curated citations to news sources
Slate: Why the Supreme Court Decision Protecting a “Majority” Plaintiff Was Really a Win for Civil Rights
Some Supreme Court cases are not difficult because of the legal questions; they are difficult because of the narratives that test them.
Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services, in which the Supreme Court correctly struck down a judge-made rule that imposed a higher burden of proof on discrimination plaintiffs from so-called majority groups, is one of those cases. The court, in a unanimous opinion written by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, was right to remind us that Title VII speaks to individuals, not demographics. And it was right to do so at a moment when the meaning of civil rights law is being contested from every direction.
The plaintiff in Ames was a straight woman passed over for a promotion in favor of a lesbian colleague and later replaced by a gay man. Courts below applied a special evidentiary hurdle to her claim, because of her status as a heterosexual woman. That rule wasn’t in the statute. It wasn’t in the case law. It was invented to screen out claims that judges instinctively distrust.
…
But Title VII is a different tool. It does not directly allocate future opportunities. It adjudicates harm. It asks whether this person, in this workplace, was treated differently because of a protected trait. And that inquiry must remain universal, not because all forms of discrimination are historically equal—they are not—but because justice must be.
(Slate more…)
-
Bulwark: How to Tyranny-Proof America’s Future
Now’s the time to start debating the reforms needed to prevent future presidential abuses like Trump’s.
(Bulwark more…)
-
Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – June 5, 2025
Today the U.S. political world was consumed today by a public fight between President Donald J. Trump and his former sidekick, billionaire Elon Musk. Musk invested about $290 million into the 2024 election, vowing to elect Trump in order to get rid of government investigations into his businesses he worried would “take [him] down.”
…Economist Robert Reich had perhaps the best summary of the fight today when he noted, “That any of us have to care about the messy breakup of these two massive narcissists—and that they both individually wield such massive power—is an indictment of our political system and further proves the poisonous influence of Big Money on our democracy.”
Indeed, today’s White House and today’s America are very different from what they were eighty-one years ago.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his twenty-ninth Fireside Chat on June 5, 1944, and had good news for the American people. The day before, on June 4, Rome had fallen to Allied troops. “The first of the Axis capitals is now in our hands,” Roosevelt said.
…On the morning of June 6, 1944, five naval assault divisions stormed the beaches of Normandy. Seven thousand ships and landing craft operated by more than 195,000 naval personnel from eight countries brought almost 133,000 troops to beaches given the code names UTAH, OMAHA, GOLD, JUNO, and SWORD. By the end of the day, more than 10,000 Allied troops were wounded or killed, but the Allies had established a foothold in France that would permit them to flood troops, vehicles, and supplies into Europe. When FDR held a press conference later that day, officials and press alike were jubilant.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)Nate Silver: 17 thoughts on the Trump-Elon feud
This was nothing if not predictable. But is it the world’s funniest social media spat, or a seismic event for American politics?
(Nate Silver more…)James Eagle: Are Trump and Musk Torching America’s Credibility?
TNR: Transcript: Why Trump-Musk Feud Has White House in “Full Panic Mode”
Reuters: Musk-Trump breakup puts billions in SpaceX contracts at risk, jolting US space program
- Trump threatens to cancel Musk companies’ contracts amid tax cut bill dispute
- Musk says SpaceX will decommission spacecraft used by NASA
- Unprecedented feud threatens to shake-up U.S. space program
Hill: Musk says Trump is named in Epstein files
Daily: Democrats Launch Investigation Into Musk’s Trump And Jeffrey Epstein Allegations
Dasily Beast: Why Trump Fears Musk’s Epstein Bomb Most of All: Biographer
…
Wolff claims he has seen damning evidence from those years that Trump would not want made public, including alleged lewd images of Trump and the sex offender, who died by suicide in a New York jail cell in 2019 ahead of his trial on sex trafficking charges.Closer to the Edge: The America that looked away
We could talk about the convictions. The 34 felonies. The $450 million in penalties. The attempted coup. The lies, the grift, the cult. But none of it cuts deeper than what so many refused to see from the beginning: The Women.
AXIOS: Musk calls for Trump’s impeachment
Daily: MAGA Wants Trump To Deport Elon Musk
Daily Beast: The Dark MAGA Conspiracy Where Musk Destroys Trump and Democracy
-
West Side Rag: Following NASA’s Removal From UWS Building, Textbooks and Journals Thrown in Dumpster
…
NASA, which has operated out of 2880 Broadway since 1966, subsequently canceled its lease. But, money will not be saved, since the lease is between Columbia University and a different federal agency, meaning that the $3 million in yearly rent will still be due, regardless of whether the scientists are in the building, a Columbia official told the Times.
(West Side Rag more…)
-
Mary Geddry: No Country for Tourists
As Trump’s travel bans expand and ICE detains lawful residents in broad daylight, the world turns away and the American sidewalk becomes a stage for fear, abandonment, and economic self-destruction.
…
As international arrivals plummet and foreign bookings collapse, the U.S. is becoming a global cautionary tale. Travel to the U.S. is down 6% in just the last month. Bookings from Europe have dropped 12%. Canadian visitors are vanishing too, down more than 20% by air and 35% by land. The World Travel & Tourism Council now estimates a $12.5 billion loss in international spending this year alone.
(Mary Geddry more…)
-
Allison Gill: Capitulation Comes With a Price
-
Austin Chronicle: Texas Man Born to U.S. Soldier on U.S. Army Base Abroad Deported
-
NPR: The U.S. Copyright Office used to be fairly low-drama. Not anymore
-
Lisa Needham: The Trump admin’s quiet (but deadly) attack on repro rights
-
Your Local Epidemiologist: What I’m learning from MAHA
-
Dean Blundell: Trump is now Begging Mark Carney for a Way Out of Canada’s “Anti-Trump” Boycott/Tariff War, in Texts/Secret Phone Calls
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Leave a Reply