Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –
In this issue –
1. SCOTUS
2. DSA
3. Decoy Dan
4. VZ Quake
1. SCOTUS. The Supreme Court ended its term last week with announcement of the most contentious opinions this year. Most went as expected. There were a couple disappointing losses, though with concurring / dissenting opinions that provided roadmaps for congress and the executive to do the job right (mail in voting and birthright citizenship), these might not be losses at all. There were some surprisingly strong positive opinions (carry rights on private property, firing political appointees, temporary protected status, trans in women’s sports), and more that will prove important in future years. Most of the opinions broke 6-3 with the conservative justices on one side. Two losses were 5-4 against with Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Barrett joining the liberals, who really didn’t add anything positive to the discussion. The three most important opinions, Slaughter, mail-in ballots and birthright citizenship will go first, followed by several others. Jeff Childers writing at Coffee & Covid had several positive, upbeat descriptions of what SCOTUS did. If he isn’t on your list of e-mail subscriptions, he should be.
- Trump v Slaughter came about when President Trump attempted to fire FEC Commissioner RK Slaughter without cause. The left challenged the firing on the grounds that the FEC is supposedly an independent commission. The opinion finally overturns Humphry’s Executor (1935), an opinion that allowed congress to create boards, commissions and other entities shielded from presidential involvement and unaccountable to voters. The 1935 opinion led directly to the unchecked, growth of the Deep State, with political appointees shielded from the president. SCOTUS immediately carved out an exemption for the Federal Reserve. We will discuss that next. The Slaughter opinion allows Trump to clean house in the remaining federal bureaucracy.
- In Trump v Cook, the court found that the Federal Reserve was unique among federal bureaucracies. The Roberts majority found that while Trump was trying to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook for cause, the firing did not allow her to address charges against her in court. Cook has been accused of mortgage fraud, claiming two different properties in two different states as her permanent residence. As a Biden appointee, she uses her position to tweak monetary policy so as to politically harm Trump, MAGA and the nation at large. The 5-4 opinion was joined by Roberts and Kavanaugh. Note that having her day in court may not mean a conviction, which would be difficult to get in DC for a black democrat in front of a jury of black democrats. I suspect all Trump needs from the presiding judge is a finding of fact from the presiding judge that Cook committed mortgage fraud whether the jury convicts or not, but what do I know?
- Watson v Republican National Committee was another 5-4 opinion against Trump, finding that federal laws establishing a uniform Election Day do not preempt state laws allowing absentee (and mail-in) ballots received after Election Day to be counted, providing that they are postmarked by Election Day. Que the leftist happy dance, as it just looks like SCOTUS is fully onboard with mail in vote, endless counts, and the election fraud that comes with it. Not so fast, as the opinion was not based on constitutionality. Rather, it was based on federal law, which can be changed by congress. SCOTUS punted the whole mess back to congress, telling them to fix US Code. The SAVE Act would be a good start. Conservative dissent mocked the majority’s refusal to even define how long is too long after Election Day to count noting that a long, drawn-out ballot count induces a significant decrease in American trust in elections. Barrett, who wrote the opinion, was emphatic that the case is not about the constitution. It is rather about congress not yet defining a uniform ballot receipt deadline, something it has never done. Solution? Legislation, the SAVE Act.
- Trump v Barbara was the birthright citizenship case. It was the largest loss for Trump, as SCOTUS tossed his Executive Order banning birthright citizenship and along with it the birth tourism industry by a 6-3 vote. Roberts, Barrett and Kavanaugh all joined the liberals. Two opinions are of interest. The first is Justice Thomas who penned a 91-page long dissent, ripping the majority to shreds. Thomas is normally short and to the point. This opinion was about twice as long as his previous longest. Justice Kavanaugh wrote a concurrence, much like Barrett in Watson, providing a roadmap for a legislative approach to shutting down birthright citizenship. Essentially, the majority only affirmed, however wrongly, the logic of 1898 Wong Kim Ark opinion, which was based on feudal common law (the King owns the serfs on his land) rather than the 14th Amendment. The good news is that congress gets to define jurisdictional limits via legislation, which allows congress and not the courts to solve this problem legislatively rather than via the amendment process. Both congress and the executive are acting on this new guidance. A Republican US senator from Ohio dusted off a 1993 bill offered by Harry Reid to shut down birthright citizenship and offered it as a bipartisan solution. The Trump administration has started shutting down birth tourism businesses, mainly catering to Chinese customers on the left coast. There is some talk about banning pregnant women from visiting the US. Expect much more on this in the months to come, as the hilarious memes excoriating the opinion will inflict more damage on SCOTUS than Roberts wants to admit or accept. Interesting thing about Roberts. Apparently his choosing sides on opinions is a big deal, with only 5% of SCOTUS opinions since he has been Chief Justice going opposite his chosen direction. He is either persuasive or incredibly gifted in his ability to drive the bus in his chosen direction.
- One final comment on birthright citizenship is in order. This case is about overturning nearly 130 years of wrongfully decided judicial precedent. When the author of the Executive Order brought it up during the first term in 2017, he was nearly laughed out of the room. The EO was signed shortly after Trump was inaugurated in 2025. And today, we have at least 4 Justices fully onboard with shutting it down.
- We will mention three more big wins as this is running a bit long. First up is Mullin v Doe, which a 6-3 majority revoked all judicial restraint on Trump’s effort to end Temporary Protected Status for nearly a half million Haitians and Syrians. Most of the Haitians were originally living in South America rather than Haiti. The court found that “temporary” actually means temporary rather than permanent, overturning every single inferior federal trial and appeals court.
- Another 6-3 opinion in a bundled pair of trans women’s sports cases found that states could restrict trans girls (medically modified men and boys) from women’s sports. West Virginia v BPJ recognized the actual physical differences between men and women.
- The final case, Wofford v Lopez, a 6-3 majority struck down Hawaii’s attempt to use property rights as a vehicle to shut down concealed carry of firearms. The smarmy little trick required firearms owners to get specific permission before carrying firearms onto private property open to the public. The was called the Vampire Rule (vampire legend requires specific permission before a vampire can enter a house). Hawaii based this sneaky little attempt on ancient Hawaiian tradition during the monarchy, a claim that was swatted away by the majority like a fly, reminding the Hawaiians that once you join the Union, all your silly little Hawaiian Monarchy Kingdom laws become overridden by the laws of the United States rather than exceptions to them when it suits you.
2. DSA. Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) had themselves quite the couple weeks run, winning primaries in NY and CO. Three incumbent, long-time democrats lost their reelection bids to young DSA candidates. Turnout in all three elections was quite small, under 11% in NYC. The DSA candidates leaned hard into the anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian, pro-Gaza schtick so popular among the young, highly educated, largely female electorate they are pandering to. The defeated incumbents include a CO House democrat who has been in congress for 15 terms, a NYC 5-term member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and Dan Goldman, who was the lead counsel during the first Trump impeachment in 2019. The fourth win was an open seat, where the DSA candidate defeated the hand-picked democrat favorite. All of the winners in NYC were Mamdani backed. He is feeling his oats, giving one of the nastier Fourth of July speeches from behind the George Washington desk in NYC over the weekend. His trademark forced smile was replaced by what is probably his actual expression of sneering condescension. The speech described his rejection of the United States and all we hold dear. Like O’Bama, he is going to clean up our act for us. While it is entertaining to watch an internal revolt among democrats, never forget that actual communists are dangerous and outright deadly whenever and wherever they get power. And once in power, they will not be dislodged electorally. It will take firearms and violence every bit as extreme as what they bring to the table. Next project will be to see who is funding them.
3. Decoy Dan. As expected, Decoy Dan, the Petersburg Poser, stand-in for democrat Mary Peltola on the August primary and November general election was reinstated to the statewide ballot by the Alaska Supreme Court. The opinion was interesting in that it noted that the Division of Elections did not have the authority to remove the liar from the ballot, opening the door, much like earlier SCOTUS opinions on mail in ballots and birthright citizenship, tossing the entire mess back into the laps of congress, and in our case, the legislature. We will see if they listen. The Sullivan campaign was quick to pivot to a full enunciation of his name in campaign ads cut after the opinion. The Division of Elections posted a sample ballot with language separating both candidates. For his part, Decoy Dan, without any resources or fundraising announced $2.2 million in ads over the next couple of months, every penny it Outside $$$. He is not actively campaigning and seems to be what everyone knows him to be, a placeholder for Mary Peltola. Should be a fun couple of months.
4. VZ Quake. Caracas was hit with a back-to-back pair of large earthquakes two weeks ago. The initial M 7.2 was followed by a M 7.5 39 seconds later. The quakes caused widespread damage across the country, particularly in La Guaria and Caracas. More than 3,300 are reported killed, 16,400 injured and over 10,000 suspected killed. Wilder claims early on had the death toll 50,000 – 100,000. Why so many dead people? In the words of NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Hugo Chavez replaced “… the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism.” In one of his first acts after being elected El Presidente and as a vehicle to installing himself as dictator, Hugo Chavez built a bunch of low-income housing as a payoff to poor people who installed him. As with all things socialist, the public housing projects were rushed into completion under Army supervision with foreign contractors and little oversight Shoddily built high rises on poor ground literally on top of a pair of known major faults is a guarantee for structural failure. The buildings pancaked, mainly with failure of the foundation and first couple floors. Because these structures were the crown jewel of Chavez’s payoff of his supporters, there were no follow-up inspections or repair work. The residents never knew the danger they were facing and ended up becoming one with the concrete. As of this writing, nobody knows how many others are trapped in the rubble. This is the future Mamdani and the rest of his DSA fellow travelers have in mind for the US as they clean up our act for us. As Trump reminded us over the weekend, communism is “death, tyranny and the pursuit of evil.”
More later –
- AG