“Last summer, two years after an upside-down American flag was flown outside the Virginia home of Justice Samuel Alito, another provocative symbol was displayed at his vacation house in New Jersey,” the New York Times reports.
“This time, it was the ‘Appeal to Heaven’ flag, which, like the inverted U.S. flag, was carried by rioters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Also known as the Pine Tree flag, it dates back to the Revolutionary War, but largely fell into obscurity until recent years and is now a symbol of support for former President Donald Trump, for a religious strand of the ‘Stop the Steal’ campaign and for a push to remake American government in Christian terms.”
“Three photographs obtained by The New York Times, along with accounts from a half-dozen neighbors and passers-by, show that the Appeal to Heaven flag was aloft at the Alito home on Long Beach Island in July and September of 2023. A Google street view image from late August also shows the flag.”
The “Appeal to Heaven” flag flying at Samuel Alito’s Jersey shore beach house is right there in Google Street View, if you know where to look. It’s not the Google Street View of Alito’s beach house proper. It’s a shot from between two houses on an adjacent street, looking across a canal, toward the back of the Alito house, where the flagpole stands.
John Collins: “Schoolhouse Rock never prepared us for this shit.”
Jay Willis: “We’re at most 48 hours away from learning that Sam Alito has been the QAnon Shaman for Halloween for the last three years running.”
Steve Vladeck: “I wonder what the neighbors did to provoke this one …”
Joyce Vance: “Perhaps we will learn some feud with local aquatic life led Mrs. Alito to fly the flag. But sarcasm aside, when you’re a Supreme Court Justice, you’re supposed to avoid giving off even a whiff of partisan bias. Or religious favoritism. As a judge, and certainly, as a Supreme Court Justice, you have that duty. Justice Alito flunks the test and flunks it badly.”
Law Dork Chris Geidner: “It’s been clear for some time that Justice Sam Alito was the Fox News (or an even further right-wing channel) justice on the U.S. Supreme Court bench. The past two weeks have helped to cement that into the public consciousness for those who don’t hear him at oral arguments or read his opinions — particularly his concurrences and dissents.”
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.”
Dahlia Lithwick: “Rather than hurling ourselves headlong into the ‘Alito Must Recuse’ brick wall of ‘yeah, no,’ we need to dedicate the upcoming election cycle, and the attendant election news cycle, to a discussion of what it means to have a Supreme Court that is functionally immune from political pressure, from internal norms of behavior, from judicial ethics and disclosure constraints, and from congressional oversight and why that is deeply dangerous.”
“The Supreme Court on Thursday reversed a lower court’s ruling that a congressional voting map in South Carolina was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander that resulted in the ‘bleaching of African American voters’ from a district,” the New York Times reports.
“The vote was 6 to 3, with the court’s three liberal members in dissent.”
“A unanimous three-judge panel of the Federal District Court in Columbia, S.C., ruled in early 2023 that the state’s First Congressional District, drawn after the 2020 census, violated the Constitution by making race the predominant factor.”
“Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) received a rebuke on the House floor Wednesday after he remarked on former President Trump’s ongoing hush money trial, comments that were deemed offensive,” The Hill reports. “The spat — which grinded the House floor to a halt for more than an hour — began after McGovern, during debate on a procedural rule, described Trump’s current legal entanglements in no uncertain terms, mentioning the hush money case and allegations that he worked to overturn the results of the 2020 election.”
Here’s what he said: “Maybe they want to distract from the fact that their candidate for president has been indicted more times than he’s been elected. Maybe they don’t want to talk about the fact that the leader of their party is on trial for covering up hush money payments to a porn star for political gain, not to mention three other criminal felony prosecutions he’s facing.”
Rep. Jerry Carl (R-AL), the Republican presiding over the House floor, interrupted saying that members should refrain from personal attacks directed toward “presumed nominees for the office of the president.”
McGovern said he shouldn’t be admonished for “stating the simple fact that the former president was indicted by a grand jury and is on trial in a court of law.”
He noted: “That’s not my opinion; it’s just the truth.”
McGovern then asked Carl if it’s “unparliamentary to state a fact” on the House floor.
When Carl said he wasn’t in a position to determine the “veracity” of McGovern’s remarks, the Massachusetts lawmaker doubled-down and repeated the number of times Trump had been indicted.
House Republicans then collectively lost their minds, according to this account in the Washington Post, and struck down McGovern’s words as if they didn’t happen.
He was also barred from speaking on the House floor for the rest of the day.
The good news is U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon held an actual hearing in the molasses-slow Mar-a-Lago case. The bad news is that it was to entertain a ridiculous claim of selective prosecution that most other judges would have rejected out of hand.
“A man who admitted to sending out robocalls mimicking President Joe Biden’s voice on the day of the New Hampshire primary is now facing criminal charges,” WMUR reports. “Ten indictments have been returned against Steve Kramer out of Rockingham County for bribing, intimidation and suppression and impersonation of candidates. The indictments name five people who said they received the robocall.”
“The Federal Communications Commission has issued a $6 million fine against the political consultant who sent AI-generated robocalls mimicking President Joe Biden’s voice to voters ahead of New Hampshire’s presidential primary,” the AP reports.
“Steve Kramer, who also faces two dozen criminal charges in New Hampshire, has admitted orchestrating the message sent to thousands of voters.”
Harry Littman: “After 20 days, 22 witnesses and intermittent courtroom fireworks, the evidence in Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial is all in. The case will soon be in the hands of the jury.”
“Who holds the advantage at this critical juncture? My assessment, after attending much of the trial in person, is that it’s the prosecution’s case to lose.”
“With the standing caveat that it takes only one juror to block a unanimous guilty verdict — and that the law puts the greatest burden on prosecutors — the case as it has come in puts the district attorney’s office in the driver’s seat going into next week’s closing arguments.”
Donald Trump explained his rationale for not taking the stand in his hush money trial despite saying for months he would be willing to do so, The Hill reports.
Said Trump: “Because he made rulings that makes it very difficult to testify. Anything I did, anything I did in the past they can bring everything up. And you know what, I’ve had a great past.”
He added: “The other reason is because they have no case. In other words, why testify when they have no case… There’s no crime … so when you say, ‘Why not testify,’ they have no case, other than it’s a corrupt system.”
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has recently been engaging with Republican Party leaders to secure an invitation to speak before a joint session of Congress,” Haaretz reports.
“Netanyahu’s efforts began a few of months ago, but in recent days he has intensified his involvement in the process, in the wake of the ICC’s chief prosecutor’s application for arrest warrants against him and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.”
“For the first time this Congress, Speaker Mike Johnson has boxed in Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. And he did it on a topic that’s near to Schumer’s heart — Israel,” Punchbowl News reports.
“Johnson’s decision to publicly — and quite relentlessly — push for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to travel to Washington to address a joint meeting of Congress has put Schumer in an unusually uncomfortable position inside the Senate Democratic Caucus, where opinions of the Israeli leader have sunk to a new low.”
“The politics are easy for Johnson. His conference is in lock-step behind Netanyahu. And Johnson is using Israel as a political cudgel against Democrats.”
“Plans to invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress are being met with fierce pushback from Democrats,” Axios reports.
“Some top House Democrats are going so far as to say Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) should not sign onto the invitation.”
“Since the first American shipments of sophisticated weapons to Ukraine, President Biden has never wavered on one prohibition: President Volodymyr Zelensky had to agree to never fire them into Russian territory, insisting that would violate Mr. Biden’s mandate to ‘avoid World War III,’” the New York Times reports.
“But the consensus around that policy is fraying. Propelled by the State Department, there is now a vigorous debate inside the administration over relaxing the ban to allow the Ukrainians to hit missile and artillery launch sites just over the border in Russia — targets that Mr. Zelensky says have enabled Moscow’s recent territorial gains.”
The Independent: With Ukraine losing ground, allies debate how to squeeze cash for Kyiv out of frozen Russian assets.
“British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak failed to stem growing speculation on Wednesday that he might call an early election after ministers cancelled events and either curtailed or delayed foreign trips to attend a government meeting,” Reuters reports.
The UK Election will be on July 4. Don’t the Brits know that’s the Fourth of July!!
“The Democratic-led Senate is poised to confirm President Joe Biden’s 200th federal judge Wednesday, a milestone that highlights a sharp contrast with his election rival, Republican former President Donald Trump, as they seek to shape the courts over the next four years,” NBC News reports. “It’s unclear whether Biden will catch up to the 234 judges Trump secured in his presidential term.”
“Hunter Biden’s trial on tax charges has been moved to September 5, after the judge presiding over the case made Biden’s attorney promise he would not seek further delays,” CNN reports.
“In asking for a delay in the case, Abbe Lowell, an attorney for Biden, cited issues with discovery, witnesses and obtaining experts in the case, as well as the upcoming trial on federal gun crimes in Delaware, which is set for June 3.”
“Special counsel David Weiss plans to introduce Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop as evidence against him at his upcoming trial on felony gun charges,” CNN reports. “The laptop is at the center of a yearslong legal and political saga, dating to the 2020 election. Republican officials and right-wing outlets have seized on the laptop’s embarrassing emails and images to attack Biden, the son of President Joe Biden. Hunter Biden’s lawyers have said the files were manipulated, and even sued a computer repair shop owner who publicly released the material.”
Said prosecutors: “The defendant’s laptop is real (it will be introduced as a trial exhibit) and it contains significant evidence of the defendant’s guilt.”
“Hunter Biden […] could face testimony from his ex-wife and his brother’s widow, with whom he became romantically involved, according to new filings from federal prosecutors that illustrate just how messy the seemingly simple court case could turn,” the Washington Post reports.
“The filings from special counsel David Weiss provide a window into prosecutors’ plans and how they may reopen some of the most painful moments in the Biden family’s past, potentially embarrassing not only Hunter Biden but also a president whose political career has long been defined by a close-knit family that stuck together through difficult times.”
“In under 48 hours this week, Donald Trump’s social media account promoted a video featuring a term frequently associated with Nazi Germany and later removed it. He suggested he was open to states restricting access to contraceptives and then walked that back. He falsely accused President Biden of being ‘locked & loaded’ to ‘take me out.’ And in between, he was in court as his legal team rested its case in his ongoing criminal trial,” the Washington Post reports.
“The dizzying sequence of events offered a glimpse of Trump’s volatile bid for a second term in the White House — one filled with legal uncertainty, escalating attacks and comments he and has campaign have had to back away from or recast. This week, Trump gave a potential opening to Democrats on topics they are eager to challenge him over in coming months, including abortion and reproductive rights.”
“Donald Trump claimed his uniquely special relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin would allow him to secure the release of Evan Gershkovich, the American Wall Street Journal reporter who has been detained in Russia for over a year on espionage charges which his newspaper and the Biden administration vehemently deny,” the Daily Beast reports.
“Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is planning to zero in on reproductive rights next month — potentially forcing Republicans to take tough votes on issues such as contraception and in vitro fertilization,” Axios reports. “The move is meant to tap into the potency of abortion rights as a voter-turnout generator for Democrats five months from Election Day. It’s timed to roughly coincide with the two-year anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, on June 24.”
“The defeat of a liberal Portland prosecutor at the hands of a tough-on-crime challenger has hardened a view among top White House officials that Democrats need to further distance themselves from their left flank on law-and-order issues,” Politico reports.
“In the wake of the voter backlash over public safety in Oregon, Joe Biden’s aides this week argued the results served as validation of their long-running concerns that crime and an immigration crisis at the southern border risk overwhelming the president’s case for reelection — especially if the broader party is seen as soft on both fronts.”
“Donald Trump’s allies are quietly getting involved in little-noticed fights over who will serve on the committee to set the Republican Party’s national platform,” NBC News reports.
“NBC News spoke with nine people familiar with what’s happening in states across the country, including Arizona, South Carolina, Kansas and Iowa, among others, who said that the campaign’s involvement is intended to stop those on the party’s right flank from trying to push the official Republican National Committee platform too far to the right on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage headed into the general election.”
Washington Post: “It has been nearly two months since a judge ruled Willis could continue prosecuting the Trump case, as long as Nathan Wade, the special prosecutor she’d appointed and had a romantic relationship with, resigned. But the drama stemming from that detour has lingered.”
“The Georgia Court of Appeals last week agreed to review an appeal from Trump and several of his co-defendants seeking to overturn the order keeping Willis on the case. The review reopens the uncertainty of whether Willis will maintain control of the historic criminal case, the biggest of her career, and makes it increasingly unlikely the case will go to trial before the November election.”
“First, Willis must face the judgment of her constituents as she seeks another four-year term.”
Former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy has acquired a 7.7% stake in BuzzFeed, Axios reports. A regulatory filing indicates that Ramaswamy plans to be an activist investor with plans to shake up the company, including a “shift in strategy.”
“Three leading members of Speaker Mike Johnson’s policy team are leaving his office by the end of May, robbing the House’s top Republican of a critical core of experienced aides,” Punchbowl News reports. “The departure, which is striking in size and in experience, strips Johnson of a significant amount of expertise in his domestic policy shop.”
“The fourth member of Speaker Mike Johnson’s senior staff is leaving the Capitol, another noteworthy departure from the Louisiana Republican’s office in the months leading up to an election,” Punchbowl News reports.
Associated Press: “As Trump makes a comeback bid to return to power, Republicans in Congress have become even more likely to cast doubts on Biden’s victory or deny it was legitimate, a political turnaround that allows his false claims of fraud to linger and lays the groundwork to potentially challenge the results in 2024.”
“A second human case of bird flu infection linked to the current H5N1 outbreak in dairy cows has been detected, in a farm worker who had exposure to infected cows,” Stat reports.
“Smartmatic alleges that Newsmax has destroyed evidence in the voting machine company’s lawsuit against the right-wing news channel over false claims that Smartmatic helped ‘rig’ the 2020 election,” NBC News reports.
“Nevada election officials can start tabulating in-person Election Day votes as they come in, rather than waiting for polls to close in an effort to get results out quicker,” the AP reports.
Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) “filed 11 amendments to his campaign finance reports Wednesday, acknowledging that his claims for the last two years to have loaned $320,000 to his campaign were not true,” WTVF reports. “Ogles says that he actually loaned his campaign $20,000, instead of the $320,000 that he had previously claimed.”
“Republican officials are running into a wall of opposition — from the Secret Service and local officials — as they fight to move a protest zone farther away from the site of their national convention in Milwaukee this summer,” NBC News reports.
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