Yes, we are under a fascistic, authoritarian takeover of the United States. Yes, it can be frightening. But our wannabe authoritarians also happen to be clowns and fools and incompetent buffoons, and should be called out at such. And so we do on today's BradCast, even while our best chance to kick these degenerates to history's curb remains at the ballot box. Which is why they are fighting so hard to game it. Again. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our coverage today...

• Trump's EPA reverses its position to do the right thing after all regarding the Biden Administration's ban of cancer-causing asbestos? Can it really be true?

• Donald Trump meets with African leaders at the White House, admires the Liberian President's excellent English and wonders how he learned to speak it so "beautifully". (Spoiler: English is the official language of Liberia.)

• As recovery efforts continue following deadly flash flooding last Friday in Texas (and on Sunday in North Carolina, and on Tuesday in New Mexico), dullard DHS Sec. Kristi Noem convenes a meeting to discuss the Admin's stated plans for dismantling FEMA entirely. Her argument for doing so this week? A report that she claims reveals that FEMA's response to the 2023 wildfires in Maui, Hawaii was so bad that "one in six survivors were forced to trade sexual favors...for just basic supplies." But that's not what the report claims at all, and one of its authors calls Noem's interpretation a "gross manipulation" of their work.

• Native American voters won a 2023 trial challenging North Dakota's racially gerrymandered legislative maps. But then the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals tossed out their 2023 victory, claiming the challengers lacked standing to sue because Article 2 of the Voting Rights Act doesn't explicitly allow individual groups or voters to challenge violations of the Act. Only the Dept. of Justice may do so, according to the 8th Circuit, despite decades of rulings to the contrary in the 60 years since passage of the VRA. The court's ruling last year now prevents private suits against discriminatory election laws in the seven states (Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota) comprising the 8th Circuit. On Wednesday, the tribes announced they were filing for a stay at the Appeals Court, as they intend to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

• Speaking of racial gerrymandering, on Wednesday, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott --- even as recovery efforts continue on the Guadalupe River where more than 100 are now dead and 160 still missing following Friday's flash-flooding --- wants the state legislature to convene a special session to...redistrict U.S. House seats in the state. TX Republicans already hold twice as many Congressional seats as Dems in the already-gerrymandered state. But the Trump White House and its corrupted DOJ have been pressuring TX to carry out a rare, mid-decade redrawing of its Congressional map in order to make four Democratic, minority-held seats around Houston and Dallas less...um...colorful. Abbott appears happy to oblige...

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with more on flash flooding in four U.S. states, in the North, South, East and West over the past week alone; thousands now dead from an extreme heat wave in Europe; and new warnings from experts that no country is currently prepared for the climate impacts to come...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Deadly flooding strikes West Virginia and Texas, as Trump cancels flood control upgrades; Administration scraps settlement to restore salmon in Columbia River; PLUS: U.N. Oceans Summit calls for end to ocean 'plunder,' as 'ticking timebomb' of ocean acidification reaches critical levels... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): David Attenborough’s ‘Ocean’ is a brutal, beautiful wake-up call from the sea; Popular NOAA climate website will be hobbled after Trump cuts entire staff; Climate worsens Rio Grande water war; Study says clean energy rollbacks will cost economy $1.1 trillion by 2035... PLUS: Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee proposes sale of more than 2 million acres of US lands... and much, MUCH more! ...

Today on BradCast: Some really troubling news about voting rights and the Voting Rights Act that hasn't received nearly enough attention since a terrible court ruling last week. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

FIRST UP... A few other items of note...

• If you haven't heard, Donald Trump seems to be freaking out about something Bruce Springsteen said on stage last week when he opened his "Land of Hope and Dreams" tour in the U.K. We share a bit of what Bruce had to say, about democracy and more. "The America I love, the America I've written about --- that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years --- is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration," Springsteen correctly sounded the alarm as he opened his show. "Tonight, we ask all who believe in democracy and the best of our American experience to rise with us, raise your voices against authoritarianism, and let freedom ring." And that's not all he had to say. We share more.

• Speaking of democracy, after recent come-from-way-behind victories by center-left and liberal parties running against authoritarian rightwing opponents in Canada and Australia in recent weeks, it happened again on Sunday. This time in Romania, where a Trump-supporting far-right nationalist candidate who looked set to win the nation's Presidential election just weeks ago, learned differently once voters actually showed up to cast their vote. Being a wannabe Trumper, he is, of course, claiming "fraud", though he has failed to present any evidence so far (as I said, just like Trump.) The apparent win for the pro-European, pro-democracy candidate is also very good news indeed for neighboring Ukraine.

• On Friday, a handful of Republicans in the U.S. House who want even more cuts to health care and nutrition assistance for the nation's neediest --- including millions of children and disabled Americans --- in order to help pay for huge tax cuts to the wealthy, blocked progress of Trump's so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill" in Committee. By the time Sunday rolled around, those so-called "deficit hawks" had been brought to heel. Another Committee meeting was called to begin at 10pm on Sunday night and the measure was successfully voted out of committee, even though it would still add trillions to the nation's debt. The measure now advances to the House floor where Speaker Mike Johnson hopes for passage before the Memorial Day recess. Thereafter, Trump's legislative agenda heads to the U.S. Senate.

• Also last Friday, there was some good-ish news from the corrupted U.S. Supreme Court via another emergency ruling at the behest of an appeal by the Trump Administration. All Justices, other than Thomas and Alito, rejected the appeal, issuing a ruling that found the Trump Administration had failed to give appropriate Constitutional Due Process to Venezuelan migrants they are hoping to deport from Texas to El Salvador under Trump's (mis)use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

NEXT... While alleged Venezuelan gang members may have access to at least some Due Process to avoid unlawful removal from the country and a life sentence in an El Salvadoran gulag, American voters in at least seven states may now have no way to challenge unlawful, racially discriminatory violations of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

A ruling last week by a three-judge panel on the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the last route for private individuals and organizations in states covered by the Circuit (Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota) to hold jurisdictions accountable for violations of the Voting Right Act. The decision echoes a similar ruling by the 8th Circuit back in 2023. But last week's ruling would seem to block the one other remaining path that voters still had to bring private complaints following that other terrible ruling two years ago.

If the 8th Circuit's decision is allowed to stand, it would mean that only the U.S. Dept. of Justice could bring suit against violations of the last central tenet still standing from the VRA. The ruling, which my guest today describes as "dead wrong", applies, for now, only in the seven states covered by the 8th Circuit. But if plaintiffs decide to appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and lose there, it would effectively kill the entire VRA in all 50 states --- at least during Republican Administrations.

JUSTIN LEVITT previously served as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice under President Obama and then as White House Senior Policy Advisor for Democracy and Voting Rights under President Biden. He is now a Professor of Constitutional Law at Loyola University Law School here in Los Angeles and joins us today to explain what he describes as last week's "truly unprecedented" decision. (That's the nicest thing he had to say about it!)

"They have effectively eliminated the ability to enforce the Voting Rights Act" in those seven states, Levitt tells me. "The 8th Circuit was way out of line, but it's not a sure bet that the Supreme Court won't follow them out of that line."

The 8th Circuit panel determined that because the Voting Rights Act doesn't specifically mention a private right to sue, that such suits are barred. Only DoJ can sue. But, in fact, since 1982, there have been more than 450 such suits and only 18 of them were brought by DoJ. Some made it all the way to SCOTUS and yet none of the judges in any of those cases --- until now --- found the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue under the law. Go figure.

"This is about people in robes forgetting why they're there. People in love with a particular statutory interpretation methodology and forgetting that what they are supposed to be doing is effectuating the intent of Congress," argues Levitt. The VRA has been amended several times since 1965 --- under Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush --- and adopted by huge majorities in both chambers of Congress. The members of Congress who amended it, and Presidents who signed the re-authorizations, "absolutely thought that the NAACP Legal Defense Fund would be bringing cases right alongside the Department of Justice and others. It's ludicrous to think that Congress wanted anything different than that." If they had wanted anything different, he notes, they could have changed the law to say as much at that time, since so many suits had already been brought under the law by individual voters and private voting rights organizations even before the law's several re-authorizations.

So, what happens next? What can be done about any of this? If the case does make it to SCOTUS and they too undermine the VRA are there ANY routes left for voters to challenge racially discriminatory election laws in the U.S.? Levitt answers all of those questions and many others on today's BradCast...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Extreme wildfire crisis now the most destructive in Los Angeles history, as Green News Report is forced to evacuate; Climate change is intensifying extreme fire conditions; PLUS: President Biden designates two new national monuments, protecting sacred tribal lands... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Jimmy Carter raised climate change concerns 35 years before Paris Accords; Trump promises to end new wind farms; What are the factors the caused the unseasonal CA fires?; California wildfires threaten insurers already teetering from climate shocks; To save the Great Salt Lake, farmers will have to grow less alfalfa; Coal was on its way out. But surging electricity demand is keeping it alive... PLUS: Biden FWS declines to remove grizzly bears from endangered list... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Record heat and drought fuel wildfires in the Northeast; U.S. Senate majority and future of climate action hang in the balance of this year's election; PLUS: Biden Administration investing in innovation, and racing the clock to allocate climate and infrastructure funding... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The climate stakes of the Harris-Trump election; Trump withheld wildfire disaster aid from WA State; EPA imposes stricter standards to protect children from exposure to lead paint; Florida's taxpayer-backed insurance fund denied 77% of hurricane damage claims; Russia amplified hurricane disinformation to drive Americans apart, researchers find; Feds OK rules for U.S. to begin electric air taxi service... PLUS: Biden Admin puts $428M into new manufacturing projects in coal communities... and much, MUCH more! ...

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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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: While we were out --- Catching up on climate and energy in the 2024 presidential race; Canada's wildfires last year emitted more carbon than India, new study finds; Extreme heat killed a record number of Americans in 2023; China hit its renewable electricity target six years early; PLUS: The mighty Klamath River is flowing freely for the first time in more than a century... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): You just lived through the most humid summer on record; Why is climate change causing ‘record-shattering’ extreme heat?; PFAS chemicals from sewage sludge fertilizer may be poisoning America's land; Carbon credits: how one company went off the rails; PA will monitor East Palestine water wells after train derailment; COP29: countries still far apart on financing... PLUS: Pope Francis says Earth is 'sick' in new climate change warning... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Toronto crippled by extreme storms and floods; Economic losses from extreme heat escalate in U.S.; More frequent severe floods raise concerns over 4,000 aging dams across the country; PLUS: Marathon Oil to pay record fine for oil and pollution in violation of the Clean Air Act... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): 'We built our world for a climate that no longer exists'; With sewage gushing into sea, US and Mexican border towns plead for help; Prisoners are uniquely vulnerable to extreme heat and flooding; Biden BLM to add protections against drilling in Alaska Petroleum Reserve; Record salmon migration runs into hot water --- literally; Deadly floods engulf parts of South Asia... PLUS: Britain faces 'age of trade-offs', warned new climate adviser... and much, MUCH more! ...

Given the rarity of the event, and what it said to portend, we're taking a few lessons, and warnings, from Lakota legend on today's BradCast. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Last week, it was reported that a white buffalo calf was discovered to have been born among thousands of brown bison in Yellowstone National Park. That is never before known to have happened. And though no one is able to explain exactly how it did --- the calf is white, with a black nose, eyes and hooves, as opposed to albino, in which case the eyes would be pink --- its birth, in native American lore, is said to be akin to the second coming of Christ, according to Chief Arvol Looking Horse, the spiritual leader of the Lakota, Dakota and the Nakota Oyate in South Dakota. He is also the 19th keeper of the sacred White Buffalo Calf Woman Pipe and Bundle. (All explained, as well as we can, on today's show.)

The birth of the rare white buffalo, according to Lakota prophecy, portends better times. That's the good news. It also is said to serve as a warning that more must be done to protect the earth and its inhabitants. We take both that encouraging news and its accompany warning to heart on today's program.

To that end, a few of the stories/warnings we cover on today's show...

• A new study finds nearly 2,000 children under five are now dying every day from air pollution. Yes, you read that correctly! That, and a number of other alarming new studies we've reported on in recent weeks --- such as the 50,000 Californians killed by chronic exposure to wildfire smoke from 2008 to 2018, and the $250 billion in climate and health benefits thanks to wind and solar over four years amid Joe Biden's renewable energy boom --- underscore the critical, life and death stakes of this year's Presidential election.

• If all of that isn't warning enough, perhaps the oppressive heat wave across much of the nation today --- and for at least the next week --- may help Americans appreciate the importance of this coming election, as Donald Trump has vowed to his fossil fuel industry donors that he will reverse all of President Biden's unprecedented, landmark climate achievements.

• Some good polling news today --- from Fox "News"(!) --- for Joe Biden, following Trump's 34 felony convictions last month in New York related to his rigging of the 2016 election with hush-money payments to a porn star. In short, Biden now narrowly leads Trump in a head-to-head contest, according to Fox' latest national survey, by 2 points, 50% to 48%. There are a whole lot of caveats on this, but the more noteworthy news is that the new numbers represent a 3-point swing in Biden's direction since Fox' last national survey in May, and a 7-point swing since March. There is other news of note from this poll, including that Biden also now tops Trump when polling is expanded to include Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Jill Stein and Cornel West, who will be on the Presidential ballot in a number of states as well this November.

• The stock price for former President's latest grift is tanking again. Bigly. The company known as Trump Media and Technology Group, which has just one wildly money-losing venture (his failing Truth Social site) has tanked in market value an astonishing 50% since his felony convictions last month. On Thursday alone the stock price, which trades as "DJT", plummeted by more than 14.5%, after skidding by about 35% over the past week. A lot of MAGA dupes dumb enough to invest in this loser have lost a whole lotta money this month.

• Next Thursday's first 2024 President Debate is now set, according to CNN. It will be a two-man affair between Trump and Biden only, with RFK, Jr. (and the others) failing to meet the polling and ballot criteria set by CNN. The debate will be 90 minutes long, will have no studio audience, and the participants microphones will be turned off when it is not their turn to speak. It will be moderated by CNN's Jake Tapper and Dana Bash...and we wish them well.

• Finally, as record wildfires, heat waves and the first named storm of this year's hurricane season explode across the nation (and world), Desi Doyen is here with our latest Green News Report. On all of that, and the even more devastating impacts of our quickly worsening climate crisis...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Heat and wildfires explode in the U.S., Greece, and Middle East; Calgary grapples with water crisis; Cheap renewable energy pushes out costly nuclear power in France; PLUS: Major railway ordered to pay $400 million to Native American tribe for trespassing... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Thousands evacuated as floods and deadly landslides hit southeast China; Singapore races to clean oil spill as luxury beach resort coated in slick; French renewable energy sector says far-right victory risks trouble for industry; Unchecked growth around Big Bend sparks debate over water; EU passes law to restore 20% of bloc’s land and sea by 2030... PLUS: Fighting climate change is powering the U.S. economy... and much, MUCH more! ...

As noted on today's BradCast, CBS News' legendary radio and TV broadcaster Charles Osgood has passed away at age 91. Other than that, we've got some arguably much brighter news throughout the bulk of today's program. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among the many stories covered today...

• Last night, just after midnight, Nikki Haley won every single vote cast in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, the first town in the state to vote in the state's first-in-the-nation Primary on Tuesday. They had a 100% turnout. Haley won all 6 votes. Donald Trump won 0. We discuss why that matters (and doesn't). Voters across the entire state are voting today on hand-marked paper ballots. In Dixville Notch --- and about 40% of towns in the state --- ballots are publicly hand-counted by human beings after polls close. The rest of the towns, the larger ones in general, are tallied by 15 or 20-year old computerized optical scanners. Though, due to a write-in campaign for Joe Biden in the state, where there is no officially sanctioned Democratic primary, most of those towns will be hand-counting a lot of ballots as well. We'll have full reported results out of NH --- and why they matter (or don't) --- on tomorrow's show, of course.

• For years, Republicans have been citing evidence of miscounted votes in Prince William County, Virginia as evidence of massive fraud in the 2020 Presidential race. The state's Republican A.G., after taking office in 2022, even filed criminal charges against the County's Registrar. Recently, however, the charges were unceremoniously dropped. And now we learn that, due to largely understandable tabulation errors, Joe Biden should have received 1,648 more votes than he was credited for, and that Donald Trump was given 2,327 votes that he shouldn't have, in a county that Biden won by more than 60,000 votes --- in a state where the Democrat won the Presidential race by some 450,000 votes. Races for U.S. Senate and U.S. House were also affected by the counting errors, though none of errors would reportedly have changed the results of any contest. We explain the whole mess.

• We've got quite a bit of good news for you today when it comes to redistricting and rolling back GOP racial and partisan gerrymanders! In North Dakota, a federal judge has ordered new state legislative map after Republicans, following the 2020 Census, cracked two Native American reservations into different districts in order to flip both state House and Senate seats from D to R. It worked in 2022. But now, the judge has ordered not only new maps, but also new elections this fall in the districts found to have been in violation of the Voting Rights Act.

• Louisiana's new Republican Governor approved a new U.S. House map for the state this week, after the GOP state legislature finally adopted it last week, following a federal court order to draw an additional majority-Black voting district in the state. The Republican-controlled legislature previously had just 1 such district out of its 6 Congressional seats, despite African-Americans accounting for nearly a third of the statewide population. GOP lawmakers only agreed to do so after many appeals, and after realizing that if they didn't draw up their own maps, the court would do it for them. The new map will likely result in an additional Democratic member of Congress from the Bayou State next year.

• And, in Wisconsin last week, voters filed a motion with the state's newly liberal-leaning Supreme Court seeking a new U.S. House map in time for the 2024 elections. Last month, the state's high court agreed with petitioners that the state GOP's state legislative maps for the Assembly and Senate, in place for more than a decade, were unlawful gerrymanders in violation of state Constitutional requirements. The new motion filed last week asks the same Supreme Court to order a new U.S. House map as well, on the same basis that the Justices determined the state legislative districts were unconstitutional. Petitioners argue that the unconstitutional and politically gerrymandered map resulted in Republicans winning 75% of the state’s Congressional seats despite winning just 50% of the statewide vote in the 2022 election. That year, the closely divided, if Dem-leaning Presidential battleground state also re-elected its Democratic Governor in the same statewide election.

• Finally today, San Diego was deluged on Monday with a year's worth of rain in a matter of three hours, overwhelming infrastructure in the usually mild Southern California city. But, as discussed in our latest Green News Report today with Desi Doyen, it was just one of dozens of cities across the U.S. in recent weeks where infrastructure has been hammered by climate change-fueled extreme Winter weather. Nearly 100 have been killed in the recent storms in a number of states as of airtime. That, as Big Oil gears up a multi-million ad blitz to hoax Americans into supporting fossil fuel friendly candidates in 2024, as the unstoppable transition to clean, renewable energy is finally underway...

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Facing 'horrific' sea level rise, Tuvalu crafts climate survival plan; Thousands of federal firefighters face a looming pay cut. How much is up to Congress; Exxon weighs chemicals output boost as EVs threaten gasoline use; Follow the Money: Why is an Arab oil man running international climate conference?; Heat-related deaths in 2022 hit highest level on record in England... PLUS: Time to Evolve: Dad goes viral on replacing gas stove... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Devastation on Maui after deadly wildfire outbreak; Record ocean heat wreaking havoc on marine life; U.S. hit with record number of mega-disasters in 2023; PLUS: President Biden permanently protects Grand Canyon's lands from uranium mining... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Scientists look beyond climate change and El Nino for other factors that heat up Earth; Making sense of Biden's "emergency" statement on climate change; Volunteers head off plastic waste crisis by removing tons of rubbish from Hungarian river; DeSantis' Florida approves climate science denial videos in schools... PLUS: First scorched, then soaked: weather whiplash confounds farmers; Millions struggle to pay AC bills... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Extreme heat and deadly storms spread across much of the U.S.; Train carrying hazardous chemicals derails into Montana's Yellowstone River; PLUS: More EV carmakers adopt Tesla's fast-charging standard... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Humans approaching limits of 'survivability' as sweltering heatwaves engulf parts of Asia; Vast fossil fuel and farming subsidies causing 'environmental havoc'; Vast fossil fuel and farming subsidies causing 'environmental havoc'; 'Its absolutely guaranteed': the best and worst case scenarios for sea level rise; Intensifying rains pose hidden flood risks across U.S.; Oil spill from Shell pipeline fouls farms and a river in a long-polluted part of Nigeria; Paris climate finance summit fails to deliver debt forgiveness plan; Samuel Alito's wife leased land to an oil and gas firm while the justice fought the EPA; Giant wind farm takes root off coast of Massachusetts... PLUS: Wolves that nearly died out have recovered, now helping island's ecosystem... and much, MUCH more! ...

Seriously worried about what's going on at SCOTUS. Yet another good decision today. Are they okay? And what does all of this good news mean for their opinions yet to come before term's end at the end of this month? We worry about that and more on today's BradCast. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Nonetheless, most of our stories today are, happily, not horrible. Among the many covered today...

• An obnoxious Fox "News" chyron describing President Joe Biden as a "wannabe dictator" on the day of Donald Trump's federal arraignment on 37 criminal felony counts (and their ham-fisted crocodilian "cover up" thereafter) offers a telling illustration of how the Trump Mind Virus has been implanted into the poisoned brains of his cult followers.

• The faintest of cracks may be emerging in the otherwise seemingly solid GOP support for their disgraced, criminal defendant former President, including an unmistakable plunge of some 15 points for Trump in Ipsos/Reuters polling among Republicans from April to June.

• Rex Huppke's hilarious and brilliantly spot-on "I don't want to live in a country where Trump could be held accountable," further dismantles the absurd claims by those with the Trump Mind Virus that we have a "two-tiered justice system" because Trump is being held accountable for crimes that neither Joe Biden nor Hillary Clinton ever actually committed.

• The attorney for 2016 Russian election interference whistleblower Reality Winner, however, has a few thoughts on our actual two-tiered justice system.

• After stunningly good decisions last week protecting both the Voting Rights Act and Medicaid, the otherwise-corrupted U.S. Supreme Court did it again today, with a 7 to 2 ruling upholding the Indian Child Welfare Act, with Amy Coney Barrett(!) writing the opinion that rejects "all of petitioners' challenges to the statute". Still to come by the end of the month, however: SCOTUS rulings on Affirmative Action in college admissions; the Independent State Legislature theory decision that could wreak utter havoc in the 2024 Presidential election; and whether they will deign to allow Biden to waive up to $20,000 for each federal student loan borrower.

• We've also had some very good news from the lower federal courts as well in recent weeks, including a U.S. District Court judge rejecting Tennessee's Republican Gov. Bill Lee's attempt to stifle free speech by unconstitutionally banning drag shows, and a temporary injunction on portions of Florida's Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis' unspeakably cruel law that places his state's Big Government between doctors and medically necessary treatments for trans children. That, in a state where DeSantis laughably ran for reelection last year with the slogan "Freedom Lives" in Florida.

• Of course, as we've learned since 2016, for GOP American Idiots infected with the Trump Mind Virus, "The Cruelty is the Point". They seem to think it will somehow help them gain or hold power. Illinois' Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker, however, in his Commencement Address at Northwestern University this week, has some helpful advice on how to spot an idiot. (Hint: Their cruelty is a dead giveaway.)

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with troubling news for the Summer on both sides of the Canadian border and in Texas. But, there is also a very encouraging landmark trial playing out right now in a Montana courtroom...

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