Justice Brett Kavanaugh on Tuesday denied Missouri’s emergency request to use a GOP-friendly congressional map for the midterm elections.

The state’s request went to the Trump appointee because he is the justice assigned to handle urgent litigation from that part of the country. Justices can handle such applications themselves or refer them to the full court for resolution. Kavanaugh rejected Missouri’s application on his own, following his rejection last week of an emergency request for Michigan officials to put a measure on the November ballot over whether to require proof of citizenship to vote in that state.

As is typical for such orders, there was no explanation for Tuesday’s denial, though it suggests the justice found Missouri’s claim was weak.

The Republican-led state turned to Washington after Missouri’s Supreme Court blocked the map from being used in November. The state’s GOP-controlled legislature passed the map last year amid the nationwide gerrymandering push. Missouri’s Republican secretary of state, Denny Hoskins, sought to prevent a ballot measure in which voters would be able to decide whether to approve the map.

Hoskins reasoned that the referendum was invalid under the state’s constitution. But the state’s top court said Hoskins was incorrect about that. The court ordered him to put the measure on the November ballot, and it prohibited the state from using the new map unless and until voters approve it. Under the court’s ruling, the map passed in 2022 remained in full effect for November.

The state court noted that the referendum petition was submitted to Hoskins in December and that he didn’t announce his finding that it was insufficient until about an hour before a deadline last month.

Turning to the Supreme Court for speedy relief, Missouri said that a “federal-election-administration disaster is unfolding” due to what it called an unprecedented order from the state court.

“No court in American history has ever given such an extraordinary remedy, which inflicts unprecedented chaos on Missouri,” said the application from Republican Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway’s office. It told the justices that “about 1.2 million Missourians” voted in the August primary under the new map and that the state Supreme Court “gave no specific guidance” about how to use the 2022 map for November.

Opposing the state’s application, referendum backer Richard von Glahn said that it “does not present a real emergency.” He said the state “waited as long as possible to manufacture the present dispute,” with Hoskins waiting “until the last possible day — and only after he had implemented HB 1 [the new map] in the congressional primary — to object to the referendum, in the hopes of running out the clock on the judiciary’s tolerance for a last-minute reversion to the 2022 districts.”

Von Glahn said the state court rejected Hoskins’ “gambit,” and he urged the justices to do the same. He said the secretary of state asked the justices “to deliver him the political victory to which he was never entitled under the Missouri Constitution.”

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in the Trump administration’s legal cases.

The post Justice Kavanaugh rejects Missouri’s request on GOP-friendly congressional map for midterms appeared first on MS NOW.

This post was originally published on this site

Hunter Biden is about to take his trolling of his conservative critics to the blockchain.

The son of former President Joe Biden is debuting a meme coin Wednesday named after his infamous laptop, years after the device’s discovery dominated political headlines in the final stretch of the 2020 election.

Hunter Biden teased the launch of the coin, which will trade under the ticker “$LAPTOP,” by posting a video compilation Monday of conservative politicians and pundits, including President Donald Trump, talking about the computer.

The montage included a video of Trump referring to the device as the “laptop from hell,” a moniker that came to define years of attacks by Trump and his conservative allies against the Biden family.

Hunter Biden dropped off his MacBook Pro at a Delaware repair shop in April 2019, and the FBI later seized the device and an accompanying external hard drive. Communication that appeared to outline his foreign business dealings, explicit pictures of him doing illegal drugs in hotel rooms with women and swaths of his financial records were published by the New York Post three weeks before the election.

That led to a cascade of conservative conspiracy theories perpetuated by Trump over the Biden family’s overseas businesses, an influx of internet memes and a massive political headache for the Biden campaign.

The meme coin, which was first reported by The Wall Street Journal, takes a tongue-in-cheek jab at Trump’s own meme coin ventures. Trump launched $TRUMP shortly before his inauguration in January 2025 to capitalize on the crypto currency community that helped him win the 2024 presidential election.

But like almost any other digital token, which holds no real value outside of the notoriety of the figures who launch them, the coin surged before cratering: $TRUMP hit nearly $15 billion at its peak market capitalization before quickly plummeting as internet enthusiasm waned. Melania Trump’s meme coin, $MELANIA, has seen a similar fate.

One-fifth of the 1 billion tokens $LAPTOP plans to issue will go straight to the crypto wallets of the individuals who lost money on $TRUMP, according to the Journal. Others receiving $LAPTOP tokens include subscribers to Hunter Biden’s Substack and people on a mailing list curated by Andrew Callaghan, the host of the YouTube series Channel 5 and a personal friend of Hunter Biden’s. Some 30% will be retained by $LAPTOP’s founders, which include Hunter Biden.

Another 30% of the coin’s shares have been marked for destruction — which would boost the overall value of the coin — if a Democrat wins the 2028 presidential election or if $LAPTOP’s valuation exceeds $TRUMP’s, according to the Journal. The remainder will go to charity and the cost of launching the coin.

The launch of the coin has so far been met with mixed reaction from the cryptocurrency community. Callaghan distanced himself from the coin, saying he and his team have “nothing to do with” the venture and that they only provided their email subscriber list to help Hunter Biden expand his audience.

The post Hunter Biden launches meme coin inspired by 2020 laptop scandal appeared first on MS NOW.

This post was originally published on this site

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. on Tuesday struck multiple Iranian tankers in response to more attempted missile attacks on a Navy warship, according to a U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations.

Iranian state television also is reporting that U.S. forces attacked Iranian oil tankers near the southern port of Jask and near Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf.

The latest tit-for-tat strikes come as Washington and Tehran lurch back toward fighting during more than six months of war.

An Iranian state TV reporter in Jask said an Iranian tanker was struck near the coast of Yekbeni, while another explosion was heard in the area whose source and location were not immediately clear.

State TV later reported that the U.S. military attacked a second tanker near waters off Jask. It said the crews of both vessels were being evacuated by lifeboat toward the Jask coast.

Separately, state television reported that another Iranian tanker was attacked in Kharg Island anchorage area. It said the crew was safely evacuated shortly after the strike.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Navy has warned crews of oil tankers near ports in Kuwait and Bahrain to immediately leave their vessels, saying the ships could be targeted in retaliation for U.S. attacks on Iranian tankers. It accused Kuwait and Bahrain of hosting U.S. forces and assisting in the attacks.

On Saturday, the U.S. military said it had struck three Iranian oil tankers after Navy warships were targeted with ballistic missiles, warning that it would, “if necessary, destroy Iran’s limited and exposed oil fleet.” Iran later said it planned to announce a new “exclusion zone” near the Strait of Hormuz aimed at vessels intending to transit.

The latest strikes are part of a dual economic and military approach by President Donald Trump as he struggles to bring an end to a more than six-month-old war with Tehran.

The Trump administration on Tuesday also imposed sanctions on additional elements of Iran’s aviation industry, targeting more than two dozen commercial and private airlines as well as foreign cargo service providers in its new push to isolate Tehran from its remaining trading partners.

Both the U.S. and Iran are seeking to exert control over the Strait of Hormuz, where about one-fifth of the world’s oil passed before the war began. Rising energy prices are posing political problems for Trump and his Republican Party ahead of the November midterm elections. A barrel of international standard Brent crude briefly climbed as high as $99.46 on Tuesday.

A U.S. blockade of Iranian ports has squeezed the country’s economy by limiting its oil exports, while the American military has been helping a limited number of ships transit on a route through the Strait of Hormuz off Oman. Tehran wants ships to follow a route that it chooses through the strait, which was considered an international waterway before the war.

The post U.S. strikes Iranian tankers after more attempted missile attacks on Navy warship appeared first on MS NOW.

This post was originally published on this site

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* Ottawa strikes back: “New Canadian tariffs targeting roughly $20 billion in U.S. imports officially snapped into place on Tuesday, the latest escalation in an increasingly costly trade war that has ensnarled two longtime allies. The duties apply to a variety of U.S. goods, including clothing, cheese, metal parts and wood products.”

* Evidently, the latest attempts at diplomacy did nothing to curb Moscow’s campaign of deadly violence: “Two people were killed and at least 10 injured after Russia struck the Ukrainian capital Kyiv with drones and missiles overnight on Tuesday, local authorities said. The attack comes after a pause over the weekend as U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff arrived in Kyiv for their first official visit in a renewed push to end the war between Russia and Ukraine.”

* German election results: “The far-right party Alternative for Germany fell short of an outright majority in crucial elections in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, according to final results posted on Monday. But it could still take power there if it wins the support of a minor populist party.”

* A huge loss for the Smithsonian: “Lonnie Bunch III announced his resignation as secretary of the Smithsonian Institution on Tuesday, marking the end of nearly four decades there amid pressure from the Trump administration to present a less critical version of American history.”

* That the U.S. delegation stood alone on this speaks volumes: “The United Nations has adopted a West African country’s proposal for a new world map to replace one created in the 16th century. The vote on Friday was almost unanimous. Only one country — the United States — voted against the proposed map, which more accurately reflects the size of Africa and other regions.”

* Some members of the worst Cabinet ever stand out: “Former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer violated department policy repeatedly, a report released on Thursday by the department’s internal watchdog said, including tolerating harassment, spending public money on personal travel and conducting an ‘inappropriate relationship’ with a member of her security detail. The 40-page report revealed new details of the dysfunction and toxicity at the top of the Labor Department under Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, who resigned in April after one year in the job as scandals and investigations closed in.”

* A story we’ve been following: “A federal judge in the nation’s capital declined to block the firings of journalists from military news outlet Stars and Stripes, in a case that the judge said required him to ‘confront the limits of First Amendment protections for public employees speaking about their jobs.’”

* Noted without comment: “Many MAGA-centered merchandise retailers and their suppliers are seeing sales dwindle, according to interviews with wholesalers, sales representatives, business owners and employees. As the president’s approval rating hovers near all-time lows, imperiling Republicans’ control of Congress, store owners blame a stagnant economy and weaker MAGA enthusiasm for lower sales. Some stores are closing permanently.”

See you tomorrow.

The post Tuesday’s Mini-Report, 9.8.26 appeared first on MS NOW.

This post was originally published on this site