#Senator Schumer (D-NY)

[govtshutdown]

It's easy to spot the sheep among the wolves

[fullhalalalchemist]

🚨🚨CONGRESS SECRETLY TRYING TO SNEAK IN EARN IT ACT COPYCAT INTO MUST PASS SPENDING BILL (PLEASE READ EXTREMELY IMPORTANT)

July 20, 2023 Congress is right now determining what is included in a must pass spending bill the NDAA. Often congress will sneakily add as amendments their bills that they can't pass in a normal setting.

If you remember, I made a previous post about EARN IT being reintroduced here.

The EARN IT Act and it's copycats are bipartisan bills that will greatly censor if not completely eliminate encryption and anything sexual and LGBTQ+ from the internet, globally. Anything the far-right doesn't like will be completely gone. The best way to stop them is to use https://www.badinternetbills.com/ to call your senators.

Following it's initial introduction earlier this year was massive opposition from human rights, LGBT, tech, political groups, and grassroots groups. Bc of this, the senators decided to remake the bill but give it a new name, so they can still pass Earn It without actually passing Earn It. Those bills are the Stop CSAM Act (yes really, they actually named it that), and the Cooper-Davis act.

The entire point of these bills is to mass surveil and censor everyone and I don't know why more people or senators speak out against it. There is a direct timeline from when the Attorney General Barr (under Trump) said he wanted to do this to it's initial introduction in 2019, and how the senators explicitly knew they couldn't actually say that so they lied and said it was about "stopping CSAM" or "stopping drugs" for Cooper-Davis Act.

These bills essentially do the following:

they gut encryption, the one thing actually protects you from having your data seen by anyone. Do you want republicans to know you're trans? that someone had an abortion? that they spoke out against the govt? to see your private photos you have uploaded to the cloud? to see what porn you watch? if youre a journalist, or an abuse survivor, any hacker or abuser can see your stuff and track you.

they gut parts of Section 230, the one thing that allows anyone to post online and birthed social media. Previous gutting into 230 gave us the tumblr nsfw ban and killed that site.

they create an unelected commission with some already established govt body (DOJ, FTC, etc) that will include law enforcement and people from NCOSE or other Christian conservative groups who will decide what is and isn't lawful to say. no citizen can vote who's on this commission, and the president gets to pick. it's like the supreme court, but for the internet.

lead to mass censorship and surveillance because of the above

We have until the end of the month to stop this, but this can be added literally any moment until then. It's literally code red. If this is added it goes into effect immediately. The BEST way to stop this is to drive calls and emails to the senate. https://www.badinternetbills.com/ connects you directly to your members of congress & gives you a call script.

It is ESSENTIAL to call the Senate leaders who can stop this. Here's a more precise call script you can use: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1huD5Ldd1lPTECYTEb9Gg2ZzrqW6Y9tryHT-MdjOl8kY/edit

All these people expressed concern over Earn It, so we need to press them hard to not allow it's copycats Cooper-Davis or Stop CSAM into the NDAA. This is URGENT and needs all hands on deck. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) (202) 224-6542 Maria Cantwell (D-WA) (202) 224-3441 Jon Ossof (D-GA) (202)-224-3521 Alex Padilla (D-CA) (202) 224-3553 Cory Booker (D-NJ) (202) 224-3224 Mike Lee (R-UT) (202) 224-5444

Please please please spread this message and blow up their phones.

TLDR; The Senate is trying to quietly push the Earn It Act's copycat bills into the must pass NDAA, which will lead to mass censorship and surveillance online by gutting Section 230 which is the entire reason you can even be on tumblr and why the internet exists, killing encryption which put everyone's lives in danger, and appointing far-right people to a supreme court-esque commission that the president has direct control over. They could be added in ANY DAY and we need to push hard to stop it before it gets to that point. CALL YOUR SENATORS **NOW** BY USING https://www.badinternetbills.com/ AND CALL THE SENATE LEADERSHIP AND SPREAD THE WORD!!!!

[probablyasocialecologist]

Thousands have hit the streets in NYC, Los Angeles, Washington DC, and dozens of other cities. A DC protest organized by Jewish activist groups drew thousands, and hundreds were later arrested, including two dozen Rabbis. An estimated 25,000 people showed up to a rally in Chicago. These events show no signs of stopping, with many more planned across the coming days. These actions have gone beyond marches, with protesters showing up at the offices and homes of politicians demanding a ceasefire. Six activists were arrested at a pro-Palestine rally outside the Boston office of Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). A large crowd demonstrated outside the Brooklyn home of Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY). Jewish protesters showed up outside the Brentwood house of VP Kamala Harris. IfNotNow members have held sit-ins at the DC offices of Schumer, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), and Rep. Katherine Clark (D-MA). Former staffers for Warren, Sanders, and Senator John Fetterman have publicly urged the lawmakers to back a ceasefire. On October 25, tens of thousands of students across more than 100 North American campuses united in a walkout to demand an immediate ceasefire, an end to unconditional support for Israel, and university divestment from the corporations funding the occupation of Palestine. On the night of October 27 Jewish activists shut down Grand Central Station, leading to the arrest of over 300 people. “This is bigger than we’ve ever seen,” US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR) Executive Director Ahmad Abuznaid told Mondoweiss. “This is the result of decades of work that we’ve put into this movement, and I think some of it is connected to the [George Floyd protests of 2020]. There was so much racial, social justice, anti-war building in that moment.

[...]

“The man broke my heart,” Palestinian-American comedian Maysoon Zayid told Politico on October 23, “I never in my life thought the empathizer-in-chief would sound the way he did. The Palestinians were given no humanity. Joe Biden should spend every breath he has condemning Israel’s genocide with the same zeal he condemned Hamas’ massacre of civilians, that same zeal. And we get nothing. 1,000 children are dead, and we get nothing.” “It’s really crazy to me that the Democratic party destroyed 20-years of worth of good will with Muslims and Arabs in just 2 weeks, losing an entire generation that was raised in the progressive coalition, possibly forever,” tweeted author and activist Eman Abdelhadi. “The rapidity of it, the finality–it’s astonishing.” “While Republican disregard for Muslim and Arab lives is clearly on display, some Muslim and Arab Americans also feel like the Democratic Party largely takes their vote for granted, though Democrats’ policies never reflect as much,” writes Dana El Kurd in The Nation. “One Arab American friend expressed to me that, at least under Republican administrations, ‘Arabs could find allies’ in their opposition.”

[trickricksblog08]

Democrat Schumer: Give me money or else your sons will die in war.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on Monday threatened to send US troops to fight Russia unless Republicans agree to his $100 billion world aid bill currently stalled in Congress

[spacetwinks]

rare, real footage of Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and unidentified senate aide speaking to The Baileys

[gusty-wind]

“It does not actually articulate or force the articulation of a strategy for how to end the conflict to begin with. So you basically have a blank check — or a near blank check — for a strategy that’s completely gone off the rails.”

Lee called out his Republican colleagues for sending aid to Ukraine at the expense of America’s own interests.

“By voting yes and passing this bill now, it empowers drug cartels, it dissolves our borders, it spends insane amounts of money that we don’t have on the priorities of foreign countries all at the same time,” he said.

Lee also slammed the bills’ proponents for defeating an effort led by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) to increase accountability and oversight of the aid to the notoriously corrupt Ukrainian government through appointment of an inspector general.

“These are not choir boys,” Lee said. “These are not Boy Scouts. These are not Girl Scouts. These are people who have really set world records for corruption. It’s an art form over there.”

Vance laid out the arguments from Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for rushing the aid through without further accountability measures.

“The basic argument is that we have to rush resources to Ukraine immediately, or they’re liable to fall to Russian aggression,” he said. “And it’s all basically an argument made under the gun that unless you approve this appropriation of resources and weapons, then you will allow Russia to win. So it’s a kind of moral blackmail.”

Supporters of yet more aid to Ukraine can not admit the reality that the war is not winnable for Ukraine, Vance continued. “They can’t admit that this isn’t going well because if they admitted that, it would cause too much psychological harm, and they’d have to cut bait.”

Johnson added that proponents argue that it is in politicians’ naked political interests to support the aid because “it’s helping build our industrial base, and so it’s creating jobs in your state. And I call that a depraved justification.”

Musk, who noted his contributions to Ukraine’s war efforts, echoed the assessment of the trio of senators that the war is ultimately not winnable and that a peace deal is in their best interests.

Ukraine is “losing people every day,” he said. “And if you’re going to spend lives, it must be for a purpose.”

Musk continued:

There is no way in hell that Putin is going to lose. If he would back off, he would be assassinated. And for those who want regime change in Russia, they should think about: Who is the person that could take out Putin? And is that person likely to be a peacenik? Probably not. They’re probably gonna be even harder, even more hardcore than Putin if they took him out.  Ramaswamy detailed additional “unacceptable” risks to American and global interests from continued “endless funding” of the fighting in Ukraine, arguing that Americans see “daily strengthening of the military alliance between Russia and China, which, when combined, is the single greatest increase for the risk of World War III that we’ve seen in the post-World War II era.”

If the foreign aid passes the Senate, as is expected, the House must still act. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) would likely face a rebellion from members of the Republican conference if he brought the bill to the floor.

Monday night, after the conclusion of the X Space, Johnson seemed to throw cold water on the Senate’s package, echoing earlier statements that Congress must address American border security first.

“In the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters,” a Johnson statement read. “America deserves better than the Senate’s status quo.”

The timing before Monday night’s vote is important, sending the message to any on-the-fence Republican senators that a vote on the unpopular aid package would imperil their political standing for legislation that will not become law.

Some Democrats have insisted they will use all the parliamentary tools at their disposal to bring the bill to the floor, although a path forward for the legislation in the House is unclear.

Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.

[welcometoqueer]

Can you help spread word of the No Kings Act?

Absolutely!

The No Kings Act was proposed by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in response to the right-wing Supreme Court’s ruling to provide Trump with “absolute immunity.”

This ruling would let Trump off the hook for any and all his criminal charges, making him a “king” above the law.

The No Kings Act would invalidate this ruling by saying the president of the United States does not have immunity for criminal actions. This legislation is necessary to preserve democracy by holding its offenders accountable.

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “The founders were explicit - no man in America shall be a king.”

In her dissenting opinion on the absolute immunity ruling, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, "In every use of official power, the president is now a king above the law." She added that she feared for our democracy.

Furthermore, President Biden has proposed an amendment to the Constitution to declare that “no one is above the law.”

Passing a constitutional amendment is difficult, it must be passed by two-thirds (2/3) of both houses of Congress as well as ratified by three-fourths (3/4) of state legislators, but it can be done with collective organizing and support.

Sign petitions and contact your representatives about the No Kings Act:

Read about it here:

Build support for a constitutional amendment against presidential immunity:

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Jack Elbaum

US Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) advised the Columbia University administration to “keep heads down” in response to criticism they faced for their handling of surging antisemitism on campus, according to a new report from the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce.

“Universities’ political problems are really only among Republicans,” Schumer reportedly said, suggesting Democrats did not have a problem with the way administrators were handling antisemitism on campus.

The report sparked backlash against Schumer because in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct 7. attack on Israel, in which the Palestinian terrorist group killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages, anti-Israel and oftentimes pro-terrorist activism exploded on college campuses across the US. In the weeks following last Oct. 7, dozens of videos of young people tearing down posters put up to cultivate awareness about the hostages went viral. Additionally, Students for Justice in Palestine chapters across the country came out in support of the terrorist attack, framing it as legitimate resistance.

When asked, Schumer and his staff indicated they did not believe it was necessary for the university’s leaders to meet with Republicans,” the congressional report stated.

One of Columbia’s board of trustees co-chairs, David Greenwald, wrote in a message to the school’s president that “if we are keeping our head down, maybe we shouldn’t meet with Republicans.”

The more than 300-page report found “a stunning lack of accountability by university leaders for students engaging in antisemitic harassment, assault, trespass, and destruction of school property.”

In a statement to the New York Post, Schumer spokesman Angelo Roefaro said the report was not accurate.

“Sen. Schumer regularly and forcefully condemned antisemitic acts at Columbia and elsewhere, saying ‘when protests shift to antisemitism, verbal abuse, intimidation, or glorification of Oct. 7 violence against Jewish people, that crosses the line.’ He conveyed this point publicly and to administrators privately,” Roefaro said.

He added, “It’s worthy to note here that Republicans are citing words from someone who is not Chuck Schumer. That is called hearsay.”

This incident reportedly occurred a few months into the Israel-Hamas war, and before “Gaza Solidarity Encampments” began to pop up on campuses across the country during the spring, and another wave of scrutiny followed.

The Algemeiner documented dozens of statements at Columbia just within the first week of the movement that were explicitly pro-terrorist.

Some encampments had to be forcefully removed after protesters got violent, invaded school buildings, and/or resisted the police when asked to disperse.

The response by universities to all of this was lackluster, claimed the report, which concluded that there was “a stunning lack of accountability by university leaders for students engaging in antisemitic harassment, assault, trespass, and destruction of school property.”

[aqlstar]

Throw back to that one time Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D, NY) claimed Hashem gave him his last name (from Hebrew Shomer- meaning guardian or keeper) because he was meant to be the shomer yisrael in Congress.

would be great if he would at least follow through on that unhinged claim and bring the Antisemitism Awareness Act to a vote.

[govtshutdown]

Senate Majority Leader Schumer set the rules for debate and Unanimous Consent of H.R. 9747, the Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025. Now the House just needs to pass it.

[darkeagleruins]

BORDER BILL BS: Both Kamala Harris and Tim Walz falsely blamed Trump for the failure of the so-called bipartisan border bill—a claim that doesn't hold up under scrutiny.

First, let's clear up the facts. The Senate border bill, drafted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) and Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), never even made it to the Senate floor for a vote. Why? Senate Democrats themselves voted against bringing it up for debate, effectively killing the bill. Some progressives were concerned the bill would empower border enforcement too much. Were Senate Democrats swayed by Trump's comments criticizing the bill, claiming it would speed up illegal immigration through better migrant processing? Highly unlikely.

Second, the House border bill, authored by Rep. Mark Green (R-TN) and Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), was more aggressive in its enforcement provisions. It passed in the House 219-213. But, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) refused to even bring H.R. 2 (Secure the Border Act of 2023) to a vote in the Senate, blocking its progress.

In reality, Senate Democrats were responsible for blocking both bills. While Trump opposed the Sinema-Tillis bill, it faced significant opposition from within the Democratic ranks, particularly progressives.

Trump had no control over Senate Democrats' decisions.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Sen. Sanders: ICC ‘right’ to seek arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Israeli defense official Gallant

Alexander Bolton at The Hill:

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders (I) on Monday defended the International Criminal Court (ICC) for seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant along with senior Hamas officials, breaking with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on the controversial issue. “The ICC prosecutor is right to take these actions. These arrest warrants may or may not be carried out, but it is imperative that the global community uphold international law,” Sanders said in a statement. “Without these standards of decency and morality, this planet may rapidly descend into anarchy, never-ending wars, and barbarism.” Sanders argued that Netanyahu’s regime has “waged an unprecedented war of destruction against the entire Palestinian people, which has killed or injured over 5 percent of the population.” He issued his statement at around the same time that Schumer denounced the ICC for seeking warrants to arrest Netanyahu, Gallant and three senior Hamas officials.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has the correct response to the ICC issuing arrest warrants to Israel leaders Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant and 3 senior Hamas leaders. This is in contrast to President Joe Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY)'s condemnatory attacks against the ICC decision.

[disasterhimbo]

Source

[ID: a quote tweet by Stephen Semler (@stephensemler) dated March 23, 2024. It is responding to a tweet by the Associated Press (@AP) that says, “BREAKING: Senate passes $1.2 trillion funding package in early morning vote, ending threat of partial shutdown.”

It says, “All but two Democratic senators just voted to:

-give Israel $3.8B in weapons, violating US law

-defund a UN inquiry into Israel's violations of international law

-defund UNRWA, worsening famine in Gaza

-sanction the UN Human Rights Council if it highlights Israeli abuses.”

It contains an image of only text showing who voted yea, who voted nay, and who abstained. 74 senators voted yea, including 47 democrats, 25 republicans, and 2 independents. 24 senators voted nay: all republicans except Senator Bennet (Democrat, Colorado), and Senator Sanders (Independent, Vermont). 2 Republican senators abstained. Full transcription of this image under the cut.]

Transcript of the image contained in the tweet:

“YEAS --- 74

Baldwin (D-WI)

Blumenthal (D-CT)

Booker (D-NJ)

Boozman (R-AR)

Britt (R-AL)

Brown (D-OH)

Butler (D-CA)

Cantwell (D-WA)

Capito (R-WV)

Cardin (D-MD)

Carper (D-DE)

Casey (D-PA)

Cassidy (R-LA)

Collins (R-ME)

Coons (D-DE)

Cornyn (R-TX)

Cortez Masto (D-NV)

Cotton (R-AR)

Cramer (R-ND)

Duckworth (D-IL)

Durbin (D-IL)

Ernst (R-IA)

Fetterman (D-PA)

Fischer (R-NE)

Gillibrand (D-NY)

Graham (R-SC)

Grassley (R-IA)

Hassan (D-NH)

Heinrich (D-NM)

Hickenlooper (D-CO)

Hirono (D-HI)

Hoeven (R-ND)

Hyde-Smith (R-MS)

Kaine (D-VA)

Kelly (D-AZ)

King (1-ME)

Klobuchar (D-MN)

Lujan (D-NM)

Manchin (D-WV)

Markey (D-MA)

McConnell (R-KY)

Menendez (D-NJ)

Merkley (D-OR)

Moran (R-KS)

Mullin (R-OK)

Murkowski (R-AK)

Murphy (D-CT)

Murray (D-WA)

Ossoff (D-GA)

Padilla (D-CA)

Peters (D-MI)

Reed (D-RI)

Romney (R-UT)

Rosen (D-NV)

Rounds (R-SD)

Schatz (D-HI)

Schumer (D-NY)

Shaheen (D-NH)

Sinema (I-AZ)

Smith (D-MN)

Stabenow (D-MI)

Sullivan (R-AK)

Tester (D-MT)

Thune (R-SD)

Tillis (R-NC)

Van Hollen (D-MD)

Warner (D-VA)

Warnock (D-GA)

Warren (D-MA)

Welch (D-VT)

Whitehouse (D-RI)

Wicker (R-MS)

Wyden (D-OR)

Young (R-IN)

(This is the end of the yeas.)

NAYS --- 24

Barrasso (R-WY)

Bennet (D-CO)

Blackburn (R-TN)

Budd (R-NC)

Crapo (R-ID)

Cruz (R-TX)

Daines (R-MT)

Hagerty (R-TN)

Hawley (R-MO)

Johnson (R-WI)

Kennedy (R-LA)

Lankford (R-OK)

Lee (R-UT)

Lummis (R-WY)

Marshall (R-KS)

Paul (R-KY)

Ricketts (R-NE)

Risch (R-ID)

Rubio (R-FL)

Sanders (I-VT)

Schmitt (R-MO)

Scott (R-SC)

Tuberville (R-AL)

Vance (R-OH)

(This is the end of the nays.)

Not Voting - 2

Braun (R-IN)

Scott (R-FL)”

(This is the end of the transcribed image.)

[bighermie]

Grill Gone Wrong: Elitist Chuck Schumer Deletes Father's Day Post After Embarrassing Raw Cheeseburger Photo | The Gateway Pundit | by Jim Hᴏft

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Mike Luckovich

* * * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

September 26, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Sep 27, 2024

Today, President Joe Biden signed the continuing resolution Congress passed yesterday to fund the government until December 20. The measure has none of the poison pills Trump and MAGA Republicans wanted, but it does add $231 million to the budget for the Secret Service to enhance its ability to protect presidential candidates. “This is a good outcome for the country. There will be no shutdown, because finally, at the end of the day, our Republican colleagues in the House decided to work with us,” Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said.

Congress will recess tomorrow as members head back home to campaign. Members will not return to Washington, D.C., until after the November 5 election.

Trump demanded that Republicans shut down the government unless the continuing resolution contained a measure requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, and the measure was widely seen as an attempt to suppress voting. Trump was unable to command Republican loyalty on this issue as he did earlier this year when he insisted Republicans kill the bipartisan border bill.

That recognition of his slipping power might have been behind his hastily announced press conference this afternoon at Trump Tower in New York, a press conference best described as the September 10 presidential debate 2.0. 

Trump reiterated his vision of the United States as a hellscape. He insisted that the nation’s booming economy is actually hemorrhaging jobs, that the FBI statistics showing crime falling are all lies, and that inflation, which has fallen close enough to the target of 2% that the Fed recently began to lower interest rates, is at an all-time high. 

Trump reserved his greatest rage for the ABC debate moderators who, he complained, fact-checked him after agreeing not to—“I want an apology,” he said—and for Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris. To her he attributed what he insists is a flood of undocumented immigrants drowning states in a welter of crime, although we know immigrants commit crimes at a lower rate than native born Americans. 

In words that sounded quite a bit like his advisor Stephen Miller, he recounted in some detail a number of horrific rapes he claimed were committed by immigrants. He did so apparently with no self-consciousness about his own liability for sexual assault that the presiding judge said would commonly be understood as rape, although his focus on rape could have been an attempt to push back on the recent spate of ads by conservative lawyer George Conway’s Anti-Psychopath PAC featuring woman who claim Trump sexually assaulted them.  

Trump had a number of reasons to melt down today. 

Special counsel Jack Smith filed with U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan his detailed report on the evidence he will use to prove that Trump broke the law when he tried to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Trump lawyers tried unsuccessfully to put this filing date off until after the election. The filing is sealed and includes previously unseen material, including interview and grand jury transcripts. Trump’s team can respond; its answer is due October 17.

The filing is clearly on Trump’s mind. This morning, he posted on social media that “Deep State subversives” had ignored his orders to prevent unrest on January 6, 2021. Then, in his press conference, Trump bizarrely suggested that he was not at fault for the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. The person to blame, he said, was then–House speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), whom he also accused of stock fraud. 

In his press conference, Trump again took Russian president Vladimir Putin’s side as he did yesterday in North Carolina, deploring the mounting deaths and the terrible destruction in Ukraine without mentioning that it is the Russian invasion that is causing that death and destruction. He claimed to be on the side of “humanity” in his desire to end the war, as he has suggested he would do as soon as he takes office in a second term, by permitting Putin to keep the land he wants.

This recalled Trump’s 2016 “Russia, if you’re listening,” statement asking Putin to hack Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s emails. We now know that Russian operatives helped Trump’s campaign in 2016 in part because of what Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort knew as the Mariupol Plan, which called for Trump to look the other way as Putin installed puppets in the oblasts of eastern Ukraine, permitting him to take through political manipulations the land that he ended up in February 2022 trying to take by force. 

Trump might also be concerned about money. After recently putting commemorative coins on the market, today he advertised Trump watches at prices from $499 to $100,000, although the fine print specified that the watches in the ad might not “be an exact representation of the final product.” 

The Commerce Department reported today that the country’s economic growth from April to June was a strong 3.1%, making the rate under Biden-Harris 3.2%, higher than the rate of economic growth the country enjoyed under Trump before the pandemic. Today, on the stock market, the S&P 500 hit another record high.

But stock in Trump Media & Technology Group, the parent of his Truth Social, has been falling and is now about 82% less valuable than it was in March when it debuted. Today a new regulatory filing showed that one of the biggest investors in the company has sold more than 7.5 million shares, or about 4% of the company’s outstanding shares. Trump owns about 60%.

Trump might want Russian help again because he is worried about losing the election. When reporters asked him today about whether he would continue to support the Republican North Carolina gubernatorial candidate, Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson—whose recently-revealed postings on a pornographic site included his declaration that he is a “black NAZI!”—Trump answered: “I don’t know the situation.” 

And this time around, it might be harder to find people and media outlets willing to lie about the election’s outcome. The highest court in Washington, D.C., disbarred Trump’s former ally Rudy Giuliani today because of his efforts to help Trump try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election; also today, the voting machine company Smartmatic settled its defamation case against Newsmax over the media company’s lies after that election. The trial was set to begin Monday. The terms of the settlement are not public.

But there was one bright spot for Trump today. For all MAGA Republicans have tried to convince people that individual Americans engage in voter fraud, there is the much bigger game of election fraud afoot.

North Carolina’s State Board of Elections announced in a press release that over the past 20 months they have removed 747,000 voters from the state’s list of registered voters. Officials said these voters either had moved or were inactive because they had not voted in the past two federal elections. The state has 7.7 million registered voters. Trump must win North Carolina to have a plausible chance at victory in 2024, but the Robinson scandal will hurt Republican turnout. In 2020, Trump won the state by about 75,000 votes. 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON