Title
Insurrection and a Little Bit of Pot
Good morning! It’s Friday, October 23rd.
Global Champagne Day
Tell me you know of a day better suited for me. Well, I guess Gin Day. Or Whiskey Day.
Or water day… no no, that’s too much of a stretch.
Global Champagne Day
And now, the news.
SCOTUS Keeps Trump Pause
-via NPR
Starting with the Supremes.
In an emergency appeal on Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration must continue to provide gender-affirming care to transgender inmates in federal prisons.
This keeps in place a lower-court injunction on the Trump administration’s pretty please that the federal Bureau of Prisons' policy terminate hormone therapy and other treatments for trans inmates.
This is medically necessary treatment for these inmates and stopping care is just cruel for the sake of being cruel. And of course Trump will try again later, but in the meantime? We take our wins where we can.
State Sen. Lucas
-via ABC News
Hey, remember a few months ago when I talked about Virginia Democratic state Sen. L. Louise Lucas and said she was being investigated for her role in a “criminal enterprise” through a medical marijuana dispensary business, with the charges ranging wide and including: racketeering, money laundering, drug trafficking, and fraud?
Of course you do! You remember literally everything I’ve ever said or done!
Well then you obviously also remember that I noted the timing of the investigation – it came after State Senator Lucas led the charge in Virginia’s redistricting fight?
Well, it turns out… it’s possible both things can be true.
Because a 45-page indictment accused Lucas and six others, including her two daughters and a grandson (it’s a family business!), of arranging for the purchase and sale of more than 100 kilos of pot, and laundering the profits. It charges Lucas was (allegedly) using her role in the senate to keep her crimes safe from scrutiny.
Lucas surrounded to authorities on Thursday morning.
Now, Lucas is not up for re-election this year, but her daughter is currently running and that’s relevant because the DOJ has an unwritten rule that they don’t bring charges within 60 days of an election.
When that was brought up to Todd Blanche, he said: first of all, that question’s dumb. You one-a those Dumb-ocrats? Also, "We don't do political paybacks.” Except, you know, all the times they do.
He noted, and I think it’s fair to note, that this investigation started when Biden was president. Adding, "The Justice Manual speaks very clearly about what the Department of Justice can and can't do. We cannot bring a charge if our purpose is improper, and there's nothing improper about this purpose.”
And she did turn herself in so on one hand, it seems like the charges are real. On the other hand, he brought up the fact that Jack Smith, aka Coach Beard, brought charges against Trump for his role in trying to overturn the 2020 election within 60 days of the 2024 election.
And the fact that that was front of mind makes it pretty obvious that they do, in fact, do political payback.
Also, while I don’t think doing crime is good, it just feels like there’s a little bit of a difference between insurrection and a little bit of pot.
Maybe that’s just me, though.
Corey Lewandowski
-via CBS News
Corey Lewandowski, Trump ally, husband of Alison Hardy, and the boyfriend of known puppy-killer (literally) Kristi Noem, is in big trouble mister as DOJ pulls a rare reverse-Uno and investigates one of their own.
They’re looking into whether he profited from his role as a top adviser to the Department of Homeland Security.
If I had to guess? I’d guess yes.
But it IS a guess, because the exact actions under investigation are currently unknown.
So see? Fair fair.
This DOJ is totally totally fair.
Trump v BBC
-via AP News
A federal judge ruled on Thursday that Trump must sit for a deposition in this $10 billion defamation suit against the BBC before December 11th.
It went up to the judge because he was supposed to sit for the deposition on October 16th, but, as president of the United States, he was dealing with what he said was a “matter of national importance.”
…he was campaigning in Georgia.
Yes yes, super important.
It all stems from Trump accusing the BBC, which is publicly funded, of defamation, and deceptive/unfair trade practices related to “Trump: A Second Chance,” a documentary they aired which he says included deceptively edited quotes from Trump to make it seem like, on January 6th, he was encouraging violence.
And like… yeah obviously you can’t slice and dice the quotes but, you know, he also straight up said things like, "If you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore."
So once again, it’s absurd that he’s fighting this because that means his quotes are going to be back in the news again.
Hear me out… that dude dumb.
11 Days
-via The Guardian, NBC News, and USA Today
And finally – talk elections to me baybee.
Starting in New Hampshire where the Supreme Court rules that student IDs don’t count as voter IDs in the midterms.
The state requires a photo ID. You can use a driver’s license (from any state), a state ID card, a U.S. passport, or a military ID.
The way we got here is that in April, the state ruled that a student ID no longer counts as a voter ID (I’ll spare you the lecture but like… you know voter IDs in general are a waste of money, so this is super pointless unless, of course, you’re trying to supress voters).
On October 2nd, a federal judge said the rule change could stand but that election officials could still use student IDs alongside other IDs when trying to verify someone’s identity.
Thursday’s ruling temporarily allows the ban to continue because they thought the federal court was changing the rules too close to Election Day.
I think they changed it too close back in April because the state has literally zero cases of fraud by voters through the use of student IDs ever. In the whole history of the state.
Live free or let the Supreme Court quell your right to vote, I guess.
And then – we need to talk about a political ad because it might just be the worst, most disgusting ad, to have ever come out.
If not even, then at least in the last decade.
Vivek Ramaswamy, who has a deep anger inside of him (I said it during the 2024 presidential primary and mean it still) is running for governor of Ohio against Amy Acton. Polling has favored Acton, just a little, although in the last few days that’s split big time, released a horrific ad featuring Acton’s mother, who she hasn’t spoken with since she was 12. In it, Acton’s mom calls her a liar.
Here’s the truth.
Amy and her brother were removed by child services from their mom’s house because, between the ages of 10 and 12, she was repeatedly abused by her mom’s husband (who her mom stayed with the entire time, even after he was charged for those crimes. I’ll say that again – he was charged).
Vivek is treating this like it’s the greatest thing in the world. Even the current governor, Republican Mike DeWine told Vivek to take the ad down.
For his comments, Trump called DeWine “disloyal to the Republican party.”
This incredibly cruel cruel administration sees nothing wrong with it. With using a clearly unwell woman, who hasn’t spoken to her daughter in years, as a prop. Letting this horrible time in Acton’s life come back into the spotlight.
And of course they wouldn’t, right? Of course this administration sees nothing wrong with any of this stuff… They’re led by a president who, at a rally on Wednesday, praised a rally-goer for punching a protester. "Wow. Man, I loved that. I watched that. That was incredible. Wow. That was unbelievable."
This administration is so lame.
Vivek has a deep anger in him, but so does Trump. He leads with anger and a lack of imagination.
And 11 days, when the state of Ohio elects Amy Acton, and when we take back the House and Senate because this president needs safeguards because otherwise he’s just going to keep making this country more expensive and put us into more wars all to distract from the fact that he’s in the Epstein files and is actively doing fascism. Right here. Right now.
But we CAN stop him. We can see consequences for action. We can hold people accountable.
All we have to do is vote for it.
And that’s it. That’s the news.
Eleven days.
Lock in.