Another Zohran Mamdani 'Affordability' Scam: Make Takeout Cost More, Then Declare Victory

GOP strategist accuses Mitch McConnell's team of morbid scam — and tells them to lawyer up

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has posted two images from the hospital to show proof of life, amid swirling speculation about his declining health.But former GOP strategist turned Lincoln Project co-founder Steve Schmidt doesn't buy it — and told Joanna Coles on The Daily Beast Podcast this week that he is convinced there is a cover-up underway.“Here’s my advice to the Mitch McConnell team: get lawyers,” said Schmidt. “I think this is a fraud that’s being perpetrated upon the taxpayer and whatever statute is applicable. I think there’s a high likelihood that what they’re doing here is illegal. I don’t think that Mitch McConnell is alive... I don’t think he’s sentient.”McConnell, who previously served as Senate Republican Leader and was an overbearing presence in national politics, was rushed to the hospital weeks ago over what has been described as a cardiac arrest event. Aides insist McConnell is recovering but acknowledge he is a long way from returning to work.The bottom line, said Schmidt, is that “I don’t think Mitch McConnell’s walking out of the hospital.”Under Kentucky law, passed recently by Republicans, Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear would not have any power to appoint an interim senator if McConnell passes away, and a special election would have to take place immediately.Beshear has faced calls from some Democratic activists to do more to demand proof of life from McConnell, but Schmidt pointed out people need to be realistic.The governor “can’t show up at the hospital and declare, ‘It’s I, Andy Beshear, governor of the Commonwealth, let me into the room.’ Right?” said Schmidt. “And by the way, Andy Beshear’s not in that political party that wants to be in your hospital room with you at the moment of birth, at the moment of death; that’s peering through the bedroom window.”

Mamdani blows off concerns from NY’ers over pied-à-terre mailing snafu as questions swirl over new tax

Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Department of Finance Commissioner Richard Lee faced pointed questions about the botched rollout of the city's new pied-à-terre tax on wealthy homeowners, neither able to explain how massive tax bills landed in the mailbox of everyday New Yorkers.

Hammer drop exposes Todd Blanche to judge hours before confirmation vote

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche's own admissions about FBI negligence in the Epstein case landed in federal court today, hours before his Senate confirmation vote.Survivors' attorneys filed the letter Wednesday before Judge Ryon McCabe in the Southern District of Florida in the case Doe 1 et al. v. United States. The filing suggests the survivors believe Blanche admitted wrongdoing by the FBI in a rush to deflect responsibility for failures in the Epstein case.The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to vote on Blanche's confirmation Thursday morning.The letter cites Blanche's statements at a July 16 meeting with survivors at Justice Department headquarters as grounds to amend the complaint. Plaintiffs said they were "seeking this relief in light of acting Attorney General Todd Blanche's very recent statements to survivors."During that meeting, ABC News reported, survivors described Blanche's conduct as "dissatisfactory and contrived" when he dismissed survivor Maria Farmer, telling her that her "call [to the FBI about EpsteinI] was made in 1996," "the case was handled improperly before 2007" and "you got screwed over by the FBI but I cannot fix the FBI's lack of investigation."Those admissions, the filing shows, now sit in a federal court record the day before senators decide Blanche's fate.The underlying lawsuit, filed in September 2024, represents 33 women suing the U.S. government under the Federal Tort Claims Act — a law that allows citizens to sue the federal government for negligence — for the FBI's failures in the Epstein case. They are seeking more than $100 million.The complaint alleges the FBI received its first credible tip in 1996, when Maria Farmer reported that Epstein and Maxwell had sexually abused her and her sister. The FBI did nothing.It also alleges the FBI ignored child sexual abuse material seized in a 2005 raid of Epstein's Palm Beach mansion, failed to interview victims whose names and phone numbers it already had, and allowed Epstein to judge a beauty pageant in the U.S. Virgin Islands in 2007 while under active investigation.Epstein survivor Annie Farmer, who testified at Ghislaine Maxwell's criminal trial, said she left the meeting convinced senators should vote against Blanche, ABC News reported. She called him "abrasive, condescending, and intentionally noncommittal to survivors."Annie Farmer said his evasiveness felt like "a deliberate attempt to claim the Attorney General's office is powerless in this matter.""The FBI has the power to open investigations, not me," Blanche told those assembled inside the meeting, MS NOW reported. "I'm just the attorney general," he added.The meeting only happened because Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), whose vote Blanche needs to clear the Judiciary Committee, demanded it as a condition of his support, ABC News reported. As of Wednesday afternoon, Tillis had still not committed to voting for Blanche's confirmation.That vote is scheduled for Thursday morning.

Trump DOJ lawyer forced to eat his own words by New Jersey judge

A Department of Justice lawyer was forced to eat his own words after boasting about getting New Jersey's voter rolls then failing the next day.On Wednesday, a federal judge dismissed a DOJ case seeking New Jersey's unredacted voter rolls. The decision gave the Trump DOJ its 18th straight defeat in court when it comes to its nationwide effort to grab state voter rolls.However, Democracy Docket noted in its coverage of the decision that the DOJ's loss was made more ironic by one of its attorneys boasting the day before that it would secure New Jersey's voter rolls.The boast came after a software glitch led to thousands of noncitizens being mistakenly added to the rolls. The DOJ argued that New Jersey had to hand over its voter rolls because of the error.However, New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill (D) refused the DOJ and wrote in a post on X that "New Jersey will not provide the personal information of thousands of New Jersey residents," along with a copy of a letter to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon saying as much."The request had no legal basis," Sherrill added. "I will always protect New Jerseyans' personally identifiable information."DOJ Attorney Jesus Osete, who describes himself on his profile as Dhillon's number two, responded to Sherrill with a post of his own. "Challenge accepted," Osete's post read.The next day, U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi, a Biden appointee, answered that challenge by throwing out the DOJ's case, Democracy Docket noted.Quraishi even noted that the software glitch had "no bearing" on whether the DOJ had a right to voter rolls.

GOP states urge Supreme Court to lift block on Trump’s mail-in ballot order

A coalition of Republican-led states asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to lift a block on key parts of President Donald Trump’s executive order tightening rules on mail-in voting, days after the Justice Department made a similar request to the high court. Trump signed an executive order in March that aimed to create federal eligibility […]

Senate approves resolution opposing Ghislaine Maxwell pardon amid Epstein investigation

The Senate unanimously passed a resolution opposing a presidential pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell on Wednesday, putting itself on record against Jeffrey Epstein’s ex-girlfriend. Maxwell was associated with Epstein for decades before he died in a jail cell in New York in 2019. She underwent criminal trials for sex trafficking charges related to facilitating Epstein’s crimes […]

GOP Senator Calls Mamdani a “Thug,” Says He Should Be Imprisoned in Gitmo

The remark comes amid a rise in Islamophobic attacks on Mamdani ahead of the 25th anniversary of 9/11.