Cross-Examination

• SCOTUS rules against racist admissions policies: The Supreme Court handed down two related rulings regarding the race-based admissions polices used by Harvard University and the University of North Carolina. In both cases, the Court found that the schools violated the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Writing the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts explained: “The Harvard and UNC admissions programs cannot be reconciled with the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause. Both programs lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful end points. We have never permitted admissions programs to work in that way, and we will not do so today.” All the liberal justices dissented on both rulings.

• University of Buffalo Law School sued for anti-white discrimination: The anti-racism group Equal Protection Project (EPP) recently filed a lawsuit against the State University of New York’s Buffalo School of Law over a special undergraduate program offered to 20 students it contends is racially discriminatory. The program’s brochure expressly states, “Preference is given to students of color and first-generation college students.” EPP founder William Jacobson argues the program’s discrimination against white students violates the Equal Protection Class of the 14th Amendment. He notes: “We expect a law school to lead the way in upholding the anti-discrimination laws, not subverting them. That it took place at the flagship law school of the SUNY system is extremely troubling, and may reflect a broader systemic SUNY problem where discrimination is tolerated or embraced so long as it comports with DEI ideology.”

• Biden jams traffic, DC residents fume: Washington, DC, metro residents were fit to be tied on Tuesday evening as they endured an hours-long traffic jam on the Beltway thanks to Joe Biden’s motorcade trip to a fundraiser in Chevy Chase, Maryland — just a seven-mile jaunt from the White House. Evidently, the anger over the road closures was so palpable that even doddering old Joe noticed it, as he commented that it made “a hell of a lot of people mad” and it could cost him “thousands of votes.” Indeed, the Washington Post’s story covering the traffic jam elicited a flood of angry readers who posted such comments as: “Who’s the geographically challenged idiot who came up with this route? Stopping Beltway traffic during rush hour???” However, given the fact that Biden won 91% of the vote in DC in 2020, losing a few thousand votes in the District won’t keep him awake at night.

• Bad news for Newsom — Californians want out: It’s no secret that, given the smoldering dumpster fire otherwise known as the Joe Biden presidency, California Governor Gavin Newsom has been positioning himself as the Democrat Party’s savior. Well, given Californians’ opinion about the state of the Golden State, Newsom might want to reconsider. A recent poll conducted by California Opinion Survey found that a whopping 40% of residents are “somewhat” or “very seriously considering” moving out. According to the survey, the two leading reasons for wanting to leave were high cost of living and high crime. And both of those issues fall squarely at the feet of Democrats like Newsom, who have pushed ever-increasing taxes and regulations and also have pushed for lax crime polices that have only served to fuel the crime rate.

• Baby formula shortage was the FDA’s fault: It was a crisis that could have easily been averted but for government bureaucracy. A year ago, new mothers across the country were scrambling to find baby formula as a sudden shortage hit the industry. The immediate cause of this crisis was one of the nation’s leading formula producers, Abbott Nutrition, having its Michigan plant temporarily shut down by the FDA to investigate a possible contamination. However, instead of recognizing that shutting down the plant would require supplementing the lost production with European manufacturers, the FDA stuck with crony capitalism and refused to green-light the importation of formula from Europe. The problem is that even in admitting its role in causing the baby formula crisis, the FDA’s solution is actually to create even more red tape for foreign companies to get approval to sell their products in the U.S.

• NASA nixes its EV plane test fight … forever: Well, it appears that folks won’t be flying around in electric-powered airplanes anytime soon. On Wednesday, NASA announced it was ending its experimental X-57 electrical aircraft program without it ever taking a single test flight. The reason for the decision had to do primarily with safety concerns. “Unfortunately, we recently discovered a potential failure mode in the propulsion system that we determined to pose an unacceptable risk to the pilot’s safety, and the safety of personnel on the ground, during ground tests,” explained project director Bradley Flick. Secondly, the budget and time needed for problem-solving (if those problems could be solved) and continuing technological development for the aircraft effectively make it untenable. As Flick noted, “We have a design that would have overcome the current difficulty that we’ve had — it has not been fully analyzed and reviewed yet.” However, he then admitted, “Whether there were other problems out there that we haven’t discovered yet is unknown.”

• China-born Dr. Mung Chiang named Purdue University’s new president: The board of trustees at one of America’s leading engineering schools, Purdue University, recently announced it had unanimously chosen Dr. Mung Chiang to serve as the school’s newest president. For the past five years, Chiang has served as the school’s dean of College of Engineering. Prior to Purdue, he was an engineering professor at Princeton University. From December of 2019 through December of 2020, he served in the Trump administration as Science and Technology Advisor to the Secretary of State. Chiang, who was born in Tianjin, China, in 1977, immigrated to the U.S. via Hong Kong.

Headlines

• Supreme Court hands religious freedom win to postal worker who refused to work on Sunday (Fox News)

• “Bidenomics”: Fact-checking Biden’s 2024 economic pitch (Washington Examiner)

• Hunter Biden arrives for deposition in lawsuit from laptop repair shop owner (Fox News)

• “Organized crime”: Comer claims Biden made six policy decisions in exchange for foreign cash (National Review)

• Hunter boasted “Bidens are the best” at doing what Chinese firm boss wants (NY Post)

• Biden shouts at reporter asking about his involvement in Hunter’s “Chinese shakedown” messages (Fox News)

• Chinese spy craft used American tech to collect photos, videos (Fox News)

• Biden tells reporters Putin is “clearly losing the war in Iraq” in latest gaffe (Fox News)

• Thanks, Buttigieg: U.S. hit with more mass flight cancellations ahead of July 4th weekend (Free Beacon)

• Michigan hate speech bill would make it a felony to cause someone to “feel" threatened (Daily Wire)

• Federal debt to soar, CBO predicts, despite GOP-led spending standoff (WaPo)

• U.S. home prices post first annual decline in 11 years (Investopedia)

• NBC News covers for radical LGBT activists’ "coming for your children” chant (The Federalist)

• Federal judge blocks Tennessee law protecting children from life-altering transgender procedures (Daily Wire)

• Federal judge strikes down Kentucky’s ban on sex-reassignment surgeries, cross-sex hormone therapies (Fox News)

• “Landmark study” shows suicide rates and mental illness higher among transgenders — much higher (Hot Air)

• Maine legalizing abortion up to the moment of birth (Hot Air)

• Malaria cases in Florida and Texas mark first U.S. spread since 2003 (Axios)

• Top Russian general arrested after Wagner rebellion (Daily Wire)

• Russia axes pledge to drop criminal charges against Prigozhin, begins targeting mutiny "sympathizers" (Daily Wire)

• Policy: Electric cars are an expensive scam (The Federalist)

• Satire: Historians now claim Hitler was just kidding when he chanted, “We’re coming for the Jews” (Babylon Bee)

• Humor: Newsom one-ups NYC by requiring pizza be baked using sun and magnifying glass (Babylon Bee)

For more editors’ choice headlines, click here.