Alabama city bemoans ‘rogue' library and 'woke' city council over sexually explicit books on library shelves
Residents of a city in Alabama are pushing back against what they deem sexually explicit books being shelved in areas reserved for children and teens.
In a vote on April 21, 2025, AL.com reported that Fairhope Public Library will keep two books in the teen section, including "Sold," which covers sexual slavery in India, and "Grown," which is about sexual exploitation.Residents said they were concerned about the placement of the books, and want them to be moved from the children's and teens' areas to the adults' section.
'WOKE' HOSPITAL COULD BE IN CROSSHAIRS OF TRUMP ADMIN AFTER SCATHING COMPLAINT ALLEGES DEI DISCRIMINATION On January 20, 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order prohibiting federal funds to agencies that promote "gender ideology."
"You are not on board with the Trump agenda," Brian Dasinger, a Fairhope attorney, said Tuesday during a meeting with the Fairhope City Council. According to reports from AL.com, Dasinger said the city council was "worthless."
The local coverage also reported that "The library board critics also called the board 'rogue' and the city council 'woke,' while city officials defended board members as unpaid volunteers who do not have a political agenda."
"The six of you should not be called 'worthless' and not be threatened," Emyle Mann, a Fairhope resident, said, speaking of the five council members and Fairhope Mayor Sherry Sullivan. "It's unfair and unprofessional."
"There are two books they are leaving (in the teen section)," Sullivan said. "There are some people not happy about that decision. They feel there is sexually explicit content in them. But our library board has reviewed that and didn't feel that way."
Sullivan also reportedly said that the library is reviewing an additional 12–14 books, and has transferred six other books from the teen section to the adult area.
Fairhope City Councilman Kevin Boone thanked the residents who waited until the meeting had concluded before leaving.
"After listening to both sides of this discussion, I'm not real big [on] people coming up giving their one side and walking out the door and not listening to what anyone else has to say," Boone said. "We need to be here listening to both sides."
Fairhope resident and library supporter Jeanine Normand said, "The world is watching."
Another supporter, William Henry of Fairhope, said, "Please don't be bullied by these people to do their agenda. They have shown their true colors and it's political."
Wendy Pickering of Orange Beach said that "We are not asking books to be burned or banned. We are asking them to be properly shelved."
Fox News Digital reached out to the Fairhope City Council, Fairhope Public Library, as well as Fairhope Mayor Sherry Sullivan for comment.
Corey Martin, who is serving his first term on the city council, told Fox News Digital in a statement that "The council listened to both sides of this argument. The process to identify books that are concerning to any parent is in place. This process has been in place from the beginning. What was added was a tiered identification card for each adolescent that has to be signed off by the parent."
Martin added that "There has been at least six books that have been placed in the adult section that our librarians and board decided on. There are two books that the librarians and board, after review, decided that these books were not inordinate to the law. We as a council and the Mayor will follow up with the state to try and create alternate review board/ committee on books that are opinionated on both sides as to whether these books have artistic or literary value. All sides are in agreement that no one wants any child to be exposed to something that is not appropriate for their cognitive aptitude or maturity level."
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Yahoo
7 hours ago
- Yahoo
Trump's hush money conviction returns to court
President Trump's hush money criminal conviction returns to the limelight Wednesday as his attorneys plead with an appeals panel to move the New York case to federal court. The oral arguments will unfold in a Lower Manhattan courthouse down the block from where a jury convicted Trump on 34 felonies last year. It marks the biggest moment in the case since Trump was sentenced to no punishment just before his inauguration. The president's personal attorneys will make the case that prosecutors relied on Trump's official acts as president at trial, so he deserves a federal forum to advance his presidential immunity claims that, if successful, would toss the verdict. But first, Trump faces a sizable roadblock. He already tried to move his case once before and failed. His attorneys must convince the appeals judges that Trump has 'good cause' to try again, an argument that largely concerns how the Supreme Court's immunity decision didn't land until after his trial. 'President Trump had good cause to pursue a post-trial removal for a simple reason: he could not have raised any of the arguments set forth herein until well after his trial began,' Trump's attorneys wrote in their written briefs. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's (D) office disagrees. It says the Supreme Court's immunity decision doesn't apply, Trump showed 'lack of diligence' by waiting two months after the ruling to restart his effort and Trump's sentencing makes the battle moot, anyway. 'Even if removal were still formally available here, there were ample grounds supporting the district court's finding of lack of good cause to permit defendant to file a second, untimely notice of removal,' Bragg's office wrote in court filings. Trump is backed by his own Justice Department, which asked to file a friend-of-the-court brief in the case in March, shortly after he took office. Wednesday's argument will also bring new attorneys into the picture. Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who led Trump's criminal defense team, stepped away to take senior Justice Department roles. D. John Sauer and Will Scharf, who became Trump's go-to appellate team, also joined the administration as solicitor general and White House staff secretary, respectively. Trump now has a new team in place from Sullivan & Cromwell, led by the elite firm's co-chair, Robert Giuffra. Giuffra is a trusted legal adviser for Trump and reportedly helped him negotiate his deal with the law firm Paul, Weiss. Taking the lectern Wednesday for the team will be Jeffrey Wall, Trump's former acting solicitor general who now heads Sullivan & Cromwell's Supreme Court and appellate practice. Wall will face off against Steven Wu, the appeals chief at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. They will appear before a three-judge panel on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, all appointed by Democratic presidents. The panel comprises Raymond Lohier, an appointee of former President Obama; Susan Carney, another Obama appointee; and Myrna Pérez, an appointee of former President Biden. No cameras are allowed inside, but the court will livestream the argument audio here. It begins at 10 a.m. EDT. And whoever loses? They could bring the matter to the Supreme Court next. Trump is declaring emergency after emergency to harness broad powers. An economic emergency paved the way for sweeping tariffs. A crisis at the southern border has justified mass deportations. And in Los Angeles, out-of-control protests warranted the mobilization of the military on American soil. Or so the president says — which is all that really matters. What constitutes an 'emergency' has not yet been defined by law, meaning whatever a president says goes when it comes to proclaiming a crisis. Since returning to the White House, Trump has declared national emergencies at least eight times and further pushed the bounds of his authority in the name of various national crises, allowing him to extend his command quickly and without Congress's help. Under the National Emergencies Act, he's deemed the southern border, economy and energy in crisis. He's used apparent emergencies to designate cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, to sanction the International Criminal Court over its stance on Israel and to crack down on China, Canada and Mexico. Beyond that, Trump has invoked the 18th-century wartime Alien Enemies Act to allow the federal government to detain or deport natives and citizens of countries deemed foreign adversaries. And now, he's flirting with the calling on the Insurrection Act, a rarely used power allowing use of the military to quell a rebellion. Trump bypassed California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) to send the National Guard to the streets of Los Angeles, after protests broke out over the weekend when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers conducted workplace raids. His administration is also set to deploy 700 Marines to assist the National Guard. He didn't invoke the Insurrection Act. But it marked the first time a president has deployed a state's National Guard without its governor's consent since former President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to protect civil rights protesters in Alabama in 1965. California sued the president Monday over the 'unprecedented power grab.' U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, a former President Clinton appointee and the brother of retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, was assigned the case. The longest trial in Georgia's history came to an anticlimactic finish Monday, putting Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) back under scrutiny. More than three years after Willis announced she'd prosecute the alleged Young Slime Life (YSL) gang under Georgia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, the last remaining defendant entered a guilty plea. Christian Eppinger, the final defendant, entered an Alford plea Monday, which let him plead guilty to several charges while maintaining his innocence, just before his trial was set to begin. He was sentenced to 75 years, to serve 40 in prison, to run concurrently with 45 years he's already serving, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Some 28 people were charged in the far-reaching racketeering case, with Atlanta rapper Young Thug at the center of it all. But the sweeping prosecution ended in zero murder convictions. Just two defendants reached the end of a jury trial, where they were acquitted of their most serious charges. And drama marred the years-long affair. 'This entire saga was a travesty,' said Anthony Michael Kreis, a law professor at Georgia State University. 'Victims of crimes were dragged onto the stand, sometimes in humiliating fashion. Defendants were overcharged and spent months of their lives incarcerated without a conviction. Jurors were asked to spend a year of their life assessing the evidence. 'Everybody walked away poorer for it,' he continued. 'There was no real justice here.' The end of the prosecution puts Willis's office back in the limelight, after its RICO prosecution against Trump and his allies over their efforts to subvert the state's 2020 presidential election came to a halt last year. A Georgia appeals court removed Willis's office from the prosecution in December over her past romantic relationship with a top prosecutor on the case, which it has since appealed. The state's top court has not yet said whether it will review her disqualification. Legal experts once predicted that a future Trump trial, alongside more than a dozen allies, could look a lot like the similarly sweeping YSL trial. And the YSL case went off the rails. Drugs were exchanged in court, a defense attorney was arrested on a gang charge and another defense attorney was held in contempt and ordered to serve jail time after discovering an ex parte conversation involving the judge, prosecutors and a key witness. Midway through the trial, the judge was removed from presiding over the case. And a smattering of other incidents tainted the trial. In a statement, Willis's office said its 'anti-gang initiative' is a critical part of her effort to direct prosecutorial resources toward the 'most dangerous offenders' while helping others keep free from a 'life damaged by a criminal record.'Jeff DiSantis, a spokesperson for the office, pointed to 'over 400 convictions' of gang members during Willis's tenure, including 19 defendants in the YSL RICO trial — a figure accounting for the guilty pleas.'Those efforts have been a key part of making Fulton County safer, taking dangerous offenders off our streets and sending a message that gang activity will not be tolerated in our community,' DiSantis said, calling Willis's efforts 'ongoing.' 'I think if there is any lesson here, it is that sometimes prosecuting crimes with a deft hand and not seeing every problem as a nail because all you have is a hammer, is a fairer and more successful way to secure justice and make communities safer,' Kreis said. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man the Trump administration deported to El Salvador in mid-March, is back in the United States. But it comes with a catch. As Abrego Garcia was flown to Tennessee on Friday, the Justice Department unsealed a two-count indictment, revealing their intent to return Abrego Garcia so he can stand trial and serve a sentence. He stands accused of taking more than 100 trips from Texas to other parts of the country to transport migrants unlawfully in exchange for payment. Abrego Garcia is due back in court in Nashville on Friday morning for his arraignment, where he is expected to enter a plea. The government will also attempt to keep him detained pending trial. 'The Government depends on witnesses to prove the allegations in the Indictment and there is a serious risk that those witnesses will be intimidated should the Defendant be released,' prosecutors wrote in a Monday brief, also saying Abrego Garcia is a flight risk. It will be up to U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, who will preside Friday. Ultimately, the case will be overseen by U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw, an Obama appointee. The Justice Department believes its criminal prosecution bolsters the case that Abrego Garcia is part of MS-13, accusing him of transporting other gang members on some of his trips. The indictment also takes aim at Abrego Garcia's relatives, who deny he has any gang ties, by alleging they were sometimes brought along. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is pushing for an end to Abrego Garcia's civil lawsuit in Maryland now that he's back. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis has been considering holding the government in contempt for not doing more to comply with a Supreme Court order to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return. Abrego Garcia's lawyers accuse the administration of having engaged in a stalling campaign to stave off sanctions until it could 'concoct a politically face-saving exit.' It called the indictment another act of contempt, noting the Supreme Court directed the man's case be 'handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.' 'Until the Government is held accountable for its blatant, willful, and persistent violations of court orders at excruciating cost to Abrego Garcia and his family, this case is not over,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers responded Saturday. The Justice Department called the response 'desperate and disappointing.' Xinis, an Obama appointee, could rule at any time on how she'll proceed. Catch up on the biggest updates from the past week: SCOTUS financial disclosures coming: The Supreme Court justices' 2024 financial disclosures will be released Tuesday at noon EDT, the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts announced. We'll have full coverage in next week's edition. DOGE wins at SCOTUS: The Supreme Court on Friday handed the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) two major victories on its emergency docket: It lifted a block on DOGE personnel accessing sensitive Social Security Administration systems and tossed a ruling forcing DOGE to turn over discovery in a records lawsuit. AP ban is back: A federal appeals court ruled Friday that the Trump administration can temporarily ban The Associated Press from the Oval Office and other limited spaces, largely pausing a judge's order to return the wire service's access. Proud Boys sue: Five leaders of the Proud Boys filed a $100 million lawsuit accusing the government and FBI employees of violating their constitutional rights in their prosecutions over the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack. Education Dept. dismantling reaches SCOTUS: The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to lift a judge's block on efforts to dismantle the Education Department. It's the administration's 19th emergency appeal at the high court since taking office. In other news… Following up on last week's edition of The Gavel: Brad Bondi, Attorney General Pam Bondi's brother, lost his bid for president of the D.C. Bar Association in a race that saw record turnout. He earned just 9.1 percent of the vote, while his opponent, employment lawyer Diane Seltzer, won 90.9 percent of votes. Law firm moves: The law firm Jenner & Block poached Damian Williams, former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, from the law firm Paul, Weiss. His departure is the latest in a series of high-profile resignations from the firm in the aftermath of its agreement with the Trump administration. Jenner & Block, meanwhile, is fighting Trump's executive order against it in court. Glossip to be retried: Oklahoma's top prosecutor said the state intends to retry Richard Glossip for murder but seek only a life sentence, after the Supreme Court threw out the death row inmate's capital conviction. Trump seeks delay in defamation case: Trump asked to delay oral arguments scheduled for June 24 in his appeal of a jury's verdict finding him liable for defaming columnist E. Jean Carroll until the court resolves whether the Justice Department can take Trump's place as the defendant. Read the full order list here. Lawyers with petitions up for consideration at last week's conference got some unexpected news Friday afternoon: an email with the court's order on their case. Orders are typically announced Mondays at 9:30 a.m. EDT. But the early release resulted from what a court spokesperson told us was an 'apparent software malfunction.' It's the second major technical mishap in a year that broke the news early of the court's decisionmaking, which is closely guarded until released with striking precision. Last June, the Supreme Court's publications unit 'inadvertently and briefly uploaded' a draft opinion in a major case concerning emergency abortions. Bloomberg found and published it, scooping the news a day ahead of when the justices announced it from the bench. IN: Death penalty and IQ tests The court took up four new cases, all of which we've highlighted in previous editions. First, Alabama is back at the Supreme Court in its effort to execute Joseph Clifton Smith, who was convicted of beating and murdering Durk Van Dam with a hammer and saw in 1997 while robbing him. Smith has battled with Alabama for years over whether he is mentally competent to be executed. In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled in Atkins v. Virginia that executing mentally disabled individuals violates the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. More than two decades later, the high court in Hamm v. Smith will examine how that applies when an inmate has multiple IQ scores. Alabama law requires inmates to show their IQ score is at or below 70 to prove an Atkins claim, but Smith took five tests, scoring between 72 and 78. Noting the tests' standard error and Smith's behavior, lower courts found he was intellectually disabled. Last year, the Supreme Court declined to take up the issue head on and instead directed the lower court to clarify its reasoning. Now that it has, the justices will hear the case next term. The grant came along three others we highlighted last week. In Rutherford v. United States and Carter v. United States, the justices will weigh whether judges can consider disparities created by the First Step Act in determining whether a defendant qualifies for a sentence reduction under what is known as 'compassionate release.' The Trump administration had asked the court to only take up the Carter case and hold Rutherford's until reaching a decision. And in Coney Island Auto Parts Unlimited, Inc. v. Burton, the court will decide whether the normal deadline for a party to ask a court to void its final judgment applies when the court had no personal jurisdiction. OUT: Republican challenge to PA ballot do-overs The court declined to take up the Republican National Committee's (RNC) effort to overturn a lower court ruling guaranteeing Pennsylvania voters a do-over option after submitting a defective mail ballot. Pennsylvania's top court ruled 4-3 that those voters can still show up at their polling place on Election Day to cast a provisional ballot. But the RNC said the decision contravenes state law. RNC v. Genser marked Republicans' latest bid for the Supreme Court to lay out specifics on how it views the 'independent state legislature' theory. Derived from the Constitution's Elections Clause, it would curtail the ability for state courts to scrutinize how state legislatures set federal election rules. Two years ago, the Supreme Court declined to endorse the maximalist version of the theory. But the justices cautioned that while state courts have some role, there comes a point where they intrude on the legislature's constitutional authority. The justices have yet to provide specifics, however. On Friday, they refused the RNC's latest bid to do so. Friday's order list also included one denied petition handed down alongside a written statement from Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas. We highlighted the petition, Chambers-Smith v. Ayers, last month. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (R) asked the court to reject ineffective counsel claims raised by Kayla Ayers, whom a jury convicted of setting fire to her father's house, as untimely. Normally, Ayers would've only had a year. But a lower court agreed she met an exception for when a previously undiscoverable 'factual predicate' comes to light. Alito's three-page statement stresses he wasn't endorsing the lower court's ruling. Alito called the denial 'understandable' because Ayers has served her sentence, signaling he would've gotten involved had she still been imprisoned. The Supreme Court added no new relists this week. But one non-relist on this week's list caught our eye, Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany v. Harris. Last week, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled Wisconsin violated the First Amendment when it found Catholic Charities Bureau wasn't religious enough to receive a tax exemption. How the justices handle the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany case this week will provide clues as to how they believe their decision should play out beyond the tax system and into the culture wars. A coalition represented by Becket, the religious legal group that represented Catholic Charities, is challenging New York's mandate that employers' health care plans cover abortions. Like in Wisconsin, New York's regulation exempts religious organizations only if they inculcate religious values, meaning many faith-based charities must still follow the mandate. The justices appear to have held the case in limbo while they considered the Catholic Charities case. But now that the decision is in, it's back on this week's conference list. Oftentimes, the justices will send a pending petition back to a lower court for reconsideration in light of a new decision. It's a maneuver known as a 'GVR,' which stands for 'grant, vacate, remand.' But Becket wants the Supreme Court to go a step further. Rather than merely wipe the lower court's earlier decision and start anew, Becket asked the Supreme Court to immediately reverse it. The group stressed it has been litigating the case for years, and the justices already GVRed it once before when it decided another major religious rights case in 2021. 'Petitioners ought not be sent back to those same courts for yet another round,' the religious groups' legal team wrote in court filings. Don't be surprised if additional hearings are scheduled throughout the week. But here's what we're watching for now: Today The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit will hear oral arguments in Trump's DOJ-backed bid to have his New York criminal conviction removed to federal court. Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.) is set to appear for a preliminary hearing before a federal judge in New Jersey in her assault case stemming from an incident at a U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center. A federal judge in Washington, D.C., is set to hold a preliminary injunction hearing in a challenge to the Labor Department's freeze of cooperative agreements and grants entered into by the department's Bureau of International Labor Affairs. A pretrial conference is scheduled in a proposed class action by voters who said Elon Musk defrauded them into signing a petition to win $1 million. Thursday The Supreme Court will announce opinions. A federal judge in Washington, D.C., is set to hold a summary judgment hearing in a challenge by two Democratic appointees to the three-member National Credit Union Administration to their firings by Trump. Friday Abrego Garcia, the man mistakenly deported to El Salvador, is set to be arraigned in federal court in Nashville on two criminal charges. The Justice Department faces a deadline to release documents related to a government motion to compel now-FBI Director Kash Patel to comply with a grand jury subpoena he received in 2022. Monday The Supreme Court will announce orders. A federal judge in Massachusetts is set to hold a motions hearing in 16 Democratic state attorneys general's challenge over the National Institutes for Health's termination of various grants that purportedly promote diversity, equity and inclusion. Another Massachusetts federal judge is set to hold a preliminary injunction hearing in Harvard's bid to block Trump's proclamation blocking new international students planning to attend the school from entering the country. Tuesday The Supreme Court justices' final disclosure reports will become available online. Ex-Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) is scheduled to report to prison. A federal judge in Rhode Island is set to hold a preliminary injunction hearing in 20 Democratic state attorneys general's challenge to the Trump administration's requirement for grant recipients to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement for various programs, particularly at the Federal Emergency Management Agency. A federal judge in New York is set to hold a pretrial conference in a legal challenge brought by two Venezuelan men in immigration custody threatened with removal under the Alien Enemies Act. A federal judge in Washington state is set to hold a preliminary injunction hearing in Democratic attorneys general's lawsuit over the administration's freezing of funds for electric vehicle infrastructure. The Washington Post's Robert Samuels, Lauren Lumpkin and John D. Harden: How the District's failure to curb truancy in middle schools fueled the biggest youth crime surge in a generation. NPR's Carrie Johnson: Federal judges are powerful. Some of their law clerks describe a toxic work culture Documented's Rommel H. Ojeda in The City: Fake Immigration Courts Take Advantage of Immigrants Desperate for Answers Politico's Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein: Trump's troop deployment is a warning sign for what comes next, legal scholars fear Reuters's Sara Merken: More partners leave Paul Weiss to join new law firm Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
10 hours ago
- The Hill
Trump's hush money conviction returns to court
Thank you for signing up! Subscribe to more newsletters here President Trump's hush money criminal conviction returns to the limelight Wednesday as his attorneys plead with an appeals panel to move the New York case to federal court. The oral arguments will unfold in a Lower Manhattan courthouse down the block from where a jury convicted Trump on 34 felonies last year. It marks the biggest moment in the case since Trump was sentenced to no punishment just before his inauguration. The president's personal attorneys will make the case that prosecutors relied on Trump's official acts as president at trial, so he deserves a federal forum to advance his presidential immunity claims that, if successful, would toss the verdict. But first, Trump faces a sizable roadblock. He already tried to move his case once before and failed. His attorneys must convince the appeals judges that Trump has 'good cause' to try again, an argument that largely concerns how the Supreme Court's immunity decision didn't land until after his trial. 'President Trump had good cause to pursue a post-trial removal for a simple reason: he could not have raised any of the arguments set forth herein until well after his trial began,' Trump's attorneys wrote in their written briefs. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's (D) office disagrees. It says the Supreme Court's immunity decision doesn't apply, Trump showed 'lack of diligence' by waiting two months after the ruling to restart his effort and Trump's sentencing makes the battle moot, anyway. 'Even if removal were still formally available here, there were ample grounds supporting the district court's finding of lack of good cause to permit defendant to file a second, untimely notice of removal,' Bragg's office wrote in court filings. Trump is backed by his own Justice Department, which asked to file a friend-of-the-court brief in the case in March, shortly after he took office. Wednesday's argument will also bring new attorneys into the picture. Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who led Trump's criminal defense team, stepped away to take senior Justice Department roles. D. John Sauer and Will Scharf, who became Trump's go-to appellate team, also joined the administration as solicitor general and White House staff secretary, respectively. Trump now has a new team in place from Sullivan & Cromwell, led by the elite firm's co-chair, Robert Giuffra. Giuffra is a trusted legal adviser for Trump and reportedly helped him negotiate his deal with the law firm Paul, Weiss. Taking the lectern Wednesday for the team will be Jeffrey Wall, Trump's former acting solicitor general who now heads Sullivan & Cromwell's Supreme Court and appellate practice. Wall will face off against Steven Wu, the appeals chief at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. They will appear before a three-judge panel on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, all appointed by Democratic presidents. The panel comprises Raymond Lohier, an appointee of former President Obama; Susan Carney, another Obama appointee; and Myrna Pérez, an appointee of former President Biden. No cameras are allowed inside, but the court will livestream the argument audio here. It begins at 10 a.m. EDT. And whoever loses? They could bring the matter to the Supreme Court next. Trump leans on emergencies to exercise vast power Trump is declaring emergency after emergency to harness broad powers. An economic emergency paved the way for sweeping tariffs. A crisis at the southern border has justified mass deportations. And in Los Angeles, out-of-control protests warranted the mobilization of the military on American soil. Or so the president says — which is all that really matters. What constitutes an 'emergency' has not yet been defined by law, meaning whatever a president says goes when it comes to proclaiming a crisis. Since returning to the White House, Trump has declared national emergencies at least eight times and further pushed the bounds of his authority in the name of various national crises, allowing him to extend his command quickly and without Congress's help. Under the National Emergencies Act, he's deemed the southern border, economy and energy in crisis. He's used apparent emergencies to designate cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, to sanction the International Criminal Court over its stance on Israel and to crack down on China, Canada and Mexico. Beyond that, Trump has invoked the 18th-century wartime Alien Enemies Act to allow the federal government to detain or deport natives and citizens of countries deemed foreign adversaries. And now, he's flirting with the calling on the Insurrection Act, a rarely used power allowing use of the military to quell a rebellion. Trump bypassed California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) to send the National Guard to the streets of Los Angeles, after protests broke out over the weekend when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers conducted workplace raids. His administration is also set to deploy 700 Marines to assist the National Guard. He didn't invoke the Insurrection Act. But it marked the first time a president has deployed a state's National Guard without its governor's consent since President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to protect civil rights protesters in Alabama in 1965. California sued the president Monday over the 'unprecedented power grab.' U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, a former President Clinton appointee and the brother of retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, was assigned the case. Georgia's longest trial comes to close; Willis scrutinized The longest trial in Georgia's history came to an anticlimactic finish Monday, putting Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) back under scrutiny. More than three years after Willis announced she'd prosecute the alleged Young Slime Life (YSL) gang under Georgia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, the last remaining defendant entered a guilty plea. Christian Eppinger, the final defendant, entered an Alford plea Monday which let him to plead guilty to several charges while maintaining his innocence, just before his trial was set to begin. He was sentenced to 75 years, to serve 40 in prison, to run concurrently with 45 years he's already serving, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Some 28 people were charged in the far-reaching racketeering case, with Atlanta rapper Young Thug at the center of it all. But the sweeping prosecution ended in zero murder convictions. Just two defendants reached the end of a jury trial, where they were acquitted of their most serious charges. And drama marred the yearslong affair. 'This entire saga was a travesty,' said Anthony Michael Kreis, a law professor at Georgia State University. 'Victims of crimes were dragged onto the stand, sometimes in humiliating fashion. Defendants were over-charged and spent months of their lives incarcerated without a conviction. Jurors were asked to spend a year of their life assessing the evidence. 'Everybody walked away poorer for it,' he continued. 'There was no real justice here.' The end of the prosecution puts Willis's office back in the limelight, after its RICO prosecution against Trump and his allies over their efforts to subvert the state's 2020 presidential election came to a halt last year. A Georgia appeals court removed Willis's office from the prosecution in December over her past romantic relationship with a top prosecutor on the case, which it has since appealed. The state's top court has not yet said whether it will review her disqualification. Legal experts once predicted that a future Trump trial, alongside more than a dozen allies, could look a lot like the similarly sweeping YSL trial. But the case went off the rails. Drugs were exchanged in court, a defense attorney was arrested on a gang charge and another defense attorney was held in contempt and ordered to serve jail time after discovering an ex parte conversation involving the judge, prosecutors and a key witness. Midway through the trial, the judge was removed from presiding over the case. And a smattering of other incidents tainted the trial. In a statement, Willis's office said its 'anti-gang initiative' is a critical part of her effort to direct prosecutorial resources toward the 'most dangerous offenders' while helping others keep free from a 'life damaged by a criminal record.'Jeff DiSantis, a spokesperson for the office, pointed to 'over 400 convictions' of gang members during Willis's tenure, including 19 defendants in the YSL RICO trial — a figure accounting for the guilty pleas.'Those efforts have been a key part of making Fulton County safer, taking dangerous offenders off our streets and sending a message that gang activity will not be tolerated in our community,' DiSantis said, calling the Willis's efforts 'ongoing.' 'I think if there is any lesson here, it is that sometimes prosecuting crimes with a deft hand and not seeing every problem as a nail because all you have is a hammer, is a fairer and more successful way to secure justice and make communities safer,' Kreis said. What's next for Kilmar Abrego Garcia Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man the Trump administration deported to El Salvador in mid-March, is back in the United States. But it comes with a catch. As Abrego Garcia was flown to Tennessee Friday, the Justice Department unsealed a two-count indictment, revealing their intent to return Abrego Garcia so he can stand trial and serve a sentence. He stands accused of taking more than 100 trips from Texas to other parts of the country to transport migrants unlawfully in exchange for payment. Abrego Garcia is due back in court in Nashville Friday morning for his arraignment, where he is expected to enter a plea. The government will also attempt to keep him detained pending trial. 'The Government depends on witnesses to prove the allegations in the Indictment and there is a serious risk that those witnesses will be intimidated should the Defendant be released,' prosecutors wrote in a Monday brief, also saying Abrego Garcia is a flight risk. It will be up to U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, who will preside on Friday. Ultimately, the case will be overseen by U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw, an appointee of former President Obama. The Justice Department believes its criminal prosecution bolsters the case that Abrego Garcia is part of MS-13, accusing him of transporting other gang members on some of his trips. The indictment also takes aim at Abrego Garcia's relatives, who deny that he has any gang ties, by alleging they were sometimes brought along. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is pushing for an end to Abrego Garcia's civil lawsuit in Maryland now that he's back. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis has been considering holding the government in contempt for not doing more to comply with a Supreme Court order to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return. Abrego Garcia's lawyers accuse the administration of having engaged in a stalling campaign to stave off sanctions until it could 'concoct a politically face-saving exit.' It called the indictment another act of contempt, noting the Supreme Court directed that the man's case be 'handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.' 'Until the Government is held accountable for its blatant, willful, and persistent violations of court orders at excruciating cost to Abrego Garcia and his family, this case is not over,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers responded Saturday. The Justice Department on Tuesday called the response 'desperate and disappointing.' Xinis, an Obama appointee, could rule at any time on how she'll proceed. Catch-up on the biggest updates from the past week: In other news… Read the full order list here. Lawyers with petitions up for consideration at last week's conference got some unexpected news Friday afternoon: an email with the court's order on their case. Orders are typically announced on Mondays at 9:30 a.m. EDT. But the early release resulted from what a court spokesperson told us was an 'apparent software malfunction.' It's the second major technical mishap in a year that broke the news early of the court's decision-making, which is closely guarded until released with striking precision. Last June, the Supreme Court's publications unit 'inadvertently and briefly uploaded' a draft opinion in a major case concerning emergency abortions. Bloomberg found and published it, scooping the news a day ahead of when the justices announced it from the bench. IN: Death penalty and IQ tests The court took up four new cases, all of which we've highlighted in previous editions. First, Alabama is back at the Supreme Court in its effort to execute Joseph Clifton Smith, who was convicted of beating and murdering Durk Van Dam with a hammer and saw in 1997 while robbing him. Smith has battled with Alabama for years over whether he is mentally competent to be executed. In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled in Atkins v. Virginia that executing mentally disabled individuals violates the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. More than two decades later, the high court in Hamm v. Smith will examine how that applies when an inmate has multiple IQ scores. Alabama law requires inmates to show their IQ score is at or below 70 to prove an Atkins claim, but Smith took five tests, scoring between 72 and 78. Noting the tests' standard error and Smith's behavior, lower courts found he was intellectually disabled. Last year, the Supreme Court declined to take up the issue head on and instead directed the lower court to clarify its reasoning. Now that it has, the justices will hear the case next term. The grant came along three others we highlighted last week. In Rutherford v. United States and Carter v. United States, the justices will weigh whether judges can consider disparities created by the First Step Act in determining whether a defendant qualifies for a sentence reduction under what is known as 'compassionate release.' The Trump administration had asked the court to only take up Carter and hold Rutherford until reaching a decision. And in Coney Island Auto Parts Unlimited, Inc. v. Burton, the court will decide whether the normal deadline for a party to ask a court to void its final judgment applies when the court had no personal jurisdiction. OUT: Republican challenge to PA ballot do-overs The court declined to take up the Republican National Committee's (RNC) effort to overturn a lower court ruling guaranteeing Pennsylvania voters a do-over option after submitting a defective mail ballot. Pennsylvania's top court ruled 4-3 that those voters can still show up at their polling place on Election Day to cast a provisional ballot. But the RNC said the decision contravenes state law. RNC v. Genser marked Republicans' latest bid for the Supreme Court to lay out specifics on how it views the so-called independent state legislature theory. Derived from the Constitution's Elections Clause, it would curtail the ability for state courts to scrutinize how state legislatures set federal election rules. Two years ago, the Supreme Court declined to endorse the maximalist version of the theory. But the justices cautioned that while state courts have some role, there comes a point where they intrude on the legislature's constitutional authority. The justices have yet to provide specifics, however. On Friday, they refused the RNC's latest bid to do so. Friday's order list also included one denied petition handed down alongside a written statement from Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas. We highlighted the petition, Chambers-Smith v. Ayers, last month. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (R) asked the court to reject ineffective counsel claims raised by Kayla Ayers, whom a jury convicted of setting fire to her father's house, as untimely. Normally, Ayers would've only had a year. But a lower court agreed she met an exception for when a previously undiscoverable 'factual predicate' comes to light. Alito's three-page statement stresses he wasn't endorsing the lower court's ruling. Alito called the denial 'understandable' because Ayers has served her sentence, signaling he would've gotten involved had she still been imprisoned. The Supreme Court added no new relists this week. But one non-relist on this week's list caught our eye, Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany v. Harris. Last week, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled Wisconsin violated the First Amendment when it found Catholic Charities Bureau wasn't religious enough to receive a tax exemption. How the justices handle Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany this week will provide clues as to how they believe their decision should play out beyond the tax system and into the culture wars. A coalition represented by Becket, the religious legal group that represented Catholic Charities, is challenging New York's mandate that employers' health care plans cover abortions. Like in Wisconsin, New York's regulation exempts religious organizations only if they inculcate religious values, meaning many faith-based charities must still follow the mandate. The justices appear to have held the case in limbo while they considered Catholic Charities. But now that the decision is in, it's back on this week's conference list. Oftentimes, the justices will send a pending petition back to a lower court for reconsideration in light of a new decision. It's a maneuver known as a 'GVR,' which stands for 'grant, vacate, remand.' But Becket wants the Supreme Court to go a step further. Rather than merely wipe the lower court's earlier decision and start anew, Becket asked the Supreme Court to immediately reverse it. The group stressed it has been litigating the case for years and the justices already GVRed it once before when it decided another major religious rights case in 2021. 'Petitioners ought not be sent back to those same courts for yet another round,' the religious groups' legal team wrote in court filings. Don't be surprised if additional hearings are scheduled throughout the week. But here's what we're watching for now: Today Thursday Friday Monday Tuesday
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In New Hampshire's open 1st Congressional District race, a trio of Seacoast Democrats lead the way
First Congressional District candidates (from left) Maura Sullivan, Stefany Shaheen, and Carleigh Beriont will face off in the Democratic primary. (Photos courtesy of the Sullivan, Shaheen, and Beriont campaigns, respectively) A military veteran with a previous unsuccessful bid for Congress, the daughter of a household name in New Hampshire politics, and a Harvard University professor — all Democrats — are the first to jump in the 2026 race for New Hampshire's 1st Congressional District. Maura Sullivan, a Marine Corps veteran and former Obama administration staffer, became the first candidate to join the race in April. Former Portsmouth City Councilor Stefany Shaheen, who is the daughter of U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, followed late last month. On Wednesday, Carleigh Beriont, who teaches at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and serves on Hampton's select board, announced her campaign. No Republican has officially entered the race yet. The district, which has been in Democratic hands for nearly a decade, is being closely watched to see whether a Republican can flip it or whether it's become a Democratic stronghold. Sullivan, Shaheen, and Beriont are vying to represent the eastern half of New Hampshire, including Manchester, the state's largest city; the Seacoast cities of Portsmouth, Dover, and Exeter; and parts of the Lakes Region, including Laconia. Chris Pappas has represented the 1st District since 2018, but it became an open contest in April when Pappas announced a run for the Senate seat being vacated by Jeanne Shaheen. Both Sullivan and Shaheen targeted President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk in their opening pitches to voters. Sullivan put particular emphasis on her military service in Iraq and Southeast Asia. 'I saw too many of my fellow Marines give their lives for this country to just sit by and watch Donald Trump and Elon Musk tear it down,' Sullivan said in her announcement video. 'They're driving up costs for New Hampshire families, making it even more difficult to own a home and pay the bills, and that's why I'm running for Congress.' Born in the Chicago area, Sullivan holds degrees from Northwestern University and Harvard. After serving in the Marine Corps, Sullivan worked in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense under former President Barack Obama. In 2017, she moved to New Hampshire and within three months announced she was running for Congress, a move widely criticized by people who pointed out how few ties she had to the state. She finished runner-up to Pappas among 11 candidates in the primary. In her campaign announcement, Shaheen focused on health care-related issues, saying her experience raising a daughter with type 1 diabetes inspired her to fight for medical research. 'When I see Donald Trump crushing medical research in our country,' Shaheen said in her video, 'when I see Elon Musk with a chainsaw chasing out our best scientists and doctors, when I see Bobby Kennedy Jr. allowing measles to run rampant because he believes in conspiracy theories instead of proven vaccines, and when I see congressional Republicans slashing Medicaid, children's health care, veterans' health care, all to fund massive tax breaks for billionaires and corporations, well, I'm going to fight.' Shaheen's mother, a mainstay of New Hampshire politics for decades, served as governor from 1997 to 2003 and has represented the state in the U.S. Senate since 2009 (she announced her upcoming retirement in March). In addition to formerly serving on the Portsmouth City Council, the younger Shaheen was chairwoman of the Portsmouth Police Commission. She works as chief strategy officer for the Manchester-based biomanufacturer ARMI and founded Good Measures, a company that seeks to connect people with chronic illnesses to proper supports. In announcing her candidacy, Beriont characterized herself as an outsider rather than an establishment candidate. 'I'm not a career politician — I'm a mom, an educator, a neighbor,' she said in a press release. 'I've spent my life standing up for people who don't always have a voice in the room. Now, I'm ready to bring that same fight to Washington — not for the powerful, but for the rest of us.' Beriont teaches religion, government, and U.S. history at Harvard. She previously worked as an organizer with Democratic campaigns. She said she hopes to build a grassroots campaign. New Hampshire's 1st Congressional District has historically been a challenging swing district. From 2006 to 2018, it switched hands four times between Republican Frank Guinta and Democrat Carol Shea-Porter. However, after Pappas took the seat in 2018 and won reelection three consecutive times, the seat has sat squarely in Democratic hands. 'It'll be interesting to see once Pappas is not on the ballot — at least not for CD1 (Pappas is running for Senate) — whether the district reverts back to being more swingy than it otherwise has been during the Pappas years,' Dante Scala, a political science professor at the University of New Hampshire, said. 'And that raises the second question, which is … how much of that can you attribute to Pappas' strengths as an incumbent and how much should we chalk up to the trend that, during the Trump era since 2016, New Hampshire Democrats have been unbeaten in terms of federal elections?' Scala said if it turns out Pappas' success was driven by his strength as a candidate, a Democratic nominee could have more difficulty. But if it turns out President Donald Trump's dominance over the Republican Party has turned off many New Hampshire voters and made the state more liberal, they won't have too much trouble replicating Pappas' success. In a similar vein, he argued that during the Guinta/Shea-Porter decade, the race became dependent on 'outside factors.' 'Like who was in power in the White House, for example,' he said. 'I think it was those sorts of extra or outside-New Hampshire national factors — which way the national breeze is blowing — that was affecting the results.' Scala said Pappas was able to 'defy the national wind' multiple times. 2022's elections, when then-President Joe Biden had low approval ratings, was a difficult moment for Democrats nationwide. 'There was all sorts of talk about a red wave in '22,' he said. 'And I thought it was quite possible at the time that Pappas would be upset by that wave. But then it turned out that New Hampshire Democrats, (Sen. Maggie) Hassan and Pappas, held steady, despite the fact that we saw the wave happen elsewhere.' Scala pointed to Pappas' centrism and the fact that he'd been on a ballot in so many races as possible drivers of success. 'He quietly goes about the business of being an incumbent,' he said. 'In some ways, it's a throwback to an earlier era of representation, where you're just looking out for your district. You're not looking to make waves. You're not trying to be a polarizing figure. You're low-profile. But that allows people who voted for (former Republican Gov.) Chris Sununu to feel comfortable turning around and voting for Chris Pappas.' Scala believes Trump will have an outsized influence in 2026. A Trump endorsement could play a big part in the Republican primary. Looking toward the general election, Scala pointed to a recent UNH poll that found 45% of Granite Staters approve of Trump's job performance, which is 'not terrible, but what does that look like in a year's time?' 'Trump's not on the ballot and on the ballot,' he said. 'Trump just takes up so much oxygen politically. Once it gets past the primaries, I really think it's a referendum on Trump. I think you have to assume that's going to benefit the Democratic candidate, whoever that may be, and I think it's increasingly difficult now for a Republican in particular to try, especially for the House, to develop any sort of identity that's distinctive enough to separate himself or herself from Trump.' On Sullivan, Shaheen, and Beriont's side of the race, Scala said 'there's a lot of discontent with the Democratic Party in general.' 'There's a lot of unhappiness and finger-pointing among Democrats about how they should be facing off against Trump,' he said. 'Is there lightning out there that could be harnessed in a Democratic primary? You know, the way that Shea-Porter was able to do?' Scala said it was Shea-Porter's ardent opposition to the Iraq War in 2006 that won her the seat originally. 'She went from nobody, but was really very much a grassroots activist on an issue, the Iraq War, that split the party, and she just went like gangbusters and rode that to Congress,' he said. 'You look at Shaheen, Maura Sullivan (Scala spoke with the Bulletin before Beriont's announcement), nothing strikes me about either of those candidates as insurgent, for lack of a better word. I mean, they're pretty much standard issue Democratic candidates. Is there someone out there who, you know, would have the wherewithal to stir the pot?' Where Scala thinks it's an open question as to whether the district solidly leans democratic, Shea-Porter has no doubts. 'I wouldn't have retired in January 2019 if I thought we hadn't flipped it blue,' Shea-Porter told the Bulletin. 'But I knew that we had.' She argued that the Republican Party nationally has moved too far right for New Hampshire voters while Democrats from New Hampshire have stayed moderate. 'They don't want the ugliness that we're seeing from the MAGA party,' she said. 'And they didn't want it then either. They don't want extremists in either camp. And we have not had a Democratic extremist.' Shea-Porter argued that the state 'is not an extremist state,' and that it typically votes 'center, center-left, sometimes center-right, but never far left or far right.' She's been paying attention to the current political landscape. 'As I have watched this unfold, I've thought, 'My gosh, this just feels in so many ways like 2006,'' she said. Shea-Porter said when she criticized the Iraq War and other actions taken by then-President George W. Bush people accused her of not supporting the troops. Today, she said when people criticize Trump and conservative policies, they're accused of 'not thinking about America first.' She also argued the MAGA movement is an extension of the Tea Party of the early 2010s. She, and many spectators at the time, credit backlash to the Affordable Care Act (colloquially known as Obamacare) for her two electoral defeats to Guinta. (Guinta did not respond to the Bulletin's requests for interviews.) She notes that today, the ACA, and the Medicaid expansion it brought, have returned to the forefront of political discussions as Republicans debate cutting it. Finally, she said both eras see Republicans trying to push tax breaks for the wealthy at the expense of the middle and lower classes. 'Echoes of today, right?'' she said. 'I mean they're the same problems that we have — that people were struggling economically and that they didn't have champions there for them and people were passing legislation that was only helping the rich — and I was talking about anybody who was supporting the wealthy over the middle class. And I used to say the middle class is stumbling and the poor have fallen. And that was always my line, and sadly, here we are again. Today, it's the same thing.' Shea-Porter said, in retirement, she's still in touch with former colleagues and she's 'not quiet on what's happening.' 'If I were any of these candidates right now,' she said, 'I would ask constitutional scholars to go to town halls with me and talk about how endangered we are right now with a very authoritarian president and a MAGA party in Washington who's really threatening so many groups of people and ignoring our Constitution.' 'I think these candidates need to not be afraid to go out and say, 'Look, I plan to do everything I can to produce legislation to vote to stop this,'' she said. 'But then they have to have the facts. … I would keep a list like I used to keep on George Bush and his administration, so that people would understand, here's the list of what is wrong.' Shea-Porter said she's spoken to candidates in the race, offering advice, though she wouldn't say who. For now, she said she plans not to publicly take sides in the primary, but will strongly support the Democratic nominee in the general election. She anticipates the primary being friendly without personal attacks. Her advice for the candidates: 'to not be afraid to lead on these issues. People are looking for people who will not lead from behind, but lead up front.'
