relationship began in 2019 after the pair met at a judicial conference and long before Willis hired Wade in 2021.

The allegations about the prosecutors have at times eclipsed the matter that preceded it: The allegations that Trump tried to steal the 2020 election.

In August 2023, a Fulton County grand jury indicted Trump and 18 others, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former state Republican Party Chair David Shafer, on charges they tried to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Trump has pleaded not guilty.

President Joe Biden's budget proposal seeks to set aside billions of dollars to push progressive gender, sexuality and race ideology at home and around the globe.

Released this week, the $7.3 trillion budget also proposes spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to train school teachers in diversity, equity, and inclusion dogma.

The White House touted the spending in its announcement of Biden’s budget, which includes $3 billion to “advance gender equity and equality worldwide.”

That $3 billion figure is several hundred million dollars higher than the 2023 budget request.

Funding for domestic projects of the same kind are robust as well though, including for public education to "improve the diversity of the teacher pipeline."

In fact, Biden’s budget prioritizes training a new generation of teachers who embrace progressive ideology on race, gender, and sexuality.

For example, the budget includes $30 million to increase the number of teachers who go through the Hawkins Centers of Excellence, a federal effort that sets up programs to trains teachers in inclusivity on race, gender and sexuality.

Those training programs must be set up at minority-focused colleges such as historically black colleges and universities or colleges focused on serving Native Americans or Hispanics.

Once established, the taxpayer-funded program must “examine the sources of inequity and inadequacy in resources and opportunity and implement pedagogical practices in teacher preparation programs that are inclusive with regard to race, ethnicity, culture, language, and disability status and that prepare teachers to create inclusive, supportive, equitable, unbiased, and identity-safe learning environments for their students.”

In another similar funding item, the budget sets aside $95 million for the Teacher Quality Partnership Program, another federal effort that administers grants for training teachers.

According to the Federal Register, this grant program prioritizes teachers of color over white teachers in order to “create inclusive, supportive, equitable, unbiased, and identity-safe learning environments for their students.”

“The Department recognizes that diverse educators will play a critical role in ensuring equity in our education system,” the agency said.

The program also prioritizes grant applicants who can help create a “positive, inclusive, and identity-safe climate” for gay, lesbian, transgender and minority students.

In response to The Center Square’s reporting, Republicans took aim at Biden’s budget.

“President Biden's reckless and radical budget adds $18 trillion dollars to the debt including billions of dollars for divisive DEI programs,” U.S. Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., who leads the House Freedom Caucus, told The Center Square. “As his partisan State of the Union speech previewed, President Biden is borrowing more money we don't have to pay for things we don't need in order to pander to the Democrat base."

In yet another similar funding item, the budget puts $90 million toward the “Supporting Effective Education Development Program,” which has given away tens of millions of dollars in recent years for similar efforts.

In one example, the program awarded $662,744 to the University of North Georgia to train teachers in “social and emotional wellbeing; trauma-informed pedagogies; and diversity, equity, and inclusion.”

“Our expected outcomes are that 30 new teachers will be certified, and 84 induction-level teachers will add two endorsements to their certifications,” the group said in its research abstract.

The funding proposals for teachers are relevant because critics of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and Critical Race Theory teachings and trainings in public education have been brushed off by defenders, who say it is not present in K-12 schools.

“President Biden has his priorities completely backward, and hardworking Tennesseans will not stand for another tax-and-spend boondoggle,” U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., told The Center Square. “This unserious budget – the largest proposed in U.S. history – includes $3 billion for the Green Climate Fund to help ‘prioritize climate change’ and millions for programs that promote DEI."

The national debt is currently over $34 trillion and would rise to $45 billion by 2034 under Biden’s budget.

As The Center Square previously reported, the budget includes several tax increases, including a 25% minimum tax on billionaires, as well as ramping up audits on Americans to increase IRS collection.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin’s push to help children in the state’s schools read better took its next step forward Monday.

The budget-writing Joint Finance Committee approved four new reading programs for the state’s public schools.

JFC co-chairman Mark Born, R-Beaver Dam, said more than 60% of Wisconsin fourth-graders currently cannot read or write at grade level. Born said changing the way Wisconsin teachers teach reading is the obvious first step.

“Between 60 and 70% of our kids can't read at the proper level. Who runs that system now folks? Who's the one providing the council and the guidance to all of our school districts on that now? [Department of Instruction],” Born said during Monday’s hearing. “DPI is part of the failure of our kids to read. What are we doing? We had to create legislation…so our kids can read.”

The new reading curricula are required under Wisconsin’s read overhaul law, known as Act 20. But Born said schools are not required to use the new lessons. He did say local schools won’t get any state money to buy textbooks or lesson plans for any curriculum that is not part of the Act 20 overhaul.

“I am not an expert in curriculum. I am not an expert in education. That's why, in the bill, we created a panel of experts to be brought together,” Born explained. “[That] a panel of experts, including people from DPI, said these are the best that meet the standards.”

JFC Democrats opposed the new reading plans.

They fear lawsuits from local schools and don’t like the four choices offered.

“We are saying that all of this isn't a mandate, you know this is just what you're going to get a grant for. Well, it is a mandate because what we've done is we've outlawed the teaching of three queuing and similar holistic approaches, and we're saying this is how we want to teach reading. That's a good thing, but we are also narrowing down the choices that schools have to simply four curricula,” Rep. Deb Andraca, D-Whitefish Bay, said.

Advocates, like Quinton Klabon with the Institute for Reforming Government, said the new curriculum is the “first comprehensive reading legislation in decades. It will replacediscredited reading curricula that have wrecked most public and private schools,upgrade teachers’ skills in classic, phonics-based methods, reflect those changes inuniversity teacher programs, and get parents more involved if their child is behind in reading.”

"The Joint Finance Committee did the right thing by trusting teachers, school leaders, and dyslexia experts,” Klabon added.

The new reading lessons will be available for schools to use in the next school year.