As expected, Senate Democrats will immediately kill the articles of impeachment against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Wednesday, Axios reports citing three Dem sources. If anything this probably should tell you how confident the Donks are about Jon Tester and Sherrod Brown hanging on, as under normal circumstance you wouldn’t want to hand their challengers any ammo – or in Tim Sheehy’s case a gun – on this issue, but apparently it’s not a concern.

Gremlin-faced bastard Canadian Ted Cruz is facing a formal campaign finance complaint over profits from the company that syndicates his stupid podcast to his PAC, the Texas Tribune reports.

The complaint from Citizens United and the Campaign Legal Center, filed Tuesday with the Federal Election Commission, alleges Cruz may have improperly directed radio marketing and distribution firm iHeartMedia to send over $630,000 to the Truth and Courage PAC, a group dedicated to Cruz’s reelection effort, which is $5,000 over the limit a candidate can fork over to their PAC.

Non-governmental watchdog complaints are usually pointless, stupid bullshit meant more to get attention than actually punish wrongdoing, like some right wing circlejerk outfit demanding an investigation into who invited AOC going to the Met Gala. We both like to think and actually do think this one is different however because it’s an actual violation, not a shrill but non-specific accusation.

The only thing that hasn’t changed is House Oversight Chairbilly James Comer’s resentment toward the “media” for calling him out on his ceaseless failures to conduct anything even remotely resembling “oversight.” Credit to the indispensable Aaron Rupar for stitching these clips together.

“Norfolk Southern Corporation announced Tuesday that it has reached a $600 million agreement in principle to resolve a consolidated class action lawsuit relating to the East Palestine derailment. If approved by the court, the agreement will resolve all class action claims within a 20-mile radius from the derailment and, for those residents who choose to participate, personal injury claims within a 10-mile radius from the derailment,” says a press release from Norfolk Southern.

“This is another promise kept by Norfolk Southern to make it right for the people of East Palestine and the surrounding communities. In March 2023, the company made commitments to address three long-term concerns of residents: drinking water, home values, and healthcare. Already, the company has announced programs for drinking water and home value assurance. The company is going further through this comprehensive settlement—providing additional, significant monetary relief to individuals, including for healthcare, and to help qualifying local businesses continue to rebuild and grow,” and blah blah blah with a bunch of other PR bullshit before they get to “This agreement does not include or constitute any admission of liability, wrongdoing, or fault,” lol.

Thus ends the “white genocide” crisis that was Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg’s fault but former President Trump selflessly donated a few hundred bucks worth of McDonald’s food to help mitigate.

“On Apr 4, 2024, the US government transferred over 5,000 AK-47s, machine guns, sniper rifles, RPG-7s and over 500,000 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition to the Ukrainian armed forces. This constitutes enough materiel to equip one UKR BDE with small arms rifles. These weapons will help Ukraine defend against Russia’s invasion. The government obtained ownership of these munitions on December 1, 2023, through the Department of Justice’s civil forfeiture claims against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). These munitions were originally seized by US Central Command and partner naval forces from four separate transiting stateless vessels between 22 May 2021 to 15 Feb 2023. The munitions were being transferred from the IRGC to the Houthis in Yemen in violation of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2216. US CENTCOM is committed to working with our allies and partners to counter the flow of Iranian lethal aid in the region by all lawful means including US and UN sanctions and through interdictions. Iran’s support for armed groups threatens international and regional security, our forces, diplomatic personnel, and citizens in the region, as well as those of our partners. We will continue to do whatever we can to shed light on and stop Iran’s destabilizing activities,” says US Central Command in a statement.

This is different from what cunts like Rick Scott, Donald Trump, and Marsha Blackburn told us about the Biden Administration funding Iranian aggression in the Middle East when Israel was attacked last year. Might be safe to assume they were all lying about that simply to score cheap political points.

White nationalist Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene may or may not actually move forward on her motion to vacate against Jesus dork House Speaker Mike Johnson, as a “Dear Colleague” letter obtained by the New York Times is lengthy on bitching and complaining but short on intent.

“If these actions by the leader of our conference continue, then we are not a Republican Party – we are a uniparty that is hellbent on remaining on the path of self-inflicted destruction,” Greene wrote. “I will neither support nor take part in any of that, and neither will the people we represent. Fully funding abortion, the trans agenda, the climate agenda, foreign wars and Biden’s border crisis is not ‘ensuring liberty, opportunity and security for all Americans.'” Still nothing about actually doing it.

The divorced psychopath also took aim at Johnson for not getting in the way of special counsel Jack Smith’s “witch hunts” of fat former President Trump, writing that Dems “want him dead and our power of appropriations could have stopped it, but Speaker Johnson didn’t even try.”

Argentinian President Javier Milei has cut ties with Miami-based MAGA political consultant Damian Merlo, who served as Milei’s “unofficial ambassador” to fat former President Trump and US Republicans during the psychotic libertarian’s successful campaign last year, Semafor reports. No reason was given, and Semafor only found out via public FARA filings that the contract had lapsed.

“Friend, in one week, my SHAM trial in New York begins. THEY WANT ME IN PRISON! Democrats are salivating. They think images of me sitting in court will be the end of the MAGA Movement. If we don’t have a MASSIVE outpouring of patriotic support – right here, right now – all Hell will break loose. #1 Democrats will say they’re winning. #2 The LIARS in the media will say our campaign is FINISHED. #3 And worst of all? THE ABSOLUTE WORST! They’ll start to say supporters like YOU have given up on me… BUT I KNOW THAT’S NOT TRUE! MY SUPPORTERS ARE THE GREATEST PEOPLE IN THE HISTORY OF THE COUNTRY! Rabid Democrats will raise MILLIONS while I’m stuck defending myself in court,” writes “President Trump” in a fundraising email sent Monday.

“Now it’s time for ALL of us to send the Democrats, the media, and the Globalist Deep State a message they’ll NEVER forget. Before the day is over, I’m calling on ONE MILLION pro-Trump patriots to chip in and say, I’LL NEVER GIVE UP ON PRESIDENT TRUMP! > Remember, the only thing standing between freedom & the TOTAL OBLITERATION of our country is your support. YOUR SUPPORT fuels our Patriotic movement. And only with YOUR SUPPORT will we win back the White House. So from the bottom of my heart, I’m asking for you to stand with me just one more time > I know together we will win back the White House and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” the email concluded.

Weird how the Trump campaign aren’t doing so well with small-dollar donations these days with messaging like this. The freely associated stream of consciousness, apocalyptic warnings of violence, and contradictory assertions of both doom and victory being imminent for the “MAGA Movement” are perfect appeals to the broken, irradiated brains of the Orange Warlord’s voter base.

“Alexander Scott Mercurio, 18, of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, was arrested Saturday, April 6, 2024, in Coeur d’Alene for attempting to provide material support and resources to ISIS. According to the affidavit in support of the criminal complaint, Mercurio pledged his allegiance to ISIS and intended to commit attacks on its behalf. He planned to attack individuals at churches in Coeur d’Alene on April 7 using weapons, including knives, firearms, and fire. The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) conducted the investigation and thwarted Mercurio’s violent plot. Mercurio is currently in custody awaiting his initial appearance which will be set by the Court. ‘As alleged in the complaint, the defendant swore an oath of loyalty to ISIS and planned to wage an attack in its name on churches in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho,’ said Attorney General Merrick Garland. ‘Thanks to the investigative efforts of the FBI, the defendant was taken into custody before he could act, and he is now charged with attempting to support ISIS’s mission of terror and violence.’ If convicted, Mercurio faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in federal prison,” says a Justice Department press release.

Well ain’t that something? You’d think an angry 18 year-old in northern Idaho who plans a mass shooting would be hardcore MAGA, not ISIS. Must be kind of a loner who gravitated away from the violent white nationalist extremism of his peers and into violent Islamic extremism. All the cool kids were goose-stepping to Patriot Front marching cadence and talking to each other about how to build deadly pipe bombs while he was by himself researching how to build deadly pipe bombs.

A new analysis by Politico finds that there were 185 incidents of physical attacks against American electrical infrastructure reported in 2023, twice the number in 2021. That information on what are the most vulnerable parts of substations and transformers and what not are often available on extremist forums these days is almost certainly a factor in the increase. “We know activists continue to use this as a vehicle to get their ideology and other political thoughts across,” said North American Electric Reliability Corp senior vice president Manny Cancel in a recent presentation.

What keeps experts like Cancel awake at night more often though is foreign cyber threats to energy infrastructure. “The current geopolitical situation has significant ramifications for the North American grid. The major nation-state actors – China, North Korea, Iran and Russia – absolutely possess the capability to disrupt critical infrastructure here in North America,” Cancel said last week.

If all the celebrities that are clamoring for more money to Ukraine really want to show us “extremists” they should go ahead and cut the checks themselves.

Simple, issue resolved and we can move on.

— George Santos (@MrSantosNY) April 9, 2024

Donald Trump’s choice for the Republican nomination for Senate to take on incumbent Democrat Tammy Baldwin said on a Fox streaming show that people living in “nursing homes” shouldn’t vote because, basically, they’ve got nothing left to live for so they should young people make the election decisions, the Daily Beast reports.

Asked if he believed the 2020 election was stolen, Eric Hovde said that he did not but pointed to senior living facilities in the state as spots of suspicious activity.  “We had nursing homes—where the sheriff of Racine investigated—where you had 100 percent voting in nursing homes,” he said on the Guy Benson Show. “Well, if you’re in a nursing home, you only have a five, six-month life expectancy. Almost nobody in a nursing home is in a point to vote. And you had children, adult children showing up saying, ‘Who voted for my 85 or 90-year-old father or mother?’”

A 22-year-old Georgia woman was arrested after wounding two people driving on a Florida highway on Monday during the eclipse, telling officers God wanted her to carry out a shooting spree, NBC News reports.  Taylon Nichelle Celestine checked out of a Florida hotel Monday and “told the staff she was going on a shooting spree, directed by ‘God’ in relation to the solar eclipse,” law enforcement officials said.

After she was pulled over, an AR-15 style assault rifle and a 9 mm handgun were found in her Dodge Challenger.  She was booked by the Highway Patrol on attempted murder, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and improper discharge of a firearm.

It’s as pre-ordained as the destruction of the Death Star in Star Wars: A New Hope, but an effort led by Congresscentauress Marjorie Taylor Greene will put the Speakership of the passively malignant Mike Johnson up for a vote.  This will lead to a handful of her fellow grumpy Republicans joining her and, banking on a predictable oppositional “support” of Democrats, they’ll rush to push Johnson out.  Marge will crow about her superpower, and she’ll get the camera time on the steps of the Capitol she so craves.

“We should hold on and do what is right, to do what ‘ar voters sent us to do,” Marge says so loudly she makes the microphone she’s holding in the vacant retirement home community hall unnecessary.  “But that has not happened this Congress.  As a matter of fact, our Republican House majority has failed completely.”

She’s right.  For once you can’t argue with her; you’d be flogging a dead horse.  The Republican House majority has failed.  Not just the leadership; the Majority.  The Republicans are, in short, a failure.  Marge is right, and Marge got them there.

Attempting to make some metaphor about the eclipse, Fox useless idiot Jesse Watters blathers, “… because just like they thought the moon would never leave, they say Trump’s gonna stay for life,” then goes to a clip of historian Michael Beschloss saying Trump’s claim that he only wants “to be a dictator for a day” before continuing.  “Just like what happens after every eclipse,” the famously counter-science Watters says as he attempts a magician’s mystical tone, “everybody knows Trump’s going to leave office just like he did the last time.”

Weeks after Alexei Navalny was murdered in a Siberian prison, another anti-Putin Russian activist has died in a Russian jail.  According to the Daily Beast, Alexander Demidenko died in pre-trial detention on April 5th after he was taken back into custody by the federal police, his lawyer was informed.

In October, Demidenko had been detained by Chechen National Guardsmen along the Ukrainian border as he helped native Ukrainians leave Russia.  Demidenko operated an underground outfit helping return Ukrainians or help others get out of Russia, reportedly helping hundreds to escape. After ten days in jail, he was released on a type of parole.

He received regular harassment, including phone calls telling him not to leave the country or things would get worse for him and his family–harassment his son says led his father to become paranoid and suicidal.  The FSB raided his home again on November 7th and took him into custody, claiming to have found a hand grenade in the house, a claim his son doubts.  After being in custody for nearly six months, authorities notified his lawyer that he died in custody.  No other explanation is known.

Special Counsel Jack Smith filed his initial brief in the Supreme Court case brought by Donald Trump asking, “Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office.”  Smith’s filing is informative, complete, and scathing.  Just a taste:

A. Petitioner asserts a novel and sweeping immunity from the federal criminal laws that govern all citizens’ conduct. Under this Court’s established separation-ofpowers framework, a claim of presidential exemption from a statutory limitation requires the President to identify an Article II basis that precludes the application of that congressional act. No presidential power at issue in this case entitles the President to claim immunity from the general federal criminal prohibitions supporting the charges: fraud against the United States, obstruction of official proceedings, and denial of the right to vote. The President’s constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed does not entail a general right to violate them.

B.  History likewise refutes petitioner’s claim. The Framers never endorsed criminal immunity for a former President, and all Presidents from the Founding to the modern era have known that after leaving office they faced potential criminal liability for official acts.  The closest historical analogue is President Nixon’s official conduct in Watergate, and his acceptance of a pardon implied his and President Ford’s recognition that a former President was subject to prosecution.

Responding to a question about whether abortion could “ever be less” polarizing for Republicans, white nationalist Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene on Monday was noticeably ambivalent when speaking to the crowd at her town hall-style cult gathering in Georgia, just blithely mentioning fat former President Trump’s abortion policy statement “leaving it up to the states” rather than national ban the freaks crave. Greene went on for some length about being 100 percent pro-life and that abortion can ever be less polarizing “because of the issue itself,” and only at the end of the answer did she touch on the Orange God Emperor’s contrived stance, saying simply “President Trump did put out a statement today, um, if you wanna go check out his statement and see where he stands on it,” before moving on to some other bullshit right wing culture war issue.

It was not a ringing endorsement and we will update this if and when we get an actual video clip of Greene’s bit we will update. You can see it here at the still-ongoing stream if you rewind to where the RSBN’s time in the lower right-hand corner says 7:06 PM ET and watch from there.

As for the town hall as a whole, most if it was devoted to ripping into House Speaker Mike Johnson, who Greene called a Democrat and a traitor and all sorts of other shit, so yeah maybe she will actually move forward with the motion to vacate when the House reconvenes on Tuesday.

Judge Juan Merchan issued his final jury selection instructions and questionnaire for the scores of New Yorkers who will be considered for the final panel to determine Donald Trump’s fate in his Manhattan election tampering case, and it’s bad news if you’re a member of the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers or Q-Anon.

In a procedural issue, Merchan ruled that the court will dispense of the lengthy practice of interviewing people who have self-identified as unable to serve on the jury because of conflicts or other causes.  Noting that during the 2022 Trump Organization trial he presided over, the jury selection process was drawn out by the mandated interviews–a process Merchan notes would be more complicated in a criminal trial.

“This Court finds, after careful consideration of the circumstances of this case, that requiring individual inquiry of every prospective juror who has already self-identified that they cannot be fair and impartial, or that they are otherwise unable to serve, is unnecessary, time-consuming and of no benefit,” Merchan declared decisively, unlike his Florida federal counterpart.  “This Decision is well within the Court’s discretion.”  This decision by Merchan will shave days, if not weeks off the trial schedule because of the security measures needed to conduct each individual’s interview.

Marjorie Taylor Greene warned us sinners of the demonic eclipse and God’s wrath, and it didn’t take long for the Lord to take the first soul of a pagan worshiper:  On the way to a state park on Saturday to see Monday’s eclipse, a Long Island woman traveling in a camper being towed by a pickup truck fell onto the highway after the camper’s door unexpectedly opened, sustaining fatal head injuries.  For the record, the camper was made by Airstream, not Boeing.  According to the New York Daily News, police are investigating the accident that killed the 58-year-old woman, which was one of a number caused by the increase in traffic as people traveled to sites in the eclipse’s path, not caused by Lucifer’s lunar lark.