Friday, April 25, 2025

April 25, 2025

Good morning,

Welcome to the news for independent thinkers

Leading the News . . .

Trump orders Justice Department to investigate Democrats' top fundraising platform . . . Trump signed a memorandum Thursday that directs Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate ActBlue, which revolutionized liberal fundraising by giving small-dollar donors an easy way to contribute to campaigns and causes. Three Republican-led congressional committees alleged this month that ActBlue has "a fundamentally unserious approach to fraud prevention." GOP lawmakers have demanded additional documents related to a string of recent resignations by top executives. Wall Street Journal

Politics

Trump's executive order on voting blocked by federal judge amid flurry of legal setbacks . . . A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Thursday blocked a portion of President Donald Trump's executive order on election integrity, specifically provisions related to providing documentary proof of citizenship before being allowed to register to vote. Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia handed down the order in response to lawsuits filed by three separate groups of plaintiffs over five different provisions in a March 25 Trump executive order relating to election integrity. Fox News

Hogg Not Backing Down in DNC Family Feud Over Primarying Incumbents . . . Just a few months into the job, Democratic National Committee Vice Chair David Hogg is already on the outs with party leaders, who are sharply critical of his efforts to unseat longtime incumbent Democrats. Hogg, who was elected one of five vice chairs on Feb. 1, first came to prominence in 2018 for his gun control activism after a mass shooting at his high school in Parkland, Florida. The 25-year-old has been calling for primary challenges against some older Democrat incumbents in order to give the party a new, younger image. Daily Signal

Official Trump Store Selling 'Trump 2028' Hats, Teasing Possible Third Term . . . Hats emblazoned with "Trump 2028" have gone on sale at the official Trump store, teasing a possible third term run that some of his supporters say would be possible despite the 22nd Amendment. Available for $50, the hats come in the standard Trump red with "Trump 2028" in place of the slogan "Make America Great Again." The store even features a photo of the president's son, Eric Trump, donning the hat. Breitbart

Culture

Trump Asks SCOTUS To Uphold His Ban On Transgender Troops In The Military . . . President Donald Trump's administration asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to allow the Pentagon to enforce its ban on troops who suffer from gender dysphoria or have undergone transgender medical treatments. The Trump administration's appeal comes after two federal judges blocked the administration from removing troops who identify as transgender, ruling that the Trump order is probably unconstitutional and motivated by discrimination rather than negative impacts on the military. Daily Wire

Facebook Says 'Misgendering' Doesn't Violate Its Hate Speech Policy . . . Facebook's parent company Meta said that two posts that included "misgendering" were not a violation of its policies, in a case that appears to have involved content from The Daily Wire. The social media giant's Oversight Board ruled that two posts about trans-identifying males do not violate the company's hate speech rules. One of the posts appears to be a video posted by Libs of TikTok on Instagram that shows an Oregon high school boy getting booed by the crowd when he finished first place in the girls' 200-meter race. Daily Wire

Internal Documents Reveal Pervasive Pattern of Racial Discrimination at Harvard Law Review . . . Will this law review article "promote DEI values"? Does it cite scholars from "underrepresented groups"? Will it have "any foreseeable impact in enhancing diversity, equity, and inclusion"? And why did one team of editors solicit "only white, male authors"? Those are some of the questions that editors at the Harvard Law Review asked in internal documents. Washington Free Beacon

Columbia Radicals Ditch Reported Encampment Plans After University Threatens Arrests

National Security

Federal agents raid home of judge — arrest him and wife after finding illegal immigrant living inside . . . Former Doña Ana County Magistrate Judge Joel Cano and his wife, Nancy Cano, were taken into custody Thursday after federal agents raided their Las Cruces home. The two face charges of evidence tampering amid allegations they harbored Cristhian Ortega-Lopez, an alleged illegal alien who is also believed to be a member of Venezuela's notorious Tren de Aragua gang. Fox News

Two More Illegal Aliens Arrested in Another Maryland Killing . . . U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced this week it had arrested a Guatemalan illegal alien, Keycy Robinson Alexis Barrera-Rosa, 24, and charged him in the killing of his girlfriend in Maryland. According to authorities, Barrera-Rosa killed Lesbia Mileth Ramirez Guerra, 23, of Waldorf, and then buried her body near Cedarville State Forest, where it was found on April 17. Berrera-Rosa's uncle, Rolvin Eduardo Bererra-Bererra, 37, told authorities in recorded testimony that he had helped his nephew bury the body of Guerra, who was the mother of two. Daily Signal

Trump Admin Hits Back at NY Times Over 'Sob Story' on Deported Illegal Alien Convicted of Kidnapping . . . The Trump administration is firing back at The New York Times after the paper published a 3,000-word "sob story" about a criminal illegal alien recently deported back to Jamaica. "Why does The New York Times continue to peddle sob stories about criminal illegal aliens and ignore their victims?" asked Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security. The Trump administration deported Nascimento Blair, a convicted kidnapper, back to his home country of Jamaica in February. DailySignal

International

Senior Russian military officer killed in car explosion, investigators say . . . A Russian general was killed Friday in a car bombing outside of Moscow, according to Russia's top criminal investigation agency. Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, a deputy head of the main operational department in the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, was killed by an explosive device placed in his car in Balashikha. The explosive device was rigged with shrapnel, Investigative Committee spokesperson Svetlana Petrenko said. Fox News

Trump says 'Crimea will stay with Russia' as he seeks end to war in Ukraine

Conservative Party Surges Ahead Of Canadian Election As Concerns Over Trump Seem To Wane: Poll . . . The 3.6-point gap has narrowed significantly from 5.6 points just a day earlier, a significant momentum shift toward opposition leader Pierre Poilievre's campaign focused on economic concerns and public safety under Liberal governance. "We can't afford a fourth Liberal term of rising costs and crime," Conservative leader Poilievre told reporters in Halifax, Nova Scotia, on Thursday, pledging to scrap electric-vehicle sales mandates. Daily Wire

Has Trump been snubbed at Pope's funeral? President to get 'third-tier seat' at service

Money

Corporate Giants Shred Their Outlooks Over Tariff Uncertainty . . . The CEOs of American Airlines, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble and many other major U.S. companies warned that shape-shifting tariff threats make it virtually impossible to plan and are spooking consumers. American, Southwest Airlines and Alaska Air Group told investors and analysts that leisure travel had already softened and pulled their full-year outlooks because the economic climate makes it too tough to forecast. Wall Street Journal

You should also know

California passes Japan as fourth largest economy . . . California's economy has overtaken that of the country of Japan, making the US state the fourth largest global economic force. Governor Gavin Newsom touted new data from the International Monetary Fund and the US Bureau of Economic Analysis showing California's growth. The data show California's gross domestic product hit $4.10 trillion in 2024, surpassing Japan, which was marked at $4.01 trillion. The state now only trails Germany, China and the US as a whole. BBC

Songs are getting shorter, thanks in part to Spotify and TikTok algorithms . . . Songs are becoming shorter as artists tailor their tracks to fit the algorithms of TikTok and Spotify, where quick hooks and replay-friendly formats drive plays and chart success. Sabrina Carpenter's "Taste" clocks in at 2:37. "Boy's a Liar Pt. 2" by Ice Spice and PinkPantheress barely passes the two-minute mark at 2:11. Benson Boone's "Beautiful Things" is a sharp three minutes. It's not unusual; it's fast becoming the new pop standard. Washington Times

Guilty Pleasures

Warhol print of Dutch Queen Beatrix accidentally thrown away by Dutch town hall . . . A Dutch town hall has admitted that it "most likely" accidentally disposed of 46 artworks, including an Andy Warhol print of the former Dutch queen, during renovation works last year. Maashorst municipality said the works, including a 1980s silkscreen print of Queen Beatrix worth about €15,000, disappeared during work on a town hall last year. An investigation said the artworks were stored in a basement during renovations and a lack of guidelines for storing the artworks could have been among the reasons why they ended up being thrown away. BBC

I mean, is it such a tragedy? And are we sure it was an accident?