Today on The BradCast: What you may not know about the horrifying Trump-Vance scheme to fire hundreds of thousands of non-partisan career civil servants and replace them with Trump loyalists --- if Trump is elected in November. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

• But, first up, results from Congressional and state legislative primary elections in "deep blue" Massachusetts on Tuesday were completely unsurprising. Though one of our listeners discovered --- and learned more details about --- a tabulation problem that resulted in one of the Democratic races for the state House in the town of Essex needing to be counted by hand overnight after the optical-scan system was unable to tally it accurately.

  As discussed, the incident serves as yet another excellent reminder of the critical importance of hand-marked paper ballots to help ensure results that voters may have confidence in, even when there are problems with the optical-scan systems. Though the issue appears to have been caused by an error in the programming and printing of ballots by the Commonwealth itself, at least MA has enough respect for its voters to allow all of them to cast hand-marked paper ballots --- whether by mail or at the polls --- unlike some other states I could mention. (Hi, Georgia!)

• Then, a quick review of the likelihood of the narrowly divided U.S. Senate flipping majority control this November from Democratic to Republican, with all eyes on the great state of Montana, where control of the upper chamber may come down to the tough reelection battle being faced by three term Democratic Senator and Montana native, Jon Tester.

  Recent polling averages show Tester trailing the Trump-endorsed Republican nominee Tim Sheehy, a wealthy rancher who moved to Montana about 10 years ago. But now, audio recordings have emerged of Sheehy slurring Native Americans at Republican fundraisers, where he repeatedly used a racist trope to disparage "drunken Indians" on the reservation. The audio recordings were surfaced last week by Char-Koosta News, "The Official News Publication of the Flathead Indian Reservation," in a state that is home to seven reservations and 12 Native American tribes, representing about 6% of the state population. It's also a state where Republicans have repeatedly attempted to suppress Native American votes.

  The outcome of the Tester/Sheehy contest is very likely to determine majority control of the U.S. Senate and whether Kamala Harris, if she wins this year, will be able to carry out her agenda or see it blocked from Day 1 by Republicans. As Jonathan Martin notes today at Politico, if she does win, but the Senate flips to GOP control (or Dems can't win back the House), Harris "would be the first Democrat to enter the presidency since 1884 without majorities in both chambers."

• And, since we're recalling the 1800s, Donald Trump has a scheme to return to the 1800s "spoils system" of appointing federal government officials based not on their skills or talent, but on their loyalty to their party and President. That system was replaced following the 1881 assassination of President James A. Garfield after he was killed by a man who was furious that he was not appointed to a foreign service position that he believed he was owed based on his work for the Republican Party.

  As James Rainey reported at the L.A. Times last week, after the law was changed under President Chester A. Arthur in 1883 to mandate a merit-based civil service system instead, "The next 22 presidents would leave the basic principles of the civil service intact. That changed when Trump took office."

  In his final year in office, Trump used his executive powers to create something called "Schedule F" which would have converted hundreds of thousands of career civil servants into at-will employees who could be fired without cause. Before full implementation, Trump lost in 2020 to Joe Biden, who quickly reversed the Executive Order.

  But now, both the far-right Project 2025 and Trump himself have detailed plans to remove and/or replace at least half a million federal workers in dozens of federal agencies should the Trump/Vance ticket win in November. In addition to replacing those career officials with loyalists, the scheme would also serve to gut the federal government of an indescribable amount of expertise on science, agriculture, healthcare, national security, education, energy, the economy, the military and so much more.

  We're joined to discuss the ramifications of all of this today by JACQUELINE SIMON, Policy Director of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the largest federal employee union representing some 750,000 federal and District of Columbia employees.

  As "horrible" as the Trump Schedule F/Agenda 47/Project 2025 scheme is, she explains, "it's the logical conclusion of something that has been going on in the federal government now for many years."

  "A good way to look at what the outline of what government would look like according to Project 2025," Simon says, "is politicizing the work of people who are right now performing all kinds of functions. Scientific research --- the research that underlays regulations that protect public health, clean air, clean water, safe food --- all of those kinds of things. They want to move everything to the states, or privatize, or defund. Those efforts can also be avenues to politicize the work of the federal government. When you privatize, you can specify exactly what the contractor will do and won't do."

  "They would take all testing and testing development away from the CDC. They would deregulate the inspection of meat and poultry that's performed right now in the Dept. of Agriculture. Completely privatize the work done by civilians at the Dept. of Defense, so that the government would be fully, fully at the mercy of its contractors. They make no bones that they would effectively shut down the VA healthcare system and privatize all of that. They would close hospitals and clinics all across the country. And basically turn the VA into a private health insurance program. There are so many ways that the operations of government, the functions of government would be corrupted, undermined, and politicized, by privatization, and by, of course, a personnel system that would allow them to hire people who aren't competent, who can't perform the duties of the position, and then hire them and fire them at will."

  "It's been the Republican playbook for decades," she tells me. "This isn't new. This is Ronald Reagan moving forward. Almost everything in this document [Project 2025] has either been tried before or is part of Republican dogma, the Republican agenda in Congress for decades." But it is, if Trump is able to return to the White House, Simon warns, likely "the final dagger in the heart of the civil service"...

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Yup. We're back! And we've got lots to begin getting caught up with on today's BradCast. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

Among the many stories reported and discussed on today's program...

• Donald Trump's recent flip-flops on abortion, pandering on IVF and his desecration of Arlington Cemetery for political purposes. (By the way, Dems should embrace Trump's pandering promise to have the Government pay for anyone's fertility treatments. It's the GOP's first baby step toward universal healthcare/Medicare-for-All after all! Sounds great! Hold them to it!)

• More than 10,000 hotel workers celebrated Labor Day by going on strike for better wages and working conditions across the U.S. Kamala Harris and Joe Biden campaigned together, speaking to a packed house of union workers in Pittsburgh on Labor Day, touting the most pro-union, jobs-creating Admin in history and promised to continue it under a Harris-Walz Administration. Trump, apparently unable to find any union workers who wanted to hear from him, stayed home yesterday.

• More than a hundred thousand demonstrators took to the streets in Israel to protest against their far-right Benjamin Netanyahu-led government, demanding a deal for a cease-fire and the release of hostages in Gaza, after six of them were found dead in a tunnel beneath Rafah on Sunday. Twenty-three year old Israeli-American hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin was among those found dead, just days after his parents spoke at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, calling for a cease-fire and the release of more than 100 hostages who remain in Hamas custody following their horrific attack on Israel last October. As we have been arguing for months, however --- and as Israeli protesters are noted as mentioning in this Guardian piece --- Prime Minister Netanyahu is unlikely to ever agree to a deal that would effectively end Israel's war on Gaza, because it would also result in the end of his governing coalition. After that, he will have to face corruption charges filed against him from which he is currently immune...as long as he remains Prime Minister. If all of that sounds like a deal that Donald Trump hopes to win for himself in November, you are right. Tune in for much more on all of this today.

• Meanwhile, on Tuesday, Russia launched another deadly, long-range missile assault on Ukraine, this time on a military academy and nearby hospital. More than 50 were killed, more than 200 wounded. That as Ukraine has finally taken possession of land inside Russia's Kursk region, including some 500 square miles along the Ukrainian border, and continues to plead with the U.S. and Europe to send weapons to help them defend themselves against the two-and-half-year onslaught by its imperialistic Russian neighbor.

• Massachusetts is holding its Congressional and state legislative primaries today, just days after its Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin warned residents in the state about scam text messages being sent to some voters, falsely telling them that they are ineligible to vote. It is just one of the many dirty tricks we will be seeing between now and Election Day, the period of time that I am calling PHASE 1 of this year's general elections.

• And, speaking of, Labor Day is a good moment to mark where things are in the horse race toward Election Day, following the unprecedented plot-twist of the last 6 weeks following Kamala Harris taking over at the top of the ticket. She has surged in the polling averages against Donald Trump --- particularly in the seven critical battleground states --- since then. But, she remains just barely ahead of Trump in the states she most needs to win. Her slim lead nationally and in the most critical battleground states she would need to get to 270 electoral votes, in a system that advantages Republicans, has resulted in, as Politico colorfully describes it today, "the equivalent of a knife fight in a phone booth."

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us today to begin catching up on much that we missed in climate and environmental news after being off just one week, including the role of climate action in the 2024 contest; new data on deadly extreme heat in the U.S.; China meeting its renewable electricity targets six years early; and the Klamath River, now finally running free again along the California/Oregon border after being dammed up for more than 100 years!...

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Yup. They'll believe anything. As discussed on today's BradCast, the MAGA dupes even have a new, insane explanation for why President Biden "allowed" his own, supposedly "weaponized"-against-Republicans DoJ to bring felony charges against his own son. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among the stories covered on today's program....

• The President's son, Hunter Biden, was found guilty by a federal jury in a Delaware courtroom on Tuesday, on charges that he had lied about his drug use on a federal background check form while purchasing a revolver in 2018, as he was overcoming his battle with drug addiction following the death of his brother. He never loaded the gun and owned it for just 11 days before his girlfriend thew it away. He was charged for something that nobody else has ever been charged with, unless they also committed an additional gun-related crime. Oddly enough, despite the "weaponization of the Justice Department" by Joe Biden to go after Trump and Republicans that we've heard so much about from Donald Trump and his MAGA minions, Hunter was found guilty on charges brought by a Trump-appointed federal prosecutor in a trial presided over by a Trump-appointed federal judge. President Biden said he "accepts" the jury verdict and does not plan to issue a pardon to his last living son.

• That news comes on the heels of yesterday's program, in which we heard from Donald Trump supporting listeners about why they still support him, even after his conviction on 34 felony counts in New York related to a hush money payment to help him successfully rig the 2016 Presidential election. If you heard the show, you know that the reasons those callers still support Trump is that they have been wildly disinformed about all manner of facts, including their belief that Biden and/or his DoJ orchestrated the NY state prosecution. Even Trump's own former defense attorney in the case has called the evidence-free claim "ridiculous". But the dupes believe it nonetheless, along with a whole bunch of other Republicans who buy that nonsense and many more evidence-free claims regarding the 2020 election, the 2021 insurrection and more.

• But, there is a bit of good news for Joe Biden and Democrats in recent polling following Trump's conviction in New York.

• There is also good news for all of us, in that some of the biggest rightwing disinformers, other than Donald Trump, are finally facing some real accountability. Last week, it was reported that rightwing radio/podcast propagandist Alex Jones was liquidating his businesses, including his InfoWars program, to begin paying off his $1.5 billion defamation liability to families of Sandy Hook victims after years of lying about the tragic 2012 mass shooting at a Connecticut elementary school as a "hoax."

• And, at the end of May, the rightwing radio outfit Salem Media Group, apologized and retracted the hoax documentary called 2000 Mules, made by convicted rightwing election fraudster Dinesh D'Souza and the long-disgraced rightwing fraudster group called True the Vote. The film details a wholly debunked, wild conspiracy about Democrats scheming to steal the 2020 election from Donald Trump through an insanely complex plot involving tens of thousands of fraudulent ballots deposited secretly into drop-boxes in battleground states. Salem pulled the film from distribution and apologies for it in response to a defamation suit filed by a man featured in the film via security camera footage and falsely described as committing election fraud. None of that, of course, will keep Trump and the MAGA dupes from continuing to cite the film as "evidence" of a stolen election --- even as it contains no actual, ya know, evidence of such any such scheme.

• On the other hand, we have more actual voter fraud documented as having been committed by Republican voters. This time, its an 85-year old GOP voter who was found guilty last month of double voting at two different houses he owned in both Massachusetts and New Hampshire during the 2016 election.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with disturbing news on gains by far-right, anti-climate action political parties in the European Union's parliamentary elections over the weekend; dumb news on New York Governor Kathy Hochul's much-criticized halt to New York City congestion pricing; and good news on new vehicle mileage standards by the Biden Administration that will save consumers money and combat climate change...

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On today's BradCast, some much needed "context" for what will absolutely be the most important election in U.S. history this November. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Donald Trump is now running on the promise of political violence --- whether he wins or loses. He made that clear (again) during this past weekend's rallies, interviews and social media postings as he continues to up his violent rhetoric with each passing day, embraces strongman tropes and celebrates his supporters' deadly attempt to overthrow the Constitution and U.S. Government on his behalf on January 6, 2021.

The real context of Trump's weekend rally in Ohio, threatening a "bloodbath for the country" if he loses this November, should be clear by now to anyone who hasn't already drunk his Kool-Aid. If it isn't, we attempt to rectify that today. And it has little to nothing to do with cars from China as his Kool-Aid drunk cultists and apologists are attempting to argue. Historians like Timothy Snyder (author of On Tyranny and The Road to Unfreedom) and Jason Stanley (author of How Fascism Works) are shouting from the rooftops to make that clear. So are folks like conservative attorney George Conway and progressive journalist Josh Marshall.

In other largely related news today...

• Former Trump trade advisor Peter Navarro, a key player in the disgraced former President's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, reported to a federal corrections facility in Miami today to begin a fourth month sentence, becoming the first Trump White House official to go to prison on charges related to Trump's failed attempt to steal the 2020 election from the American people.

• Election denying Michigan MAGA attorney Stefanie Lambert, charged on four counts related to the unlawful breach of voting systems in the state, was arrested in D.C. on Monday after a hearing in a separate case in which she is defending billionaire election denier Patrick Byrne who is being sued for defamation by Dominion Voting Systems. Her arrest by U.S. Marshals was related to her failure to show up for a hearing in her own case back in MI, even as she improperly released discovery documents from the Dominion case to the public.

• The corrupted U.S. Supreme Court allowed a Texas law to take effect today that overturns more than a century of federal immigration authority and the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution which has long held that federal law trumps state law. The TX statute, which allows state and local police to arrest people they suspect have violated federal immigration law, is similar to Arizona's 2012 "Papers Please" law that was blocked at the time by SCOTUS. But neither Court precedent nor the Constitution appear to mean much anymore to the current, far-right supermajority on the High Court.

• There is a movement among Congressional Republicans to prevent Joe Biden from giving a State of the Union Address to Congress next year under the premise that his speech two weeks ago was "divisive" and "hyper-partisan". (And you know how much Republicans hate that sort of thing, especially at SOTU!) At the same time, Republicans are pretending that polls suggest Biden's SOTU was not "well received". Actual numbers from viewers of the speech before and after strongly suggest the contrary.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with the EPA finally banning all uses of toxic asbestos; extreme heat in Africa; the Biden Administration's investment of billions of dollars to rebuild under-privileged communities that were broken into pieces decades ago by highway construction; and the remarkable climate change deniers in a wealthy coastal community in Massachusetts who want millions of dollars from the state, in perpetuity, to save their beaches and property values, despite the ravages of global warming and rising seas.

All of that and a whole lot more on today's BradCast!...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: EPA finally bans all uses of asbestos in US, after decades of trying; President Biden unveils billions for rebuilding struggling communities torn apart years ago by highway construction; Extreme heat wave in Africa forces schools to close; PLUS: Massachusetts coastal town spent big on beach restoration that washed away just days later... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The U.S. has its first large offshore wind farm; Court temporarily halts S.E.C.’s new climate rules; Fifth Circuit sides with Texas in dispute over nuclear waste storage; Trump’s violent language toward EVs; Oregon's powerful timber industry loses bid for another massive tax cut; Zombies of the tax code: Why fossil fuels subsidies seem impossible to kill; Your tax dollars may be funding the expansion of the plastics industry... PLUS: You can start applying for the American Climate Corps next month... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Happy 2024! While we were out...December 2023 was the hottest December on record, and 2023 was the hottest year ever recorded; Warm winter causing snow drought in U.S.; Landmark youth climate lawsuit to finally proceed to trial; PLUS: Some good news, including the historic Endangered Species Act turning 50... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Big oil 'fully owned the villain role' in 2023, the hottest year ever recorded; Brace Yourself For A Blockbuster Year On Energy And Climate; West Australia bans commercial native logging; Europe Escaping Russia's Gas Blackmail with Clean Energy; A flood-prone historic site decides to live with rising water rather than fight it; What If Farmers Had to Pay for Water?; Polar Bear Dies From Bird Flu As H5N1 Spreads Across Globe... PLUS: Floatovoltaics Could Help The Southwest Generate Power And Conserve Water... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Monumental humanitarian crisis in Libya after catastrophic extreme flooding; U.S. hits new record for billion-dollar weather disasters in a single year; PLUS: Texas heat and drought is causing damage to local water systems... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Earth 'well outside safe operating space for humanity', scientists find; CA lawmakers pass groundbreaking greenhouse emissions disclosure bill; New York could require flood disclosures in home sales; Study: lead exposure killed more than 5 million people in just one year; World’s biggest carbon capture plant being built in Texas; For a pittance, miners can work public land. There’s a push to make them pay.... PLUS: Development in Washington State is crowding out cougars... and much, MUCH more! ...

Nope. The 2022 midterms still aren't fully over. At least not on The BradCast, where we're still following every last vote to the bitter end. But that's not all we have for you today. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

In fact, we cover all of the "E" stories on today's program, including Elections, Energy and the Economy, if not necessarily in that order...

• As if the good news of cheap, renewable energy like wind and solar wasn't bad enough for them, the Big Fossil Fuel boys already seem to be freaking out about today's news regarding a major breakthrough in nuclear fusion technology and the possibility that it could eventually result in clean, virtually unlimited, carbon-free energy.

• New AAA numbers reveal that Joe Biden has lowered gasoline prices in the U.S. to less than they were before Russia's war on Ukraine! (If it was all his fault the price went up, he gets all the credit when it comes down, right?)

• New numbers from the Labor Department today reveal that Joe Biden has Joe Biden has almost ended inflation in the U.S.! (See above.)

• Colorado has finished their "recount" for the U.S. House seat in the state's 3rd Congressional District between incumbent Republican nut Lauren Boebert and her Democratic challenger Adam Frisch. After computers retallied all of the ballots (rather than hand-counts) Boebert was declared the winner by just 546 votes out of more than 325,000 votes cast, in a district which all forecasters saw as "solid Republican". Happily, because the Republican won in this case, there were no death threats to election officials or armed insurrections in response.

• Boebert's razor thin victory means the GOP will have 222 House seats in the next Congress beginning in January to the Democrats' 213. While they lost just 9 seats in in the lower chamber, and the majority along with them, it was an extraordinary midterm election for a party controlling both chambers of Congress and the White House. In addition to holding all of their Senate seats and even flipping one from Red to Blue (a feat not matched since 1934 for a party that controls the White House), Democrats also won Governors races in red states and flipped state legislative chambers in a way that just doesn't happen in this kind of midterm election. Dems won trifecta control (the Governor's office, plus majorities in the state House and Senate) in four more states this year: Michigan, Minnesota, Maryland and Massachusetts. They also held off GOP supermajorities in states with Dem Governors such as North Carolina and Wisconsin. In fact, taking back the majority in the U.S. House, by the barest of margins, is perhaps the only thing the GOP can feel good about this year. Even there, the average pick up is about 20 or 30 seats in elections like this one. And Republicans may have a difficult time electing a House Speaker in January, depending on how things go in the weeks ahead for GOP House Leader Kevin McCarthy.

• But there are still a number of midterm recounts and legal contests underway in various spots around the nation. Yesterday, we discussed the recount now underway in the Arizona Attorney General race, after the Democratic candidate, Kris Mayes, was certified to have defeated Republican Abe Hamadeh by just 511 votes out of more than 2.5 million cast. Sadly, as in CO, AZ "recounts" with computers instead of by hand. In Massachusetts, meanwhile, they do it correctly (by hand). Thankfully so. Because a hand recount for a state House of Representatives seat, in which the Democrat initially lost to the Republican incumbent by 10 votes, has resulted in her winning the seat by just one. single. vote. The Republican incumbent is, naturally, filing a lawsuit in response.

• And then there's the battle for control of Pennsylvania's House of Representatives, where Democrats appear to have won the majority from Republicans for the first time in more than a decade. They flipped a net total of 12 seats last month to take control of the House by the barest possible margin, 102 to 101. But then the confusion began. One Democrat actually died back in October but won reelection anyway. Two others also won races for higher office (Lt. Gov and U.S. House) and resigned after the 2021-22 session officially ended on November 30. But now, there is a battle, including in court, for who gets to decide when the special elections to fill all three vacant seats takes place, and who will be elected as House Speaker when the new session officially begins on January 3. We try to make sense of the legislative mess in the Keystone State which even a longtime PA journalist we spoke to is having trouble making sense of!

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with news on a massive Keystone Pipeline spill in Kansas; New evidence of Big Oil's big lies about their pretend commitment to tackle climate change; And news on the nuclear fusion breakthrough announced today by U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Missing 'red wave' in 2022 midterm elections is good news for the climate; New reports warn of skyrocketing methane levels; PLUS: Mixed results for state environmental ballot propositions... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Former Interior Secretary Zinke wins Montana US House seat; A NASA satellite launched to detect dust has discovered huge methane leaks; COP27: John Kerry makes his move on private climate finance; Heat pumps mandated in Washington state; No Surprise: Climate Denier John Stossel Spreads Disinformation about EVs; US To Climate Summit: American climate policy won't be repealed; How Mitsubishi vacuumed up tuna from a rogue Chinese fishing fleet; Who's driving climate change? New data catalogs 72,000 polluters and counting... PLUS: How to Live in a Catastrophe: In search of a way to think clearly about the planetary crisis... and much, MUCH more! ...

Republicans and corporate media appeared to be shocked on Tuesday night. But it looks like we had it right all along on BradCast regarding this year's midterm elections. And, once again, the corporate media didn't. But, good news for them! As usual, they'll pay no price for being wrong, no matter how many times they ill-serve the nation with their failures. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

There was no "red" wave. Conventional wisdom, as we've been advising since early Spring, was to be ignored before this year's midterms in these decidedly UNconventional times. If we could see that data --- sometimes via polling from some of the very same media outlets --- why couldn't the corporate media? Maybe its group think. Maybe its because whatever Republicans tell them they believe to be the truth, or simply report it as such.

In any event, while there was no "red" wave, it is still quite possible that Republicans win majorities in both the U.S. House and the Senate --- if just barely in each case. And while Dems, as we go to air today, have an apparent edge to hold on to their Senate majority, it'll almost certainly require another win in another U.S. Senate runoff in Georgia next month to nail it down. There even remains a long-shot chance that Dems can keep a majority in the House as well, and that, as we explained yesterday, it all may come down to the effect of unusually large downpours on Tuesday's Election Day in both Northern and Southern California.

Either way, for the moment, American democracy, while still on life support, has lived to see another day. For now. In similarly encouraging news, our previous President may even finally face some accountability from his own infuriated party. They were deprived of what should have been a huge and easy win on Tuesday, but for the rightwing loons that Donald Trump helped push into the Party and onto ballots across the nation. Many of them, if not all, lost bigly.

On today's program, we discuss all of the above and, based on what we know as of airtime, run through a ton of critical victories and losses --- including both inspiring surprise wins and several disappointments --- in dozens of states, at both the state and federal level.

As of yesterday's election, anyway, American voters (including many young ones, thankfully!) appear to have held the line for democracy. It is not dead yet. For that, I hope you'll take a minute or two to breathe a small sigh of relief. But not too many minutes. The good fight ain't over yet. Not by a long shot...

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Today's BradCast starts off with a show-stopper! Everything else thereafter, well, you'll decide for yourself. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

On today's program...

• Since it's, apparently, National Voter Registration Day today (yes, that's a thing), we thought we'd celebrate by starting off with a fantastic new lyric rewrite video from the cast of Broadway's Hamilton. They've updated a song from the show called "The Election of 1800" to a new version called "The Election of 2022" to raise awareness of the importance of voting this year. Their effort is in partnership with Michelle Obama's When We All Vote and Vote Riders. But for help in registering to vote, checking to make sure your registration still exists (and is at the address where you actually live), and for information on the type of ID required to vote where you live, I recommend either the DNC's IWillVote.com app or the federal government's Vote.gov. Both sites allow you to check your registration or register to vote without having to give information to a third party. And, since merely voting is no longer enough, we are officially enlisting you to spread the word to others on all of this! Ask your friends, co-workers, neighbors etc., if they are registered to vote; help them do so, if not; make sure they get to the polls to vote by November 8 this year, etc. etc. Yes, it's that important this year!

• There is a weird beer shortage looming! Why? Lack of carbon dioxide due to contamination at an extinct volcano in Mississippi. Yes, I realize that sounds bizarre --- especially given the deadly over-abundance of CO2 in our atmosphere, causing our deadly climate crisis --- but, well...tune in for the full bizarre explanation.

• On yesterday's program, we detailed some of the apparent federal criminal statutes, such as kidnapping, that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis seems to have violated when he shipped 48 Venezuelan migrants from San Antonio, Texas to Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts on behalf of the state of Florida. We noted that requests had been made to the MA Attorney General U.S. Attorney's office in the state to investigate whether laws were violated. But shortly after airtime yesterday, news broke that Bexar County (San Antonio), Texas Sheriff's office has opened a criminal investigation into the matter. Good news!

• As to what actually happened --- versus what DeSantis is claiming --- TPM's Josh Marshall has been trying to do some digging, after first noting that the initial story "Doesn't Add Up". Why did DeSantis hunt down migrants in Texas seeking asylum to entice (with false promises) to go to Massachusetts? Are there no migrants in Florida that could have been similarly abused, since the Florida state legislature has set allocated some $12 million to use to transport migrants out of the state (as opposed to out of the state of Texas)?! Who is this mysterious "Perla" character who has been identified as having recruited the migrants and organized luxury corporate jets to fly theme to MA? And, though the Florida Governor and Presidential hopeful is refusing to offer specifics, what clues can be gleaned about all of this from some of the statements that he has made, referencing a "contractor" or "vendor" who seems to have been hired for all of this, rather than government workers. In other words, what the hell is really going on here?

• Then, in some election law related news today, the House January 6 Select Committee Vice-Chair Liz Cheney (R-WY) and committee member Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) detailed proposed reforms to the Electoral Count Act, over the weekend. The Committee, they explain, hopes to make it more difficult in the future to steal elections via the Electoral College, as Donald Trump attempted to do on January 6, 2021. The new measure, officially introduced by the Committee in the House on Monday, is called the Presidential Election Reform Act. It would clarify the role of the Vice President on January 6 as purely ministerial; increase the number of Representative and Senators required to challenge any state's Electoral College votes; offer legal options to Presidential candidates in the event that a state fails to certify its Electoral Votes (as a number of GOP candidates for Governor and Sec. of State this year have said they would have done in 2020, had they been in office at the time); and prevents state legislatures from changing the rules for determining election results after the election has already started. The House measure is similar to one recently introduced by a bipartisan group in the Senate, and would need to be reconciled with that version if both versions are successfully brought to a vote in each chamber.

• Some good news --- and some troubling news --- for disabled voters. New voting restrictions adopted by Republicans in several different states have made it literally impossible for some disabled voters to vote at all without breaking the law. For example, a Wisconsin law had mandated that nobody other than the voter him or herself could place an absentee ballot in a mailbox. That means that those without use of their arms --- such as voters suffering from advanced multiple sclerosis or who may have been injured --- might not be able to vote absentee at all. A recent federal court victory in WI will at least allow disabled voters in that state to receive assistance when casting their ballot. But several other states, such as Kansas, Iowa, Kentucky and Missouri, still have measures in place that could make it impossible --- and/or illegal --- for some disabled voters to vote at all in 2022 and beyond.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, as three major storms made simultaneous, catastrophic landfall in Puerto Rico, Alaska and Japan over the weekend; a new report finds climate change made Pakistan's recent catastrophic flooding much much worse; better news in Australia where the nation, until recently controlled by climate change deniers, is finally moving to reduce carbon emissions; and, in Louisiana, a court has blocked the construction of a massive, toxic plastics plant in area of the state known as "Cancer Alley"...

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Well, that was a lively BradCast today. Especially the caller segment! Please tune in! [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

Among the stories covered on today's program...

• Despite a bizarre, very much Nazi-like rally in Ohio held by our former President over the weekend, mainstream corporate media are still pulling their punches in calling out the Republican Party for having gone full bore authoritarian at this point under their far-right MAGA cult leader Donald Trump. Democracy itself is now very much at stake in this nation, and we really need a professional media corps which isn't afraid to start acting like it, calling it out, and reporting it to the American people.

• While the death and funeral of Queen Elizabeth in Great Britain has received virtual wall-to-wall coverage from outlets such as CNN since her death 11 days ago, three major climate change-fueled hurricanes made landfall over the weekend. Puerto Rico had its power knocked out island-wide by Hurricane Fiona (almost 5 years to the day since Hurricane Maria did the same), with as much as 30 inches of rain falling catastrophically in some areas. In Alaska, remnants of Typhoon Merbok resulted in the state's most intense storm in 50 years, leading to widespread flooding across a thousand miles of coastline. And, in Japan, over the same weekend, Supertyphoon Nanmadol resulted in widespread flooding and power outages, while clocking in as the fourth most intense typhoon to make landfall in the nation's history. As Desi Doyen reports today, all of those storms were super-charged by our warming climate and all seemingly quite newsworthy. Then again, Queen Elizabeth died 11 days ago, so...ya know.

• As you have heard by now, Ron DeSantis, Florida's ambitious Republican Governor, has taken credit for coercing 48 migrants from Venezuela, who were lawfully seeking asylum in San Antonio, Texas, onto to two chartered private jets to Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Neither the people of Martha's Vineyard, nor even the state's Republican Governor, were notified in advance before the migrants were left stranded. While DeSantis claims the migrants boarded the planes "voluntarily", a brochure, obtained by Popular Information today, citing "Massachusetts Refugee Benefits," appears to have falsely informed the migrants that they would be eligible for "8 months cash assistance," "assistance with housing," "food," "clothing," "transportation to job interviews," "job training," "job placement," "registering children for school," "assistance applying for Social Security cards," and more in MA. That brochure, according to attorneys for 30 of the 48 migrants, is now evidence of a crime --- specifically, as former life-long Republican attorney Keith Barber describes, the federal crime of kidnapping (18 U.S.C. § 1201).

• So, what will or should be done about DeSantis' apparent political stunt that actually appears to have been a pretty straightforward federal crime? Will he be held accountable by MA's Democratic Attorney General or by the U.S. Dept. of Justice? Callers ring in with their thoughts (several of whom, by the way, support DeSantis' crime!), on today's very lively program!...

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We were on this story very early. Happily, more and more of the corporate media are finally covering it. But they still do not seem to be fully grasping --- or, at least, reporting on --- what now appears to be Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger clearly covering up election related crimes carried out by Team Trump and the MAGA crowd. We've got new evidence to support that charge on today's BradCast, as Raffensperger runs against Democrat Bee Nguyen for re-election this fall, hoping to win the MAGA vote after previously refusing to help them steal the 2020 Presidential election. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

But first today, an update on the record heat wave still lashing much of the U.S. West for a second week. On Tuesday, amid record temps (the state's capital city topped out at 116 degrees!) electricity demand surged along with the possibility of blackouts in California. But, following a cell phone warning from public officials, state residents answered the call to reduce usage. Demand reportedly plunged in response. Blackouts averted. For now.

It may take a hurricane to end this seemingly endless heat wave (it's also of record duration) by week's end, even as "extremely critical" warnings of wildfire risks are issued in almost a dozen states from the U.S. Northwest to the upper Great Plains. Record temps and wind gusts of up to 60 miles per hour could slam several states this week amid tinder-dry conditions that could spark uncontrollable new fires. Some 54 million people are currently under heat warnings and advisories as our climate emergency worsens in late summer.

Meanwhile...on the other side of the nation, Massachusetts' Democratic Attorney General Maura Healey will face Trump-backed, election denying, abortion opponent Geoff Diehl in this November's race for Governor, as moderate Republican Gov. Charlie Baker has opted against seeking a third term in the otherwise very liberal state. That's one of several general election contests determined by voters during Tuesday's primaries in the commonwealth. Tune in for more noteworthy results ahead of next week's final primaries of the season in Delaware, New Hampshire and Rhode Island.

Then, yup, we're going back to Georgia...

Back in May, we broke the story of what appeared to be a very serious breach of voting system security in Georgia's rural, Republican-leaning Coffee County. The news was based on a recorded phone call from one of the participants in the breach, seemingly confessing to the crime or bragging about funding the scheme to make unlawful copies of Dominion Voting System's sensitive Election Management Software following the 2020 election. The call, from Atlanta businessman Scott Hall, was recorded by the plaintiff in a long-running lawsuit against GA Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger, seeking to force the state to move from 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting systems to verifiable hand-marked paper ballots.

That plaintiff was MARILYN MARKS, our guest once again today. She is a longtime election integrity champion and founder of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Coalition for Good Governance. After sharing that recorded phone call in May, she also joined us in June, after claims by Raffensperger that his office had been investigating the security breach at the Coffee County Board of Elections. In fact, as Marks noted at the time, she had been able to find no evidence whatsoever of an official probe by the Secretary's office into what we have now learned was part of a multi-state coordinated effort shepherded by Trump attorney Sidney Powell to make copies of voting systems software in Georgia, Michigan, Colorado and Nevada.

In at least the first three of those states, we now have evidence of MAGA sympathizers unlawfully creating hard drive images of voting systems, which were later released in various, dangerous ways to the public. As Marks points out today, law enforcement officials and Democratic Secretaries of State in Michigan and Colorado are carrying out serious criminal probes into the matter. Tina Peters, a Republican County Clerk in Mesa, Colorado, for example, has already been indicted on 10 criminal counts related to illegal hard drive copies. In Georgia, however, Raffensperger's office has either lied about their investigation or otherwise covered-up the entire matter.

That cover-up has now become considerably more difficult for Raffensperger, thanks to security camera surveillance footage subpoenaed by Marks in her federal lawsuit. On Wednesday, Washington Post, CNN and AP all ran detailed investigative stories on the Team Trump characters seen on video tape entering the Coffee County Board of Elections office on January 7, 2021 (the day after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol), to scan and image hard drives and ballots. That, after several of those folks --- including the Chairs of both the Board of Elections and the County Republican Party --- appear to have lied about their involvement in the scheme during depositions in Marks' lawsuit.

Also discovered from that footage: Doug Logan, the CEO of the now-defunct Cyber Ninjas --- the outfit that ran the phony "audit" in Maricopa County, Arizona after the 2020 election, ultimately confirming that Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the state --- is seen entering the Coffee County Board of Elections over several different days, for hours at a time, for reasons still unknown.

Raffensperger's office, of course, could have obtained that security camera footage themselves at any time over the past year and a half, if they were really investigating this very serious breach. (Marks explains on today's show why it's so serious in advance of both 2022 and 2024!) And, while AP recently reported that Ryan Germany, the general counsel for the Secretary of State's office, claimed the office had opened an investigation into the matter in March this year, Raffensperger's top deputy, Gabe Sterling, appeared on a "Restoring Confidence in American Elections" panel at the Carter Center in Atlanta in April and denied anything happened in Coffee at all!

"We have claims, even recently, there was people saying 'We went to Coffee County and we imaged everything,'" Sterling said. "There's no evidence of that. It didn't happen."

Well, thanks to the newly obtained surveillance footage, we know Sterling was wrong. It did happen. And, surely Sterling would have known that by April, given that his office claimed to have begun their investigation a month earlier. Was he lying? Or did Raffensperger's top lieutenant just not know? "We do know he was not telling the truth," Marks politely notes today.

As to whether Raffensperger is carrying out a cover-up, she tells us, "It certainly doesn't look like a sincere effort to have a diligent investigation." She compares the situation to what's going on in Michigan and Colorado. "The Attorneys General and the state election officials went after the perpetrators who did that," Marks explains. "There's a special prosecutor with nine targets [in Michigan,] five of them are involved in Georgia. But none of them have been interviewed in Georgia." She charges that in Georgia, Raffensperger "does not seem to want to know --- the Secretary and the State Election Board --- neither seem to be terribly interested."

Oh, and at least one more critical point today: Raffensperger's office has finally opened some sort of investigation. How do we know? Because they have issued at least one subpoena in the matter...to Marilyn Marks!

She explains that and much more in our conversation today as the Coffee County Cover-Up continues to be uncovered, thanks to her.

Finally today, a step or two closer to at least some real accountability for Team Trump. Last week, former Trump aide Steve Bannon's motion for a new trial, after being convicted of two counts of Contempt of Congress, for failing to respond to a lawful subpoena from the House J6 Committee, was rejected by the judge. His sentencing is now scheduled for October 21.

And, more bad news for Bannon. On Wednesday, several media outlets are reporting that he has been indicted on fraud charges in New York, related to stealing at least a million dollars from the "We Build the Wall" scheme, which raised $25 million to build a bit of barrier on the U.S./Mexico border. He was charged federally for the same crime before being pardoned for it by Trump. He will reportedly turned himself over to authorities in Manhattan on Thursday, as the indictment is unsealed...

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Like it or not, we're back on today's BradCast after a much-needed week off! And, as it turns out, we've got plenty to talk about. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

Among the huge number of stories covered on today's show, as we try to get caught up with both what we missed and what's still unraveling today...

• It's hot here in Los Angeles. Really hot. A record heat wave (in both intensity and duration) now stretches from Southern California all the way up into Canada. And, no, it is not normal. (Or at least it didn't used to be.)

• It's also not normal for Mississippi's capital city of Jackson to have no water for drinking, bathing, flushing or even fighting fires. But it was predictable. That's what happens when you lower taxes and defer maintenance on critical infrastructure for decades before a warming climate dumps tons of rain to knock your water systems offline entirely. Now the state's Republican Governor (who has been instrumental in deferring that maintenance), is discussing privatizing the water system. As of Sunday, in any event, water pressure is finally returning to residents after a full week without, and about a month of boil water notices prior to the outage.

• Some good news following Labor Day: Public approval of labor unions, at 71% of the American people, is now the highest it has been since 1965, according to Gallup. That's a 7-point spike in their pre-Labor Day survey since the pandemic began and a more than 21-point jump since 2009. And, as we discuss, that's all good news for both union workers and non-union workers alike!

• A judge in New Mexico has ordered Cuoy Griffin, co-founder of Cowboys for Trump and an elected Otero County Commissioner, immediately removed from his post for violation of the U.S. Constitution's "Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause". Griffin, who was convicted of participating in Trump's January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, is the first public official to be removed from office since 1869 under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

• There is new evidence out of Coffee County, Georgia today --- including security camera surveillance video gathered via a federal lawsuit against Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger to block use of his unverifiable touchscreen voting systems --- revealing that rightwing MAGA Trump supporters lied about unlawfully breaching and making copies of the County's voting system software after the 2020 election. The long-running lawsuit was filed by Coalition for Good Governance founder Marilyn Marks, a regular guest on this program. She originally broke the Coffee County voting system software breach story on this show some months ago, along with detailing Raffensperger's clumsy, months-long efforts to cover-up of the entire boondoggle. More details on that story coming soon!

• In the second-to-last primary day of the midterm election season, voters in Massachusetts are selecting party nominees for the contest to succeed the state's popular, outgoing Republican Governor in the otherwise liberal-leaning state. As in Maryland in July, the choice on the GOP side in MA is between a Trump-backed election denier and an otherwise normal-ish Republican candidate. In MD, the Trump-backed loon won, likely handing Governor's mansion to the Democrats this fall. Will the same thing happen in MA? Tune in tomorrow!

• While we were out, Alaska's embarrassing former Republican Governor Sarah Palin, did not win the Special Election for the state's only U.S. House seat. After a Ranked Choice Voting election featuring two Republicans and one Democrat, the Democrat, Mary Peltola was elected to fill the seat occupied for nearly 50 years by the late Republican Rep. Don Young. She'll serve the rest of Young's term through the end of the year and becomes the first Alaska Native elected to Congress. The same three candidates, and one other, will square off in another RCV election in November for a full term beginning in January. Hopefully Palin will continue her losing streak.

• Also, while we were out, the President of the United States found it necessary to offer a prime-time address to warn of the rising menace posed to democracy itself by Donald Trump and his supporters. Joe Biden was, of course, both correct and accurate in his remarks outside of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, highlighting the fact that democracy itself will be on the ballot this fall and the threat that demagogues from the right now pose to our nation. "What’s happening in our country today is not normal," he said, though corporate media outlets seemed to have a tremendously difficult time simply pointing out how Biden's assertions were demonstrably true. By way of just one example, after a Trump rally in Pennsylvania over the weekend, in which an invited speaker discussed support for January 6 insurrectionists, including her nephew, who is literally a Hitler fan, USA Today's Francesca Chambers actually said: "President Biden and former President Trump are having some difficulties when it comes to optical issues both could have avoided." (!!!)

• Finally today, some thoughts on the Trump-appointed federal judge in Florida who, on Monday, issued an absurd ruling ordering a Special Master to review thousands of pages of highly classified and other stolen government documents obtained by the FBI during its federal court-ordered search of Donald Trump's home at Mar-a-Lago last month. The ruling by Judge Aileen Cannon --- to appoint a Special Master to examine the documents for both executive privilege (which hasn't been claimed by Trump, and can only be asserted by Biden) and for attorney-client privilege --- was ridiculous and absurd on several counts and yet still somewhat less of an outrage than many have characterized it to be over the past 24 hours. We explain why.

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Years ago, the month of August was considered the slowest news month of the year. Those years are obviously over. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among the stories covered on today's BradCast...

• There are some huge economic advantages on the horizon for large companies who transition their fleets to all-electric vehicles, including 18-wheelers. A writer at Torque News recently broke down the "staggering economics" in "fuel" savings for a 200-mile trip in the coming-very-soon Tesla Semi. The calculation finds, the costs for such a trip would plummet from about $170 now to just $28 in an all-electric semi-truck, an 83% reduction! (Not to mention the savings in lower maintenance costs "due to no engine and oil changes" and, yes, most critically, savings for the planet in huge cuts to carbon emissions amid our worsening climate crisis!)

• And speaking of climate emergencies...A new federal study out today from the Dept. of Energy largely confirms several recent independent analyses finding the Democrats' newly-signed Inflation Reduction Act --- which invests nearly $400 billion to move the nation from dirty, deadly fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy --- will cut greenhouse gas emissions causing climate change by about 40% by 2030. It will remove more than one billion tons of heat-trapping gasses, including cutting 35 tons for every one that it adds, according to the study. As we discuss, while there are valid criticisms of the law as passed with several giveaways to the fossil fuel industry in order to win Joe Manchin's vote. But ya gotta start somewhere. And this is a very good start. Want even more climate action? (We do!) Then elect more Democrats to Congress this year, since the IRA passed with the barest of Democratic majorities in both chambers of Congress without the support of one single Republican --- a party which still, in 2022, describes climate change as "a hoax"!

• And speaking of denial...On Tuesday in Wyoming, GOP voters elected a Trump-backed 2020 election denier to become the state's next chief election official. Because no Democrat ran for the job, it means the winner on Tuesday, Chuck Gray, will become WY's next Secretary of State. Of course, it's a very Republican state (Trump won 70% of the vote in 2020), but there are now 2020 election deniers running to become chief state election officials in five battlegrounds states: Mark Finchem (Arizona); Kristina Karamo (Michigan); Kim Crockett (Minnesota); Jim Marchant (Nevada); Audrey Trujillo (New Mexico). While the 2022 election will be about a lot of things, it will likely prove to be about the 2024 election --- and the survival of American democracy --- as much as anything else.

• And, speaking of even more election deniers...One GOP 2020 election denier who won't be a Republican Party nominee for Secretary of State this year is Tina Peters. She is the Mesa County, Colorado Clerk who has been indicted on 7 felonies and 3 misdemeanors related to making unlawful copies of her county's sensitive Election Management System Software in the middle of the night, and allowing it to be released to the public to make hacking future elections easier. Last month, Peters ran for the GOP nomination to become Colorado Sec. of State. She lost. By a lot. Nonetheless, she raised $250,000 for a statewide recount and...lost again. She gained just 13 votes in the re-tally out of the 90,000 votes needed to defeat the GOP's nominee, Pam Anderson. (Anderson will run against incumbent Democratic Sec. of State Jena Griswold in November.) But Colorado does statewide recounts by employing the same computers to re-tally hand-marked paper ballots that tallied them (either correctly or incorrectly) in the first place, rather than hand-counting them. While Peters is a duped rightwing loon, even duped rightwing loons deserve to know for certain if they won or lost an election. If candidates are willing to follow the law and raise the money to pay for a hand-count, they should be allowed to have one. Such counts will help, not hurt, to regain confidence in our electoral system after it has been so grievously harmed by the lies of Donald Trump and his party.

• And speaking of hand-recounts...A group of anti-choice activists in Kansas this week had sought a statewide hand-count of the ballot initiative this month that would have rewritten the state Constitutional to allow Republicans to ban abortion rights. The measure failed by a stunning 165,000 votes (18 points), according to computer tallies. But the activists failed to raise the $229,000 needed for a full, statewide count, so they are settling for hand-counts in just nine counties. If supporters of the failed referendum want to spend their money on a hand-count to make sure it really really failed, that's perfectly fine by us, and likely to prove a good thing for our faltering democracy after Trump and his party have worked so hard to undermine confidence in it.

• And speaking of confidence-men...The Trump Organization's longtime Chief Financial Officer, Allen Weisselberg, pleaded guilty in state court on Thursday to all 15 criminal counts related to tax fraud that he was charged with last year, along with the Trump Organization itself, by the Manhattan District Attorney's office. Weisselberg will not be cooperating with prosecutors in their criminal investigation of Trump himself. But he has agreed, as part of his plea deal, to testify truthfully for the prosecution in the company's upcoming fraud trial in October. If he does so, the 75-year old will then be sentenced to just 5 months in Rikers Island, will have to pay nearly $2 million in taxes, penalties and interest, and face five years of probation. He remains an employee of the Trump Organization even after being indicted and even after pleading guilty to all charges.

• And speaking of attempts at accountability for the disgraced former President...A federal magistrate judge in Florida --- the same one who signed the FBI's warrant for a search at Mar-a-Lago last week finding "probable cause" that Trump violated the Espionage Act and several other federal statutes --- is considering the release of a redacted version of the affidavit the Dept. of Justice submitted to obtain the warrant. The DoJ strongly objects to its release, even with redactions. Nonetheless, the Judge ordered the Department to submit a redacted version of the affidavit by next week and said during his bench order that he will consider its release in a "careful process".

• Finally...Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report following President Biden's signing of the largest single investment to take on the climate crisis by any nation. The historic bill was followed by Massachusetts' Governor signing a sweeping new climate and energy law this week. Both new laws can't have come soon enough, as several other stories Desi covers today, regarding unprecedented water worries in the U.S. West, make abundantly clear...

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