Thanks so much for joining me today. Since last Tuesday, Trump and Republicans have lost four separate times. That’s what this edition is about.
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Kerry Kennedy Just Stopped Trump’s Chisel
On Wednesday, two federal judges blocked Trump’s name from being carved into the stone front of the US Institute of Peace. The institute’s fired board says a contractor had already been picked.
Congress created the independent nonprofit institute in 1984 to help settle wars overseas. Late last year, Trump’s name was bolted onto the front of the building. He later claimed he “had nothing to do” with it.
Bolts weren’t permanent enough. In September, fired board members took the matter to a federal appeals court. One of them is Kerry Kennedy, President John F. Kennedy’s niece, who last December vowed to take a pickax to Trump’s name on the Kennedy Center. She never had to. A federal judge ordered the letters off in May, and they came down in June.
The regime’s lawyers told the court there were “no current plans” to carve anything. But in the same filing, they admitted that the State Department had already contacted two vendors about engraving the building. They even got a quote from one. Judges Cornelia Pillard and Harry Edwards didn’t take the lawyers’ word for it, granting the board’s emergency request to stop the carving.
For now, the letters will stay bolted. Arguments are set for November 17. Taking the Trump name down will be a job for a screwdriver. I’ve got one.
Domestic Violence Shelters Win Against Trump
The DOJ started attaching strings to federal grants that pay for crisis hotlines and shelter beds—shelters couldn’t use the funding to help people the regime calls “removable aliens.” They couldn’t run diversity programs or describe abuse as a problem bigger than one crime.
In response, 25 nonprofits from 22 states and Washington, DC, sued, led by the Rhode Island Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Its director, Lucy Rios, told the court last year around $1 million of its yearly budget comes from these grants. Its annual report showed federal money made up 79% of its revenue.
On Tuesday, Judge Melissa DuBose handed the DOJ its third loss in this case, and this one was final. The judge said it was “a sweeping and chaotic overhaul.” She decided to throw out the conditions for every shelter that competes for this money, not just the ones who sued.
The regime wanted to close shelter doors on some survivors. A judge kept them open.
Colorado Says GOP Governor Nominee Broke The Law
Victor Marx wants to run Colorado. On Friday, a state hearing officer found that the Republican nominee for governor’s campaign took illegal money on purpose. He recommended a $57,647 fine, which would likely be the largest for a campaign finance violation in state history.
In Colorado, one person can give a candidate for governor $1,450, period. The Marx campaign took 200 contributions over that limit from 110 people, plus 10 cash donations over the $100 cash limit, about $83,758 in all. The state warned it in May. It kept taking the money through July, clicking right past the warning pop-ups on the state’s own filing website.
Marx called it a “nothing burger” back in July. His lawyers blamed his treasurer’s inexperience. Hearing officer Macon Cowles didn’t buy any of it. He found the campaign took the prohibited contributions intentionally, and he called the scale “without precedent.” He asked why nobody hired a professional when the campaign had hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting in the bank.
Cowles ordered the money still not refunded to be handed over to charities that have no ties to Marx. The fine’s not final until a top state election official signs off on it. But voters will get the final word on November 3, and now they know a man who couldn’t follow a $1,450 limit wants the keys to the whole state.
Disabled Voter Beats Kansas GOP In Court
Robert Mikesic has voted in Kansas since 1984. He’s paralyzed from the mid-back down, uses a wheelchair, and votes by mail. For last November’s local election, his county mailed his ballot on the very first day the law allowed. It took three weeks to reach his house and showed up the day after the election.
Mail delays like that are why the state of Kansas started giving mail ballots three extra days in 2017 to be counted, as long as they’re postmarked by Election Day. In 2024 alone, that saved 2,110 ballots. Republican lawmakers overrode Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto to kill that grace period. So Mikesic, other voters, and three nonprofits sued. Judge Carl Folsom put the three days back in July.
Secretary of State Scott Schwab has fought to undo it ever since. Late last year, his office told the court the law’s start date was “largely meaningless” and the hearing could wait so everyone could “enjoy the holiday season.” Then he spent the summer complaining that the ruling came too late. Sounds like someone knew they were going to lose.
On Friday, Schwab lost for the third time. The Kansas Court of Appeals refused to bring the law back for this November. The state can wait, the judges explained, but a lost ballot never comes back: “The potential injury to voters, by contrast, is final.”
Ballots start going out October 14. Now, every Kansan who mails one by November 3 gets three more days to make it count. As they should.
We have just twenty-nine days to go.
The Trump regime needs you to believe the election is over before a single vote is counted. It is not. Every day we show you stories that prove there’s been more good news than I have room to print.
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One last thing before you go. Hit the ❤️ like button and restack this. Two judges just blocked Trump’s name from being carved into the Institute of Peace. Pass that on to someone who could use a reason to smile today.
Onward!
Scott
Should Victor Marx give back every illegal dollar before Election Day?
What would you carve on the Institute of Peace instead of Trump’s name?
I want the tarp removed from The Kennedy Center.
Sitting here with coffee, mad and grateful at the same time. Mad that any of this had to be fought. Grateful somebody fought it. That is the whole fight for me.