Crooked Chief Justice of the Crooked Court John Roberts has presided over the death of Aerican's confidence in the Supreme Court. He has steered it into a partisan endeavor. This was made clear on MORNING EDITION (NPR) this morning:
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Who has the right to sue the president? That's a question that's being raised by a number of recent rulings by the Supreme Court. It's allowing construction of President Trump's ballroom at the White House to continue, saying that an architectural historian's objections weren't enough to allow a lawsuit to go ahead. The court has also recently declined to block the administration's plan to restrict mail-in ballots. Stephen Vladeck has been watching all this. He's a constitutional law expert and a professor at Georgetown Law. Professor, good morning and welcome back to the program.
STEPHEN VLADECK: Good morning, Leila. Thanks for having me back.
FADEL: What do these two cases tell us about who can prevail in a lawsuit that tries to check executive power?
VLADECK: I think they tell us a couple of things, and they're going in somewhat different directions.
FADEL: OK.
VLADECK: So in the mail-in ballots case, the Supreme Court's first ruling a couple weeks ago was that the blue states challenging President Trump's executive order didn't have standing, like they weren't the right parties to bring the lawsuit, mostly because they sued too soon. They sued before the USPS had issued its final rule. That's now happened. And so in that case, the procedural problem was temporary. In the ballroom case, what the Supreme Court held last week was that the National Trust for Historic Preservation just doesn't have standing at all. That's a permanent ruling that's going to make it very hard for anyone to challenge how President Trump does or doesn't reconstruct the White House.
FADEL: And so as a constitutional law expert, when you're watching this, what is your biggest concern about the future, given these rulings?
VLADECK: So I think the problem, Leila, is that the Supreme Court's hostility to standing in these kinds of cases, first, has been a bit inconsistent historically. The justices have a remarkable tendency to stretch standing rules to allow lawsuits, for example, the challenge to President Biden's student loan debt forgiveness program. Second is, I think all of the doctrine presupposes that there are other checks, that the courts are not the only mechanism for enforcing the separation of powers - principally, that Congress would actually do more to stand up for its own authority over appropriations and other topics. And I think, Leila, what we're seeing is that piece of it has totally broken down.
And especially note this section:
FADEL: This is a court that is majority conservative justices. Are you saying that they're acting in a partisan way when you call it inconsistent?
VLADECK: So I think the problem is that whether it's partisan or not is very much an assessment of their motives. It certainly appears that the justices tend to be stricter about enforcing these kinds of procedural requirements like standing when they're being invoked against Republican presidents than when they're being invoked against Democratic presidents. I think that's what gives rise at least to the appearance that the justices are playing partisan political favorites.
That really nails it.
"The Snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
The report alleged that Lewandowski, Donald Trump's 2016 campaign manager, operated as the department's "shadow secretary" under then-Secretary Kristi Noem, his long-rumored romantic partner, pitched himself for private hire to Qatari and Emirati officials, and helped slash a Palantir contract from $2.7 billion to $1 billion after the company refused a one-on-one meeting. Lewandowski has denied wrongdoing, and a federal watchdog investigation is weighing a criminal referral.
The report sparked a firestorm online.
Former CIA officer and MS NOW national security contributor Marc Polymeropoulos applauded the report: "Bravo to the WSJ. Staggering corruption now for the American people to see. But is anyone really surprised? This administration will go down as the most corrupt in modern history. This is just the tip of the iceberg. The rent is coming due."
Dartmouth political scientist Brendan Nyhan, who co-directs the democracy watchdog Bright Line Watch, chimed in: "Unprecedented corruption," while writer Hemant Mehta added: "There is no bottom to how corrupt Republicans are."
A Thursday report from the Inspector General states that former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer went to a strip club while on the job, even forcing her driver to rain dollar bills on one of the dancers.
The report further details just how sloppy and reckless Chavez-DeRemer’s tenure as Labor secretary was until she stepped down in April.
“During Chavez-DeRemer’s April 15–20, 2025 personal travel to Oregon, she requested an off-the-record stop at an establishment that was determined upon entry to feature partially nude dancers,” the IG report reads, noting that Chavez-DeRemer made a point to bring her limousine driver inside with her.
“Chavez-DeRemer subsequently took money from her purse, gave the money to the driver, and directed him to give it to the performer. When the agent resisted and sought guidance from [Assistant Special Agent in Charge]1, ASAIC 1 instructed him to comply with Chavez-DeRemer’s requests,” the report continues. “Chavez-DeRemer then took additional money from her purse and asked the agent to drop the bills one by one onto the partially nude woman. The agent again hesitated and sought intervention from ASAIC 1, who told him to follow Chavez-DeRemer’s instructions. The agent complied against his wishes.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth decided in early 2025 to spike Gen. Christopher T. Donahue’s nomination to be the top U.S. military officer in Europe.
Mr. Hegseth believed that President Trump wanted heads to roll for the deaths of 13 U.S. service members in a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. General Donahue was not responsible for security at the bombing site. But he was a top commander at the airport, and so Mr. Hegseth decided he needed to go.
It fell to Joe Kasper, Mr. Hegseth’s chief of staff, to try to convince him that he was wrong.
Mr. Kasper asked a senior Pentagon official to prepare a card with a half-dozen bullet points laying out the facts in General Donahue’s defense, current and former officials said. He took it with him in March of last year as he and Mr. Hegseth sped through traffic to the White House for a press event.
For those few minutes in the car, Mr. Kasper knew he would have his boss’s undivided attention.
Sirens were blaring. He handed Mr. Hegseth the card.
These were the facts of General Donahue’s three-decade career: He had seen more combat in his 20-plus deployments than just about any officer in the U.S. military. A star in the clandestine world of special forces, he had spent years in the shadows hunting terrorist leaders. And then as the world and warfare changed, he changed with it.
He had played a central role in the U.S. military’s efforts to help Ukraine hold off a much larger Russian force, a job that inspired his vision for a new kind of combat that married divebombing drones, robotics and artificial intelligence.
Now his fate lay in the hands of Mr. Hegseth, a former Fox News host who had two deployments as an Army officer to Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Hegseth had come to the Pentagon vowing to weed out the “small” and “feeble” generals who he believed had failed in those wars.
What played out in the 16 months after the car ride was a clash between Mr. Hegseth and General Donahue’s supporters, who viewed him as a generational talent.
That clash, and its outcome, was described to The New York Times by more than 40 people at the Pentagon, in Congress and around the world, nearly all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution.
Hegseth is a failure, an utter failure. He was the topic of two of the Sunday chat & chews. ABC's THIS WEEK started their Hegseth segment with a thorough review of recent events for Hegseth:
MARTHA RADDATZ: And as the Iran war drags on, this week, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has faced mounting questions about his leadership. His army secretary resigned Monday. And that’s just the latest in a series of resignations and firings in Hegseth’s tumultuous tenure at the Pentagon.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RADDATZ (voice-over): For Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, it was a week of unwelcome headlines and renewed calls for his ouster.
Republican Thom Tillis posting on X, “I have never witnessed more inept management of the brave men and women who serve our country. I urge the president to find a new leader at the Pentagon who will retain and empower our military talent, rather than diminish it.”
That followed the resignation of Army Secretary Dan Driscoll after repeated disagreements with Hegseth over the firing of multiple senior military officers, including the highly respected Army chief of staff, Randy George, and a slew of others.
REP. DON BACON, (R) NEBRASKA: He has not been a very good leader in many -- in many ways.
REP. MIKE LAWLER, (R) NEW YORK: It is critical, frankly, that Pete Hegseth come forth and talk about exactly why these changes have been made.
RADDATZ (voice over): Before resigning, Driscoll warned President Trump about the impact of Hegseth firing senior military leaders and blocking promotions as well, according to sources familiar with the matter.
VICE ADM. NANCY LACORE, FORMER CHIEF OF U.S. NAVY RESERVE (RET.) & (D) SOUTH CAROLINA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: One year into that position, I was removed by Pete Hegseth. I was not given a reason.
RADDATZ (voice over): One Navy vice admiral Hegseth fired, Nancy Lacore.
LACORE: There was no notice other than, you know, being called down to a senior Navy four-star’s office on Friday afternoon and given the message. And that was it. An hour later, I was out of the Pentagon.
RADDATZ (voice over): Lacore, now running as a Democrat for the congressional seat currently held by Representative Nancy Mace.
LACORE: The abrupt end to my service really just wasn’t sitting well with me. And I, you know, service has been my entire life. And I just wanted to continue serving. Running for Congress was another way of serving our country.
RADDATZ (voice over): And it is not just those who have been ousted from the Pentagon who have concerns. “The Washington Post” reported that top military leaders have advised Hegseth that prolonging large scale operations against Iran was unsustainable and risked weakening our ability to confront threats elsewhere and at home. Leaks have infuriated Hegseth, but they keep coming, reportedly prompting him to polygraph Pentagon staff.
“The New York Times” reporting late Friday that some 50 members of the U.S. military’s joint staff have been polygraphed because of leaks about critical munitions shortages. Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell telling ABC News, the department “does not comment on internal personnel or investigative matters but takes all leaks of classified national security information extremely seriously and investigates accordingly.” Hegseth has repeatedly claimed the U.S. has won the war and depleted Iran’s missiles, while denying the U.S. has a problem.
PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: We had plenty when we needed it, and we have plenty now, and we’ll have plenty when we’ll need them in the future.
RADDATZ (voice over): Since the beginning of the war, Hegseth has rarely held press conferences, which are often combative.
HEGSETH: Excuse me. Why are you so rude? Just wait. I’m calling on people.
RADDATZ (voice over): And none since May 5th, more than four months ago. And never any explanation why he has taken the axe to so many senior officers.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
RADDATZ (on camera): And to talk about all of that, I’m joined now by former secretary of the Air Force under Joe Biden, Frank Kendall, who caused quite a stir this week with a “New York Times” op-ed titled “Military Officers Can’t Look Away From This Any Longer.”
It’s good to see you, sir.
And what you are talking about is Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon. You spent years at the Pentagon. Twenty years at the Pentagon in civilian jobs. About 11 years active duty in the Army. You know, politics has no place in the military, yet you say military officers should take action. What do you mean by that?
FRANK KENDALL III, FORMER AIR FORCE SECRETARY: I’ve always been incredibly impressed with the apolitical professionalism of our military. And I’ve served a total of 20 years, as you said, in the Pentagon. I’ve been through a number of transitions. Different parties come in. People just continue to do their jobs. They support whatever the policies are of the current party in power.
I’ve never seen an attempt to politicize our military like the one being conducted by Pete Hegseth. He’s fired 25, roughly, senior officers. He’s pulling people off of promotion lists. And that effect is rippling all the way down through the ranks. It’s causing people to be afraid and refuse -- and, in many cases, I think he’s not getting good advice because people are afraid to tell him things that he doesn’t want to hear. Long term serious damage is being done to our military.
But what the op-ed addressed was a tendency to try to partition the military off from responsibility for some of the decisions that the administration is making, that the military’s asked to carry out. There’s an obligation on our officers, particularly our senior officers, who interact directly with the senior political leadership to tell them the truth and to stand up to them when they want to do something which is morally wrong, unethical, or illegal. And we’re not -- I’m afraid they’re not doing that.
RADDATZ: The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Dan Caine, you addressed that in your piece. He has said, in front of Congress, we don’t make policy. And the military doesn’t make policy. But do you think he’s filling his -- fulfilling his obligation to give the president his best military advice?
KENDALL: I think he’s trying to keep the military apolitical, but he’s drawing the line in the wrong place. He made a comment in a speech about how his role was about telling the administration what they can do, not what they should do. That’s not accurate. It can be accurate in one sense technically, but it’s not accurate when you’re asked to do something that’s illegal, immoral, wrong, or even unconstitutional. The most egregious example is the strikes on drug boats. Just because the president's lawyer told you they were legal, you have to look at this on your own and make your own decision.
And as we approach the midterms, I'm worried that all of our guardrails are gone. We already saw once what President Trump is capable of doing when he doesn't like the results of an election. I think we're going to get an opportunity to see that again. And with the Justice Department in the hands it's in, with the State Department -- I'm sorry, with the National Security, Homeland Security Department in the hands of (INAUDIBLE), with a passive Congress and, of course, with Pete Hegseth in the Pentagon, the professionalism and the apolitical nature of our military, I think, is going to be tested in a very serious way.
RADDATZ: But let me go back to -- you're talking about the military not saying what they want to say, not saying what should happen. The "Washington Post" reported this week that top military leaders have warned Hegseth that prolonged operations against Iran are unsustainable. Isn't that exactly what you're saying should happen and that has happened?
KENDALL: It is, Martha, but that's on the narrower, purely military advice side of the equation. That's the sort of thing I would routinely expect as a matter of course our military people are talking about. What I don't understand, frankly, about the Iran war is what advice was given to the president that led him to start this conflict?
Aside from the fact that he never got approval from Congress to do it, the results of the initial strike have been about as one would have predicted. The illusion that the Iranian regime would suddenly fall and this would be a very short conflict was not one that's been held by anybody else until now.
RADDATZ: What -- look, officers are, and enlisted, are understandably, if they go forward and say something about the Pentagon or about Pete Hegseth, they're fearful. You saw, Driscoll, Dan Driscoll resigned this week. You have seen other senior military officers who have been fired or resigned not say anything publicly after that because they're -- they say there is a real fear there.
KENDALL: I'm in touch with a lot of people who are currently serving and have served recently. And that climate of fear, which I wrote about over a year ago, is very real and it's very debilitating. Very good people that I know are leaving because of the climate of fear and because of the things the military is being asked to do. I talked to someone who was involved in teaching ethics at the Air Force Academy the other day.
They're in a very difficult time explaining how the decisions being made by this administration conform to ethics as it's been taught to our officers.
RADDATZ: We have about 20 seconds. What would you do if you were Air Force secretary right now?
KENDALL: I couldn't serve this administration.
RADDATZ: OK. Thanks for joining us this morning. We appreciate your time.
KENDALL: Thank you.
CBS' FACE THE NATION also saw Hegseth as a story worth covering:
MARGARET BRENNAN: We're joined now by Colorado Democratic Congressman Jason Crow.
It's good to have you here in person.
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW (D-Colorado): Thank you. Thanks for having me.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, CBS is reporting that several dozen of the highest- ranking officials in the United States military were subjected to polygraph tests as part of the sweeping leak probe that Secretary Hegseth has ordered.
This includes combatant commanders. They're looking for who leaked the highly classified details about the nation's stockpiles of sophisticated weapons. This is extremely rare.
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW: Yes.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is it appropriate? Has Congress been told anything about the outcome?
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW: I haven't been briefed anything about this.
I'm a senior member of the Armed Services Committee and the Intelligence Committee. We haven't received any information. It's just been public reports. And, certainly, stopping leaks and protecting classified information is really important. And I would always support that.
The problem is, is the broader context that Pete Hegseth has created here. He has purged over 80 generals and admirals. The top 10 percent of the entire military chain of command has been purged. We are at a 25-year low for the number of women on the promotion list. And he's created an environment of fear. He's pushed out journalists.
He's pushed out media. This is part of his effort to create fear and to clamp down on information coming out of the Pentagon.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I mean, polygraph tests are part of routine cadence.
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW: Right.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But, from what I understand, it's the number, it's the rank of people here. It also seems to confirm the reporting about the problems with America's munitions shortages.
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW: Right.
MARGARET BRENNAN: What is the state of that?
REPRESENTATIVE JASON CROW: Well, because they don't – they don't want people to know. This is exactly the point. They don't want people to know what's actually happening.
That's why they fired the editor of "The Stars and Stripes," an independent newspaper that's been around since 1861, by the way, 1861. It was founded during the Civil War to be an independent media outlet for our service members, so that people would understand what they're going through.
This is the broader trend of them not wanting anybody, including members of Congress, to understand what's going on. Munitions have been depleted. The stockpiles are very low. Contrary to what Donald Trump wants us to believe. these types of precise munitions do not grow on trees. They take a long time to build up.
They started this war, the president started this war without a plan, without a strategy. I mean, I just heard your prior guest, Secretary [of Energy Chris] Wright, talk about numbers and barrels and – and that's all tactical discussion, right? These are tactical decisions.
There's no strategy here. There's no off-ramp. There's no longer-term plan for how we get out of this and how we normalize the markets and how we drive down prices for Americans.
President Donald Trump’s administration has installed a new informational plaque that sanitizes a former memorial to the Confederacy as Pete Hegseth’s Defense Department prepares to return the “racist” sculpture to Arlington National Cemetery.
The Confederate Memorial was removed from the cemetery in 2023 after Congress passed a law requiring the U.S. military to change property names and remove symbols honoring the Confederacy.
It was replaced with a marker explaining that the monument had portrayed a “nostalgic, mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery” in the form of a “Mammy” figure and a “faithful slave” following his owner to war.
Despite the congressional mandate, Hegseth announced last year that the “beautiful and historic sculpture” will “rightfully be returned” to Arlington National Cemetery.
The administration is now preparing for its reinstatement next year with a new sign providing “historical background” on the monument that conveniently omits any mention of its controversial past, The Washington Post reported.
This anti-Blackness coming out of the administration succeeds because there's a lot of anti-Blackness on the right. And, as Ava and I noted in "Media: BIG MISTAKES, PROUD, LUCKY and anti-Blackness," on the left as well.
Howard Lutnick, President Trump’s billionaire commerce secretary, was holding court before reporters outside a Washington courthouse recently when he acknowledged what had become readily apparent inside the White House.
As the war with Iran grinds on, Mr. Trump finds reprieve by focusing on the minutia of an endeavor much more within his grasp: renovating Washington with ornate projects.
[. . .]
He is at his most animated, aides and visitors to the White House say, when he is showing off the designs for the ballroom, boasting about the size of the columns and their designs, or taking officials on tours of the White House to show off where he has gilded the interiors. His personal touch has been quite literal: He has used super glue to affix gold pieces onto the walls and the Oval Office mantle, among other places.
President Donald Trump on Sunday unveiled a potential redesign of U.S. Space Force uniforms, and it’s giving sci-fi fans a bad feeling.
The president posted an image of the supposed “next generation” design on his Truth Social feed:
Trump shared the image during a massive day-long posting spree, and it’s not clear if this is a real design for a new uniform or just one of the many images, memes and AI slop creations he likes to throw into his feed.
U.S. Senators Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Peter Welch (D-VT) and 10 of their colleagues condemned the Department of Justice (DOJ)’s refusal to seek immediate appellate relief from a recent district court decision striking down key regulatory requirements of the National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA).
In a letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche, the senators expressed serious concerns about DOJ’s failure to vigorously defend the NFA, a foundational federal gun violence prevention law that regulates some of the most dangerous concealable weapons in the country.
“For months, DOJ has defended the NFA in court against legal challenges brought by the firearms industry, certain state attorneys general, and the gun lobby. But less than one week after you were confirmed as Attorney General, the Department appears to have reversed course,” wrote the senators. “The Department’s failure to immediately pursue an appeal in support of the NFA calls into question statements you made to the United States Senate during your confirmation process and raises serious doubts about your willingness—and ability—to keep Americans safe.”
Last month, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas held the NFA’s regulatory requirements for certain highly dangerous weapons unconstitutional. Although the court temporarily stayed its order to give DOJ time to seek immediate appellate relief, DOJ declined to do so, opting instead to let the court’s injunction take effect.
The senators demanded answers about DOJ’s justification for not seeking immediate relief and called on DOJ to appeal the district court’s decision.
“As a result of DOJ’s refusal to seek a stay of the District Court’s order, some of the most dangerous concealable weapons in the country—including those that have been used in several mass shootings—can now be (and have been) bought and sold outside the NFA’s heightened regulatory framework for the first time in nearly 100 years,” concluded the senators. “We urge the Department to resume its vigorous defense of the NFA and fulfill the promises you made to defend the constitutionality of laws passed by Congress and keep Americans safe.”
In addition to Kelly, Padilla, and Welch, the letter was signed by Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL), Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Jack Reed (D-RI), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA).
This letter continues Kelly’s push for commonsense gun violence prevention. Kelly has repeatedly introduced the GOSAFE Act, legislation to protect communities from gun violence while safeguarding Americans’ constitutional right to own a firearm. He also introduced the Background Check Completion Act to close the “Charleston loophole” that allows gun sales to proceed before a background check is completed. As a gun owner, combat veteran, and husband of a gun violence survivor, Kelly knows firsthand the damage these weapons can cause and has pushed Congress not to wait for the next tragedy to act.
Click here to read the full text of the letter.
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