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Utah Senate President Calls for Major Reduction in Scale of Planned Data Center

2 hours agoFar Left

The project, backed by celebrity investor Kevin O'Leary, has spurred major controversy amid Utah's water challenges.

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Ex-South Park writer reveals plan to troll MAGA Shark Tank star with brutal billboards

Raw Story

1 hour ago

Ex-South Park writer reveals plan to troll MAGA Shark Tank star with brutal billboards

Former "South Park" writer Toby Morton had a surprise over the weekend for Mr. Wonderful — aka Kevin O'Leary — announcing plans to troll the Canadian businessman.The MAGA "Shark Tank" star has financially backed the development of a large-scale, 9-gigawatt data center located on a 40,000-acre parcel of land in Utah, which has prompted outrage from locals and leaders in the state. "Kevin O’Leary is backing a massive AI data center near the Great Salt Lake, powered by natural gas and fast tracked by state officials. Scientists warn it could increase emissions, strain resources, and further impact an ecosystem already in decline," Morton wrote in a post on Instagram."Kevin is also aware that I own KevinOLearyTV.com, his social media handle as a domain name. I’ll be using it accordingly," Morton added. "Billboards are on the way."Morton encouraged people to donate to the billboard campaign via the new website, where he said people can expect updates from Utah residents, public information and environmental concerns, along with "satire, commentary, and excessive pettiness." He explained it will also feature "occasional reminders that this website exists because Kevin forgot to buy his own social media handle as a domain name."This isn't Morton's first time taking on public figures. He publicly teased President Donald Trump after purchasing multiple domain names associated with the president's attempted rebrand of the Kennedy Center. In December, Morton launched the TrumpKennedyCenter.org website, which includes several not-so-subtle digs at the president's second administration and his handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files — including photos highlighting his ties to the late financier and convicted child sex offender. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Toby Morton (@wordclown)

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Trump Backs Off Plan for $1.8 Billion Fund That Drew Political Backlash

NYT > U.S. > Politics

2 hours ago

Trump Backs Off Plan for $1.8 Billion Fund That Drew Political Backlash

The fund has drawn backlash from critics who said it was a scheme to reward President Trump’s political allies with public benefits.

Center Left

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Mills Reminds Maine Voters She’s ‘Still on the Ballot’ for Senate Amid Platner Controversy

NYT > U.S. > Politics

4 hours ago

Mills Reminds Maine Voters She’s ‘Still on the Ballot’ for Senate Amid Platner Controversy

A month after withdrawing from the state’s Senate race, Gov. Janet Mills suggested she remained an option after the likely Democratic nominee, Graham Platner, faced a new scandal.

Center Left

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Trump Plans to Drop $1.8 Billion Slush Fund After Major Court Loss

The New Republic

4 hours ago

Trump Plans to Drop $1.8 Billion Slush Fund After Major Court Loss

The Trump administration is suspending its $1.776 billion slush fund for alleged MAGA victims of political targeting after internal disagreement. “The Department of Justice disagrees strongly with the decision on the Anti-Weaponization Fund put forth by the United States District Court Judge in the Eastern District of Virginia, wherein the Court stated that, under no circumstances, may the Department of Justice proceed with the Anti-Weaponization Fund recently established in order to make up for the tremendous abuse, harm, and hate unfairly shown to so many people,” the Justice Department wrote on X Monday afternoon, referring to the fund’s temporary ban last Friday. “This Fund was open to anybody who was so weaponized, targeted, or persecuted, whether they were Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent, or otherwise. The Department will abide by the Court’s ruling.”Last week, a federal judge suspended the administration from proceeding with its slush fund for at least two weeks, scheduling a June 12 hearing to hear arguments. If Trump has truly given up on his plans, this would be a quick life and death for an enrichment fund that drew criticism from both Democrats and even some Republicans, as both sides decried it as a problematic conflict of interests at best and blatant taxpayer theft at worst. Outrage grew as the administration refused to exclude January 6 rioters convicted of assaulting police officers from getting a payout.“This has become a distraction,” an administration source told Axios. “The president believes government was weaponized against people—it wasn’t just him. But this isn’t the time and vehicle for it.”

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Janet Mills hints at resurrecting Maine Senate bid amid Graham Platner scandals

Washington Examiner

4 hours ago

Janet Mills hints at resurrecting Maine Senate bid amid Graham Platner scandals

Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME) suggested she could restart her Maine Senate campaign after suspending it in April against Democrat Graham Platner as the embattled progressive insurgent faces fallout from his latest scandal involving sexts to women who were not his wife. “People have the impression that I ‘withdrew’ or ‘dropped out,’” Mills told the Portland […]

Center Right

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Thune calls on White House to ditch $1.8B anti-weaponization fund

The Hill News

4 hours ago

Thune calls on White House to ditch $1.8B anti-weaponization fund

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters at the Capitol on Monday that his preference would be that the White House shut down the proposed $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund if Congress is to pass a budget reconciliation package anytime soon. “I made my views very clear on the issue,” Thune said. Asked if he…

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'Absolutely screwed': DC insider delivers brutal verdict as Senate GOP stuck in 'bad jam'

Raw Story

4 hours ago

'Absolutely screwed': DC insider delivers brutal verdict as Senate GOP stuck in 'bad jam'

Republicans returned to Capitol Hill on Monday facing a cascade of crises of President Donald Trump's making, and a prominent Beltway insider delivered a blunt diagnosis for the party's predicament.Punchbowl News co-founder Jake Sherman described Senate Republicans as "absolutely screwed" and stuck in a "very bad jam" over the anti-weaponization fund specifically, with the administration failing to send language that could win over GOP holdouts."These are critical weeks for Trump and the GOP-controlled Congress, with just over five months left until Election Day. Trump has been bogged down in peace negotiations with Iran. The conflict remains at a stalemate somewhere between war and peace. Trump blames ‘Dumocrats, and various seemingly unpatriotic Republicans’ for not understanding that ‘it will all work out well in the end,'" Punchbowl News wrote. Republicans hope to launch a vote-a-rama Wednesday night and muscle the immigration reconciliation bill through by Thursday morning, the outlet reported. Two provisions have badly snarled that timeline.Security funding for Trump's planned White House ballroom was already attached to the package, costing support among lawmakers worried about electoral blowback. The Senate parliamentarian ruled last month that the $1 billion provision violated the Byrd Rule, forcing Republicans to redraft.The anti-weaponization fund has proven to be an even larger hurdle, with some Senate Republicans refusing to advance the bill until the White House places guardrails around the money, which the administration has shown little interest in doing. Democrats are preparing what Punchbowl called a "massive amendment blitz" to force public votes on the fund.“Senate Democrats will launch a coordinated effort to kill the slush fund before one cent goes out the door,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer proclaimed Monday. “And no matter what Republicans do, we will force them to vote on it.”

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Top Trump DOJ revenge case hits major snag after crucial ruling in unrelated case

Raw Story

4 hours ago

Top Trump DOJ revenge case hits major snag after crucial ruling in unrelated case

The Trump Justice Department's criminal case against former FBI Director James Comey got a worrisome sign on Monday — and it wasn't a development in that case itself, but one in an unrelated case involving the National Park Service.According to Politico, U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss has issued a two-week restraining order prohibiting the park service from doing anything to interfere with a protest by the liberal group Accountability Now USA, which has for months been protesting President Donald Trump outside a federal courthouse near the National Mall — by flying a huge banner that says "86-47," with "47" being a reference to Trump and "86" a common slang term for getting rid of something.The group has been harassed by the Secret Service, and more recently, a National Park Service official issued an email ordering the group to remove it as it is "obscenity" not protected by the First Amendment. This is in line with a number of Trump officials and allies who have claimed "86-47" is a call for violence against the president."Moss, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, disagreed in his ruling.“The Court does not doubt that political violence is on the rise and that it poses a grave threat not just to the targets of the threats but to the country as a whole," wrote Moss. "But the enormity of that problem does not change the meaning of Plaintiff’s speech, which by any reasonable measure merely advocated for the President’s impeachment and removal from office — that is, ‘to throw [him] out.’”This could have grave implications for the administration's separate efforts to prosecute Comey, who was charged with violent threats for a social media post from last year depicting seashells arranged to spell out "8647." Comey deleted the post and apologized, but has made clear he was never advocating violence.All of this comes as the DOJ quietly reassigned a prosecutor in charge of the Comey case.

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