Crooked Media - What A Day: Alito shop of horrors

Between two Supreme Court decisions paving the way for electoral malarkey and House Republicans quintupling down on an attempted coverup of the January 6 insurrection, Thursday marked another bumpy ride for your old pal democracy.
 

• In a dreaded 6-3 decision in Brnovich v. DNC, the Court’s conservative bloc upheld two Arizona voting restrictions that have had a disproportionate impact on minority groups, and took a sledgehammer to Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act in the process. Justice Samuel Allito, writing for the majority, made up the exceptions that a) some disparate racial impacts are fine, actually, because of racial differences in “employment, wealth, and education,” b) laws that target minority voters might still be legal if those voters can conceivably overcome them, and c) states can impose all kinds of restrictions if they remember to pretend they’re super worried about fraud. (No evidence of fraud necessary.)
   
• The ruling wasn’t the absolute worst-case scenario, but it just got much, much harder for voting rights advocates to challenge new GOP voter-suppression laws in court, and thus much more important for the Senate to pass federal voting-rights legislation pronto. Justice Elena Kagan warned as much in her dissent, and President Biden released a statement denouncing the Court’s damage to the Voting Rights Act and calling on Congress to make it right: “Democracy is on the line.” Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), a primary obstacle to getting this done, took a good hard look at Brnovich and very helpfully told the Senate to get this done. Thank you, Kyrsten.
   
• But wait, there’s more! The conservative majority handed the GOP another gift-wrapped permission slip in Americans for Prosperity vs. Bonta, ruling 6-3 that a California law requiring nonprofit organizations to disclose their donors is unconstitutional. Conservative foundations had argued that those confidential filings would somehow expose their donors to threats and harassment, and while they couldn’t point to any instances of it ever happening, the conservative justices agreed that the imaginary doxxing of billionaires was a good enough reason to let unregulated dark-money groups pour cash into elections forevermore.

Meanwhile, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy finally issued his own ruling about the kind of behavior that won’t fly in the GOP caucus.
 

• Spoiler: It’s not minor infractions like “extending a warm welcome to white supremacists,” or “sex trafficking.” Instead, McCarthy threatened to strip Republican members of their committee assignments if they accepted an offer from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to join the January 6 select committee—a threat almost immediately followed by Pelosi’s announcement that Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) would serve on the panel. Pelosi’s other seven picks include Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS) (who will chair), Adam Schiff (D-CA), and Jamie Raskin (D-MD).
   
• McCarthy said he was surprised to learn that Cheney had accepted a seat, and clutched his pearls at the anomaly: “I don't know in history where someone would go get their committee assignments from the Speaker and expect to have them from the conference as well.” We’re not sure where else in history a violent mob has stormed the Capitol to disrupt the electoral vote count, either, but that hasn’t stopped McCarthy from using every tool at his disposal to try to force it down the memory hole! Anyway, here’s a powerful new video breakdown of the normal Capitol tourist visit at which nobody got hurt.

The Supreme Court’s (second) gutting of the Voting Rights Act and Republicans’ continued opposition to a full accounting of the attack on Congress are both appalling, but there’s been no change to the tasks on Democrats’ to-do list—just to any abiding notion that democracy might have a judicial or bipartisan safety net if those tasks go undone.

If you haven’t already, check out our new podcast Edith!, a scripted comedy starring Rosamund Pike. Edith! explores the untold true-ish story of America’s secret First Female President Edith Wilson. In this week’s episode, a decades-old sex scandal emerges to the surface, and Edith is left with no choice but to meet Woodrow's former lover face to face. New episodes of Edith! are released every Thursday and the first three are out now. Follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.  

Happy Trump-Adjacent Perp Walk Day! Manhattan prosecutors have charged the Trump Organization with running a 15 year scheme to help top executives evade taxes by compensating them off the books. (The company apparently kept an internal ledger of exactly how much money it was hiding from the IRS, one of the first things they warn you against in tax-evasion school.) Prosecutors accused CFO Allen Weisselberg of personally avoiding taxes on $1.7 million of his income by hiding perks like a free apartment, cars, and furniture. Weisselberg has pleaded not guilty to grand larceny (punishable by up to 15 years in prison), tax fraud, and other charges. If Weisselberg were to change his mind and agree to cooperate with prosecutors as part of a plea deal, it would be quite bad for Donald Trump, but there’s been no indication that he’s likely to do so.

White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain has called on Facebook to clean up its knee-deep muck of vaccine misinformation, as the company faces an escalating investigation into whether it’s violating consumer-protection laws by failing to do so. In a podcast interview with Kara Swisher, Klain stopped short of saying that tech platforms should be held liable for vaccine misinformation, but said that Facebook in particular needs to “do better”: “I’ve told Mark Zuckerberg directly that when we gather groups of people who are not vaccinated and we ask them, why aren’t you vaccinated, and they tell us things that are wrong, tell us things that are untrue, and we ask them where they’ve heard that, the most common answer is Facebook.” Washington, DC, Attorney General Karl Racine has subpoenaed Facebook for its records of all groups and accounts that have violated coronavirus-misinformation policies, and an internal study it conducted on vaccine hesitancy among its users.

In 2021 mental health is finally a thing, especially as people are not feeling like their normal selves. Let’s support one another and talk openly. Whether or not therapy is your thing, knowing it’s available and affordable is important, for you or perhaps a loved one.  

Millions of people are trying and loving online therapy. It doesn’t have to be sitting around just talking about your feelings.

So, what is therapy, exactly? It’s whatever you want it to be.

You can privately talk to someone if your stress is too much to manage, you’re battling a temper, having relationship issues, anxiety, depression, etc… Whatever you need, there’s no more shame in these normal human struggles. We take care of our bodies, why not our minds, too? Without a healthy mind, being truly happy and at peace is HARD.

BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone and even live chat sessions with your therapist, so you don’t have to see anyone on camera if you don’t want to. It’s much more affordable than in-person therapy and you can start communicating with your therapist in under 48 hours.

It’s always a good time to invest in yourself, because you are your greatest asset. See if online therapy is for you by heading to BetterHelp.com/crooked for 10% off your first month.

White House coronavirus czar Jeff Zients announced that the Biden administration will share tens of millions more vaccine doses globally this summer, in addition to the 80 million it has already set aside.

Attorney General Merrick Garland has ordered a moratorium on federal executions.

The Biden administration has taken its first steps to ban surprise medical billing.

Officials from 130 countries have signed on to the Biden administration’s proposal for a global minimum tax rate.