by Ja'han Jones | Jul 14, 2026 | Civil Rights, Opinion, Supreme Court
Republicans are yet again looking for help from the Supreme Court’s GOP-appointed supermajority in placing a thumb on the scale for Republicans in future elections.
Rep. Byron Donalds, a Florida Republican and gubernatorial candidate, and America First Legal, the far-right law firm founded by Trump adviser Stephen Miller, were handed a serious setback last week when a court panel dismissed their lawsuit with prejudice, meaning they can’t file it again. The suit claimed Florida had been wrongfully denied an additional congressional seat and Electoral College vote because of the way the 2020 census was conducted.
For years, many Republicans have followed President Donald Trump’s lead in falsely claiming that the census count intentionally benefits Democrats. Liberals, including Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, have debunked these claims while spotlighting how the process of apportionment — that is, the delegation of congressional seats based on population — has been used to benefit conservatives.
The Florida Phoenix reported on last week’s ruling from a U.S. District Court three-judge panel. Per the outlet:
The Republicans alleged that a proper count would have given Florida an additional U.S. House seat and an additional vote in the Electoral College but for the “vast use” of a statistical method known as imputation. However, for the second time in six months, the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida dismissed the case, this time with prejudice, finding that any further amendment to the pleadings “would be futile.”
The ruling was celebrated by lawyer Marc Elias, the pro-democracy attorney whose law firm helped thwart conservatives in the case. A day later, the plaintiffs appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.
For the record,
by Jarvis DeBerry | Jul 14, 2026 | Opinion
When I was a boy in Holly Springs, Mississippi, you could stand in front of the local Women, Infants and Children office, throw a rock and hit the office of the Mississippi State Highway Department, where my dad worked on road construction crews. My mother, a seventh-grade English teacher, would sometimes bring me with her to the WIC office to pick up food items such as cheese and powdered milk on her way home from the school.
I don’t know how my mother felt pulling into WIC’s parking lot or pulling open its doors. She’s no longer here for me to ask. But I became angry on her behalf last week when Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma suggested she should have been ashamed.
I don’t know how my mother felt pulling into WIC’s parking lot or pulling open its doors.
Stitt’s state has one of the country’s highest poverty rates, one of the country’s highest child poverty rates and one of the highest rates of hunger and food insecurity. But he nevertheless supports the Trump administration’s cuts to food assistance programs. Those cuts have reduced the number of mothers and fathers who can discreetly purchase food in grocery stores using plastic cards connected to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. In an interview with Stateline, Stitt, who also serves as the chairman of the National Governors Association, spoke longingly of the days when “there was a little stigma attached and you had to actually go to a food bank and pick up commodity cheese and commodity groceries, and it had a little stigma so you were a little bit embarrassed.”
He said, “Maybe we should
by Hayes Brown | Jul 13, 2026 | Congress, elections, Opinion
The House returns to session Monday two weeks after a hasty retreat from Washington. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., sent his members home early ahead of the Fourth of July weekend when a revolt from his caucus’ right flank left the chamber paralyzed. Time hasn’t changed the situation since then — and time is what Johnson lacks now.
Chances aren’t looking good for either of the two broad clusters of action items on the House GOP’s agenda.
Lawmakers are in town for eight working days before their annual August recess. When they return in early September, it will likely be too late for anything ambitious to make its way through the legislative process. Most of Congress’ focus will be on simply keeping the lights on, not cramming a grab bag of conservative priorities into yet another GOP-only spending bill. But that is exactly what Johnson keeps insisting is in the works, even as every sign and portent says otherwise.
Chances aren’t looking good for either of the two broad clusters of action items on the House GOP’s agenda.
The first group includes the annual spending bills, which fund the federal government, and the National Defense Authorization Act, which sets policy for the Pentagon and instructions for its many projects. Before the most recent break, Johnson hoped to at least move forward on the NDAA and an initial package of appropriation bills for fiscal 2027, which begins Oct. 1.
Those plans were derailed by a group of hard-line Republicans who voted down the procedural rule that would move those bills to the floor. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., said she would refuse to vote for any procedural rule
by James Downie | Jul 12, 2026 | Economy, Opinion, White House
“FREEDOM FUEL HAS ARRIVED,” the White House’s X account announced this week. The post touted the first “Freedom Fuel Network” gas station, “lowering the price at the pump to $3.47 for our 47th President.” The White House’s announcement provided few details, leaving the reader — and the viewer of the accompanying video — the impression that the administration, whether through subsidy or takeover, was directly intervening to lower gas prices.
Freedom Fuel, however, is not stealth Marxism from a president fearmongering about “communist” Democrats. “A VERY smart Retailer, located throughout the Northeast, is stepping up,” Trump announced on social media before the July 4 weekend. “They are doing this because they love the U.S.A.” It is not clear who runs the Freedom Fuel Network, with 25 stations in Pennsylvania and southern New Jersey. The Delaware Department of State lists a filing for Freedom Fuel Network LLC from June 23, but no other information.
But whoever is behind Freedom Fuel, Trump’s praise is emblematic of his second year back in the White House: a half-hearted, poorly thought-out stunt.
The administration later clarified that its support is strictly promotional.
Though the White House post on X said, “President Trump is leading the charge to lower gas prices this summer,” the administration later clarified that its support is strictly promotional. “The administration is not involved in the company, nor has the administration given the company any funding. There is no other entity or person subsidizing the lower gasoline costs,” a White House spokesperson told CNN.
Trump is apparently hoping for copycats. For days, he has complained that gas prices are not as low as they were before he
by Lauren Harper | Jul 12, 2026 | Opinion, Trump Administration
The Department of Government Efficiency, which carried out the most transformative restructuring of the federal government in a generation, has formally ended — with no public accounting of its actions. Despite touting itself as the most transparent administration in history, the Trump White House is working to ensure that no DOGE records ever see the light of day.
This is a dangerous antidemocratic precedent, especially since DOGE took direction from Elon Musk, who was famously not a regular government employee. By handing over essential government functions to members of the ultrawealthy who happen to be friends with the president, while systematically dismantling America’s transparency infrastructure, the administration is effectively hiding that public policy is being dictated at an oligarch’s request. The threat is the privatization of government power, with no chance of oversight or public input.
Play
Former Sen. Boxer slams impact of Musk’s DOGE: ‘So authoritarian and un-American’
July 7, 2026 / 07:54
If the DOGE model succeeds, there’s no telling how many shadow agencies may follow — and how many government decisions taxpayers could be locked out of.
To date, what little the public knows about DOGE has mostly come from whistleblowers. The mechanics behind this information blackout are twofold.
Almost from its inception, the Trump administration argued that DOGE was not an agency with independent authority and therefore was not subject to the real-time scrutiny of Freedom of Information Act (or FOIA) requests. Rather, the administration said that DOGE’s sole legal function was to advise and assist the president, and that political appointees at federal agencies — not DOGE personnel — held the ultimate authority to implement its recommended mass firings and agency liquidations.
If the DOGE
by Zeeshan Aleem | Jul 11, 2026 | Congress, Opinion, White House
President Donald Trump loves to slap his name on things: hotels, merchandise, stimulus checks and even a cultural institution Congress named for a former president. But Trump pointedly refused to affix his name to a major housing bill that both houses of Congress recently passed with huge veto-proof margins. The bill became law Saturday without his signature.
The president declined to sign it because he is still seething over another piece of legislation: his repressive anti-voting bill he calls the Save America Act. Senate Republicans (fortunately) failed to pass that bill, and Trump’s resulting political tantrum is so baffling and self-destructive it beggars belief.
The passage of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act marks an extraordinarily rare event in today’s Washington: Congress forming a huge bipartisan majority to achieve something genuinely good. The bill, which addresses the national housing shortage, was the product of a partnership between progressive firebrand Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Tim Scott, R-S.C., who is a staunch Trump ally. The White House initially backed the bill.
Trump’s description of the housing bill as a “yawn” before refusing to sign it reveals how completely he’s lost the plot.
Robert Kuttner, co-editor of The American Prospect, a progressive policy publication, called the bill a “medley of good ideas.” Among other things, it would streamline environmental reviews (without scrapping standards), make the construction of certain kinds of housing units cheaper, offer economic incentives for local governments to support new construction and make it easier for some consumers to get mortgages. It’s the biggest piece of housing legislation in decades
But just hours before the signing ceremony to sign the housing bill into law, Trump canceled the
