“The hottest temperatures of the year so far will impact much of the Midwest to Northeast. Widespread daily records are likely for daytime heat, with some monthly records possible. Heat index readings are expected to peak from 100 to 105 degrees in many locations. By this weekend, the most intense heat will shift south from New England towards the Northeast urban corridor and Mid-Atlantic. Factors Making This Heat Wave Dangerous: The early arrival of the heat, persistence of heat over multiple days, and light winds will increase the danger of this heat beyond what the exact temperature values would suggest,” says a National Weather Service Bulletin about the heat wave forecast to start Tuesday and last until who the hell knows in the US’s northeastern quad.

Republican Pennsylvania state House member and current 7th District US House candidate Ryan Mackenzie, 41, would have been 33 now if he had been the age he listed himself as being in the Tinder profile he set up in 2020 to find women to Netflix and Chill with during the pandemic, trashy British tabloid the Daily Mail reports with screenshots and a non-denial from Mackenzie to prove it.

Another issue is that it’s kind of ambiguous as to whether Mackenzie was already dating now-wife Chloe (or if she was initially duped by his digital de-aging), with a campaign spokesperson telling the Mail simply that the Republican was “neither married nor engaged” when the profile was active.

Mackenzie is currently trying to take down incumbent Dem Congresswoman Susan Wild in a deep purple Eastern Pennsylvania swing district that Biden won by 0.6 percent in 2020. Stupid and petty as this “scandal” is, it also paints him as simply cringey and insecure. Probably not good.

Sources on President Biden’s reelection campaign’s internal polling team tells Politico that their internal polls are showing Joe gaining ground on fat former President Trump following his conviction on 34 felony counts in Manhattan for interfering in the 2016 election by engaging in a hush money scheme to cover up a two-minute unprotected sexual encounter with pornstar Stormy Daniels.

“We’ve seen in polling since the conviction that the more the conviction is front and center in voters’ attention, the worse it is for Trump,” the anonymous pollster said. “Trump has dug his own hole deeper on the convictions. and we’re seeing him pay the price for that in the polling.”

Another said now that the message has been settled on, “almost universally, voters know this happened,” it’s important for the campaign to “keep it in the bloodstream and not let it fade from voters’ minds.” Biden Campaign Communications Director Mike Tyler said “It all comes back to the harm that he’s going to inflict on people because he’s looking out, fighting for one person, and that’s Trump. That’s true of the criminal convictions and that’s true of everything that he wants to do [in a second term]… That is the connective tissue that we’re building as we approach the debate.”

Biden to announce sweeping protections for migrant spouses of US citizens https://t.co/6ppRgOe1Tx

— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 18, 2024

To help him prepare for his upcoming debate against incumbent President Joe Biden, 34-time convicted felon Donald Trump began a series of “policy discussions” with friendly subject matter experts and Senators, Politico reports.  Trump has never performed well in debates, appearing authoritarian and argumentative rather than intelligent and policy-driven in his debates against Hillary Clinton and Biden.

Given that the rules for the June 27th debate include the ability of cut mics to allow the candidates to respond without repeated interruptions by the other, one of Trump’s normal tactics, the indicted and convicted felon’s team will have to ensure the candidate can sound relatively informed on basic issues.

A nurse in Oregon was charged with 44 counts of assault for substituting water for liquid fentanyl in patients’ IV lines, depriving them of vital pain medication and leading to infections that may have been fatal to many of them, the Oregonian reports.

Officials elected to charge 36-year-old Dani Marie Schofield with second degree assault even though 16 of them subsequently died.  Medical examiners could not conclusively determine conclusively, however, that the tap water Schofield used in the patients’ sterile central IV lines led to the infections that contributed their deaths; in many cases, the patients had other severe conditions cited as the cause of death.

All 44 patients involved were being treated in the Asante Rogue Regional Medical Center’s intensive care unit.  Hospital officials originally called the police when they noticed an unusual spike in central line infections for patients in the unit.  After a seven month investigation, police determined Schofield switched out the drug so she could use the narcotic herself later.

A Secret Service agent was robbed at gunpoint returning to his home in Los Angeles after completing an assignment Saturday night while the President was at a fundraiser downtown, USA Today reports.  The agent fired his weapon at the robber, but it’s unclear if anyone was hit.  The agent was not injured.

The robber made off with a bag the agent was carrying, reportedly holding the agent’s personal property.  Some of the contents of the bag were found later.  It’s unclear if the agent was targeted or what assignment the agent was working on; even while the President was in town on Saturday, agents are involved in other ongoing protection details for other VIPs, threat assessments, and other law enforcement operations.

“It really makes you wonder just how bad Biden is behind the scenes because in front of a camera, he’s really bad,” Trump advisor and animated heavy bag Sean Hannity fabricates as he sets up an out of context clip again.  “Here is yet another example from just a few hours ago.  Take a look.  [Rolls clip of a photo gaggle with Biden joking about a question a reporter yelled at him as they were being shuttled out of the room.]. Was he like, barking?  What was that?”

A federal judge ruled Iowa’s new law giving its state law enforcement and judicial officials power to enforce federal immigration regulations is illegal, NBC News reports, saying that the law oversteps the state’s authority.  “As a matter of politics, the new legislation might be defensible,” U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Locher, a Biden appointee, wrote in his decision, “As a matter of constitutional law, it is not.”

The law is similar to one that Texas enacted in that it allows local officials to file charges against migrants who have outstanding deportation orders, had been previously denied entry, or had been removed from the country under an immigration order.  To avoid prosecution, the detainee would be allowed to “self deport” and leave the country.

“I am disappointed in today’s court decision that blocks Iowa from stopping illegal reentry and keeping our communities safe,” Iowa Republican Attorney General Brenna Bird said, apparently referring to “illegal reentry” from Missouri. “Since Biden refuses to secure our borders, he has left states with no choice but to do the job for him.”

U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy wants you to know Disqus is bad for your mental health and not just because of the periodic service issues.  In a New York Times Opinion piece, Murthy urges Congress to pass legislation that would mandate warnings that “regularly remind parents and adolescents that social media has not been proved safe.”

“Legislation from Congress should shield young people from online harassment, abuse and exploitation and from exposure to extreme violence and sexual content that too often appears in algorithm-driven feeds,” Murthy wrote.  “The measures should prevent platforms from collecting sensitive data from children and should restrict the use of features like push notifications, autoplay and infinite scroll, which prey on developing brains and contribute to excessive use.”

Citing the success of anti-smoking campaigns to reduce cigarette use, Murthy wants Congress to mandate social media companies release all information, data and studies they’ve commissioned or conducted relating to its effects on mental health, particularly when it targets children.  Let’s hope he has more success getting it from social media companies than the government did getting smoking addiction information from tobacco companies.

While loudly touting his claimed pedigree as a successful businessman on the campaign trail, transgressing tangerine Donald Trump has quietly seen the value of his holdings in his eponymous publicly traded company drop by 30% in less than three weeks.  On May 31st, the day of Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts related to his election interference hush money scam, Trump media closed just over $49 per share; DJT closed at $34.72 on Monday, a drop of 30%.

Disgraced former Texas appellate judge and Southern Baptist Convention Vice President Paul Pressler, a far right leader in the Lone Star State credibly accused of sexually molesting at least six boys and young men over his long career in Evangelical politics, died earlier this month at the age 94 of undisclosed causes, the Texas Tribune reports after having found out his funeral was on Saturday.

No announcement was made by the Southern Baptist Convention of Pressler’s death which would make sense considering they paid out a settlement to one of his victims just six months ago.

Over the last year we picked up some of the Tribune’s quite excellent reporting on Pressler in the twilight of his life and were utterly shocked at the sheer hypocrisy and depravity of him and his law partner, the deeply homophobic former Harris County GOP chair Jared Woodfill. However maybe more eyebrow-raising was a 2015 Washington Post article titled “Long-time Texas conservative activist endorses [Senator Ted] Cruz for president,” which says “Pressler first met Cruz when the candidate was a teenager. They have stayed in touch though they are not particularly close.”

To be more serious, this guy was a fucking predator and, according to another young man who had worked as an intern out of Pressler’s house until he quit due to sexual harassment in 2017, the judge preyed upon a homeless 20 year-old man who had been caught stealing money from him, coercing the kid into massages and God knows what else. The witnesses’s account of the coercion was not graphic so much as downright revolting and heartbreaking so we don’t want to print it here.

There is however definitely one good thing about Paul Pressler that we can now write: He’s dead.

As he continues to purge the senior leaders of his national defense system as the Russian invasion in Ukraine struggles to advance, Vladimir Putin wants to make sure he’s surrounded by loyalists at the Kremlin by installing his daughter Ivanka Kushner niece Anna Tsivileva as deputy defense minister, Reuters reports.  Tsivileva will oversee social support to Russia’s military and their families.

As part of the defense ministry shakeup, Putin also put the son of his former prime minister to oversee military property management and construction, an area rife with corruption in Russia.  Tsivileva’s husband, Sergei Tsivilev, is already Putin’s energy minister.

The House Ethics Committee has closed four probes into me, which emerged from lies intended solely to smear me. Instead of working with me to ban Congressional stock trading, the Ethics Committee is now opening new frivolous investigations. They are doing this to avoid the…

— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) June 17, 2024

“Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach is suing Pfizer for misleading claims it made related to the COVID vaccine Kobach and Deputy Attorney General Fran Oleen, Assistant Attorney General Kaley Schrader, and Assistant Attorney General Melanie Jack today announced the lawsuit at a press conference in Topeka. ‘Pfizer made multiple misleading statements to deceive the public about its vaccine at a time when Americans needed the truth,’ Kobach said. According to the complaint, filed today in Thomas County District Court, Pfizer misled Kansans about the vaccines’ risks, including to pregnant women and for myocarditis,” says Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, or KKK for short, in a statement on his latest effort to publicly beat a dead horse for the MAGA assholes’ enjoyment.

“Additionally, Pfizer claimed its vaccine protected against COVID variants, despite data showing otherwise. The pharmaceutical giant also suggested its vaccine prevented COVID transmission, but later admitted it had never studied whether its vaccine stopped transmission. The complaint also alleges that Pfizer coordinated with social media officials to censor speech critical of COVID-19 vaccines and declined to participate in the federal government’s vaccine development program, Operation Warp Speed, to avoid government oversight,” the statement continued.

We guess at this rate Kobach will get around to figuring out what to prosecute the Bidens for sometime in the winter of 2027, provided he’s still in office and hasn’t lost another Senate bid.

“Nikhil Gupta, also known as Nick, 53, an Indian national, was arrested and detained in the Czech Republic on June 30, 2023, and extradited pursuant to the bilateral extradition treaty between the United States and the Czech Republic. Gupta arrived in the US on June 14 and was presented on the charges today. According to court documents, last year, an Indian government employee (CC-1) worked together with Gupta and others in India and elsewhere to direct an assassination plot against an attorney and political activist, who is a US citizen of Indian origin, on US soil.”

“Gupta is an Indian national who resides in India, is an associate of CC-1, and has described his involvement in international narcotics and weapons trafficking in his communications with CC-1 and others. CC-1 is an Indian government agency employee who has variously described himself as a ‘senior field officer’ with responsibilities in ‘security management’ and ‘intelligence’ and has referenced previously serving in India’s Central Reserve Police Force and receiving ‘officer [] training’ in ‘battle craft’ and ‘weapons.’ CC-1 directed the assassination plot from India. In or about May 2023, CC-1 recruited Gupta to orchestrate the assassination of the victim in the US The victim is a vocal critic of the Indian government and leads a US-based organization that advocates for the secession of Punjab, a state in northern India that is home to a large population of Sikhs, an ethnoreligious minority group in India. The victim has publicly called for some or all of Punjab to secede from India and establish a Sikh sovereign state called Khalistan, and the Indian government has banned the victim and his separatist organization from India,” says a lengthy Justice Department press release about the Modi Regime’s failed effort to assassinate a New York-based Sikh community leader accused of involvement in a separatist movement for the Indian religious minority group.

The San Bernardino County, California Sheriff’s Office on Sunday put out an APB on 29 year-old Riverside man Deshaun Stamps following his escape from the recreation yard behind the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga at about noon, the San Bernardino Sun reports.

Stamps, who had been awaiting trial on charges of attempted murder, may be undergoing a harrowing search himself for the REAL attempted murderer, maybe a one-armed man who framed him to cover up some massive conspir… Oh wait. Shit. The Sun’s article says Stamps tried to grab a cop’s gun during a response to a report of vandalism… Goddammit. Yeah, so he probably wasn’t framed or anything like that. Why are so many real life crimes so freaking boring?

It’s been THREE WEEKS since that Jury “convicted” Trump.  Why aren’t they doing the TODAY SHOW? Where is the 60 Minute “sit-down”?? And dont give me this “they’re afraid of MAGA” nonsense.  The Jurors who convicted GOTTI and Whitey Bulger gave interviews.  WEIRD! pic.twitter.com/iBVl2gMhKH

— Greg Kelly (@gregkellyusa) June 17, 2024

New York City this week will become utterly unbearable this week when rising temperatures will force residents to endure small talk like “Hot enough for you?” and “My brother cooked an egg on his car! See? He sent me the video,” creating a hellish nightmare from which the white noise of air conditioners running full blast will only provide a partial respite. May God have mercy on our souls.

The actual National Weather Service bulletin says “A Heat Advisory is issued when the combination of heat and humidity is expected to make it feel like it is 95 to 99 degrees for two or more consecutive days, or 100 to 104 degrees for any length of time. Seniors and those with chronic health problems or mental health conditions are at an increased risk. Homes without air conditioning can be much hotter than outdoor temperatures. Use air conditioning to stay cool at home or go to a place that has air conditioning. If you don’t have home air conditioning, continue to seek out cool spaces each day as long as it remains hot, and for a few days after if your home is still hot. Check on vulnerable friends, family members and neighbors. To reduce risk during outdoor work, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration recommends scheduling frequent rest breaks in shaded or air conditioned environments. Anyone overcome by heat should be moved to a cool and shaded location. Heat stroke is an emergency! In cases of heat stroke call 911.”

President Biden is expected on Monday to announce a new program to streamline legal residencies and provide a path to citizenship to the undocumented spouses of American citizens, a cohort estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands, the Wall Street Journal reports on something that will freak out right wingers despite the part about maintaining marriages and keeping families together.