From the weekend:

• 🏛️ Capitol Reset: Lone Star MAGA War →

• 🌎 Geopolitics 101: Trump’s NATO Win →

• 🔴 Redshift: Iran's Online Warfare →

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

✅ The Big, Beautiful Bill clears a Senate hurdle. The Senate voted 51-49 to advance President Trump’s Big, Beautiful Bill to a full vote, which includes many of his spending and tax priorities. Two Republicans, Senators Rand Paul (KY) and Thom Tillis (NC), joined all Democrats in voting against the procedural motion. With Democrats planning to stall through lengthy readings and a vote-a-rama, the bill still faces a difficult path before meeting Trump’s July 4 deadline.

👋 Sen. Thom Tillis announced his retirement after vote. North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis (R) announced he will retire at the end of his term, a day after voting against President Trump’s Big, Beautiful Bill. Trump had publicly criticized Tillis and vowed to meet with potential primary challengers to replace the senator. Tillis’ departure now sets up a competitive race in a key swing state, creating another hurdle for Republicans defending their majority in the 2026 midterms.

⚖️ SCOTUS upholds Texas age verification law. The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to uphold a Texas law that requires pornography websites to verify the age of their users. In the majority opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas affirmed a state’s authority to prevent children from accessing sexually explicit material online. The decision marks a major victory for parental rights advocates and provides a legal foundation for the 21 other states with similar laws.

⚖️ SCOTUS allows parents to opt out children from LGBT curricula. The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that schools violate religious liberty when they bar parents from opting their children out of LGBT-themed classroom instruction. Justice Alito wrote that requiring children to receive instruction that poses "a very real threat of undermining" parents' religious beliefs burdens their First Amendment rights. The decision cuts through years of school districts claiming absolute authority over what children must learn, restoring parental control over sensitive topics.

INSIDER RADAR

Elon Musk on the Big, Beautiful Bill

Insiders behind the paywall: Elon Musk, Lara Trump, Zohran Mamdani, and Marco Rubio.

HOAX TRACKER

“Zohran Mamdani has never espoused antisemitic views”

QUICK AND IMPORTANT

• Federal agents discovered an Iranian human smuggling hub in Los Angeles, arresting two foreign nationals.

• President Trump said a buyer has been found for TikTok’s US operations, with a deal expected within two weeks.

• Senate Republicans removed a provision from the Big, Beautiful Bill that would have sold off public land.

• Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-TX) filed multiple bills to penalize sanctuary cities and rioters by targeting federal funding and aid eligibility.

INSIDER EXCLUSIVE

A MAGA proxy war in Texas

Texas Senator John Cornyn (R) has served in the Senate since 2002. But that time could be coming to an end next year as he faces a serious challenge from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Paxton has a controversial past in Texas, having been impeached for abuse of power…

Read Now

THE MAIN STORY

Barrett goes knives out on Ketanji Brown Jackson

WHAT’S HAPPENING_

Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett delivered an extraordinary rebuke of fellow Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson in Friday's ruling on Trump v. CASA, Inc.

The case addressed nationwide injunctions against President Donald Trump's day-one executive order regarding birthright citizenship. Barrett, writing for the 6-3 majority, accused Jackson of advancing arguments "at odds with more than two centuries' worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself."

The ruling limits lower courts' ability to issue nationwide injunctions against presidential actions but doesn't address the constitutionality of Trump's order itself. Jackson's separate dissent warned that the ruling poses "an existential threat to the rule of law" — language Barrett dismissed as untethered from legal doctrine.

_THE FACTS_

• In the majority opinion, Justice Barrett accused Justice Jackson of taking an "extreme" position and embracing an “imperial Judiciary.”

• Barrett wrote that Jackson offers a judicial vision that would make “even the most ardent defender of judicial supremacy blush.”

• Jackson dismissed the majority’s legal analysis as a “mind-numbingly technical query” and “boring ‘legalese.’”

• Jackson’s dissent warned that the ruling was an “existential threat to the rule of law” that would make executive power “uncontainable.”

• Her dissent also included informal slang atypical for the Supreme Court: “Instead, to the majority, the power-hungry actors are…(wait for it)…the district courts.”

• She accused the majority of getting “caught up in minutiae” and missing the larger plot of the case.

• To make her argument, Jackson invoked a hypothetical Martian coming “from another planet.” Trump adviser Stephen Miller was quick to point out that Martians only “come from one very specific planet.”

• Barrett contrasted Jackson’s dissent with Justice Sotomayor’s, which she said focused on “conventional legal terrain.”

• The ruling in Trump v. CASA specifically limited the power of district courts to issue nationwide injunctions, marking a win for President Trump.

_OUR INSIGHTS _

Insights and analysis are for members only.

Insights behind the paywall: Jackson’s philosophy and the other liberal justices’ views on her dissent.

_JOIN THE DISCUSSION_

Do you think Justice Jackson’s dissent damages the reputation of the Supreme Court?

_{Comments are open for everyone.}

_MORE FROM US _

• 🎧 How Qatar Bought America with Frannie Block

• 📖 An Army of Iranian Bots Infiltrates the West

• 📖 Trump Forces Europe To Defend Itself

• 📖 A MAGA Proxy War in Texas

• 📖 New York Dems Go Socialist

MEDIA BIAS SPOTTER

How left and right outlets frame the recent Supreme Court decisions

Mentioned behind the paywall: NPR, Vox, The Post Millennial, and The Daily Signal.

THE DAILY DEBATE

POLL RESULTS FROM YESTERDAY

Do you think foreign bots flooding social media will have long-term implications for Americans?

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 👍 Yes (756)
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 👎 No (152)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🤔 Unsure (110)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💬 Other (Comment) (7)

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