"If you need more proof of how deranging our times have become just consider this. The number of times the word 'staged' was used in the hours after the White House Correspondents Association dinner shooting last Saturday.

"This isn't only a problem for social media companies. It is a problem for our democracy. And it is one we need to tackle.

"While hundreds of journalists were sheltering in place on Saturday evening, and the entire chain of command of the United States was being raced out of the room in DC, social media platforms were having a field-day.

"Analysis shows that in the hours after Saturday's attack the term 'staged' (as in that the latest attempt on the life of President Trump was 'staged') appeared in more than 300,000 posts on X (formerly Twitter). Other platforms like Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and YouTube were filled with the same claims. Many of these claims were unnaturally boosted. Some by foreign accounts."

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"The Supreme Court dealt a blow to race-based redistricting on Wednesday, finding that Louisiana's second black-majority congressional district was created in violation of the Constitution and the scope of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

"The 6-3 ruling means states that have been forced by courts or litigation threats to draw districts based on race now have significantly more freedom to redraw those maps without prioritizing racial outcomes, as the high court raised the bar for when the Voting Rights Act actually requires race-based line drawing.

"'Allowing race to play any part in government decisionmaking represents a departure from the constitutional rule that applies in almost every other context.' Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority in a 36-page ruling, while three Democrat-appointed justices dissented. 'Correctly understood, Section 2 does not impose liability at odds with the Constitution, and it should not have imposed liability on Louisiana for its 2022 map.'"

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"In almost any other era, the hostile exchange between EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) would have been an instant embarrassment on Capitol Hill.

"But at a time when political violence is becoming frighteningly common and widely accepted, DeLauro's nasty suggestion that Zeldin drink a glass of weed killer marked just another day in the trenches.

"Dripping with bitterness, the 83-year-old, purple-haired DeLauro is often an embarrassment to Connecticut and more sober-minded Democrats with her nutty bluster."

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"We are seeing increasing support for violent action across social media, including those lamenting that the recent presidential assassination was not successful. Conservative sites have been featuring teachers and others who were upset that the recent effort failed, including one who has now lost her job. The current violence and violent rhetoric have been building for years as our leaders fuel the rage in the nation.

"One poll by the University of Virginia Center for Politics found that 52 percent of Biden supporters say Republicans are now a threat to American life, while 47 percent of Trump supporters say the same about Democrats. Among Biden supporters, 41 percent believed violence is justified 'to stop [Republicans] from achieving their goals.' An almost identical percentage, 38 percent, of Trump supporters embraced violence to stop Democrats.

"The support for violence has been growing. One prior poll shows a quarter of Americans supporting political violence."

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"The Department of Justice (DOJ) on Sunday pressed the preservation group suing the White House over President Trump's ballroom project to drop the lawsuit in the wake of Saturday's shooting at the White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) dinner.

"In a letter posted to social media by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the DOJ pressed for the National Trust for Historic Preservation to drop its 'frivolous lawsuit' against the Trump administration after Saturday's incident, which prompted the evacuation of the president and high-profile administration officials from the gala. ...

"Trump on Saturday, speaking to reporters after a gunman exchanged fire with law enforcement at the Washington Hilton where the WHCA hosted its annual dinner, argued the shooting spotlighted the need for a White House ballroom."

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"In 2025, the Republican-led One Big Beautiful Bill Act created a federal school choice tax credit program -- the first of its kind.

"The program allows states and Washington, DC, to opt in. Governors can make that decision on their own, though legislatures can also step in.

"So far, 30 states say they plan to participate, including five with Democratic governors (though in Kansas and Kentucky, Republican legislatures effectively forced their governors' hands).

"Despite the program's popularity -- and flexibility -- Democrats in Congress are trying to kill it before it gets off the ground in 2027."

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"Will 2026 be a 'blue wave' election for Democrats?

"To listen to the media and more and more Democrats, the answer is yes.

"But hold on. Yes, we've seen a string of GOP losses in special elections, with the media contrasting the winning percentages against President Donald Trump's performance in 2024.

"But political waves are more complicated than that."

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"A federal grand jury in Alabama on Tuesday indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center on 11 counts of wire and bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering, as the Justice Department accused the group that rose to fame during the 1960s Civil Rights movement of paying members of 21st century extremist groups to stoke hatred.

"'The SPLC is a nonprofit entity that purports to fight white supremacy and racial hatred by reporting on extremist groups and conducting research to inform law enforcement groups with the goal of dismantling these groups,' Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told a news conference attended by CBS News. 'The SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred.'"

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"A new federal watchdog report is warning that fraud across government programs remains widespread, costly, and difficult to contain, with officials describing a system strained by complexity, fragmented oversight, and evolving criminal tactics.

"The report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, released on April 15, found that 'all federal programs and operations are at risk of fraud,' underscoring vulnerabilities in programs administered jointly by federal and state governments. Testifying before lawmakers, GAO officials said the scale of the problem is staggering. The agency estimates that fraud costs the federal government between $233 billion and $521 billion annually, based on recent data. ...

"The structure of many federal programs relies heavily on state agencies to administer benefits such as Medicaid and unemployment insurance. In fiscal year 2025 alone, the federal government distributed about $1.2 trillion in grants to state and local governments. While that decentralized model allows programs to reach millions of Americans, auditors say it also creates gaps in oversight and coordination. It may also lend itself vulnerable to political patronage."

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"Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger has, since her election as a 'moderate' Democrat last fall, quickly proved that she's neither a moderate nor even remotely intelligent. If she were, she'd never have agreed to sign Virginia onto the left's unconstitutional scheme to bypass the Electoral College.

"With Spanberger's signature this week, Virginia became the 18th state to join the 'National Popular Vote Compact.' States that do so agree that, regardless of how their state votes for president, their Electoral College votes will go to the winner of the national popular vote.

"If states adding up to 270 electoral votes join the compact, the Electoral College would effectively be moot, since 270 is what's needed to declare a winner in a presidential election. With Virginia on board, the compact is now just 48 electoral votes shy of its goal.

"'This is on the 5-yard line of making this a reality,' Alyssa Cass, a 'strategist for the National Popular Vote Project and a Democratic consultant,' told NPR."

Read the entire article here.