• Trump prevails against universal injunctions: “Universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts,” the Supreme Court ruled today in a big win for the Trump administration and a rebuke for power-hungry lower-court judges. “The Court grants the Government’s applications for a partial stay of the injunctions entered below, but only to the extent that the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue.” The 6-3 Trump v. Casa opinion, written by the lately beleaguered Justice Amy Coney Barrett, concluded, “The issuance of a universal injunction can be justified only as an exercise of equitable authority, yet Congress has granted federal courts no such power.” Furthermore, “When a court concludes that the Executive Branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power, too.” Lower courts must now reconsider numerous cases filed by litigious activists against everything Trump has done.

• Supreme Court upholds Texas age-verification law for adult websites: Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the 6-3 decision for Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, which determined that Texas has the right to enforce its age-verification law for pornographic content. The case brought by advocates of the porn industry argued that the law impeded the free speech of adults accessing the content. Thomas’s decision explains that this only “incidentally burdens” adults’ protected speech, while the main focus is on preventing minors’ access to harmful content. This is very similar to the minor burden adults face in accessing alcohol. Tradition has established that sexual content that is harmful to minors but ostensibly not harmful to adults is protected in part and unprotected in part; this decision reinforces that tradition. Writing for the dissent, Justice Elena Kagan wishes for a more perfect law that restricts access to minors without burdening adults.

• SCOTUS rules parents have opt-out rights: In a 6-3 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Mahmoud v. Taylor in favor of parents in Maryland who sued the Montgomery County Board of Education after their petitions to opt their children out of classes that promote LGBTQ ideology was denied. Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “Today, we hold that the parents have shown that they are entitled to a preliminary injunction. A government burdens the religious exercise of parents when it requires them to submit their children to instruction that poses ‘a very real threat of undermining’ the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill.” This ruling is a significant victory for both parental rights and religious freedom. It’s also a blow to the groomers.

• Trade deal with China: Donald Trump announced late Thursday night that a trade deal with China had been signed, although he did not provide details. Subsequently, China’s Ministry of Commerce announced that it will approve export applications of “controlled items,” while the U.S. will ease “restrictive measures” imposed on Beijing. Earlier this month, Trump announced that the U.S. and China were nearing an agreement on rare earth minerals, which are crucial to advanced technologies such as clean energy projects; it is unclear if that is the deal signed this week. For now, details of the agreement are sparse pending more official announcements.

• Senate briefing on Iran: On Thursday, members of the Trump administration, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine, briefed senators in a closed-door hearing. The briefing was intended to communicate intelligence on the impact of the U.S.‘s bombing mission against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Following the briefing, senators expressed dramatically different views that fell along party lines. Republicans expressed satisfaction that the intel showed the mission had been a success and Iran’s nuclear program had suffered “catastrophic damage.” Democrats sang a different tune, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer saying the briefing offered “no coherent strategy, no endgame, no plan.” Spinning a political narrative matters more to many lawmakers than supporting America’s effort to end a nuclear threat from the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism.

• Patel to testify FBI suppressed evidence of China’s election interference: FBI Director Kash Patel will soon testify before Congress. The headline issue of his testimony is his claim that former FBI Director Christopher Wray lied when he stated during a Senate hearing in September 2020 that there were no credible threats of voter fraud in the buildup to the election. As Wray put it, “We have not seen, historically, any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election, whether it’s by mail or otherwise.” According to Patel, that was not true: “Based on our continued review and production of FBI documents related to the CCP’s plot to interfere in the 2020 U.S. Presidential election, previous FBI leadership chose to play politics and withhold key information from the American people — exposing the weaponization of law enforcement for political purposes during the height of the 2020 election season.”

• James Carville warns about Zohran Mamdani: Longtime Democrat strategist James Carville sees New York City’s Democrat primary winner, Zohran Mamdani, as “potentially damaging” for the Democrat Party. Mamdani, an avowed socialist who touts his plan to freeze rent and establish government-run grocery stores, would undoubtedly be devastating for everyone in the Big Apple, but Democrats have a hard time seeing beyond damage to themselves. Carville warns that Mamdani, like Kamala Harris, believes in issues that are abhorrent to most of America, and he will need an “umbrella answer” for all of those issues. He also believes that Republicans will use Mamdani’s policies to hammer Democrats across the country, forcing them to disavow a member of their party or embrace unpopular policies.

• Mexico’s president objects to Trump admin sanctioning three Mexican banks: The U.S. Treasury announced sanctions on three Mexican banks Wednesday due to money laundering for drug cartels. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum responded with outrage, claiming that the sanctions — set to take effect three weeks after the announcement — lacked evidence. The Treasury says it can impose sanctions if it has “reasonable grounds” without presenting public evidence. According to the Treasury CIBanco, Intercam Banco, and brokerage Vector Casa de Bolsa facilitated millions of dollars in Chinese transfers that were used to purchase chemicals used to make fentanyl. Some U.S. banks were also implicated, although they remain unnamed for now. Sheinbaum claimed that there wasn’t malfeasance, merely a strong trading relationship between China and Mexico.

• DHS eliminates $1M pro-DEI program: Yesterday, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem announced that the department has eliminated a $1.5 million taxpayer-funded program that promoted a DEI agenda in public schools. Known as “Invert2Prevent,” the program created by the Biden administration in 2021 under the auspices of preventing terrorism did little other than funnel “taxpayer money into a highly politicized organization called 'The Eradicate Hate Global Summit,’ which promoted DEI and LGBTQ ideology at K-12 schools.” Former DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas touted the program as a way to help young people “counter targeted violence, terrorism, and acts of hate, but also how to empower initiatives that advocate for community connectedness and inclusivity, mentorship, and the accessibility of pro-social activities.” Noem contends that it was a “grift” designed to promote “DEI and expose grade school children to sexualized topics like LGBTQ issues.”

Headlines

• Kristi Noem reveals Honduras and Guatemala now taking deported asylum seekers (Newsweek)

• Kilmar Abrego Garcia will be deported to “third country,” prosecutors say (Daily Wire)

• Immigration officer charged with taking bribes to help immigrants obtain legal status (Fox News)

• California bookstore pulls J.K. Rowling books over author’s defense of women’s rights (National Review)

• Study: COVID vaccine reduced fertility in women by a third (Hot Air)

• Humor: 7 changes Mamdani is proposing for New York City (Babylon Bee)

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