Political Glance
A federal judge won’t throw out a lawsuit against Donald Trump’s administration over plans for a nearly $1.8 billion compensation fund for the president’s allies after officials refused to provide a sworn statement that the fund is actually dead.
U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema wanted officials to file a “short, written declaration under the penalty of perjury” that the government won’t take any action to “create or operate” what critics have called a slush fund for Trump’s allies.
Government attorneys refused, so the lawsuit is still alive, and the case could now go to trial, the judge said Thursday.
Despite telling members of Congress that the government is “not moving forward” with the fund, Blanche said he’s “not committing to put anything in writing” and refused to rescind a memo establishing the fund. Last week, the Justice Department called the judge’s request for a written statement “unnecessary” and said it amounted to judicial “overreach.”
An executive order by President Trump that seeks to enlist the U.S. Postal Service to limit voting by mail has hit a legal hurdle.
It’s the day after Mother’s Day, the first one Elizabeth Soto has spent apart from her three children. Sitting in jail in Wichita Falls, Texas, her face is washed out by the overhead fluorescent lighting, and her dingy jumpsuit blends into the cinder block walls surrounding her.
The Microsoft founder Bill Gates told US members of Congress that the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein had sought to “blackmail” him over his extramarital affairs, according to a transcript of the testimony.
A federal judge on Wednesday permanently barred President Donald Trump's administration from implementing most of his first executive order on elections, part of which sought to require people to show documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote.
