Over/under @ 70.5 - Need I say again....Easy Money....

Jeff went out to shoot basketball practice. USC opens its season MONDAY in Las Vegas. Always comes quicker than expected.

Jim Jordan’s bid for speaker didn’t work out, but that gives him more time for his favorite congressional hobby: investigating investigations.


Nov. 1, 2023, 8:15 AM CDT
By Steve Benen

It’s been nearly three months since Politico reported that Washington D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb had launched an investigation into Leonard Leo and his network of non-profit groups. The reporting, which has not been independently verified by MSNBC or NBC News, added:

The scope of the investigation is unclear. But it comes after POLITICO reported in March that one of Leo’s nonprofits — registered as a charity — paid his for-profit company tens of millions of dollars in the two years since he joined the company. A few weeks later, a progressive watchdog group filed a complaint with the D.C. attorney general and the IRS requesting a probe into what services were provided and whether Leo was in violation of laws against using charities for personal enrichment.

Click to expand...

There’s been little in the way of public disclosures since, but it appears some in Congress want to know more about the probe. The Hill reported this week:

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) launched a probe Monday into a D.C. investigation of a conservative judicial activist. The two Republicans sent a letter to Washington, D.C., Attorney General Brian Schwalb to demand answers on his investigation into Leonard Leo....

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All things considered, it’s not too surprising to see Jordan and Comer intervene in the ongoing case (if there’s an ongoing case). On the contrary, it would’ve been far more astonishing if they didn’t — because if there’s one thing House Republicans, especially Jordan, like to do, it’s investigate investigations.

Circling back to our earlier coverage, it looks like it’s time to update the big list:

• The GOP found the investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia scandal to be problematic, so Republicans investigated the investigation.
• The party didn’t care that Hillary Clinton was cleared in her email controversy, so Republicans endorsed investigating the investigation.
• Much of the party opposed the bipartisan investigation into the Jan. 6 attack, so Republicans are investigating the investigation.
• Jordan and his cohorts were outraged by the former president’s indictment in New York, so they launched an investigation into the investigation.
• Jordan and his cohorts were also outraged by the former president’s indictment in Georgia, so they launched an investigation into the investigation.
• Congressional Republicans are incensed by special counsel Jack Smith’s probe, so the party is investigating the investigation.
• GOP officials have all kinds of concerns about Hunter Biden’s case, so the party is investigating the investigation.

The bad news for Jordan is that his bid for House speaker fell far short. The good news for the Ohio Republican that he can redirect his energies into his favorite congressional hobby.

Any thoughts?

What has led to Eric Gentry's inconsistent playing time and what did he need to show to get more opportunity?

"He played well, he was very impactful in the game the other day. So his good plays are really, really good. He had a couple of mistakes that he needs to be cleaner on. But you certainly, you can’t deny the impact that he’s made. Um, inconsistent snap counts, I think early in the year, he missed all of spring ball and he essentially missed all of camp so he was really, really rusty to begin the year, which is to be understood so getting back healthy, hadn’t played football in a while, you could tell early, he’s physically gotten better, i think gotten more confidence in the injury, is kind of making less mistakes and he’s been pretty consistent for us the last couple of weeks, which has been good. But like a lot of our guys, he made a lot of huge, impactful plays the other day, I mean, some unbelievable plays, but the inconsistent snap counts before have been because of a combination of injury and staying mentally focused and not making some of the mistakes that hurt you and keep you from playing at the level that you want to play. And so excited about how he played and would expect that’s a performance he can build on and I think the end goal for him and all of our guys is to be able to make the impactful plays like he made last Saturday and then also do it playing a clean brand of football and that’s obviously what we’re striving to for him and everybody else on this team."

What is your coaching point with Caleb Williams on deciding when to hold onto the ball looking for plays vs. running with it?

"Yeah, I think that’s a constant battle for a QB. I think you can be Tom Brady and have played for 30 years and still, you go through that because you’re having to make split second decisions. These decisions have to happen so quickly and the reality is there’s a lot that goes into them. What’s happening on that play, being able to diagnose it, the game situation, and you’re going to make some mistakes there. It happens so fast and I think for him, it’s like all QBs, I think you’re going back after, you diagnose the situation, you learn from it. I think if there are situations that come up in games, which there are several, where there’s some where hey, you gotta really err on the side of throwing it away, there’s some where you really gotta err on the side of, if you have some – if you see an opportunity of taking that shot to go make a play, you have to be able to identify those and kind of know that ahead of time and yeah, it’s just – it’s a constant battle because every game’s different, every situation’s different, every single play is different. So yeah, I think he’s overall done a good job of that. It’s like anything else in sports, that’s just a constant battle. The day you stop having to make those decisions is the day you’re not playing the position anymore. So I'm glad he’s got a mentality of wanting to continue to improve on it, we’re just going to keep working and I think it’s been overall a pretty good strength for him in his career and obviously will be important for us here down the stretch."

What is Max Williams' status?

"Max is doing well. He’s definitely improved. Has not been a full participant this week but has been able to do a little bit more than he was last week so we’re hopeful to have him available in some capacity with Zion’s injury. But he’s not to the point today where we would say yeah, he’s for sure going to be able to participate. So hopefully he can make some progress and even if not in a full capacity, be able to help us a little, but the next 48 hours will tell the tale."

You talked in the offseason about getting more involved with the defense. How has that manifested?

"I definitely took a more active role certainly in the offseason, no question about that. In-season, I’ve probably spent a little bit more time there than I did this time last year, just some of the continuity on offense and some of the offensive staff and all that. I certainly spend more of my time to be ready to call the offense, so of course spend most of my time there, but yeah, the communication has been good. Yeah, I mean, I’m one – it’s always a fine line for a head coach. You’ve got people in positions, and you have to do your part to oversee, to supervise, to offer support, offer guidance when you deem necessary. But you certainly, whether it’s players out there making plays or staff members, you have to trust them to do their job well, too. I’m excited about this week. Really fired up about how we played there in the second half, in the fourth quarter. We’ve got a chance right now where if we win this game, we’re in first place in the best conference in America. So we’re gonna try to do our job really good this week and win this game, and here we go.

What have you seen from Zachariah Branch's progress as a receiver?

"His role in the next few weeks, we’ll see. I think he’s developed. He has. He came in fairly polished, I think, from a high school receiver standpoint. There’s still some things technically that he’s learning. He’s doing a lot of good things. He’s a smart kid. He really wants to be a good player. So I think he has improved a lot, and he’s going to continue to improve. There was a little rust after missing the time that he did there midseason. And it felt like he’s started to knock that back off a little bit and maybe head into a little better form on the offensive standpoint. He's growing. He’s learning. Kind of like the question with Eric Gentry. Guys like that, you know are going to have a chance to make plays. Sometimes for those guys, it’s less about the big plays to make than are they offsetting that with a number of mistakes, mistakes that can hurt you as much as they can help you. That’s been the fight with him. He’s doing a good job. He’ progressing. His route speed, learning to set guys up by being where he needs to be in the right spot, which is very important in our offense, that knowledge is growing. Like any player, if he continues to play more consistent, he’ll have an opportunity for that role to continue to expand."

What do you like about Washington's offense and have you taken away from the games where they've been kept in check more?

"They’re a really good group. The quarterback has really good command of what they’re doing, and you can tell he and their staff are really in sync. He’s really decisive with the ball. He’s not much of a runner, so he does a good job of getting the ball out of his hands and playing to his and their strengths, which is getting the ball to the talented playmakers that they have. They’ve got some guys out there that are obviously capable of making good plays. They do a good job, just enough with motions and shifts to change the picture formationally to stretch defenses. So they’re good. They have good players and a good scheme and have done a really nice job. The teams that have slowed them down, the biggest thing we’ve seen is being able to limit some of the big plays. They’re a group that, like most offenses, they thrive on being able to make explosive plays. So I think limiting the big plays, then making your share of competitive plays against them. I think watching them, and again, I don’t know that it’s necessarily specific to them, but when they do make mistakes, you gotta make them pay for it. Then you gotta try to limit the big plays because they are very capable and have had a lot of games where they’ve hit a ton of big plays. And so, I think those are the keys, capitalizing on those windows of opportunity and then winning those competitive plays. They put you in those positions. They’re smart about it. You’ve got to go win your battles. We’ve seen a little bit of it on tape, but obviously got a really good group."

Major landlords nationwide are effectively colluding to keep rents high, D.C.'s attorney general argues in a new lawsuit.

How it works: The companies that manage large apartment buildings in the D.C. area — and many other cities — all use the same software to set their rents, Axios' April Rubin writes.

• The software, RealPage, estimates supply and demand, collects demographic information and spits out a rental price to maximize landlords' revenues.
• RealPage said in 2020 that its software served more than a third of all rental units nationwide.

D.C.'s lawsuit argues that this amounts to a "cartel" in which buildings that ought to be competing for renters are instead all feeding into a system that keeps rents high.

• RealPage is facing similar lawsuits in other states and is also under scrutiny from the Justice Department.

The other side: RealPage will "vigorously defend" itself in court, said Jennifer Bowcock, the company's SVP for communications. She said the lawsuit is wrong in its facts and application of the law.

U.S. Concerned Russia’s Wagner Group Could Send Air Defenses to Hezbollah: (I'm telling you, this whole war is all Russia's doing)​

AJ McDougall​

Breaking News Reporter
Published Nov. 02, 2023 3:49PM EDT

Marwan Naamani/AFP via Getty Images​

The Wagner Group, the notorious Russian mercenary organization, may be circling a plan to send an air-defense system to Hezbollah as it engages in fierce clashes along the border it shares with Israel, according to The Wall Street Journal. Intelligence collected by the U.S. has not suggested that the system, an SA-22, has been sent to the Lebanese militia, but officials monitoring conversations between the two groups have characterized potential delivery as what the Journal called a “major concern.”

Hezbollah has thus far appeared reluctant to involve itself in a full-scale war, but the system—which uses both antiaircraft missiles and air-defense guns—could lead it to reconsider opening a northern front. Its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, is expected to speak publicly on Friday, his first remarks since the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas. That speech, the Journal reported, may indicate whether or not Hezbollah plans to fully enter the conflict.

Suspects in Star of David Tagging Say They Had Orders From Russia​

ALARMING

Allison Quinn​

News Editor
Published Nov. 02, 2023 11:55AM EDT

Lucien Libert/Reuters​

A Moldovan couple arrested for allegedly spray-painting Stars of David on a Paris school last week reportedly told investigators they were acting on orders from an “individual in Russia.”

The 33-year-old man and 29-year-old woman were taken into custody after a witness reported seeing them “tagging a blue star” on the building, one of several such acts of vandalism in the French capital in recent days. According to Europe 1, when questioned, the pair “declared that they had committed this offense on the orders of a third party.” No further details were immediately available on the unidentified Russian individual, and it wasn’t clear if the couple tagged more than one building. Local authorities said approximately 60 of the Jewish symbols were drawn on buildings throughout Paris, in what the mayor described as “despicable acts” of antisemitism.

House Speaker Mike Johnson’s first significant legislative endeavor is offering timely evidence that the GOP congressman isn’t good at arithmetic.


Nov. 2, 2023, 7:42 AM CDT
By Steve Benen

House Speaker Mike Johnson’s first big piece of legislation could’ve been easy. The Louisiana Republican and his GOP leadership team were eager to move an aid bill related to the Israel-Hamas war, and it appeared likely to advance with a fair amount of bipartisan support.

But the new House leader decided that wouldn’t quite be good enough. Instead, Johnson said he wanted to “offset” the costs of the $14.3 billion emergency funding package by cutting an equal amount from the Internal Revenue Service. The goal, Johnson said, was to prevent increasing the budget deficit.

It fell to the Congressional Budget Office to remind the new speaker that he got the arithmetic backward: The bill would add $26.8 billion to the deficit.

As NBC News reported, Johnson didn’t respond especially well to the news.

Johnson said Wednesday he was “not surprised at all” by the CBO score that showed the legislation adding billions to the deficit. “Only in Washington when you cut spending do they call it an increase in the deficit,” Johnson said.

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We’ll probably never know for sure, but I’d love to know whether the House speaker genuinely doesn’t understand budget arithmetic, or if he was just pretending to be foolish.

I can appreciate the fact that the federal budget and the congressional appropriations process can be complex, but in this instance, the math is relatively simple. The IRS collects money for the federal government. The more Congress cuts funding for the IRS, the less the IRS will collect for Congress to spend.

It’s precisely why cutting spending on enforcing tax laws ends up costing more, not less. It’s really not that complicated.

What’s more, the $26.8 billion figure is a conservative estimate. IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel added that if the Republicans’ bill were to pass, it would actually cost American taxpayers closer to $90 billion.

As a result, Johnson’s preferred budget “offset” wouldn’t actually offset the costs; it would do the opposite.
What we’re left with is a straightforward dynamic in which House Republicans have effectively declared, “We’ll assist Israel, but only if we can undermine federal law enforcement and help tax cheats in a way that makes the budget deficit bigger.”

Johnson’s first significant legislative endeavor is offering timely evidence that the GOP congressman isn’t good at math. His bill is nevertheless likely to get a floor vote this week. Watch this space.

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Republican Senators Angrily Turn on Tuberville’s Military Blockade​

‘100% WRONG’

Dan Ladden-Hall​

News Correspondent
Published Nov. 02, 2023 6:36AM EDT

Jonathan Ernst/Reuters​

Republican senators’ patience finally snapped on Wednesday night over Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s protest against the Pentagon’s policy on abortion for service members. Since February, the Alabama conservative has blocked routine military promotions over a Department of Defense policy reimbursing travel costs for troops seeking an abortion outside of the state where they’re stationed.

On Wednesday night, several Republicans including Sens. Dan Sullivan, Lindsey Graham, and Joni Ernst enjoined Tuberville to end the deadlock in the interest of national security. They sought to force the issue by proposing votes on the Senate floor on individual officers whose promotions have stalled in the backlog, but Tuberville objected to each one.

“Xi Jinping is loving this,” Sullivan said at one stage. “So is Putin. How dumb can we be, man?” Sullivan also said Tuberville is “100 percent wrong.” Graham noted that Tuberville blocked one advancement for a service member who had “zero” to do with the abortion policy. “You just denied this lady a promotion,” Graham thundered. “You did that.”

Republicans are capitalizing on Israel aid to reward the ultra-rich​

New House Speaker Mike Johnson’s first proposal to cut spending is a farce.

Nov. 1, 2023, 3:47 PM CDT
By Zeeshan Aleem, MSNBC Opinion Writer/Editor

President Joe Biden called for an international aid package last week that would provide billions of dollars in support to Israel and Ukraine. This week, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., proposed a counteroffer, narrowing the aid to $14 billion to Israel alone. And he threw in a condition ostensibly meant to satisfy Republicans’ alleged concern about the national debt: The bill would be financed by cutting the same amount of money from the IRS budget.

Johnson has blessed us with one of those moments that makes Republicans’ deviousness over “concerns about the national debt” crystal clear to the public. Robbing the IRS of money needed to make it more efficient will not help reduce the debt, it’ll increase it. What the move reveals is that Johnson is desperate to exploit the hot-button issue of Israel to shoehorn in a favor for the GOP’s high-income and corporate donors.

Johnson’s approach to his first major legislative maneuver as the new leader of an unruly caucus is minimalistic. In a bid to avoid defections over aid to Ukraine, which a number of right-wing nationalist House Republicans oppose, he has focused on support for Israel — an initiative with widespread support in both parties. (Although in the process, he could lose Democrats and Republicans in the upper chamber who consider Ukraine aid vital.) But because his caucus approaches every legislative opportunity like a hostage negotiation, Johnson is trying to notch a putative win with the IRS cuts — and in the process is telling the world what the GOP really cares about.

According to The Washington Post, the proposed cuts to the IRS would cut back the agency’s expansion under the Inflation Reduction Act and would target “increased enforcement and a new online portal to allow taxpayers to file their taxes for free directly with the government.” There are two clear beneficiaries of those cuts: rich tax cheats, and corporations that make money off the IRS’ arcane filing system.

Republicans have tried to portray Biden’s attempts to reform the IRS with increased enforcement (among other things) as an attempt to soak and surveil ordinary Americans. But increased tax enforcement is increasing audits of people making more than $400,000 a year, and is generating greater scrutiny of exceptionally high-income people whose finances are more complicated, and who can afford to hire help to find loopholes in the tax code. Meanwhile, axing funding for the new portal for free filing increases the likelihood that Americans will continue to have to pay to use services like TurboTax to file their taxes.


Fewer resources for enforcement means that the IRS will lose out on money that’s owed to the government. It’s the last place a person sincerely concerned about the debt would turn for cuts. “Paying for new spending by defunding tax enforcement is worse than not paying for it at all. Instead of costing $14 billion, the House bill will add upward of $30 billion to the debt. Instead of avoiding new borrowing, this plan doubles down on it,” said Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. “Funding the IRS to reduce the tax gap has a long history of bipartisan support and has been proposed by every President from Reagan through Biden. It is one of the few ways to raise revenue without raising taxes.” The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the cuts would add $12.5 billion to the deficit in the next decade.

There’s little chance these numbers (or basic logic) will deter Johnson, since reducing debt is simply a shoddy disguise for an effort to advance a plutocratic agenda. The bigger issue for him is that the bill is already receiving criticism from both parties in the Senate. Among other things, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell wants Ukraine in the bill, and Democrats have said the IRS cuts are unacceptable. Since Republicans were able to get Democrats to agree to $20 billion in IRS cuts as part of the debt ceiling deal earlier this year, they’re banking on being able to prevail on that front again by attaching more cuts to top-tier foreign policy goals. When asked to react to the CBO’s estimates, Johnson told reporters, “Only in Washington when you cut spending, do they call it an increase in the deficit.” Johnson surely knows that you can’t spend money that hasn’t been collected.

Open this link to find out what new requirements your State has.

New Republican House speaker falls on his face with brazen misstep

Newly crowned House Speaker and annoying hall monitor everyone still remembers from elementary school Mike Johnson is having a hard time defending his emergency aid scheme for Israel, which Republicans are insisting must be paid for by...stripping billions in funding meant to help the IRS catch wealthy tax cheats. "We must defend Israel (and protect and further enrich our billionaire donors) at all costs!" Funny how that works.

A white supremacist group bought up land in rural Maine for a headquarters. Months after their location was revealed, they’ve sold the property.

Kelly Weill​

Reporter
Updated Nov. 01, 2023 5:04PM EDT / Published Nov. 01, 2023 3:08PM EDT



A Maine neo-Nazi is pulling up stakes on his planned white supremacist compound, after pressure from locals resulted in his ban from a local gym, and his friend’s ban from AirBnB.

Christopher Pohlhaus is the founder of the fascist group “Blood Tribe,” which has held small hate rallies harassing minority groups across the country. Alongside those attention-seeking rallies, Pohlhaus has also advertised a property in rural Maine as a future headquarters for his Nazis. But Mainers were none too thrilled about their new neighbors, The Daily Beast reported this year. Now, after local opposition, Pohlhaus has sold the property, the Bangor Daily News first reported on Tuesday.

Pohlhaus did not return a request for comment. But on Telegram on Tuesday night, he blamed the political left for spoiling his plans.

“We made the decision to sell the 10 acres that was in my name up here,” he wrote. “With the militant leftist doxing the location, it was basically too dangerous to fulfill its purpose to be a safe space for families to make the transition up here. People were coming up there all the time, snooping and getting very brazen, even driving down into the clearing.”

But Maine lawmakers had previously warned that the compound’s residents posed a potential risk to locals. “We have a problem with Nazis coming to set up a military-style camp,” Maine State Sen. Joe Baldacci told The Daily Beast in August, noting that he was proposing a law like one on the books in Vermont, where paramilitary-style training facilities are banned.

And it wasn’t just “militant leftists” who declared Pohlhaus’s crowd persona non grata in Maine. Local businesses also gave him the boot.

A Planet Fitness gym banned Pohlhaus from its facilities this summer, citing “multiple member complaints about the t-shirt you have been wearing and some of your visible tattoos.” Among those tattoos was a large swastika.

One of Pohlhaus’ associates was also banned from listing her property on Airbnb this fall after the company learned that Pohlhaus had stayed and worked at the property while customers were also staying there. The bed-and-breakfast owner came to locals’ attention after she wrote an op-ed in a newspaper defending Pohlhaus’ swastika tattoo and condemning his Planet Fitness ban.

“First of all I am not a Nazi sympathizer or supporter but I still thought this country allowed people to have different opinions without being accused or cancelled,” she wrote.

On Telegram, Pohlhaus claimed he had other, larger properties in Maine, and that if he attempted the project again, he would not buy land under his own name. (His purchase of the property under his legal name tipped off the Southern Poverty Law Center to the encampment this summer.)

“You could call it a leftist W [win] I guess, but really, it’s not slowing us down at all in the slightest,” he claimed.

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Proof 👇

As requested, here is a collection of all the links to our 2019 USC Next Up series, profiling the Trojans' newcomers. We still have a few more stories to roll out, time allowing, but here's what we've produced so far.

-Late USC recruiting pickup Dorian Hewett now poised to make early contribution at CB

-USC CB Adonis Otey: 'Now that I've got the opportunity, I can't fail'

-Physical transformation teases future potential for USC's Tuasivi Nomura

-Two-sport prospect Drake London has bright future, big decision ahead

-Overshadowed in recruiting, WR Munir McClain already impressing at USC

-Why Kenan Christon and his record-setting speed can be 'elite' at USC

-4-star TE Jude Wolfe one to watch in camp after 'all in' path to USC

-Jason Rodriguez appreciates significance of wearing Anthony Munoz's No. 77

-DE Drake Jackson's USC arrival 'the way it was supposed to be'

-QB Kedon Slovis deflected doubters in embracing competition at USC

-Inside Max Williams' lifetime pursuit to USC debut

-Inside Nick Figueroa's 'crazy journey' to USC

Goin in-depth on USC's high-profile transfer additions

-CB Chris Steele goes in-depth on how he found his way back to USC

-The bond between USC's Bru McCoy, JT Daniels and Amon-Ra St. Brown

The lawsuit alleges Trump violated his oath of office in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, leading up to the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.

Oct. 30, 2023, 8:07 AM CDT / Updated Oct. 30, 2023, 1:15 PM CDT
By Summer Concepcion

A Denver court began hearing arguments Monday in a lawsuit seeking to bar former President Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 ballot over his role in the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021.

The trial comes after Colorado Judge Sarah Wallace last week rejected the latest attempt by Trump to toss the lawsuit, which was filed on behalf of six voters in Denver district court last month.

The lawsuit argues Trump should be prohibited from running in future elections, citing Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which states no person may hold office if they “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” after swearing under oath to support and defend the Constitution. The suit alleges Trump violated his oath of office in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The lawsuit was filed by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and several law firms on behalf of six Republican and unaffiliated voters.

Eric Olson, a lawyer for CREW, began the hearing by describing Trump’s conduct in the days leading up to Jan. 6, including a tweet in December 2020 telling his supporters that there would be a rally in Washington, D.C. Olson said Trump had repeatedly talked about Jan. 6 and argued that he riled up his supporters by encouraging them to come to D.C. that day while pushing false claims of election fraud.

Olson played a video clip of Trump’s speech on the Ellipse the morning of Jan. 6 that included a part when the then-president said “let’s walk down to the Capitol.” He argued that Trump “knew the power of his words” and that his speech agitated his supporters.

Olson also pointed to a tweet Trump posted shortly after the conclusion of his speech on the Ellipse that attacked then-Vice President Mike Pence for what he described as not having “the courage to do what he should have done.” He then played a clip showing the mob of Trump supporters outside the Capitol shouting: “Hang Mike Pence.”

“We are here because Trump claims, after all that, that he has the right to be president again,” Olson said. “But our Constitution, the shared charter of our nation, says he cannot do so.”

Scott Gessler, a lawyer for Trump, decried the lawsuit as “antidemocratic” and characterized Monday's hearing as "politicized" in opening arguments. He insisted that Trump had used the word “peace” several times during his speech on the Ellipse on Jan. 6 and in tweets that day. He argued that the lawsuit is an effort to get the court to endorse the report by the Jan. 6 Committee, which he described as a “one-sided poisonous report.”

A lawsuit seeks to remove Donald Trump from the ballot in Colorado.Dave Sanders / The New York Times / Bloomberg via Getty Images

Gessler said the defense will present evidence showing Trump took precautions on Jan. 6 to avoid violence and that the rally outside the Capitol was “peaceful.”

“We should allow only real evidence that’s subject to cross examination” rather than the Jan. 6 report “with little to no credibility,” Gessler said.

Grant Sullivan, a lawyer representing Colorado’s Democratic secretary of state, Jena Griswold, said she won’t offer any evidence in the case and doesn’t have any direct evidence on whether Trump engaged in insurrection. However, Griswold would make her deputy elections director available to testify on how her office administers state election law, Sullivan said.

Metropolitan Police Department Officer Daniel Hodges took the stand to testify about his harrowing experience as the Capitol attack unfolded. He recalled seeing Capitol rioters wearing tactical gear, which he said made him “very uncomfortable.” He testified that he sustained multiple injuries as rioters stormed the Capitol, including bruises on his body, a large contusion on his head, lacerations on his face, bleeding in his mouth, and said a rioter attempted to gouge his eye out. He said he remembers rioters chanting that the “election was stolen” and to “fight for Trump” as they scolded law enforcement for being “on the wrong side of history.”

Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., testified remotely that Trump made clear before the 2020 election that he wouldn’t accept the results if he lost, and that the then-president proceeded to ramp up his rhetoric after lawsuits challenging the results were dismissed.

Swalwell recalled lawmakers becoming increasingly concerned when Trump said “we’re going to the Capitol” during his speech on the Ellipse. He went on to recall his and other lawmakers’ distressing experiences in the chamber as rioters breached the Capitol.

In her ruling last week, Wallace dismissed Trump’s argument that Congress, not the courts, has the authority to handle questions about ballot eligibility. She also rejected Trump’s claim that state election officials don’t have the authority to enforce Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

The judge noted that the clause “clearly gives Congress the ability to remove a constitutional disability should a person be disqualified” under the provision, but that it “says nothing regarding what government body would adjudicate or determine such disability in the first instance.”

“The Court notes, however, it would be strange for Congress to be the only entity that is empowered to determine the disability and then also the entity that is empowered to remove it,” Wallace wrote.

Wallace said “states can, and have, applied Section 3 pursuant to state statutes without federal enforcement legislation.”

Wallace’s ruling followed a decision by Chief U.S. District Judge Philip A. Brimmer to dismiss Trump’s request to move the Colorado ballot case to federal court. In a four-page order, Brimmer, a George W. Bush nominee, said Trump did not properly serve Griswold or obtain her approval to move the case to federal court, making Trump’s bid to move the case “defective.”

Trump is also facing other challenges on his eligibility to appear on the 2024 presidential ballot. Arguments before the Minnesota Supreme Court in a lawsuit to boot Trump off the ballot in the state, which also cites the little known provision in the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, are set to begin Thursday. Similar legal challenges are underway in New Hampshire, Arizona and Michigan.

Trump, who continues to falsely insist that he won the 2020 election, has repeatedly denied wrongdoing in his efforts to overturn the results as well as his role in the Capitol attack. He called the lawsuit in Colorado to remove him from the ballot under the 14th Amendment “nonsense” and “election interference.”

... could they possibly make the same mistake again and hire Lincoln at 40?

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Reality…​

The Invasion of Gaza Hasn't Started but It Looks Like Hamas Has Won a Strategic Victory​

There can/will be no peaceful coexistence of a Palestinian State and the Jewish State of Israel.

Hamas and its supporters have only one obsession: “From the River to the Sea Palestine Will be Free” = The annihilation of the Jewish state of Israel.

The only way Israel survives as a nation is the complete destruction of Hamas. And this will only further the worldwide hostility toward the Jewish nation. (See below pics of worldwide hate towards the Jewish State of Israel - The Jewish state is in a no win position)

It’s a vicious cycle of good vs evil culminating in Armageddon. Brace for impact. 🍿