Lou

The conservative Supreme Court made 3 rulings this week.

• The Supreme Court ended the use of race-based affirmative action in college admissions, overruling nearly 50 years of precedent and depriving selective universities of a tool essential for keeping campuses diverse. Vote was 6 to 3.
• The Supreme Court struck down President Biden’s controversial proposal to cancel $400 billion in higher education loan repayments. Vote was 6 – 3.
• The Supreme Court ruled that a Christian graphic artist can refuse to design wedding websites for same-sex couples, saying a Colorado anti discrimination law violates the First Amendment, spelling a major defeat for gay rights at a time when anti-LGBTQ+ legislation is erupting across the nation. Vote was 6 – 3.

State legislators are considering a bill that could help track and address noise complaints from local airports in the state — something Danvers residents say is needed to help stop noise issues from arising at Beverly Regional Airport.

The bill, filed as H.3358 and presented by Sen. Joan Lovely, D-Salem, and Rep. Sally Kerans, D-Danvers, went before the Joint Committee on Transportation at the Statehouse Tuesday morning during a public hearing on proposed bills.

It calls for the Massachusetts Aeronautics Division to collect and post all noise reports and complaints made to each municipal or regional airport in the state between April 1 and Oct. 1 regularly on its website, according to the bill.

It would also instruct airport towers to record the number and duration of all “touchand- go” maneuvers between April 1 and Oct. 1, data which would also appear on Mass Aeronautics’ website forever.

These maneuvers specifically have caused some of the strife between Beverly Airport and its neighbors in the Anthony Lane area of Danvers.

For months, residents there have complained to the airportand local officials that these touch-and-goes — when an aircraft lands on a runway then immediately takes off again, often as part of flight training — and an increased number of flyovers have polluted their properties with excessive noise.

Trump was indicted last week on 37 counts related to more than 100 classified documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago in August. The charges include willful retention of national defense information and conspiracy to obstruct justice. It’s the first time in American history that a former president has faced federal charges.

Trump traveled to the courthouse in a 12 car motorcade. Who possibly could have been in those 12 cars? Appears that in his mind, he is still the President or at least wants to appear that he is.

Former President Donald Trump surrendered to authorities at the federal courthouse in Miami just before 2 p.m. ET. At his initial court appearance, Trump was represented by attorney Todd Blanche and former Florida Solicitor General Chris Kise. The court required that Trump be represented by a Florida lawyer. Probably, due to the fact that Trump’s reputation for not paying his lawyers and that his lawyers typically need lawyers, he did not engage Mr Kise until the morning of the arraignment.

Trump was fingerprinted, used a previous mugshot, pleaded not guilty and left the courthouse roughly two hours later. Trump sat stoically with arms crossed and said nothing during the proceeding.

U.S. Magistrate Judge John Goodman presided over the arraignment, but the case will be overseen by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee who ruled in Trump’s favor in an earlier dispute in the investigation.

Walt Nauta, a personal aide to Trump and a co-defendant, did not enter a plea today because he did not have local counsel. He faces six federal criminal charges, including conspiracy to obstruct, withholding a document or record and scheme to conceal. Trump is holding Nauta very close to him. He still works for Trump, traveled with him to the court and they walked out together. If Nauta flips, it obviously would be bad for Trump.

Trump signed a bond document that prohibits him from discussing his case with certain witnesses (i.e. Nauta and most everyone at Mar-A-Lago) — an unusual anti-witness-tampering provision added by U.S. Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman that the prosecution had not sought. I have no idea how this would be enforced.

Trump previously proclaimed that if was ever indicted that the country would rise up in protest and he again urged his supporters to come to Miami. There was no nationwide protest and as before in NY, there was not a large number of protesters at the courthouse. However, we are all relieved that he did not provoke another January 6 type response.

Trump and Republicans repeated say that Trump is being treated differently and that there are two sets of rules, one for Democrats and another for Trump. I think they are correct. Others who have taken classified documents, have been swiftly brought to justice, they are fingerprinted, have mug shots taken, have passports taken, have bonds set and many are incarcerated until their trial. Compare Trump to Massachusetts resident Jack Texeira recently arrested for posting classified documents. Not saying Texeira was treated too severely, as in my opinion he was not, but that Trump is certainly being treated less severely than anyone else.

Trump also faces criminal charges in a New York state court where he pleaded not guilty in April to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. In addition, he still faces investigations surrounding attempts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia and the special counsel’s investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

For those keeping score, the score now is Trump 71 felony counts, all other presidents 0.

After the arraignment, Trump flew back to New Jersey, where he gave a speech to supporters at his golf club in Bedminster. Trump brought out all his greatest hits: “witch hunt”, “hoax”, “fake”, “Hilary Clinton”, “treated unfairly”, attacked the prosecutor and his wife, etc, etc. (we know the script well now) and at one point, he confessed to taking the documents because it was his right and he said he was “too busy” to look through the boxes.

Donald Trump has been indicted on seven counts of mishandling classified documents at his Florida estate, a remarkable development that makes him the first former president in U.S. history to face criminal charges by the federal government that he once oversaw. (see the full indictment below). The Department of Justice has been investigating whether classified documents from the Trump White House were illegally mishandled when they were taken to his Florida Mar-a-Lago residence after he left office. The indictment includes charges of willful retention of national defense information — a crime under the Espionage Act, which regulates the handling of government secrets — obstruction, false statements and conspiracy. The indictment carries unmistakably grave legal consequences, including the possibility of prison if Trump’s convicted. The Justice Department did not immediately confirm the indictment publicly. Trump is due in court Tuesday afternoon in Miami, where a federal grand jury had been hearing testimony as recently as this week.

Prosecutors have said that Trump took roughly 300 classified documents to Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House, including some 100 that were seized by the FBI last August in a search of the home that underscored the gravity of the Justice Department’s investigation. Trump has repeatedly insisted that he was entitled to keep the classified documents when he left the White House, and has also claimed without evidence that he had declassified them.

Court records unsealed last year showed federal investigators believed they had probable cause that multiple crimes had been committed, including the retention of national defense information, destruction of government records and obstruction.

Since then, the Justice Department has amassed additional evidence and secured grand jury testimony from people close to Trump, including his own lawyers. The statutes governing the handling of classified records and obstruction are felonies that could carry years in prison in the event of a conviction.

Donald Trump continued his string of presidential firsts in our legal system. He was the first president to be impeached twice, the first president to have been charged with a crime, the first president to be found liable for sexual assault by a jury of his peers and now the first president to be indicted of a federal crime.

The case adds to deepening legal jeopardy for Trump, who has already been indicted in New York.  The DOJ is separately investigating efforts by Trump and his allies in the January 6 insurrection to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. And the district attorney in Georgia’s Fulton County is investigating Trump over alleged efforts to subvert the 2020 election in that state. These also could lead to criminal charges. 

As for his 2024 presidential bid, nothing stops Trump from running while indicted, or even convicted.

As expected, House Republicans have rallied around the twice impeached, found to have sexually assaulted a woman and charged for paying hush money to a porn star, Donald Trump..

Today is yet another sad but necessary day for the United States of America and for all Americans. It is a necessary action to prove that in America that no one is above the law.

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Read the Indictment

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Takeaways from the indictment

Trump faces a total of 37 counts, including 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information. His aide, Walt Nauta, faces six counts, including several obstruction and concealment-related charges stemming from the alleged conduct. 

“We have one set of laws in this country, and they apply to everyone applying those laws, collecting facts, that’s what determines the outcome of an investigation,” Smith said in a short appearance in Washington, DC, on Friday. “Nothing more and nothing less.”

The 49-page indictment included new details about how Trump allegedly took classified documents to Mar-a-Lago after leaving office in 2021 and resisted the government’s attempts to retrieve the classified materials. In his statement, Smith encouraged the public to read it “in full to understand the scope and the gravity of the crimes charged.” 

Here are the key takeaways from the indictment:

Alleged obstruction separates Trump from Pence and Biden classified doc snafus

Trump showed classified documents to others on two occasions

The documents are extraordinarily sensitive

Pictures are worth 1,000 words

Trump wasn’t charged over classified documents he turned over voluntarily

Steve Rattner explains the debt deal negotiated by President Biden and Kevin McCarthy. I think he does a pretty good job.

Elmer Stewart Rhodes (he never says his name is Elmer), the leader of the far-right Oath Keepers militia, was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in prison for his conviction on seditious conspiracy charges for the role he played in helping to mobilize the pro-Trump attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

The sentence, handed down in U.S. District Court in Washington, was the most severe penalty so far in the more than 1,000 criminal cases stemming from the Capitol attack — and the first to be increased for fitting the legal definition of terrorism.

It was also the first to have been given to any of the 10 members of the Oath Keepers and another far-right group, the Proud Boys, who were convicted of sedition in connection with the events of Jan. 6.

For Rhodes, 58, he will now be send to prison for what is likely to be the better part of his remaining life.

The trial of Rhodes, Meggs and three other defendants — Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins and Thomas Caldwell — was a milestone in the Justice Department’s sprawling investigation of the Capitol attack. The convictions of Rhodes and Meggs on seditious conspiracy charges were the first time that federal prosecutors had won a sedition case since 1995, when a group of Islamic militants was found guilty of plotting to bomb several landmarks in New York.

At a dramatic, nearly four-hour hearing, Judge Amit P. Mehta chided Rhodes for seeking for years through his leadership of the Oath Keepers to have American democracy “devolve into violence.”

“You, sir,” Mehta went on, directly addressing the defendant, “present an ongoing threat and a peril to this country, to the Republic and the very fabric of our democracy.”

Kelly Meggs – 12 years

Jessica Watkins – 8.5 years

Kenneth Harrelson – 4 years

Amy Carnevale knew when she took the helm of the Massachusetts Republican Party in February that she faced a big job. But even she didn’t realize the scope of the mess she inherited.

The hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt, the four lawsuits, the tangle of campaign finance probes, the record of electoral failure, and the reputation for dysfunction — those were on her radar. But the week after her election as the new party chair, the state GOP was slapped with another six-figure bill, yet another debt the party is disputing. Then came two new lawsuits. And now, in the wake of repeated omissions and errors on campaign finance reports under prior leadership, she’s expecting an audit from the Federal Elections Commission, alongside a similar probe from state regulators.

Bring back Jim Lyons.

Massachusetts Republicans have lost a governor and lieutenant governor, as well as every race they’ve run for statewide office and Congress, not to mention a slate of legislative seats, hundreds of thousands of dollars from the party’s campaign account, and about 30,000 registered voters.

Bring back Jim Lyons.