Trump’s Lawyers Typed “Challenge Accepted.” One Day Later, A Judge Buried Them.

Plus: Trump’s own judge turned on him, an invoice nobody at the Kennedy Center saw coming, and Schumer’s plan to make Trump pay it all back

Thanks for being here. Every Sunday I bring you proof the fight is working, whether the regime wants you to see it or not.

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THE REGIME IS 0-19

Dale Caldwell runs elections in New Jersey. Last year the DOJ told him to hand over the state’s entire voter file, meaning every name, birthdate and home address on it—plus driver’s license numbers and millions of partial Social Security numbers. When Caldwell refused, the regime sued him in February.

Gov. Mikie Sherrill turned down a second demand last week and called it baseless. A Justice Department lawyer answered her on social media with two words I’ll bet they now regret: “Challenge accepted.”

Judge Zahid Quraishi dismissed the case the next day, with prejudice.

The Civil Rights Act of 1960 does not give the federal government a state’s live voter database, Quraishi wrote, and he called the department’s claim untenable.

That made it eighteen rulings on these lawsuits and eighteen losses. Two days later, Illinois made it nineteen. To date, no court has ordered a state to turn over a voter file.

TRUMP PICKED THIS JUDGE. HE TOLD TRUMP NO.

Ramón Rodriguez Vazquez worked the fields around Grandview, Washington, for sixteen years. He owned his house. He had been married forty years, raised four children, and helped care for a granddaughter who had already survived two heart surgeries. He had never been arrested in his life. Then, in February of last year, ICE came to his door looking for somebody else, and took him instead.

Immigration Judge John Odell refused him a bond hearing. Under the regime’s rules, anybody who crossed the border years ago could be held indefinitely with no bond hearing at all.

On Thursday, the Ninth Circuit killed that rule. Judge Daniel Bress, appointed by Trump himself in 2019, wrote the opinion. Thousands of people held across nine western states, according to his attorney, can now ask a judge to set them free.

Rodriguez Vazquez won’t be one of them. After a second bond denial, he stopped fighting and left the country last year, worn down by months in a cell he never should have been in. But the rule that took him from his family is now dead in nine states.

THE PEOPLE SUING TRUMP KEEP GETTING PAID

Jazz musician Chuck Redd was booked at the Kennedy Center for a Christmas Eve show in 2025. He canceled it after Trump’s appointees voted to put Trump’s name on the building.

The Kennedy Center sued him that March. A judge threw the case out in June, ruling the center had retaliated against Redd for speaking out. Judge Christopher Cooper, in a separate case, ordered Trump’s name taken off the building entirely the same month, ruling only Congress had the authority to put it there. Redd is now billing the Kennedy Center more than $250,000 to cover his legal fees.

Redd’s case ran on D.C.’s anti-retaliation law. The federal government works under a similar principle. A law Congress passed in 1980 says that when it hauls somebody into court without justification and loses, it has to cover that person’s legal bills too.

Between July 2025 and July 2026, winning attorneys have demanded six-figure reimbursements from the federal government in at least ten cases, totaling more than $2.5 million.

Even when the IRS commissioner sued Trump over his removal and won, a Florida judge ruled the regime has to cover the other side’s legal bills. It’s the same story everywhere: the agencies slashing your benefits are now paying some of that money back to the people they wronged. It’s the closest thing to justice a taxpayer gets to see—for now.

DEMOCRATS WANT YOUR MONEY BACK FROM TRUMP

Dem Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer stood at a Public Citizen forum in DC on Thursday and introduced a bill built to claw back what Trump has taken through corruption.

The Anti-Corruption Bureau Creation Act, filed with Sen. Alex Padilla, creates one agency with subpoena power over the executive branch, led by a seven-member board confirmed by the Senate. It draws its money from outside the annual budget, the same way the Federal Reserve does. If a president tries to leave a board seat empty to disable it, a panel of D.C. Circuit judges steps in and appoints a replacement after 14 days.

The provision with teeth lets any American sue to recover money taken through corruption, with state attorneys general given priority.

Trump’s own financial disclosure puts his income at more than $2 billion since retaking office. The bill cites a separate New Yorker estimate putting his family’s total gains from the presidency above $4 billion.

Republicans hold both chambers, so Schumer’s bill won’t pass, not yet.

That’s the fight. We find what the regime hopes nobody sees. We put it in front of millions. Then we hand you a megaphone, so you can spread the truth about why Republicans keep failing you and how Democrats can finally stop Trump. That’s how we win in November.

If you’ve been meaning to go paid, today’s the day:

Hit the ❤️ like button and restack this. Every restack is a direct hit on Trump’s propaganda machine telling people the fight is already lost, and today we’ve got the receipts to prove it wrong.

Onward!

Scott

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Of everything horrible Trump’s done, what should a new Congress investigate first? Let me know in the comments! I know it’s hard to choose just one with so many examples.