Politics

One of the most complex current issues in sports can be traced back to a track meet in Germany in 2009, when an unknown 18-year-old from South Africa blew away a field of the best female runners on the planet to win the world title. The teenager was hardly out of breath when she flexed her muscles at the end of it. What quickly became clear is that sports faced an unprecedented dilemma with the arrival of Caster Semenya. Caster Semenya sits in the European Court of Human Rights before its decision over sex eligibility rules in sports on July 10 in Strasbourg, eastern France. Now a two-time Olympic and three-time world champion in the 800 meters, the 34-year-old Semenya has been banned from competing in her favored event since 2019 by a set of rules that were crafted by track authorities because of her dominance. They say her natural testosterone level is much higher than the typical female range and should be medically reduced for her to compete fairly against other women. Semenya has refused to artificially alter her hormones and challenged the rules claiming discrimination at the Court of Arbitration for Sport court in Switzerland, then the Swiss Supreme Court and now the European Court of Human Rights. A ruling Thursday by the highest chamber of the European court — Semenya’s last legal avenue after losing at the other two — found that she was denied a fair hearing at the Swiss Supreme Court. It kept alive Semenya’s case and reignited a yearslong battle involving individual rights on one hand and the perception of fairness in sports on the other, with implications across the sporting world. A complex issue Semenya is not transgender and her case has sometimes been inaccurately conflated with that of transgender athletes. She was assigned female at birth, raised as a girl and has always identified as female. After years of secrecy because of medical confidentiality, it was made public in 2018 that she has one of a number of conditions known as differences of sex development, or DSDs. They are sometimes known as intersex conditions. Semenya was born with the typical male XY chromosome pattern and female physical traits. Her condition leads to her having testosterone levels that are higher than the typical female range. Caster Semenya competes in the Women’s 800m race during the Prefontaine Classic in Stanford, Calif., in June 2019. World Athletics, the track governing body, says that gives her an unfair, male-like advantage when racing against other women because of testosterone’s link to muscle mass and cardiovascular performance. It says Semenya and a relatively small number of other DSD athletes who emerged after her must suppress their testosterone to below a specific level to compete in women’s competitions. The case has transcended sports and reached Europe’s top rights court largely because of its core dispute: Semenya says the sports rules restrict the rights she has always known as a woman in every other facet of life and mean she can’t practice her profession. World Athletics has asserted that Semenya is “biologically male.” How the rules work Track and field’s regulations depend on the conclusion that higher testosterone gives rise to an athletic advantage, though that has been challenged in just one of the many complicated details of Semenya’s case. To follow the rules, DSD athletes must suppress their testosterone to below a threshold that World Athletics says will put them in the typical female range. Athletes do that by taking daily contraceptive pills or using hormone-blocking injections and it’s checked through regular blood tests. Track first introduced a version of its testosterone regulations in 2011 in response to Semenya and has made them stricter over the years. The current rules require athletes affected to reduce their testosterone for at least two years before competing and throughout competitions, effectively meaning elite DSD runners would be constantly on medication to stay eligible for the biggest events like the Olympics and world championships. That has troubled medical experts and ethicists, who have questioned the “off-label” use of birth control pills for the purpose of sports eligibility. Semenya is not alone While Semenya is the only athlete currently challenging the regulations, three other women who have won Olympic medals — Francine Niyonsaba of Burundi, Margaret Wambui of Kenya and Christine Mboma of Namibia — have also been sidelined by the rules. The issue came to a head at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, when Semenya, Niyonsaba and Wambui won the gold, silver and bronze medals in the 800 meters when the rules were temporarily suspended. Supporters of the ban cited that result as evidence they had an insurmountable advantage over other women. World Athletics is now considering a total ban on DSD athletes like Semenya. Its president, Sebastian Coe, said in 2023 that up to 13 women in elite track and field fell under the rules without naming them. What Thursday’s decision means Caster Semenya and her lawyers on July 10 after their partial victory at the European Court of Human Rights in her seven-year legal fight against track and field’s sex eligibility rules. Track’s DSD rules became a blueprint for other sports like swimming, another high-profile Olympic code that has regulations. Soccer is considering testosterone rules in women’s competitions. Sex eligibility is a burning issue for the International Olympic Committee and new president, Kirsty Coventry, who was elected in March. It was brought into urgent focus for the IOC after a sex eligibility scandal erupted at last year’s Paris Olympics over female boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan. Most sports will watch the direction of Semenya’s case closely as it is sent back to the Swiss Supreme Court, and possibly to sport’s highest court, even though that could take years. The ultimate outcome — whether a victory for Semenya or for World Athletics — would set a definitive precedent for sports because there has never been a case like it.

 Black Music Sunday is a weekly series highlighting all things Black music, with over 270 stories covering performers, genres, history, and more, each featuring its own vibrant soundtrack. I hope you’ll find some familiar tunes and perhaps an introduction to something new. Folks across the nation have been hit by sweltering heat waves this spring and summer, and my thoughts have turned to songs I grew up with, which, back then, never referenced climate change but did talk about heat and hot sun.  I’ll never forget the opening lyrics to “Under the Boardwalk,” sung by The Drifters in 1964:  Oh, when the sun beats down and burns the tar up on the roof And your shoes get so hot you wish your tired feet were fire proof Under the boardwalk, down by the sea, yeah On a blanket with my baby is where I’ll be… YouTube Video If you don’t know The Drifters’ history, Musician Guide has a complete biography written by Ronald D. Lankford Jr:  The Drifters held their ground as a premier doo wop and R&B band from the early 1950s until the mid-1960s, recording such unforgettable hits as “Some Kind of Wonderful” and “Under the Boardwalk.” “The Drifters are part of an … exclusive fraternity,” maintained Bruce Eder in All Music Guide, “as a group that managed to carve out a place for themselves in the R&B firmament and also define that music.” While lineup changes plagued the group throughout both decades, lead singers like Clyde McPhatter and Rudy Lewis, along with the production team at Atlantic Records, assured the Drifters’ continued success. Twenty-five of their 37 hits reached the top ten, and five topped the charts at number one. Innovations such as the string section the group used on “There Goes My Baby” influenced the soul sound developed by Phil Spector and Motown Records during the 1960s. Although hits stopped coming for the group after 1964, the Drifters continued to draw fans through performances in various combinations in England and the United States from the 1970s onward. “The Drifters are an institution,” noted Bill Millar in The Marshall Cavendish History of Popular Music. “Very few vocal groups have remained popular for more than 30 years, and in an area notable for its lack of consistency the Drifters’ longevity is almost without parallel.” The complex history of the Drifters can best be divided into two separate phases: the first begins with McPhatter’s leadership in 1953, and the second six years later when Ben E. King took over lead vocals. In the first stage, the band performed as a classic doo wop unit, incorporating harmonies from groups such as the Mills Brothers as well as from gospel. In the second stage, they performed as an R&B band, recording a series of pop hits that can still be heard on oldies radio stations. Interestingly, “Up on the Roof,” written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin in 1962, echoes “Under the Boardwalk.” I remember many a sweltering night when I lived in an old crumbling four-story walkup, un-air-conditioned apartment in a brownstone in East Harlem (aka Spanish Harlem) when we either had to sit out on the fire escape or head up to the roof to catch a breeze.  YouTube Video Bill Janovitz at All Music wrote: Carole King wrote the song with her former partner and husband, Gerry Goffin, soon after penning their first hit, “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” while working for impresario Don Kirshner at his Brill Building-like company, Aldon. Goffin’s lyrics are playful, wistful, and empathetic: “At night the stars put on a show for free/And, darling, you can share it all with me/I keep a-telling you/Right smack dab in the middle of town/I’ve found a paradise that’s trouble proof/And if this world starts getting you down/There’s room enough for two/Up on the roof.” Couldn’t resist posting one of my favorite “Up on the Roof” covers, which was recorded by the late great (my High School of Music and Art classmate) Laura Nyro.  YouTube Video When dealing with the heat waves criss-crossing the nation this summer, on my playlist is, of course, Martha and The Vandellas’ “Heat Wave,” which, though referencing a different kind of “heat,” has become an anthem for long hot summers.  YouTube Video The Michigan Legend Rock & Roll Hall of Fame reports: “Heat Wave” was the second single and the first Top Ten hit written for Martha & The Vandellas by Motown’s new writing and production team of Holland-Dozier-Holland. Produced with a gospel-like fervor, the song opens with a 27-second instrumental passage featuring handclaps, Joe Hunter’s piano, Thomas “Beans” Bowles sax, and the drumming of “Pistol” Allen.  “Heat Wave” is often credited as being one of the first songs to exemplify the style of music that would later be called the “Motown Sound”. “Heat Wave” is probably Martha Reeves greatest vocal performance, and it helped Martha & The Vandellas become the first Motown group to receive a Grammy Award Nomination for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group. Martha Reeves remembered watching the network news during the summer of 1963. “I was in my mom’s living room when the anchorman said, ‘There’s a heat wave in Los Angeles,’ it was a hundred and something and then they played “Heat Wave”. I jumped all over the floor. My mom told me to sit down and shut up! I screamed, ‘We’re on network TV! They’re playing our song!” This summer, we lost Sly Stone, who joined the ancestors on June 9, 2025. Our MOST-READ ARTICLES of June include our tribute to the late great Sly Stone by @tenelson65.bsky.social | Read more here: album.ink/SlyStone [image or embed] — Albumism (@albumism.com) June 30, 2025 at 11:01 PM I really appreciated reading Terry Nelson’s memories about his introduction to Sly in “Remember Who You Are: Celebrating Sly Stone’s Life & Legacy” at Albumism: I grew up in a household where Motown and Stax got the top billing, while Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra and Billie Holiday made frequent guest

PoliticusUSA can say what others won’t because we are 100% supported by readers like you. Please consider supporting PoliticusUSA by becoming a subscriber. Subscribe now It follows Donald Trump everywhere. It is in the shadows overhanging every moment of his return to the White House. Whether it is the Russia scandal, the attempted coup on 1/6, or Jeffrey Epstein, this president can’t outrun his past. The crisis that threatens to consume his return to the White House isn’t his TACO tariffs, the economy that the president is wrecking, the unpopular tax cuts for the rich, or his general lack of popularity. Trump’s decision to direct Attorney General Pam Bondi to bury information on the Jeffrey Epstein case has torn apart his administration and triggered what was an epic Trump meltdown on Truth Social. Trump posted: What’s going on with my “boys” and, in some cases, “gals?” They’re all going after Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is doing a FANTASTIC JOB! We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening. We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and “selfish people” are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein. For years, it’s Epstein, over and over again. Why are we giving publicity to Files written by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration, who conned the World with the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, 51 “Intelligence” Agents, “THE LAPTOP FROM HELL,” and more? They created the Epstein Files, just like they created the FAKE Hillary Clinton/Christopher Steele Dossier that they used on me, and now my so-called “friends” are playing right into their hands. Why didn’t these Radical Left Lunatics release the Epstein Files? If there was ANYTHING in there that could have hurt the MAGA Movement, why didn’t they use it? They haven’t even given up on the John F. Kennedy or Martin Luther King, Jr. Files. No matter how much success we have had, securing the Border, deporting Criminals, fixing the Economy, Energy Dominance, a Safer World where Iran will not have Nuclear Weapons, it’s never enough for some people. We are about to achieve more in 6 months than any other Administration has achieved in over 100 years, and we have so much more to do. We are saving our Country and, MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, which will continue to be our complete PRIORITY. The Left is imploding! Kash Patel, and the FBI, must be focused on investigating Voter Fraud, Political Corruption, ActBlue, The Rigged and Stolen Election of 2020, and arresting Thugs and Criminals, instead of spending month after month looking at nothing but the same old, Radical Left inspired Documents on Jeffrey Epstein. PoliticusUSA is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. LET PAM BONDI DO HER JOB — SHE’S GREAT! The 2020 Election was Rigged and Stolen, and they tried to do the same thing in 2024 — That’s what she is looking into as AG, and much more. One year ago our Country was DEAD, now it’s the “HOTTEST” Country anywhere in the World. Let’s keep it that way, and not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about. Thank you for your attention to this matter! MAGA has no influence over him. Trump views himself as the MAGA movement, as he put it elsewhere, MAGA is what he says it is. The president made it clear in his rant that Pam Bondi is doing what he directed her to do. Trump’s critics misunderstand his second presidency. Trump doesn’t care about being a fascist, or a dictator, or holding on to power forever. Trump’s drivers are greed and ego. Trump wants to destroy guardrails so that his ego can feel all powerful, and he can get as much money as he can. Trump’s second presidency is about erasing history. Trump wants to discredit the 2020 election because it makes him a loser. Trump has already tried to whitewash the 1/6 attack by pardoning criminals who tried to overthrow the government on his behalf, and he is having Pam Bondi fire anyone at the DOJ who worked on the cases against him. No matter what he does, Trump can’t rewrite history. The president’s own history follows him everywhere. Jeffrey Epstein is a ghost that continues to haunt Trump. He can’t make Epstein go away. It is fitting that a movement that was built on myth may fracture and end based on the facts of Trump’s own life. What do you think about Trump’s meltdown? Share your thoughts in the comments below. Subscribe now

Ideally, this interview would have been over breakfast at a diner in Omaha, and the local congressman, Don Bacon, would have ordered his namesake. He says he eats bacon two or three times a week when he’s in Nebraska; he likes it extra crispy and, if possible, prepared at home. “If you ask me for my favorite bacon, it’s Angie Bacon,” he told me this week, referring to his wife of 41 years. (Sadly, the congressman and I were speaking not over breakfast but by phone.) Angie enjoys having her husband in Nebraska for a number of reasons. One is that if he’s home, she’s less likely to sleep with a gun—something she resorted to when harassment and death threats got really intense a few years ago. These menaces have become progressively worse in recent years. Protesters showed up at the Bacon house during an Easter-egg hunt that he put on for his grandkids two years ago. County police were parked in the driveway. Eventually, the Bacons moved to another house, in a more remote location. But it all can get exhausting. The congressman was working 12- to 14-hour days, bouncing between Washington, D.C., and Omaha. “After the last election, I was on E. I had no gas in the tank,” he said. Bacon announced last week that he would not run for reelection in 2026. This was not a huge surprise. Bacon, who had spent 30 years in the Air Force before coming to Congress, in 2017, is one of the last remaining House Republicans who are not thrilled—and willing to say they are not thrilled—by the direction their party has taken since Donald Trump took it over. Bacon has been a rare GOP lawmaker willing to criticize Trump during a second presidential term that has otherwise been marked by acquiescence. After the Signalgate scandal, Bacon suggested that Trump should fire Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, whom Bacon dismissed as “an amateur.” He has also called Trump “very weak” in his approach to Russia. None of which makes for a savvy career move if you’re a Republican in these Trump-dominated times. For the likes of Don Bacon, quitting in disappointment has become a familiar endgame. We’ve seen this miniseries before: A Republican who considers themselves to be a traditional Reagan conservative vows to fight for their principles and beliefs. But when these principles and beliefs conflict with what Trump wants, things get complicated—and often unpleasant. Your party threatens to recruit a primary challenger. The president does not take kindly to you. His supporters say nasty things. And it all takes a toll. [Read: No one loves the bill (almost) every Republican voted for] Bacon, 61, is coming off of an especially high-stress period. He was considered something of a wild-card vote on the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the domestic-policy package that the president signed into law on July 4. It was not universally seen as beautiful, even among some who wound up voting for it, including Bacon. “To me, this bill was an 80–20–type bill,” Bacon said. He liked that the bill bolsters the military and protects the tax cuts that had passed during Trump’s first term. He did not like how the bill will explode the deficit and lead to Medicaid cuts. Ultimately, Bacon swallowed his reservations, voted yes, and decided to head home. Either you like bacon or you’re wrong, reads a sign in the representative’s Washington office, displayed not far from a prominent model pig. For the most part, House members from both parties seem to like Bacon, the colleague. They describe him as one of the few Republicans left in Washington who do not consider moderate or bipartisan dirty words. This has proved a winning position in Bacon’s swingy Second Congressional District of Nebraska. (Kamala Harris carried it by 4.6 points in 2024, making this the bluest district that a House Republican represents.) Still, Bacon’s relative independence has made him a bipartisan target. The MAGA contingent derides his RINO, or “Republican in name only,” apostasies, such as when he was the only GOP House member to vote against a bill to rechristen the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America.” (“I thought it was dumb,” he told me.) Democrats, meanwhile, have been eyeing Bacon’s district since he was first elected, in 2016. “Vulnerable House Republican” has effectively become part of his job title. After a three-term GOP mayor of Omaha was defeated in May by a Democrat, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries declared that the “Don Bacon retirement watch” had officially begun. Bacon told me that the nature of the threats he has received has changed. He used to get the hardest time from the far left, “the Bernie Sanders crowd,” he said. “They hate Trump so much, they don’t think straight.” But lately, threats have come more from the “dark MAGA guys.” As Bacon put it, “If you show any disagreement at all with Trump, you’re a traitor. It’s sort of strange.” [Read: What the next phase of Trump’s presidency will look like] Things became really ugly in late 2023, during the race to elect a new Republican House speaker. Representative Jim Jordan, the choleric conservative from Ohio, was the clear favorite of Trump and his House acolytes; Bacon was not kosher with this, and the abuse followed. “There’s, like, four people on social media, and they have a million followers,” Bacon told me. “And they are thugs.” He received 31,000 phone calls to his office during the speakership brawl, he said, plus texts and emails. Bacon continues to believe that “we’re just in a phase right now.” He is among the latest in a long line of departing Republicans who seem to think that the Reagan-vintage GOP will magically return when the phase—which has lasted about a decade—finally ends. “Maybe when President Trump’s term is over, we’ll see a readjustment,” he said. “Right now, what I think America wants is a little bit of normalcy.” Bacon told me that one

A cartoon by Clay Bennett. Related | Trump and Texas point fingers as flood death toll rises

A cartoon by Pedro Molina. Related | Musk’s anti-woke AI chatbot goes full Nazi—then gets shut off

A number of developments this week indicate that a blue wave may swell in the 2026 midterms. From Democrats landing top-tier recruits in critical races, to Republicans in competitive races retiring or forgoing bids, to the fact that President Donald Trump is desperately trying to rig House districts, sign after sign shows that the wind is at Democrats’ backs. First, former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina seems close to entering the Senate race following GOP Sen. Thom Tillis’ abrupt and unexpected retirement. Cooper, who left office after two terms with a positive approval rating, would perhaps be the best Democratic nominee in the race. His entrance into the contest would give Democrats an exceptional opportunity to pick up a critical Senate seat, bringing the party one step closer to taking control of the chamber.  GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina That’s especially true if Republicans nominate a wackadoodle, which they could very likely do as Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump seems poised to run—something Tillis is warning Republicans not to do. “This is going to be a tough race for someone. They need a good, solid, business, right-of-center conservative to match up against [Cooper],” Tillis told Washington Post reporter Patrick Svitek. Meanwhile, in Texas, former Democratic Rep. Collin Allred announced that he is running for the seat of Republican Sen. John Cornyn, who is struggling in a primary against scandal-torn Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. In fact, Paxton’s scandals grew this week, as his wife announced that she filed for divorce, citing “recent discoveries.” If Allred is up against Paxton, Republicans fear that Democrats could pick up the seat—so much so that they’re now trying to meddle in the Democratic primary. And Dan Osborn, an independent who surpassed expectations in a Nebraska Senate bid in 2024, announced that he is taking another swing at the race to possibly oust a GOP incumbent. Datawrapper Content On the flip side, GOP officials are retiring and the party is struggling to land top recruits in other key races—a telling sign as candidates often forgo bids when they expect that the political environment would be bad for their party. Aside from Tillis, GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska announced that he is retiring, and the nonpartisan Cook Political Report predicts that the seat will be a Democratic pickup with Bacon out of the race—putting Democrats one seat closer to the three needed to win the speaker’s gavel. In Pennsylvania, GOP Rep. Dan Meuser recently decided against challenging Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro in 2026, even though Trump offered to endorse Meuser. That’s not something a candidate does if they think they have a good shot at winning. Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia And earlier this year, GOP Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia said he would not try to oust Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in 2026—leaving Republicans without a top-tier recruit in the swing state. But perhaps the most obvious sign that Republicans don’t think 2026 will be great for their party is Trump himself forcing Texas to redraw its congressional maps to eke out more GOP seats—a desperate effort to offset losses in other parts of the country. Trump reportedly said that he thinks Republicans will lose the House and that gerrymandering House districts in Texas and Ohio could help him rig a different outcome. “It’s shameful that while Texans are still responding to the deadly and tragic floods, Governor Abbott, House Republicans, and Donald Trump are focusing their time and resources trying to push through new, rigged Congressional maps,” Democratic Rep. and DCCC Chair Suzan DelBene said in a statement.  “Republicans are running scared because they know the American people will reject them next year for their broken promises and failed agenda. They also know they cannot win fair and square, so they are trying once again to rig the maps,” she added. Ultimately, the 2026 midterms are a long way away. But pieces are falling into place showing that it could be a great year for Democrats.

“The rule of law must be upheld,” the lawsuit states. By Mitch Perry for The Florida Phoenix The five Democratic state lawmakers who were denied entrance to inspect the new immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades last week filed a lawsuit in the Florida Supreme Court against Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Department of Emergency (FDEM) Management Executive Director Kevin Guthrie on Thursday. They contend that their exclusion from the facility violated state law as well as the Florida Constitution by eroding the separation of powers and improperly restricting the authority of a co-equal branch of government. Related | Trump and cronies are giddy to trample human rights at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ State Sens. Shevrin Jones and Carlos Guillermo Smith and state Reps. Michele Rayner, Anna Eskamani, and Angie Nixon are the plaintiffs in the case. The five Democratic lawmakers attempted to enter the facility on July 3, but were denied entrance for what officials there claimed were “safety concerns” that the Democratic lawmakers say were never identified to them. Their attempt to visit the facility came two days after President Donald Trump, Gov. DeSantis, and several other state Republican officials held a tour and roundtable discussion at the center with members of the media. Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, Kristi Noem, and others tour “Alligator Alcatraz,” on July 1. Officials with FDEM said earlier this week that state statute grants inspection authority only to legislative committees, “not to individual legislators engaging in political theater.” They also said that while Florida Statute 944.23 does authorize members of the Legislature to visit state correctional institutions, they have to be those under the jurisdiction of the Florida Department of Corrections. “The Alligator Alcatraz facility is not under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections and does not otherwise fall within the statutory definition of a ‘state correctional institution,’” said FDEM spokesperson Stephanie Hartman, referring to the appellation given the facility by state leaders. During the roundtable discussion on July 1 when the facility was opened to the media, Gov. DeSantis described the detention center as a “one-stop shop” with a runway that will allow the federal government to carry out deportation flights. The governor used a state of emergency declaration he issued in January 2023 to take over and begin the speedy construction on the land Miami-Dade County owns. Related | Trump says he wants other states to build migrant detention centers after Florida tour The five Democrats allege in their lawsuit that under Florida Statutes 944.23 and 951.225, members of the Legislature are explicitly entitled to conduct unannounced visits to any state or local detention facility at their “pleasure.” They also contend that DeSantis and Guthrie undermined the State Emergency Management Act under which the governor derives his emergency powers. They are seeking a writ to compel DeSantis and Guthrie “to provide immediate, unannounced access to the Petitioners to the Dade-Collier Training & Transition Airport site of the proclaimed ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ detention facility.” The department announced on Wednesday that it will open the center for all state lawmakers and members of Congress this Saturday for a 90-minute visit. Reports of poor conditions The filing of the lawsuit followed news reports of poor conditions at the 3,000 person-capacity tent and trailer detention center. Multiple detainees told the Miami Herald and CBS News that they had gone days without showering, the toilets didn’t flush, and temperatures fluctuated between extremes. “The rule of law must be upheld,” the lawsuit states. “Our Constitution does not coronate a king. It is not hyperbolic to contend that the Governor’s actions, directly or indirectly through the actions of agency directors and their employees, could become more far reaching into the third branch of our government. Conjecture is not necessary at this moment because the distinctive and autonomous power of the legislative branch has and is being challenged by and through the executive branch. The blatant, illegal, and cavalier nature of violation of the Florida Constitution and statutory authority puts members of the legislative and judicial branches at risk if we, those sworn to protect and defend the Constitution and rule of law, do not speak out loudly and boldly against its trespasses and transgressors.” Related | Stephen Miller whines to Fox News over criticism of twisted migrant camp The lawsuit was filed by two Democratic members of the Florida House, attorneys Ashley Gantt and LaVon Bracy Davis. Along with Rep. Rayner, the three female Democratic lawmakers announced last month that they were forming their own law firm called BDGR P.A. Two environmental groups, Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity, have already gone to federal court to sue the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), FDEM, and Miami-Dade County alleging construction of the detention center violates a federal law that requires environmental analysis of potential harms and that the public did not get an opportunity to comment. The governor’s office responded late this afternoon to the filing of the lawsuit. Yesterday, the Florida Division of Emergency Management invited all Florida legislators to tour Alligator Alcatraz this weekend. Today, five Democrat legislators responded by filing a frivolous lawsuit demanding access to Alligator Alcatraz,” said Sierra Dean, deputy press secretary for Gov. DeSantis. “The State is looking forward to quickly dispensing with this dumb lawsuit.”

Two letters went out. One was a mistake. The other one explains how to ensure you can keep voting in state and local elections. By Jen Fifield for Votebeat Maricopa County voters who recently received letters from the Recorder’s Office about their registration status may be confused by the two separate mailings, including one that’s incorrect. But no matter what, they will need to act soon to make sure they are able to continue to vote in state and local elections. The Recorder’s Office sent the first letter in error to 83,000 voters, telling them the office had gotten notice they had moved out of state and they would be removed from the active voter rolls if they didn’t act. Flummoxed voters began receiving those mailings on June 26. The office then sent out the mailing that the voters were supposed to get, with an added explanation in bold at the top explaining that the initial mailing was a mistake. This letter told voters about how they would need to provide documentation proving their U.S. citizenship, because of a separate error that affected 200,000 voters statewide. Voters wait to cast their ballots in Arizona’s presidential primary election in Gilbert, Arizona, in March 2016. In Maricopa County these voters will have 90 days to respond with a birth certificate, passport or other document. If they do not, they will be classified as federal-only voters, and permitted to vote only in presidential and congressional races. The letters prompted widespread confusion among recipients and demands for an explanation. After the incorrect letter went out, average wait times at the county’s call center jumped from just seconds to 10 minutes or more for three days, and peaked at more than 40 minutes, according to data Votebeat obtained through public records requests. The Recorder’s Office did not make a public statement about the incorrect letters for more than a day after voters began to receive them, which meant public officials and residents searching for information from the office could not find any. Votebeat first reported the incorrect mailing on June 26, and many voters said that story provided the only information they were able to obtain. Many voters later told Votebeat that they believed the letter was a sign of something nefarious. “My wife and I both got one and thought someone had used info of ours from a data leak to take out fraudulent IDs,” said Shane Watson, of Phoenix. Kristopher Bliznick of Phoenix said he “thought it was some sort of voter suppression.” “I thought they were trying to passively push people off the voter rolls,” he said. Why some longtime Arizona voters are being asked to prove their citizenship The letters to voters are part of the effort underway in all Arizona counties to correct a state record-keeping error that was disclosed last summer. For 20 years, the state said, it had failed to collect documentary proof of U.S. citizenship for some voters when they first registered to vote or updated their registration after moving across county lines. About 200,000 voters, or roughly 5% of the state’s voter roll, were caught up in that error, including the 83,000 Maricopa County voters who received the letters from the Recorder’s Office. These voters are all longtime residents, and some have lived in Arizona and been registered to vote for decades. But because state law requires proof of citizenship to vote in state and local elections, these voters will now need to provide that proof to continue to vote a full ballot. Related | It’ll likely be harder to vote in this state, thanks to Trump’s election lies Federal law does not require documentary proof of citizenship. It requires voters to attest to their citizenship under penalty of perjury. Arizona voters who do not provide citizenship proof can still vote in federal elections, because they have already attested to their citizenship when registering to vote. What Maricopa County voters should do if they receive the letters In Maricopa County, the second letter — which is dated June 27 at the top — explains how affected voters can resolve the problem. The voters can use the return envelope provided to send back their name, address, and a copy of a document proving their citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport. The voters can also send the documentation by email to voterinfo@maricopa.gov, or bring the documentation to the Recorder’s Office at 301 W. Jefferson Street in Phoenix. Voters in other counties who have received similar letters should contact their recorder’s office to learn how to fix the problem. The Secretary of State’s Office initially provided a way for voters to check online whether they were on the list of affected voters, but isn’t doing that anymore. Voters who have questions about their record can contact their county recorder’s office. Why incorrect letters went out Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap and his staff at first blamed Complete Print Shop, a vendor the office hired to send the letters, for the incorrect mailing. The office said in its first statement that the vendor “has taken full responsibility for the mistake.” But emails first reported by 12 News on June 30 showed an employee of the Recorder’s Office had approved a proof of the incorrect letter. And in an email sent a few days after the error was uncovered, a Complete Print Shop employee told a county staff member looking into the issue that “the proof using the wrong template was sent and approved by the recorder office.” Nonetheless, the emails showed that Complete Print Shop said the mailing of the incorrect letter constituted a mistake on its part, and confirmed that it would mail a corrected letter at its own expense. After those emails were publicly released, Heap put out a second statement confirming that his office had erroneously approved the proof of the incorrect letter. Complete Print Shop did not respond to phone calls and emails requesting comment. Longtime voters outside of Maricopa County are also being asked to prove citizenship The 83,000 Maricopa County voters who received the

Injustice for All is a weekly series about how the Trump administration is trying to weaponize the justice system—and the people who are fighting back. Emil Bove, a high-level official at the Department of Justice who got that job as a reward for being President Donald Trump’s former criminal lawyer, is ready for his next act: a lifetime seat as a judge on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. So many allegations about Bove’s conduct would have torpedoed his nomination under any noncriminal president, but for Trump, Bove’s behavior is a feature, not a bug.  Last month, whistleblower Erez Reuveni, the DOJ attorney fired for refusing to sign court filings saying wrongly deported Maryland father Kilmar Abrego Garcia was a terrorist, revealed that Bove told DOJ lawyers that planes to El Salvador needed to take off no matter what and that they would need to weigh telling the courts “fuck you” and ignore a court order to the contrary.  Emil Bove When asked about this during his confirmation hearing, Bove dropped a whole I-am-but-a-simple-country-lawyer bit and said he simply couldn’t recall such a thing.  Sure, buddy.  Whistleblower emails released on Thursday show DOJ attorneys discussing—as it was happening—Bove’s wild demand to ignore court orders and let planeloads of deportees take off regardless. They even specifically referenced the “fuck you” comment.  If it didn’t seem bad enough that a federal judicial nominee thinks the government doesn’t have to follow orders, how about that same nominee refusing, in front of God and Congress and everyone, to rule out a third term for the guy who is nominating him? Or that he also refuses to denounce the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection helmed by the guy who has nominated.  It’s totally, definitely clear that Bove will bring an even temper, respect for judicial authority, and nonpartisan fairness to the bench, yesiree.  Fam, is it bad if El Salvador and the Trump Administration can’t get their stories straight about who is doing what? When the government was ordered to facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia, whom they mistakenly deported to El Salvador, they initially claimed they had no power to do so, because he was under the control of El Salvador. Then Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele did a gruesome little vaudeville routine with Trump in the Oval Office where they both said they couldn’t possibly have the power to bring Abrego Garcia home.  Of course, the administration did manage to bring Abrego Garcia home when they felt like it—but only after ginning up criminal charges against him. And for whatever reason, El Salvador no longer feels like playing along. It said in a court filing earlier this week that “the jurisdiction and legal responsibility for these persons lie exclusively with the competent foreign authorities.”  Judges are not happy with this little back-and-forth and want explanations, but the DOJ’s capacity to keep refusing is near-infinite.  Fam, is it bad if the head of the FBI is a thin-skinned paranoiac? As FBI Director Kash Patel rampages through his agency, he is now demanding polygraph tests for employees because he needs to find out who made fun of him. Dozens of officials have reportedly been asked to take polygraphs, though it isn’t clear if those are all related to Patel’s fragile ego. Patel is on the hunt to find the leaker who told the media about Patel’s goofy demand for a service weapon so he could play at being an agent. Patel’s craving for absolute loyalty is so great that he threatened a top official with a polygraph simply because he was friends with former FBI agent Peter Strzok, an obsession for Trump after the former agent criticized him in some texts.  Officials are also being questioned about whether they have ever said anything negative about Patel. Come on, man. This is just pathetic. You’d think the FBI would have something better to do, but the agency is busy disintegrating over the so-called Epstein files right now, so Patel probably has some free time. Fam, is it good if the party of small government wants to see your private medical records? Continuing its transphobic full-court press, the Department of Justice is demanding private patient data from hospitals and doctors that provide gender-affirming care to minors. Surely, there’s no danger in turning over the private medical records of trans kids to this administration, right?  Transgender rights supporters The DOJ’s subpoena of over 20 providers is both an attempt to intimidate those providers and to figure out a way to access confidential medical information in states that have passed laws protecting that data from being used in nightmare witch hunts just like this.  The DOJ’s consumer protection unit appears to be conducting the investigation, which appears to be the way the administration thinks it can access private medical records: Gotta figure out if these monstrous doctors have been lying to turn kids trans.  This fixation on gender-affirming care being some sort of fraud isn’t limited to the DOJ. The Federal Trade Commission just held its daylong invite-only workshop about how providing gender-affirming care is somehow fraud. Apparently, during the workshop, a DOJ official said that the agencies are investigating drug manufacturers for possibly violating drug marketing laws by prescribing them for gender-affirming care. Terrific.  Fam, is it bad if your lawyers get sanctioned for using fake cases? If you’re Mike Lindell, then the answer to the above is yes, yes indeed. During Lindell’s recent Colorado trial, he was sued for defamation by former Dominion employee Eric Coomer over his wild allegations that Coomer somehow used Dominion machines to rig the 2020 election.  Lindell lost that case, and it turns out that his lawyers are each losing $3,000 for filing a court document chock-full of mistakes, including cases entirely made up by AI. The judge in Lindell’s trial was understandably not thrilled with this move, and to be honest $3,000 is a pretty light punishment.  But since Lindell has had quite a bit of trouble actually paying his lawyers