Many of the state laws that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis touts as major policy wins are being challenged in the courts, Axios reported.

The lawsuits target DeSantis' policies on abortion, trans rights, drag shows, and gender and race discussions in classrooms.

"Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has cast himself as a Trump-likeconservative who's better at getting things done, but many of the state laws DeSantis touts as his biggest accomplishments are on hold, mired in court challenges," the outlet reported. "The big picture: DeSantis and his state are facing a swarm of lawsuits challenging his policies aimed at abortion, trans rights, drag shows, voting by felons, discussion of racial issues in schools and more."

The court challenges come as DeSantis' struggles in the polls against Donald Trump has him rebooting his campaign."

DeSantis' presidential campaign dismissed the court challenges, saying that "activists seek to use the court system to enact their agenda by judicial fiat because their agenda did not succeed at the ballot box."

"Ron DeSantis has the most accomplished conservative record of any candidate in the race," the campaign said in a statement.

Former Michigan Republican Party co-chair Meshawn Maddock appeared in court this Friday and pleaded not guilty to eight criminal charges she faces, 10 News reported.

Maddock is accused of forgery and conspiracy to commit election forgery.

She and 15 other people allegedly acted as false electors for former President Donald Trump in Michigan during the 2020 election.

According to The Detroit News, the judge pushed the evidentiary hearing back by two months in order to provide Maddock's lawyer time to review "voluminous" discovery in the case.

On Thursday, her attorney described Henry as a wife, mother, grandmother and "pillar of the community."

"The government's claim that she attempted to subvert the will of the voters and undermine an election is spurious and unsupported by the facts," said attorney George MacAvoy Brown.

Maddock made her court appearance virtually.

After President Joe Biden's $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill was signed into law in 2021, the White House says it has distributed around of $42 billion across America to expand internet access to rural and isolated communities and fund roads and bridges, public transit, water infrastructure, power grids, and airports.

One of the Republicans who voted in favor of the bill was former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who took to Twitter and called out his former colleagues.

Kinzinger quote-tweeted a post from Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) that celebrated her state's receiving of funds for its transit system, accusing her of hypocrisy.

"I can't say how upsetting it is: I voted for this money and took a lot of heat from GOP. Mace didn't but is happy to pretend she did once the heat is off," he tweeted.

Republicans who voted in favor of the bill at the time were attacked by members of their own party. As Newsweek points out, Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene even called them "traitors."

Now, some Republicans who voted against the bill are singing its praises after enjoying its benefits. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), who voted opposed the bill, tweeted Tuesday that the broadband it's provided his constituency "is vital for the success of our rural communities and for our entire economy. Great to see Alabama receive crucial funds to boost ongoing broadband efforts."

Sen. Jon Cornyn (R-TX) also announced that his state was benefitting, despite being against it.

One of the Republicans who voted in favor of the bill was former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who took to Twitter and called out his former colleagues.

Kinzinger quote-tweeted a post from Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) that celebrated her state's receiving of funds for its transit system, accusing her of hypocrisy.

"I can't say how upsetting it is: I voted for this money and took a lot of heat from GOP. Mace didn't but is happy to pretend she did once the heat is off," he tweeted.

Eric Trump has been accused of landing residents of New York City's Trump World Tower with millions of dollars in fees following a deal to convert an unoccupied bar into “amenity space," The Villager reported.

Trump World Tower resident Johanna Beiter filed a lawsuit against the condo board, of which Eric Trump is a member, saying he approved the conversion with little notice to condo owners and without giving them an opportunity to appeal.

"Beiter says that for the past four years, the space at the World Bar had sat vacant, but on Feb. 23, residents received a letter from the board disclosing the 'amenity space plans' and noting that they would start being charged the special assessment a week later, on March 1. The Trump Corporation began charging both the special assessment and 2% amenity charge fees that day, says Beiter," The Villager's report stated.

According to Beiter's lawsuit, the proposed conversion violated condo by-laws, since any project that exceeds $200,000 should first be voted on by residents.

Read the full report over at The Villager.

As financial belt tightening and layoffs rippled throughout the tech industry in recent months, fact checkers and researchers who were tasked with keeping disinformation and extremism off of social media platforms are becoming scarce, CNBC reported.

"The cuts come at a time of increased cyberbullying, which has been linked to higher rates of adolescent self-harm, and as the spread of misinformation and violent content collides with the exploding use of artificial intelligence," the report stated.

In a mass effort to boost productivity with less overhead, Meta, Alphabet, Amazon, and Microsoft have all slashed thousands of jobs.

In an example of just how far tech companies are willing to go to cut costs, departments tasked with trust and safety and AI ethics have been slashed as well.

"Twitter effectively disbanded its ethical AI team in November and laid off all but one of its members, along with 15% of its trust and safety department, according to reports. In February, Google cut about one-third of a unit that aims to protect society from misinformation, radicalization, toxicity and censorship," says CNBC. "Meta reportedly ended the contracts of about 200 content moderators in early January. It also laid off at least 16 members of Instagram’s well-being group and more than 100 positions related to trust, integrity and responsibility, according to documents filed with the U.S. Department of Labor."

Read the full report over at CNBC News.

Speaking to CBS News this Thursday, former Attorney General Bill Barr said that the legal case that currently poses the greatest threat to former President Donald Trump is his alleged mishandling of classified documents.

"I've said all along that of the cases out there right now, the one I'd be most concerned about, if I were the president, is the Mar-a-Lago document case," Barr told CBS News anchor Catherine Herridge.

"It's very clear that he had no business having those documents," Barr added. "He was given a long time to send them back ... they were subpoenaed. And if there's any games being played there, he's going to be very exposed."

Barr said that Trump's argument that the documents were automatically declassified when he took them to Mar-a-Lago is not "gonna fly."

The DOJ appointed special counsel Jack Smith to investigate Trump for documents that were discovered last August at his Palm Beach resort, which were then taken by the FBI.

Speaking to Newsweek, University of New Haven political science practitioner Patricia Crouse said that Barr is likely correct.

"The law says you cannot simply remove classified documents from the White House when you leave, nor can you declare that they became 'automatically declassified when I took them,' as Trump did on national television at his CNN Town Hall," Crouse said. "The DOJ can really just use his own words against him in this case."

Republican Reps. Jim Jordan (OH) and Dan Bishop (NC) sent a letter to the CEO of the sustainability organization Ceres, accusing the company facilitating "collusion" with a company named Climate Action 100+, which they say may be violating U.S. antitrust law.

The lawmakers called Climate Action 100+ a “cartel” that gets businesses to take action on climate change, The Daily Caller reported.

“The Committee on the Judiciary is conducting oversight of the adequacy and enforcement of U.S. antitrust laws. Corporations are collectively adopting and imposing progressive environmental, social, and governance (ESG)-related goals, and Ceres appears to facilitate collusion through Climate Action 100+ that may violate U.S. antitrust law. To advance our oversight and inform potential legislation related to collusive ESG policies, the Committee must understand how and to what extent Ceres and Climate Action 100+ facilitated corporate collusion to promote ESG-related goals,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter.

The letter provides a list of requests from the lawmakers, asking the company to explain its efforts that could be violating anti-trust laws.

The lawmakers gave them until May 19 to respond with the information that they requested.

Read the full report over at The Daily Caller.

Michigan attorney Jamie White, who is known for his work with sexual assault victims, says that Donald Trump's lawyer Joe Tacopina blew Trump's chances of prevailing in the rape civil suit brought by E. Jean Carroll.

"The cross-examination of Ms. Carroll was the most tone-deaf and shameless cross-examination I have ever seen," White told Newsweek. "His insinuations were credibly rebuffed by Ms. Carroll. If Mr. Trump had a prayer of coming out on top, his attorney threw it out the window yesterday."

As Newsweek points out, White represented the members of the U.S. Gymnastics team who were assaulted by former coach Larry Nassar.

"His attacks on her credibility were based on discredited and ignorant theories that she is lying because she did not scream or call authorities," White said. "Any competent professional that works in this space knows most victims do not come forward initially. or at all for that matter."

During his cross examination of Carroll, Tacopina asked her if she was "supposedly raped."

"I was raped," Carroll responded, to which Tacopina then asked her why she didn't "scream for help."

"I'm not a screamer. I was in a panic, fighting," Carroll responded. "You can't beat up on me for not screaming."

"People always ask, 'Why didn't you scream?' Some women scream; some do not," Carroll continued, growing visibly emotional. "He raped me, whether I screamed or not. If I was trying to make a lie I would say I was screaming my head off, but I did not scream. I did not scream."

According to White, "to accept the defense argument one must believe that Ms. Carrol told two different friends about the assault 27 years ago with the plan to sue him 27 years later. That is ridiculous on its face." He added that the "next two witnesses will seal Mr. Trump's fate in a civil context."

"I expect Ms. Carroll's attorneys to pile on with the Hollywood Access tape and deposition testimony. While the only thing guaranteed in life are death and taxes, I would accept any wager that purports Mr. Trump will not be found liable for raping Ms. Carroll."

British throne heir Prince Williams secretly received a "very large sum of money" in 2020 thanks to a settlement from Rupert Murdoch’s media empire for phone hacking, Fortune reported.

In his lawsuit against the publisher of The Sun and now-defunct News Of The World, Prince Harry’s lawyer revealed the payment while making the case that the lawsuit should not be thrown out. According to the suit, the newspapers unlawfully gathered information for two decades.

Murdoch-owned News Group Newspapers is arguing the suit should be thrown out because it was brought too late. Harry claims that the secret agreement between the royal family and the newspapers that called for a settlement and apology was the reason for the delay.

“It is important to bear in mind that in responding to this bid by NGN to prevent his claims going to trial, (Harry) has had to make public the details of this secret agreement, as well as the fact that his brother, His Royal Highness Prince William, has recently settled his claim against NGN behind the scenes,” attorney David Sherborne wrote. “This is used very much by (Harry) as ‘a shield not a sword’ against NGN’s attack.”

Lawyers for Hunter Biden will meet with US attorney David Weiss and at least one senior Justice Department official to discuss the investigation into the President's son, CNN reported.

The meeting comes after the lawyers reached out to the Justice Department to request an update on the case.

"After prosecutors narrowed down the possible charges Hunter Biden could face last year, there haven’t been any public developments," CNN's report stated. "According to sources familiar with the investigation, prosecutors are still weighing whether to bring two misdemeanor charges for failure to file taxes, one count of felony tax evasion related to the overreporting of expenses, and a false statement charge regarding a gun purchase."

Hunter Biden has not been charged with a crime and has denied any wrongdoing.

The scheduled meeting comes as news reports say an IRS supervisory special agent has reached out to Congress claiming to have evidence of mishandling and political interference in the case. The agent is seeking whistleblower protections in order to share what he knows to Congress.

"The IRS agent worked on Hunter Biden’s criminal case and contends that the president’s son is being treated differently than other individuals would be in terms of violations of the tax code, sources familiar with the agent’s allegations said," CNN's report continued. "The agent reported up the chain of command about his concerns of the treatment of Hunter Biden’s returns and tax filings, one of the sources added."

Read the full report over at CNN.

MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell has been ordered to pay $5 million to an expert who debunked his claims about the 2020 election, CNN reported.

Lindell, who pushes mass voter fraud conspiracy theories, vowed to award a multimillion-dollar prize to any cyber security expert who could disprove his claims. An arbitration panel awarded software developer Robert Zeidman the $5 million payout on Wednesday after he sued Lindell.

“Based on the foregoing analysis, Mr. Zeidman performed under the contract,” the arbitration panel wrote in its decision. “He proved the data Lindell LLC provided, and represented reflected information from the November 2020 election, unequivocally did not reflect November 2020 election data. Failure to pay Mr. Zeidman the $5 million prized was a breach of the contract, entitling him to recover.”

Brian Glasser, founder of Bailey & Glasser, LLP, who represented Zeidman, said that the decision marks "another important moment in the ongoing proof that the 2020 election was legal and valid, and the role of cybersecurity in ensuring that integrity."

“Lindell’s claim to have 2020 election data has been definitively disproved," he added.

Lindell hosted a so-called “cyber symposium” in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in 2021, where he announced the “Prove Mike Wrong Challenge," where anyone who could prove his data was wrong could get the payout.

“The symposium was to get the big audience and have all the media there and then they – the cyber guys – saying yes this data is from the 2020 election and you better look at how they intruded into our machines, our computers, and that was the whole purpose,” Lindell said in a deposition obtained by CNN.

“I thought, well what if I put up a $5 million challenge out there, then it would get news, which it did,” Lindell said in the deposition. “So, then you got some attention.”

Zeidman signed up for the challenge and found Lindell’s data to be "largely nonsensical," CNN reported.

“The Contest did not require participants to disprove election interference. Thus, the contestants’ task was to prove the data presented to them was not valid data from the November 2020 election,” the arbitration panel wrote.

“The Panel was not asked to decide whether China interfered in the 2020 election. Nor was the Panel asked to decide whether Lindell LLC possessed data that proved such interference, or even whether Lindell LLC had election data in its possession,” according to the arbitration panel. “The focus of the decision is on the 11 files provided to Mr. Zeidman in the context of the Contest rules.”

Read the full report over at CNN.

In its fight against the $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, Fox News has shifted its strategy to blaming former President Donald Trump, Newsweek reported.

Fox News is requesting that the judge overseeing the case allow it to introduce evidence showing that the network's commentary about mass voter fraud in the 2020 election were just examples of a news organization reporting on the rhetoric Trump was using – not an endorsement of his claims.

"Such a development, if accepted, could play a key role in the development of the case. To successfully win a defamation suit, the allegedly defamed entity would have to prove the person or organization who defamed it did so with harmful intent," Reynolds writes.

In sum, Fox is arguing that Trump's rhetoric about a "rigged" election was newsworthy and the network was just covering his comments as news.

Responding to the network's shift in strategy, Trump lashed out at Fox on Truth Social, writing in all caps, "FOX NEWS IS IN BIG TROUBLE IF THEY DO NOT EXPOSE THE TRUTH ON CHEATING IN THE 2020 ELECTION," he wrote. "THEY SHOULD DO WHAT'S RIGHT FOR AMERICA. WHEN RUPERT MURDOCH SAYS THAT THERE WAS NO CHEATING IN LIGHT OF THE MASSIVE PROOF THAT WAS THERE, IT IS RIDICULOUS AND VERY HARMFUL TO THE FOX CASE. PERHAPS HE SHOULD SAY THAT 'HE JUST DIDN'T KNOW,' BUT THAT IS HARD TO BELIEVE."

Read the full article over at Newsweek.

Amid rumors of an imminent indictment of Donald Trump by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg over his alleged hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels, some New York City attorneys who are no fans of Trump are voicing skepticism about Bragg's chances at winning a conviction, Rolling Stone reported.

“This case is a joke, frankly, and I’ve litigated against that office for 33 years,” said longtime New York criminal defense attorney Jeffrey Lichtman, who represented the former Sinaloa Cartel leader know as El Chapo. “I don’t think that case is winnable.”

Bragg's case against Trump raises two questions: did the payment actually violate any laws, or was it just a business-as-usual attempt to prevent an embarrassing sexual affair from becoming public? Even if laws were broken, it's still questionable if the case is winnable.

Manhattan prosecutors contend that the payment to Daniels, through his then personal lawyer and "fixer" Michael Cohen, was illegal because Trump falsely recorded $130,000 in repayments to Cohen as legal fees for tax purposes -- an offense that is usually treated as a misdemeanor.

"Speculation surrounding prosecutors’ legal theory is that the other alleged crime could be campaign finance-related, given that the payoff happened right before the election," writes Rolling Stone's Victoria Bekiempis. "This is where things get especially thorny: if prosecutors do go the campaign finance violation route, it’s not clear whether they’re going to claim Trump wanted to violate state or federal election law. And if it turns out there isn’t an applicable state campaign finance statute (which there might not be) then the question arises: Could state prosecutors invoke federal law in this type of situation, even though it’s not their jurisdiction?"

Another skeptic of Bragg's case is adjunct professor at Cornell Law School Randy Zelin, who is not a Trump supporter.

“I do not believe, based upon what we know, that the felony charge will stick,” said Zelin.

“What you need to do to elevate the misdemeanor falsification of business records to a felony simply is this—[show] that the act of falsifying the business records was done in furtherance of another felony, another crime, that’s it,” Zelin added.

“I think that the District Attorney’s office in New York County is running a great risk of diluting the strength of other potential cases brought by other prosecutors, because this is a weak case—legally, it is a weak case.”

“Practically, it is really more or less a victimless crime, unless you truly believe that the election was truly influenced by the fact that people didn’t know about the hush money payments,” Zelin told Rolling Stone. “And with all of the stuff that he has said, does anyone really believe that if it got out that he paid Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, that it would have changed the election? Probably not.”

Another longtime New York defense attorney with no love for Trump feels the same.

“I think that the basis for the felony, linking it to campaign finance declarations … It’s a strange way to get to an indictment, especially in a falsifying business records situation that’s often charged as a misdemeanor,” Peter Brill said. “On the one hand, the facts seem fairly damning, but the foundation that they’re built on is weaker than I would hope for in the first criminal indictment or criminal charge [against] Trump.”

Read the full report over at Rolling Stone.

The daughter of former Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway is taking jabs at Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and other Republicans with Twitter polls comparing them to fictional characters.

In one tweet, Claudia Conway asked, "who’s winning in a fight" and gave the choice between Sen. Ted Cruz and the "green m&m." The green M&M won in a landslide by over 98 percent.

One Twitter user replied: "If Ted Cruz is one answer to that question, the other answer is always right."

"my money is on the green guy if Ted doesn’t run away to Cancun," another user replied.

In an imaginary "dance battle," Conway pitted Carlson up against the cartoon character Clifford the Big Red Dog. The winner was Clifford by over 96 percent.

"Tucker was voted off early on Dancing With the Stars, so this is a no-brainer," one person replied. "Clifford all the way."

In an imaginary foot race between Marjorie Taylor Greene and Harry Potter, the winner was the fictional child wizard by over 95 percent.

"Not even close. MTG has a broom but it’s not magic like Harry Potter," quipped one person.

As HuffPost points out, Kellyanne Conway and MSNBC contributor George Conway recently announced that they are divorcing after more over two decades of marriage.

A man who allegedly posted death threats online aimed at a Florida sheriff was arrested on March 6, The Daytona Beach News-Journal reported.

Richard Golden, 38, was charged with second-degree felony written threats to kill or injure, Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood said in a press conference this Tuesday.

Chitwood, who was the target of Golden's threats, said that Golden was unemployed and living in a back bedroom at his mother's house and harbored anti-police views.

Golden made the threats in a 4CHAN chatroom after Chitwood spoke out against the Goyim Defense League (GDL), a neo-Nazi group, for spreading fear and antisemitic hate literature about the Jewish community in Volusia County.

"Just shoot Chitwood in the head and he stops being a problem. They have to find a new guy to be the problem. But shooting Chitwood in the head solves an immediate problem permanently. Just shoot Chitwood in the head and murder him," Golden reportedly wrote.

The Volusia County Sheriff's Office along with other government agencies launched an investigation after they were notified of the threats.

"They discovered he is anti-government, he is anti-law enforcement and like every active shooter that we come across he is a marginalized member of society who spent hours and hours and hours in these extremist chat groups," Chitwood said.

"Here is this clown sitting in his bedroom who is indoctrinated by this bull (expletive) and thinks the best way to solve the problem is to put a bullet in my head," Chitwood said.

Watch the video below or at this link.

Man found at mother's house, arrested for threatening to murder Volusia County Sheriff youtu.be