'BradCast' 11/4/2025 (Republican Thuggery While Americans Vote)

It is about holding the line to what makes us who we are. They did not expect California. They did not expect all of you. They thought we were going to write an op-ed, have a candlelight visual, maybe do a rally. They poked the bear, and the bear is poking back, and we're going to get out there and win. and send a powerful message not only to the people of the state of California, but the people all over the United States of America. Well, we'll see. Whoa, wait. From Pacifica Radio in Los Angeles, this is the broadcast. As heard on KPFK, 90.7 FM in LA, elsewhere in California, in Red Bluff and Reading on KFOI and Round Mountains, KKRN, up in Oregon on the Central Coast, on KYAQ, Cottage Groves, Koso, Eugene's, KEPW. Lanchester, Pennsylvania's W-New, Maui, Hawaii's K-A-K-U, in Columbus, Ohio, on WGRN, Palinville, New York's, WLPP, Rochester, New York's, WRFZ, down in New York, out in Gallup, New Mexico, on K-N-I-Z, Concord, New Hampshire's, WN-H-N, Fayetteville, Arkansas, K-P-SQ, and Seattle on K-O-D-X, Richmond, Virginia's, W-R-W-K, Fairmont, West Virginia's W-E-F-R, Janesville, Wisconsin's W-A-D-R, Minneapolis, St. Paul's, AM-950, K-T-N-F. We also stream every day around the globe on the Internet, on the Progressive Voices Channel, Netroots Radio, Radio for Humans, Nicole Sandler.com, Radio Free Brooklyn, No Lies, Radio, Detour Talk, Del Marva FM. And most of your favorite podcast sites, Blanketing Planet Earth, I'm Brad Friedman, your friendly investigative blogger, journalist, troublemaker, muckraker, and all-round, swell fellows, says me from bradblog.com. Thank you for joining us today for another thrilling edition of the broadcast. So, yep, as we go to air today, well, first, the federal government shutdown, that is now tied for the longest in history at 35 days, tying the previous record. During, yes, the previous Trump administration, we are hearing some buzz today about a potential path out of this mess by even by week's end in the U.S. Senate over the past 24 hours or so. Though a lot of that seems to be coming from Republican sources only.

So far. So I'm going to wait before diving into that particular rabbit hole today, Desi Doyen. Probably a good idea. Until and unless there is some better, harder details, I have already heard Democrats from the House saying, don't do it over there yelling at the Senate in case they actually are considering doing it. Democrats in the Senate considering caving. That's what they're talking about. So yeah, if you've got a Democratic Senator, go ahead and call them if you'd like and let them know what you'd like them to do. Well, there you go. In the meantime. for now, staying out of that rabbit hole for the moment. It is Election Day as we go to air. But since many of our listeners may not even hear today's program until the day after the election and thus may already know more about the reported results than we do at this hour because we don't know. any of them yet. I will note that we won't be spending a lot of time on specifically on Tuesday's elections today other than to note that they are ongoing with voters at the polls for marquee races and ballot initiatives in New York City, New Jersey, Virginia, and of course out here in California, as you just heard. Governor Gavin Newsom referring to at the top there. There are also local elections and important initiatives on the ballot in parts of, I believe, 32 different states on Tuesday. And there's even other statewide elections in places like Maine and Texas, Pennsylvania, and Georgia, which is electing two commissioners to its public utility commission. An election that is more important than you might realize, because I know that sounds really boring. We may or may not get to explaining why that is today, tomorrow, or at a future time, we will see. As to... reported problems at the polls on Tuesday so far. Longtime listeners know that many such problems for voters or concerns about voting machines and tabulators, etc. did not become known until after election day. So far, I've yet to see or hear reports of any major problems for the most part for voters on Tuesday other than in New Jersey. where there were a number of threats of some sort, unclear if they were bomb threats or shooting threats or something else. CNN just describes threats in their reporting, while local media are describing them as bomb threats. As CNN reported Tuesday morning, several threats were made against polling places across New Jersey, according to state officials, prompting law enforcement reaction and some polls to close temporarily. In a statement, Lieutenant Governor Tahitia Wei in New Jersey said a few hours after the initial reports that law enforcement has, quote, investigated and determined that there are no credible threats at this time.

Good. New York's P.I.X. 11 notes that law enforcement investigated threats that were made against polling places in Bergen, Essex, Friedrich Merz, Friedrich Merz, Middlesex, Monmouth, Ocean, and Passaic counties. All in New Jersey, according to the state attorney general there, Matthew Platkin. Some locations were quickly reopened to the public after these threats, while some voters were directed to different polling sites for Election Day. Preliminary investigation by the Bergen County Sheriff's Office revealed that some of the threats were computer-generated swatting incidents. That's essentially where prank calls or emails in this case are made to police to say that there's an ongoing active shooting going on somewhere. In this case, apparently at polling places where there were not any actual incidents like that going on. Needless to say, such reports are exceedingly dangerous in that police units, sometimes SWAT units, may show up and misinterpret whatever they see going on there. Quote, law enforcement officers have responded at each affected polling place, and they have worked swiftly to secure these polling locations and ensure the safety of every voter, said Plattkin, the state's attorney general, explaining voters should continue to have confidence that they can cast their ballot without fear of intimidation. And we will continue to work tirelessly to ensure a free, fair, and secure election. He noted, quote, make no mistake, we will not tolerate any attempts to interfere with our elections. We will swiftly hold accountable. Anyone who seeks to interfere with the safety or security of our election process. The Patterson, New Jersey mayor said that some of the threats appeared to be from an email originating abroad. Hmm, really? Now, you may recall back on Election Day, 2024, if you remember anything from that day, I know a lot of you did a lot of drinking that night. Might have wiped out all memories of that day and night. In any event, back in 2024, there were also non-credible bomb threats that had disrupted voting in several swing states in a bunch of precincts, including in Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Pennsylvania at the time. Some of the threats appeared, according to the FBI at the time, quote, to originate from Russian email domains, which is the memory that sort of pinged for me here when I saw that the Patterson, New Jersey mayor was saying some of the emails originated abroad. Most of the affected counties in New Jersey on Tuesday...

are Democratic-leaning counties. However, two of them Monmouth and Ocean are generally, reliably Republican and Passaic, is more of a swing county. So it's hard to say if there was some sort of partisan political bent behind this right as of now in any event. Passaic, by the way, is the one county in New Jersey where Donald Trump's corrupted Department of Justice announced that they would be deploying observers for Election Day for unknown reasons. along with five of the largest counties out here in California. Jersey residents are casting their vote for the state's next governor, of course, where the latest polling shows Democratic nominee Mikie Sherrill has been leading Republican nominee Jack Ciattarelli in a race that, however, has been tightening in recent days. So we will see. The state is also voting on all members of its... State House of Representatives, where Democrats hold a large majority. Virginia is also voting for governor on Tuesday, along with Lieutenant Governor and AG, as well as its entire State House of Delegates, where Democrats currently hold the barest of majorities there controlling 51 seats in the 100-member House. in Virginia. In New York City, progressive Democrat Zohran Mamdani is facing off against disgraced former Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo, who has now been endorsed by Donald Trump, of all people, make of that what you will. And also in the race, the Republican nominee, Curtis Sliwa, who I guess Donald Trump chose not to endorse. Other than that, I've yet to... To hear of any major problems for voters at the polls on Tuesday as of this hour. Though Kentucky's Secretary of State, Michael Adams tweeted on Tuesday, quote, we're getting calls about polls being closed. He said they are closed because. We do not have elections today. Kentucky votes next year, he said. You cannot vote today in Kentucky for the mayor of New York City or the governor of Virginia. Sorry, he added. Well, that is a shame. Beyond that, we will have reported election results as available and any other polling-related problems in Kentucky or elsewhere on our next broadcast that when I believe we'll be joined by the great progressive journalist and elections maven, our friend John Nichols of the nation. Am I right about that? So far. So good, yes. So far. We hope he'll be here to help us make sense of those results.

Nonetheless, I do hope to focus on a few more election-related issues today as time allows, sort of weirdly, more so than I ever remember, this year's 2025 off-year elections are sort of blending straight into next year's 2026 midterm elections, even more than they usually do. If only thanks to Prop 50, the statewide ballot measure out here in California calling for the redistricting of five different U.S. House seats in the state in response to Texas's recent gerrymander to steal five Democratic congressional seats in Texas at the demand of Donald Trump all before. next year's midterm. So they all kind of work together. That alone, that Prop 50 alone sort of blends election 2025 straight into election 2026, whether we like it or not. But I hope to, as I note, still have still more on the gerrymander wars today as yet another new front. In yet another state has apparently been opened since we last spoke on yesterday's broadcast. When I think we also talked about the gerrymandering war. So. We will be talking about elections today and a bit just to stay in the spirit of the day, I guess, but not this week's elections per se, for the most part, as we have been discussing those in detail for the last week or so. We will save that with results and analysis for tomorrow and beyond at this point. In other news, Dick Cheney died. Now, I was brought up believing that when someone dies, if you don't have anything nice to say, well, you don't necessarily need to say anything at all. So I will keep this fairly brief. Allow others to create hagiographies for the man if they wish to do so. I do not. So working partially from AP here, Dick Cheney, who became one of the most powerful and polarizing vice presidents in U.S. history. And a leading advocate for the failed and disastrous invasion of Iraq has died at age 84, which frankly may have been the most surprising news of all today on this. That he was only 84? That he was only 84. I thought he was pushing his 80s when he became vice president. Turns out, and this is frankly disturbing to me today, apparently Dick Cheney was only 59 at the time. When he became vice president. Yes. And we all thought he was already an old man. Well, so anyway, George W. Bush's vice president, in fact, yes, died on Monday, on Monday from complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease. His family said Tuesday in a statement.

Now, before he became W.'s vice president, Cheney served as President Ford's White House Chief of Staff, the youngest to serve in that position at the time. He was a member of Congress. He was Bush Senior's Secretary of Defense during the First Gulf War after becoming the CEO of the Oil Services Company, Halliburton. And then he returned to public life. As the vice president under the elder Bush's son, in Cheney's hands, as AP describes it, the vice presidency became a nexus of influence and manipulation. When he bunkered in secure undisclosed locations after the September 11, 2001 attacks, that was less an inconvenience for Cheney than a metaphor for a life of power that he exercised to maximum effect from the shadows. I would add, for good or ill, mostly ill. He was the small man operating big levers, as if from Oz, according to AP. Machiavelli with a sardonic grin, quote, the Darth Vader of the administration as Bush himself described the public's view of his own vice president. Cheney was, in effect, the chief operating officer of the younger Bush's presidency, notes AP. He had a hand, often a commanding one in implementing decisions, most important to the president, all while living with decades of heart disease, A post-administration heart transplant. Cheney consistently defended the extraordinary tools of surveillance and detention and what AP describes as Inquisition, but I will describe more accurately as torture. employed in response to the September 11 attacks, just one of many chargeable war crimes, by the way, for which neither Cheney nor Bush were ever held to account. Years after leaving office, Cheney became a target of Donald Trump, especially after his daughter, Liz Cheney became the leading Republican critic and examiner of Trump's desperate... and unlawful attempts to stay in power after his 2020 election defeat and, of course, his incitement of an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021. Quote, in our nation's 246-year history, There has never been an individual who was a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump, said Cheney in a television ad for his daughter, which coming from him was quite a statement.

Inspectors General, whose congressionally mandated jobs are, in fact, to police, waste, fraud, and abuse in government. You know, the stuff that Republicans pretend to hate. Even as the Trump administration, for some reason, fires almost all of those watchdogs whose job it is to root out government waste, fraud, and abuse. The administration has also defunded the group that supervises those offices. But other than that, they are really totally concerned, really worried about government, waste, fraud, and abuse, right? Created after the 2008 financial crisis, the FHFA is typically A low-profile regulatory office, of course, leave it to Republicans to figure out how to abuse it. Bill Pulte has claimed to launch an effort targeting mortgage fraud. If only mortgage fraud allegedly carried out by certain political enemies of Donald Trump and has made public criminal referrals against the series of those Trump foes, including New York Attorney General, Letitia James, Federal Reserve Board Governor Lisa Cook, and California Democratic Senator Adam Schiff. And that, of course, is how you know that these claims are... stuff and nonsense even before any indictments were brought because, well, if you got a criminal referral and you're doing it legitimately, you don't necessarily go out loud, go and mention it out loud before the Department of Justice can even take a look at it. Lindsey Halligan, the Trump former insurance lawyer, and for now the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, was handpicked for that job by Trump before almost immediately, subsequently, indicting both former FBI Director James Comey and then New York Attorney General Letitia James. after her predecessor, after Lindsey Halligan's predecessor in the office, declined both indictments citing a lack of evidence. James's indictment is for alleged mortgage fraud, as referred to, as referred by Bill Pulte to the DOJ, even if the charges are pretty ridiculous and are likely to be tossed out before they are even heard in trial. Alan The, uh, that Joe Allen, the now fired inspector general reportedly received notice of his termination from the White House after he had made efforts to provide key information to prosecutors.

in the office of the Eastern District of Virginia, where James was indicted. The information that he turned over was constitutionally required, according to two of Reuters' four sources on this story. Oh, so you mean the inspector general that was fired was actually following the law? That's right. Oh, how horrible. Well, as it turns out, there is an explanation for that. He was not appointed by Donald Trump. He's been serving in the government for like 40 years. So, yeah, he followed the law. And he tried to let them know something. What? We don't yet know. A third described, a third source of Reuters described it as being potentially relevant for discovery in the Letitia James case. So material that she has a right to see, perhaps. His ouster is also said to have come about as he was preparing to send a letter. to Congress, notifying lawmakers that the FHFA under Bill Pulte was not cooperating with the Inspector General's office, as they are required to do by law, that according to three of the Reuters sources. James, Letitia James has pleaded not guilty to one count of bank fraud or one count of lying to a financial institution. Her legal team is seeking to have the case dismissed. Claiming Lindsey Halligan's appointment was unlawful and the prosecution is vindictive. Both of which are illegal. We'll have more on that in a moment. But Bill Pulte has reportedly circumvented the agency's Office of Inspector General in pursuing the cases against Trump's foes, James and Cook and Adam Schiff. Alan, who served as chief counsel of the FHFA, Office of Inspector General before he was put in charge of it. He became the FHFA's acting inspector general in April of this year, according to an archived page of the agency's website. He had a nearly 40-year career with the Department of Justice. where he held various roles from a federal prosecutor to senior legal positions with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms, and Explosives before he then joined the FHFA's Office of Inspector General in 2014. So last year under Joe Biden, when he became the counsel of the office, senior counsel of the office, and then... Acting Inspector General. On Monday, the website for the Office of Inspector General at the FHFA list of the position as, quote, currently vacant. I guess I should apply. Do you think they will have me? Don't laugh. In response to news of Allen's removal.

A Democratic U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said, quote, Director Pauley has some answering, Bill Pulte has some answering to do. Since taking his office for a second term, Donald Trump, who really, really is concerned about government, waste, fraud, and abuse. We know because he said it himself, and he wouldn't lie. Unless, of course, it's his government. Oh, that's a whole different thing. Waste fraud and abuse in the Donald Trump administration? Well, not interested in that. Anyway, yeah, he's fired dozens of inspectors general, including at the departments of agriculture, commerce, defense, education, energy, health and human services, housing and urban development, the Department of the Interior, labor, state, transportation, treasury. Veterans Affairs, as well as agencies like USAID, EPA, OPM, SBA, SSA, And others involved in Afghanistan reconstruction and the Export-Import Bank. In other words, he's fired all the police within the administration that might call out governmental waste, fraud, and abuse as committed by the Trump administration. And one more sort of related item here before we get to a short break. Speaking of the corrupt, weaponized Trump DOJ charges against Letitia James and James Comey, which were filed. Just days after Donald Trump sent an accidentally public message to Attorney General Pam Bondi, effectively telling her to charge them right away. Well, in a remarkable filing in both the James Comey and James cases, Trump's Attorney General Pam Bondi submitted a document that she signed on Halloween. More than a month after James Comey's indictment, declaring that she was retroactively ratifying everything that interim U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan had done to secure the two indictments. Which is all pretty weird. If it sounds weird, it's because it is weird. Retroactively ratifying. The Pam Bondi filing came in the Trump administration's response to motions from both. James Comey and James to dismiss their indictments on the grounds that Lindsey Halligan was unlawfully appointed as U.S. attorney. That is just one of several grounds that both James Comey and James have filed to dismiss their respective cases. But yes, federal judges in three other jurisdictions around the country here in Los Angeles, out in Nevada, out in New Jersey.

have found that U.S. attorneys were unlawfully appointed to their roles and or they were serving without Senate confirmation in all three of those cases. The courts are still trying to figure out what exactly that should mean if the U.S. attorneys are allowed to stay on the job in some fashion or if indictments that were brought under their tenure needed to be dismissed entirely. It's so unusual for this to ever happen once, much less to happen so far three different times, and we haven't even gotten to former beauty queen contestant Lindsey Halligan just yet. In Lindsey Halligan's case, specifically regarding her indictments of James Comey and James just days after she took the job, well, things could be even worse there in that she was the only prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Eastern District of Virginia who was willing to sign on to those indictments. Only her name is on them. So if she's found to be unlawfully serving in that job and if she's removed from the cases, well, it would seem that the cases themselves would almost certainly have to go away since she was the only one who actually signed on to them at the time of the indictments. Not to mention, by the way, in James Comey's case, if that case is dismissed, it could not be brought again because it was brought, I think, a day or two before the statute of limitations would have run out on that particular ridiculous case against him. So now we've got Pam Bondi trying to sort of shore up these indictments retroactively. claiming that she validly appointed Lindsey Halligan as interim U.S. attorney on September 22, but also purporting to give new and additional authority somehow to Lindsey Halligan. Quote, for the avoidance of doubt as to the validity of that appointment, I hereby appoint Ms. Lindsey Halligan to the additional position of special attorney. retroactive to that same date as her original appointment. I don't think that's how these things work. I don't know. I'm not a lawyer. So maybe, but I don't think you can retroactively say somebody. Oh, yeah, she was totally legal back then because of what I'm doing now. Anyway, TPM's Kurtz again says not much was not much doubt was avoided. In fact, it was amplified by her motion. The fact that Pam Bondi felt the need.

To do any after-the-fact cleanup of Lindsey Halligan's appointment tends to undermine the rest of the Trump DOJ brief. It certainly does. Which attempted to argue that Lindsey Halligan is a perfectly valid U.S. attorney. Why just look at this retroactive statement that was signed by the Attorney General? All the magic wand waving and retroactive appointments seem like a huge concession, argues Kurtz, perhaps forced by... those federal judges in New Jersey and Nevada and California, where they have already found fault with the appointments of those other Trump U.S. attorneys, and those were under less unusual circumstances than we are dealing with regarding Lindsey Halligan. Now, I've argued that the James Comey case... And probably the James case will never make it to trial. And that if James Comey's case did, well, it would be likely laughed out by a jury. The same seems to me to be likely true in James's case. And we are already seeing a desperate DOJ sort of trying to backfill, reverse engineer both cases, ridiculously corrupt insufficiencies in each of them. So there you go. Stay tuned. Let's take quick break here. And I've got, I think, a couple more voting and elections related stories to get to today, including yet another state. announcing that it too is getting in on the gerrymandering wars, sort of, I think. So they say, we'll find out. Plus, Desi Doyen's latest green news report. What? All of that. Still ahead on today's broadcast. I'm Brad Friedman.

You're listening to The Bradcast. We are 100% listener supported thanks to listeners like you who drop by Bradblog.com slash donate. Welcome back. It's the Bradcast, Bradfriedman, from brandplog.com. Apparently, and I don't even know the details on this, Desi, you may know them better than I do. Donald Trump went out and claimed that there was the California election was being rigged. The Prop 50 election was being rigged. Like he always does. With every election, anytime anyone is allowed to vote by mail, oh my God, it's supposed to be completely fraudulent. It's a bunch of nonsense. Journalists asked in the White House, asked Karoline Leavitt about it. And she's, oh, yes, it's absolutely happening. There's all kinds of fraud going on in California. Anyone who doesn't know that doesn't know anything or whatever nonsense she had to say. Just in a response I got from the California Secretary of State, Dr. Shirley Weber, who says, quote, if there are irregularities, what are they? Why won't they identify them? Where exactly is this fraud? Ramblings don't equate with fact. She said California voters will not be deceived by someone who constantly makes desperate, unsubstantiated attempts to dissuade Americans from participating in our democracy. She said California voters will not be sidelined from exercising their constitutional right to vote. and should not let anyone deter them from exercising that right. Californians had until 8 p.m. on Tuesday, including those who might have had a vote-by-mail ballot sent to them. They can drop them off at a drop box, et cetera, before 8 p.m. on Tuesday. So far... No evidence of fraud or allegations thereof other than by the President of the United States. All right. Back to the gerrymandering wars before 2026. So far, our story in very brief, Texas Republicans. They're already gerrymandered congressional maps to flip five Democratic U.S. House seats to Republican next year. California. responded by calling for a voter-approved rewrite of its U.S. House map in order to flip five Republican seats to the Democrats next year. Missouri and North Carolina Republicans rewrote their maps to steal one Democratic seat in each state. Virginia Democrats then jumped into the game with a complicated but so far doable scheme to flip as many as three seats from red to blue next year if voters approved.

Indiana Republicans are convening to consider stealing one, maybe two seats from Democrats in that state, though some brave Republicans out there are so far blocking that effort. Illinois Democrats then are considering reportedly redistricting their already gerrymandered map to maybe flip one red seat to blue. Ohio has now redrawn its U.S. House map for various legal reasons, and they have made two Democratic District, congressional districts, harder, but not impossible for Democrats to hold on to. And now, on Tuesday, this week, another state enters the gerrymandering wars as Democratic Maryland Governor Wes Moore. said that he was forming an advisory commission in Maryland that would consider redrawing congressional maps in the state. A state with eight U.S. House districts, only one of them currently Republican. And that one was largely via court order since Democrats in the state had previously tried to gerrymander it, only to be told by the courts that they could not before, well, a few things happened in the courts that now make it apparently more feasible to create partisan gerrymanders to any state's heart's content. Quote, we will explore every avenue possible to make sure Maryland has fair and representative maps, said Governor Moore in a statement. This commission, he said, will ensure the people are heard. Whatever that means exactly. The commission includes three appointments made by more, including commission chair and senator, Angela also Brooks, in addition to the Maryland General Assembly's presiding officers or their designees, both the president of Maryland Senate and its House Speaker are Democrats in the otherwise very blue state. Notably, State Senate President William Ferguson, however, a Democrat has publicly opposed redrawing the map in a way that would target the only Republican in the state's congressional delegation. So. We'll see. This could be a bit of a faint by the governor. I don't know. By Governor Moore to act like he's trying to get something done, knowing that it can't really happen because it'll be blocked in the state Senate. I don't know. It sounds akin perhaps.

To what the governor, Governor Mike Braun, the Republican in Indiana, has been doing. He called a special session, even though Republicans out there in the state legislature had said they will not go along with it, with redistricting in order to flip the remaining blue seats to red in Indiana. We could be seeing something like that from Wes Moore in Maryland. I don't know. But we'll see. His statement said the commission will quote, organize public hearings, solicit public feedback, and make recommendations to the governor and Maryland General Assembly to improve our current map and ensure Maryland has fair congressional maps. So it sounds to me like if folks in Maryland would like to see their state that seat flipped in response to what Republicans are doing to what, frankly, Donald Trump began. Well, I guess they should speak up before this commission and let them know how they feel if they're for it or against it. Yeah. How else will they know how you feel if you don't let them know? So another state now enters this race to the gerrymandering bottom again kicked off by Donald Trump ordering ordering GOP controlled states to rewrite congressional maps in the middle of the decade, which is never done because he. arguably for very good reason, believes that his party is otherwise likely to get trounced in next year's midterms, given how wildly unpopular both he and his policies are among the American people. So instead, he's just going to cheat. Instead of changing his policies, instead of doing things that the American public actually wants him to do, he's just going to cheat instead if he can get away with it. a spate of new polling released this week in advance of Tuesday's off-year elections, finds that Donald Trump is now more unpopular than at any time during either of his two terms in office, yes, including after he incited an insurrection by his supporters at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. That's how much he is hated. All of that, of course, about the gerrymandering wars comes with my usual reminder that, frankly... All bets will be off for 2026, depending on if and when, mostly when, I'm afraid, Trump's corrupted Republican U.S. Supreme Court majority decides that they want to gut Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which, depending if they go for it, while that would clear the way for dozens of Republican-controlled states to completely rewrite their maps yet again. In order to kill any majority minority districts in the state that they had in place under requirements of the Voting Rights Act, meant to ensure that minority voters could elect representatives of their choosing if the Voting Rights Act is gutted to...

And that mandate, essentially, then like I say, all bets are off for the Republicans. Yeah, it would be extremely stunning and yet not at all surprising to me if the right wing Supreme Court justices decide that they are going to get rid of the prohibition on racial gerrymandering. It's just sad. Hopefully it doesn't happen, but, you know, we have to be prepared for that. Well, indeed. Right now. You know, the court may do it as early as January as some fear. They had an oral argument on this just a few weeks ago. So if they do it in January, that would essentially give time enough for all of these GOP seats, states, I'm sorry, to do that to rewrite these seats before candidate deadlines for next year's. midterm primaries. If the court, on the other hand, does it in June or July, that would likely be too late for a number of GOP states, if not all of them, to do it before the 2026 primaries and election. Now, if the court does not do it at all, if they uphold the Voting Rights Act or rule against it very narrowly, well, that would be a happy miracle, but I will take it. Finally, some good news regarding voting rights for all Americans. This came in late on Friday in a ruling by U.S. District Judge Colleen Kolar Katelli of D.C. She permanently barred Donald Trump from requiring proof of citizenship. on federal voter registration forms. Now, this is part of Trump's ridiculous executive order demanding all sorts of things in elections that presidents have zero lawful or constitutional authority over. He doesn't care. He just issues an order on anything that he feels like. In this case, Trump had tried to strongarm the Elections Assistance Commission. or EAC, into imposing the proof of citizenship requirement as part of his broad executive order on voting. The EAC publishes the national voter registration form that is meant to be used by anybody, any citizen in any state, any eligible citizen. So 18 and over, etc. In any state, this is a sort of a leftover from the Jim Crow era when some states made it next to impossible for certain people. to even be able to find a form with which to register to vote for some odd reason. In fact, the president has no legal role whatsoever in U.S. federal elections. And the March executive order that he signed, which, you know, as many were freaking out about it at the time, I told you that you could largely ignore it because he had no legal authority to do pretty much anything in that EO. He can say whatever he wants in these orders. But if he has no authority to carry them out, at least until the...

Supreme Court invents some authority, then we don't need to be worrying about it. There's plenty of other things that we do need to be worrying about. In any event, that order was seen by many as Trump testing just how far he could go in asserting power over election administration. And now, according to two different federal court judges, the answer is, Not far at all. You don't get to do that, Mr. President. Judge Kolarkateli had already temporarily blocked the proof of citizenship provision back in April. And a different federal judge in Massachusetts had also blocked other elements of that executive order in making her ban permanent last week. Judge Kolarkateli noted the president's lack of role in elections, writing, quote, the court pauses to note a conspicuous absence. from the legal and historical context thus far provided. The states have initial authority to regulate elections. Congress has supervisory authority over those regulations. The president does not feature at all. The judge wrote. Pretty clearly, I think. The case, which combined three different lawsuits by the Democratic Party and by voting rights groups, presented an early test for whether the courts would resist sweeping claims of presidential powers in areas where there was no explicit legal authority or historic custom or tradition. for the president to be operating in any way, shape, or form. Proof of citizenship to register has been a Republican obsession for years now. Trump and the GOP have wildly lied about the prevalence of illegal voting by non-citizens voting and so forth, and additional hurdles to voting, like requiring proof of citizenship that has, you know... been something they've been fighting for for years. That would almost certainly dampen registration, particularly in immigrant communities, communities with lawful immigrant citizen voters and among marginalized potential voters who might be afraid of all of this. Tens of millions of Americans, in fact, lack ready access to proof of their own citizenship. Quote, the measure was designed to suppress voter participation in elections, a solution in search of a problem, writes Joyce JD Vance, a former U.S. attorney in Alabama. She said, quote, it's akin to the poll taxes used in the South before the Supreme Court put an end to them.

Well, at least until they allow them again, Joyce, as they arguably do already in one sense because they allow draconian photo ID restrictions at the polling places now. They didn't use to. Even though some 30 million Americans do not have the specific type of IDs that Republicans now mandate in many states that they control. But for now, anyway, good news on the proof of citizenship part of this that someone apparently told Donald Trump he could simply declare by executive order fiat if you wanted to. He can't, period. End of story. I hope. All right, quick break. And we are back with Desi Doyen and the Green News Report straight ahead on the broadcast. I'm Brad Friedman. Hey, this is Brad. The Bradcast survives thanks to you and your support. Please stop by bradblog.com slash donate today to help us continue to do over your public airwaves what we try to do five days a week. That's bradblog.com slash donate and thank you.

Okay, dokey. Once again, election results on tomorrow's broadcast. But before we get there, let's get to it. Our latest green news report. We don't have any clothes for the baby. Everything gone, roof gone, host on. Humanitarian disaster looms in Jamaica following monster hurricane Melissa. This I've never seen like that at all ever. Extreme rainstorm shatters records in New York City. Plus, the Trump administration used mob-like tactics to scuttle the first-ever emissions rules for international shipping. All of that thuggery and more straight ahead from Bradblog.com. I'm Brad Friedman. And I'm Desi Doyen. Stand by for six minutes of independent green news, politics, analysis, and snarky comment. In other news, the administration just announced that Trump will open the pristine Alaskan wilderness to drilling. The land in question is the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a critical habitat for polar bears, caribus, and migratory birds. As one expert put it, One of the worst things you can do for polar bears is to industrialize their habitat. That's a study from the New England Journal of Ways to F with polar bears. This is your Green News Report. I'm going to soak up the sun. Okay, Desi Doyen, it has only been a week, but it kind of seems like the... Media have moved on from Hurricane Melissa already? Yes, it does appear to be so, and it's quite distressing because there is a looming humanitarian crisis in the aftermath of last week's Category 5 Monster Hurricane Melissa, one of the strongest Atlantic storms ever recorded. The confirmed death toll is now at least 67 across multiple Caribbean islands. Jamaica bore the brunt of the storm's ferocity, with entire neighborhoods demolished. Victims are... are scrambling for food, clean water, shelter, and medicine. The United States has deployed at least one disaster recovery team, but experts say that the Trump administration's abrupt dismantling of USAID, the world's largest aid organization, prevented the usual preparations and coordination for managing hurricane disasters in the region. U.S. capacity for aid and emergency response internationally has been drastically diminished for this and future disasters, according to the former head of the USAID for the Caribbean, Brian Heidel in an interview with NPR. There is no way that the U.S. government is going to be able to provide a major level of support that they have provided in the past. Well, all I can tell you was when Ronald Reagan was the president and the last terrible storm to hit Jamaica, Hurricane Gilbert came around in 1988. There was a huge effort by Ronald Reagan to send out aid, ships, hospital equipment, food, everything else to Jamaica.

This time. Obviously, Trump doesn't give a damn. Nope. A new rapid attribution study has calculated that human-caused climate change made Hurricane Melissa four times more likely to occur due to record hot ocean waters that turbocharged it. The findings are in line with similar rapid attribution analyses and a growing body of research showing how ocean warming from climate change is fueling the conditions necessary for the most extreme tropical storms. In the Northeast... a record rainstorm hammered the New York City region late last week, shattering daily rainfall records in Central Park and elsewhere. The rain fell at three times the rate the city's flood control system was designed for, inundating streets and subway stations, halting flights at major airports, and killing two people trapped in flooded basements. Numerous studies show that rainfall intensity is increasing due to global warming, leading to more frequent and severe... beer flooding worldwide. In Antarctica, a glacier on the Antarctic Peninsula shrank by 50% over just two months, the fastest retreat ever recorded in modern history. Yikes. Researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder say they were shocked by how fast the small glacier retreated five miles in two months, comparing it to falling dominoes. They said the retreat was heavily influenced by warming ocean waters and has major implications for global sea level. rise if larger Antarctic glaciers follow the same pattern. Falling dominoes. Meanwhile, CBS News, which was recently taken over by the right-wing billionaire owner of Skydance media late last week, fired its reporters who specialized in climate change. Because of course. Finally, we're now learning more about the Trump administration's extreme pressure tactics that succeeded in derailing the first ever global carbon emissions fee on international shipping intended to reduce pollution and climate warming emissions. The Financial Times reports that diplomats compared the tactics to dealing with the mafia, saying U.S. representatives directly threatened nations supporting the measure with visa restrictions for shipping crews and other penalties like increased fees. to access U.S. ports. Experts warned that using leverage to force other countries to comply carries long-term risks for U.S. influence, increasing the chances that non-U.S. countries will conclude that they cannot work with the U.S., making agreements independently among themselves that work around the United States. This is going to take a very long time to recover from. Yep.

I'm afraid. For much more on all of those stories and the ones we couldn't get to today, check out our website at greennews.bradblog.com. I'm Brad Friedman. And I'm Desi Doyle. And this has been your Green News Report. So basically... This guy, this thug, we've got an international agreement for the first time ever to curb emissions of shipping around the world. Yes, it is the first time that all the nations agreed that they were going to do this. All the nations except for the thug, the godfather, the mafia leader that heads the White House at this point, going around all of those countries and saying, hey, if you do this. Nice country you got there. Hate to see something happened to it. Yes, including going up to them during coffee breaks to threaten them, apparently. Unbelievable, although... Not that unbelievable anymore, I'm afraid. All right, we've got to get out. Thanks again to Desi Doyen, our producer, to all of you for spending a portion of your day or night with us. If you missed any portion of today's show, download it anytime for free at bradblog.com. And hey, while you're there, please hit one of those donate buttons. Nice blog you got there. I hate to see you something happen. Anyway, hit one of them donate buttons. If you don't mind, it goes straight to Bradblog.com slash donate to help us stay on your podcast. airwaves. Drop me email. I'm, if you like, I'm Brandcast at bradblog.com. And on the social media, especially blue sky, I am the Bradblog. We will see you there until we see you here, hopefully tomorrow, hopefully with election results, hopefully with John Nichols, and certainly with Desi Doyen. Until then, I'm Brad Friedman. Good luck, world.