Let me follow up about the comment TPM Reader HS got when she called the office of her state’s senior senator, Alex Padilla. She called insisting there should be some kind of investigation into the Justice Alito flag controversy. When HS got through to Padilla’s office on the second try, a staffer told her they hadn’t yet been briefed yet on whether Padilla had a position on the issue. In response to that piece, another reader pointed me to this article from this morning in Politico.
Continue reading “Low Energy, Part 2”Low Energy
For all the endlessly merited outrage about Justice Alito being outed as the second pro-insurrection Justice (I mean, more evidence, no surprise), it seems like the response on Capitol Hill is truly low energy.
From TPM Reader HS …
I’ve been a reader since the 2000 election and live in San Francisco. When the story on Alito came out last week, I called Senator Padilla, a Judiciary committee member, and left a message about how outrageous it was and hoped that as a member of the committee, he would call for hearings and investigations (no one answered). I also called Senator Durban’s office (picked up on first ring) and communicated the same.
Today, I called my Senator again. His staff person said “I haven’t been briefed on his position and I will be happy to pass on your message” That’s it. No response at all. CALIFORNIA!
Indeed, that’s the best a senator from California can do?
The Alitos Let Their Freak Flag Fly High – And No One’s Gonna Do A Thing About It
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
Don’t Let Sam Alito Fall Off Your Radar
Senate Democrats? Fellow justices? Anyone?
Is the Alito household’s protest of Joe Biden’s election by flying an upside down American flag in the period between the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and Inauguration Day going to just recede into oblivion? That’s it? We’re done with that? Time to move on?
Have the Republican Party’s sustained attacks on the court system and the rule of law become just more background noise to our national politics? Just par for the course here in 2024?
Elected Republicans keep showing up to support the insurrectionist former president at his criminal trial as a defiant workaround to the gag order imposed on him. It’s a jarring sight, but not as remarkable as a sitting Supreme Court justice sending out a distress signal that the government has been illegitimately taken over by Joe Biden:
- Brian Beutler: “Here’s a simple objective for Senate Democrats: Reveal to the public whatever behind-the-scenes roles Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas have played in the Supreme Court’s corrupt effort to protect Donald Trump from the law.”
- Jesse Wegman: “In short, Justices Alito and Thomas appear to be breaking federal law, tanking what remains of the court’s legitimacy in the process. The challenge is whether anyone is willing to do anything about it.”
- Jamelle Bouie: “Whether or not Justice Alito was part of the decision to fly the inverted flag, there is no question that he is a genuine Republican partisan who is more than willing to share views that echo narratives aired throughout conservative media.”
Alito’s own admission to the episode was mere hand-wave toward his wife and their “very political” neighbors as if he knew it would all blow over soon enough. No Senate hearings. Not even a sustained drumbeat from Democratic electeds.
Yesterday’s Big Blow Up in Court
Robert Costello looks to be the primary defense witness for Trump, and things did not go well, as he quickly ran afoul of the judge, who took the unusual step of throwing nearly everyone not a litigant out of the courtroom and closing it while he read Costello the riot act.
We didn’t know what was said behind closed doors until later in the day when the transcript was released:
Live Trial Coverage
TPM’s Josh Kovensky is back at it this morning. Follow along on what could be another unpredictable day in court.
What Comes Next?
Today: Trump’s defense case isn’t expected to last long – unless we get surprise testimony from Trump himself in his own defense. After testimony concludes, probably this morning, attention will shift this afternoon to preparing jury instructions and arguments to the judge about what they should say. Joyce Vance runs through that process so you can familiarize yourself.
Wednesday: Off Day/No Trial
Thursday: Partial trial day (if needed)
Friday: Off Day/No Trial
Monday: Memorial Day/No Trial
Tuesday: Closing Arguments
Trump Campaign Vid References ‘Unified Reich’
AP: “The word ‘Reich’ is often largely associated with Nazi Germany’s Third Reich, though the references in the video Trump shared appear to be a reference to the formation of the modern pan-German nation, unifying smaller states into a single Reich, or empire, in 1871.”
Reichsbürger Plotters Go On Trial in Frankfurt
The far-right coup plotters who wanted to violently overthrow the German government and install an obscure aristocrat as chancellor went on trial Tuesday in Frankfurt.
The Real Danger If Trump Is Reelected
Mr. Trump’s economic and foreign policy nationalism would subvert the preponderance of power that America has enjoyed since 1945 and that he has promised to bolster. It has been threatened from without but never from within. As he vows to upend America’s relations with the rest of the globe, the danger is not that Mr. Trump would fail to live up to his principles. It’s that he would.
2024 Ephemera
- Donald Trump out-raised Joe Biden in April, the first time this cycle that Trump’s beaten Biden in fundraising. Biden still enjoys a significant cash-on-hand advantage.
- Election officials are increasingly targeting schools and other unconventional sources to address the rising shortage of election workers.
- Statewide referenda seeking to protect abortion rights in Florida and Arizona are polling extremely well.
‘You’ve Been Served’
WaPo: How Rudy Giuliani tried, and failed, to avoid his latest indictment
More here:
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Katie Britt And Ted Cruz Introduce Bill To Rehab Image Of Katie Britt And Ted Cruz
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) has been putting in a lot of hours into trying to convince Texas voters, specifically Hispanic Texas voters, that there’s much more to him than the trolly, argumentative, hard-right hysterical persona he’s carefully crafted throughout his career in the Senate.
Continue reading “Katie Britt And Ted Cruz Introduce Bill To Rehab Image Of Katie Britt And Ted Cruz”Star Trump Defense Witness Gets Into Confrontation With Judge
NEW YORK — Donald Trump’s defense team called only two witnesses: one was a paralegal who appeared on the stand for just a few minutes on Monday.
Continue reading “Star Trump Defense Witness Gets Into Confrontation With Judge”Donald Trump’s Lawyers Begin Their Defense
Donald Trump’s lawyers wrapped up their days-long cross examination of Michael Cohen Monday afternoon and, soon after, the DA’s Office rested its case.
Trump’s lawyers are now beginning their defense.
Your Primal Scream Is Good Therapy, Not Good Campaign Advice
After a short bout of mea culpas and self-flagellating in response to Biden’s State of the Union speech in early March, Ezra Klein is back with a laundry list of complaints about the campaign. He starts by taking as gospel an Axios report about Biden campaign polling denial and proceeds to whine and perseverate about every possible aspect of the campaign.
This passage from the lead in to the piece offers some illustration …
Continue reading “Your Primal Scream Is Good Therapy, Not Good Campaign Advice”Rudy G Gets Served But Not Before Beclowning Himself Again
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
Hate To See Rudy Roasted
Under indictment in Arizona for his alleged role in the 2020 fake electors scheme there, Rudy Giuliani had managed for the past few days to avoid being served in that new criminal case.
Feeling cocky, Rudy went on X/Twitter Friday night and began taunting Arizona prosecutors. His gloating didn’t last long. Shortly thereafter, Rudy was served in Palm Beach at his 80th birthday bash, hosted by Trumper Caroline Wren.
That prompted this retort from Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes:
Rudy soon deleted his own tweet.
Meanwhile, co-defendant John Eastman pleaded not guilty to the Arizona charges in a court appearance earlier Friday.
UPDATED: No Trump Verdict Til At Least Next Week
The cross examination of Michael Cohen should end this morning, but we won’t have closing arguments until next Tuesday, the judge just said in open court.
TPM’s Josh Kovensky is liveblogging the trial here.
The wild cards that remain:
(1) How much longer will the Cohen testimony go? We could end up in a bit of a dance of redirects and re-crosses that drag today out a bit – or we could be done with Cohen by late morning. Stay tuned.
(2) Will Trump testify? He loves to promise it, but don’t expect him to deliver. It would be madness.
(3) Will Trump put on any kind of defense case? It will be spartan if he does.
Ed. note: This item was updated based on the new developments Monday morning.
… But Their Yard Signs!
Justice Samuel Alito’s “explanation” for why his wife was flying the American flag upside down at their home as a pro-insurrection protest in the days before Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration is for the ages.
The neighbor dispute that Alito describes – including accusing some of his neighbors of being “very political” natch – doesn’t actually explain anything. “My neighbors were rude in blaming me for Jan. 6 so I proceeded to retaliate by showing my support for Jan. 6” is a first-class non sequitur.
Counter-programming my neighbor’s “Fuck Trump” sign with a symbol warning that America has been taken over by enemy forces in the name of Joe Biden maybe has an internal logic to it but it remains quite insane, especially at the home of a Supreme Court justice.
Many others have imagined the fallout in a scenario where one of the liberal justices let their true flag fly. You get it.
Judge Cannon Is Not Fit For This Moment
Former CIA lawyer Brian Greer: It Is Inexcusable How Judge Cannon Is Delaying the Trump Documents Case
Pelosi’s Husband’s Assailant Must Be Resentenced
The man who broke into then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco home and bludgeoned her husband with a hammer was sentenced Friday to 30 years in prison for the attack – but sentencing has been reopened because the judge in the case failed to give the defendant a chance to speak during the sentencing hearing.
The Latest Hunter Walker Special
TPM’s Hunter Walker: Lawsuit Exposes Internal Feuds And Inner Workings Of Stew Peters’ Extremist Media Empire
2024 Ephemera
- David Corn: Here Come the Russians, Again
- Politico: Trump at NRA convention floats 3-term presidency
- NYT: 2 Liberal Groups to Spend $5 Million on State Supreme Court Races
It’s Fundamentally Not An Insurance Problem
The NYT is out with its own version of the “homeowners insurance crisis” story, and it’s better than most in emphasizing that climate change is driving this issue. But it’s still mostly trapped in a framing where instead of treating the lack of insurability as a symptom of the larger problem, it focuses on it as the problem.
The story gives away the game though when it talks about state-backed high-risk pools for homeowners, like in Florida:
So many homeowners have flooded into Florida’s state-backed high-risk pool that it is now the state’s largest insurer, with rates that are too low to reflect the risk it faces in the event of a major hurricane.
It doesn’t matter how big of a pool you create to disperse the risk if the baseline risk is simply too high to insure against. And if you don’t price the risk properly on top of that, you’re just shifting the risk from insurances companies and homeowners to taxpayers with no appreciable reduction in risk or in the ultimate cost. It’s a recipe for financial disaster alongside each natural disaster.
It’s Bad Out There For EV Drivers
I have had to make a conscious effort not to turn Morning Memo into a long-running diatribe about the state of EV charging infrastructure in this country. I’m almost four years into owning my first EV. Love the car (2019 Kia Niro EV), love how EVs drive, love the low maintenance. I’d never go back to an IC car, all else being equal. But the public charging infrastructure for EVs remains spotty and often shitty.
I thought I was making the shift as the EV wave was beginning to crest in 2020, but the availability of public EV chargers has gotten only marginally better in the time I’ve owned an EV – and their reliability still stinks. Showing up at a charging station with only some of the chargers working is 100% normal. Showing up where none are working is not uncommon. That only adds to the length of the lines to get a recharge and uncertainty of longer trips.
A couple of things that may make my situation a little different from the optimum EV owner that I knew meant I’d be pushing the envelope a little: I haven’t had off-street parking so no home charger, and I wanted to use the EV for occasional trips up and down the East Coast of as long as 500 miles each way.
I have a higher tolerance than most people for turning what should be casual road trips into white-knuckle adventures. But it’s no way to live, really. I was mostly willing to endure the indignities of being a relatively early adopter, figuring it was a small contribution to nudging along the energy transition. But it’s not getting better as fast as it should, and it’s going to end up being a impediment to the wider adoption of EVs, if it isn’t already.
With a reliable charging network, I’d have been fine. But the charger situation has muted even my enthusiasm for EVs. Not enough to dissuade people from making the plunge, but when people ask how I like my EV, my response is always the same: “The car is great! But lemme tell you about the charging situation …”
For The Ages …
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The Fifth Circuit Is In For A Beatdown
Hello, it’s the weekend. This is The Weekender ☕
Continue reading “The Fifth Circuit Is In For A Beatdown”Lawsuit Exposes Internal Feuds And Inner Workings Of Stew Peters’ Extremist Media Empire
A dispute raging inside the “Stew Peters Network” ended up in a federal court in Florida last month. The ongoing case has exposed drama between a group of far right media personalities, complete with alleged text messages and emails that show the inner workings of a company that has peddled conspiracy theories, anti-gay hate speech, racism, and antisemitism, while still maintaining connections with more mainstream Republicans.
Continue reading “Lawsuit Exposes Internal Feuds And Inner Workings Of Stew Peters’ Extremist Media Empire”