Commentary: SCOTUS’ Decision on Affirmative Action Could Spell Big Trouble for ESG’s ‘Diversity, Equity and Inclusion’ Hiring Quotas

It’s a simple ruling: “Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it.”

On June 29, the Supreme Court affirmed Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S. Code § 2000d’s prohibition on racial discrimination in federally funded programs, including higher education, at both public and private universities, in the Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard decision.

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U.S. Supreme Court Again Vacates Judgement Against Oregon Bakers

Aaron and Melissa Klein

For the second time, the U.S. Supreme Court has vacated a lower court decision against a Christian couple in Oregon who were punished for not making a cake for a same-sex wedding.

In an orders list release Friday, the nation’s highest court vacated the decision against Aaron and Melissa Klein in their ongoing litigation with the Oregon Bureau of Labor & Industries.

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Supreme Court Expands Degree to Which Businesses Must Accommodate Religious Workers

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday to expand the degree to which businesses have to accommodate workers for religious purposes.

In the case, Groff v. DeJoy, Postmaster General, the court found that postman Gerald Groff, an evangelical Christian, should not have been disciplined for refusing to work on Sundays for religious reasons. The majority opinion cited Title VII’s requirement to accommodate employees for religious purposes provided it does not cause the employer “undue hardship.”

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IRS Whistleblower: Hunter Biden Hasn’t Paid Taxes on 2014 Money from Ukrainian Oligarch’s Firm

Federal agents secured evidence that Hunter Biden engaged in a “pretty classic tax evasion scheme” that allowed him to avoid paying taxes on millions of dollars in income since at least 2014, and the deal he ultimately got would not have been afforded to other Americans facing such serious charges, an IRS whistleblower who supervised the investigation tells Just the News.

“If these facts were from the local businessman or the neighbor next door, they would have been charged, they would have already probably had their entire sentence,” IRS Supervisor Agent Gary Shapley said during a 45-minute interview aired Thursday on the John Solomon Reports podcast.

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Supreme Court Ban on Affirmative Action Expected to Prompt ‘Workarounds’ to Favor Some Races

Two decades ago, the Supreme Court purportedly put limits on racial preferences in college admissions: no stereotyping of minority viewpoints or policies that “unduly harm” non-minorities, plus a 25-year ticking clock to wind them down.

Not only is there “no end in sight” to race-conscious admissions with five years left, but selective colleges can’t even explain how courts would evaluate the constitutionality of their programs under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday, casting a pall over the use of race in settings far beyond higher education.

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Christian Organizations Celebrate Supreme Court’s Ruling Against Forcing Web Designer to Work for Same-Sex Weddings

Christian groups applauded the Supreme Court’s ruling Friday that held “The First Amendment prohibits Colorado from forcing a website designer to create expressive designs speaking messages with which the designer disagrees.”

Organizations, including the Catholic League, Family Research Council, and the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, submitted friend of the court (amici) briefs in support of 303 Creative, the custom website design business owned by Lorie Smith.

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Indiana Supreme Court Rules Abortion Ban Is Constitutional

The Indiana Supreme Court issued a decision Friday that said the state’s abortion ban was constitutional in a 4-1 ruling, according to the text.

Senate Bill 1 was signed into law in 2022 and prohibited abortion with limited exceptions in the case of preventing “serious health risk of the pregnant woman or to save the pregnant woman’s life,” if the child is diagnosed with a “lethal fetal anomaly” or rape or incest, according to the bill’s text. The law was quickly halted by a lawsuit brought by Planned Parenthood Great Northwest before being vacated by the state Supreme Court, which ruled that the law did not violate the Indiana Constitution.

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IRS Whistleblower Attorneys Hit Back at Hunter Biden Attorney over Leaking Accusations

IRS Whistleblower Gary Shapley’s legal team hit back on Friday against accusations from Hunter Biden’s attorney suggesting he had claimed to be a whistleblower to escape punishment over his own alleged misconduct. Biden attorney Abbe Lowell on Friday wrote to House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith, suggesting Shapley and a second unnamed IRS agent of blowing the whistle “in an attempt to evade their own misconduct,” Axios reported. The “timing of the agents’ leaks and your subsequent decision to release their statements do not seem innocent.”

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Vivek Ramaswamy Reacts to SCOTUS Ruling on Biden Administration’s Student Loan Forgiveness Program

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy released a video statement Friday after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Biden administration’s proposal to unilaterally cancel hundreds of billions in student loan debt.

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Biden Education Secretary Claims Supreme Court’s Affirmative Action Ruling ‘Takes Our Country Decades Backward’

Secretary of the U.S. Education Department Miguel Cardona reacted to the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the use of race in weighing college admissions with the claim the ruling “takes our country decades backward” because such discrimination based on the color of skin has served as “a vital tool that colleges have used to create vibrant, diverse campus communities.”

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Pressure Grows on Judge to Reject Hunter Biden Plea Deal amid Evidence of DOJ Interference

Pressure is growing in congressional, legal and media circles for the federal judge in the Hunter Biden case to reject a plea deal that would spare the first son from serving prison time after evidence has emerged from two IRS whistleblowers that a more serious criminal tax case was sabotaged by the Justice Department.

“I don’t understand how any judge could bless this plea agreement now that all of this evidence of obstruction and DOJ and FBI wrongdoing has surfaced,” Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., told Just the News. “So I hope this judge does reject this, and then insists and demands on an honest investigation and an honest prosecution as well.”

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Justice Department Watchdog Blames Jeffrey Epstein’s Death on Prison ‘Negligence, Misconduct’

Financier and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein’s 2019 death in a Manhattan federal jail cell was the result of “negligence” and “misconduct” on the part of the Bureau of Prisons, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz said in a report Tuesday.

“Epstein’s injuries were more consistent with, and indicative of, a suicide by hanging rather than a homicide by strangulation,” the report also stated.

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Supreme Court Rules Against GOP in North Carolina Election Law Case

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled against North Carolina Republicans, who were fighting for a congressional map that would be in their favor.

The justices ruled 6-3, with Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett siding with the court’s three liberal members. 

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Impeachment Talk Moves up GOP House Agenda After IRS Whistleblower Revelations, Durham Testimony

The Republican House agenda has in recent weeks been dominated by impeachment resolutions following testimony from former special prosecutor John Durham on the Russian collusion probe and IRS whistleblower revelations about the Hunter Biden investigation – with calls ranging from ousting Attorney General Merrick Garland to expunging the two impeachments President Trump received.

In addition to Garland, whom critics say runs a “two-tiered” justice system in America, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is also a target – largely over his handling of record migration and its often overwhelming consequences from U.S. borders to the rest of the country.

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Montana Republican Lawmakers the Latest to Receive Threatening Letters with White Powder

Montana Republican legislators are the latest GOP state officials to be targeted, receiving threatening letters containing white powder after Tennessee and Kansas Republicans received similar suspicious mail in recent days, officials say. 

Meanwhile, four days after the Cordell Hull Building legislative offices in Nashville were locked down upon Republican leaders received threatening mail, an FBI official tells The Tennessee Star that the incident remains under investigation and that the agency has no comment at this time.

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SCOTUS Throws Out Dem Lawsuit Seeking Trump Hotel Records

The Supreme Court threw out Democratic lawmakers’ lawsuit seeking to compel an executive agency to disclose records relating to the Trump hotel formerly located in the Old Post Office building in Washington, D.C.

Though the Supreme Court agreed in May to hear the case, which questioned whether individual members of Congress can sue executive agencies to compel records disclosures, Democrats voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit in a June 7 filing. In an unsigned order Monday, the Supreme Court tossed the case.

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With New Evidence, Congress Unmasks a Multi-Year Government Plot to Protect Biden, Sully Trump

When the Justice Department discovered from journalists a storage locker containing evidence against ex-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, a search was executed immediately.

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Alan Dershowitz Commentary: Trump’s Prosecutors Shouldn’t Get to Use the Word ‘Espionage’

Former President Donald Trump has been charged with a variety of crimes, including violation of the misnamed Espionage Act.

That 1917 statute is misnamed because it covers a great many offenses that don’t involve spying or giving secrets to the enemy. In fact, over the years it has been used extensively against patriotic Americans who have opposed wars and dissented from other government actions.

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Federal Trade Commission Sues Amazon for ‘Deceptive’ Tactics

The Federal Trade Commission sued Amazon on Wednesday alleging the online retailer used “manipulative, coercive, or deceptive” practices to get customers to enroll in Prime subscriptions.

The Federal Trade Commission’s partially-redacted complaint alleges the company tricked millions of people into enrolling in Amazon Prime. Amazon Prime, a $139 annual subscription service that has fueled the company’s growth and made it part of many Americans daily routines.

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Feds Built Case Hunter Biden Evaded $2.2 Million in Taxes Dating to 2014 Before Being Thwarted

If Hunter Biden pleads guilty next month as expected to two misdemeanor tax evasion charges, he’ll be admitting he shorted the U.S. government of about $100,000 in taxes he owed in 2017-18.

But it’s a far cry from the evidence the IRS and FBI developed showing a pattern of tax evasion and avoidance that stretched back to his father’s term as vice president a decade ago, according to newly released documents and testimony.

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3M Settles Water Contamination Lawsuits with $10.3 Billion Payout

Chemical manufacturing company 3M agreed to settle multiple lawsuits with a $10.3 billion payout over the U.S. water supply being allegedly contaminated with “forever chemicals” contained in firefighting foam and other products, the company announced in a press release on Thursday. 

Under the settlement, 3M will provide the payout over a 13-year period to both public water suppliers that have found traces of Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and other suppliers that “may detect PFAS at any level in the future.” The company did not admit liability in the settlement. 

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Judge Blocks Wyoming Abortion Pill Ban, Pending Lawsuit

A Wyoming judge has temporarily blocked the state’s ban on abortion pills, pending legal arguments.

The state is the only one to have specifically banned abortion pills, though numerous others have effectively done so by banning abortion almost entirely, the Associated Press reported. Wyoming law generally bans the procedure, though that law is also the subject of a judicial block from the same judge.

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SCOTUS Holds Law Making It Illegal to ‘Encourage or Induce’ Illegal Immigration Does Not Violate First Amendment

The Supreme Court upheld a law that makes it a crime to “encourage or induce” illegal immigration, rejecting the argument that it violates the First Amendment.

The case, United States v. Hansen, stems from Helaman Hansen’s 2017 conviction for running a program advertising a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants through “adult adoption,” which earned him more $1.8 million between 2012 and 2016. Though it affirmed Hansen’s convictions on mail and wire fraud charges, the Ninth Circuit held that the law behind his two counts of encouraging or inducing non-citizens to reside in the United States for financial gain was “overbroad and unconstitutional,” covering “a substantial amount of speech protected by the First Amendment.”

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JPMorgan Accused of Deleting Millions of Emails in the Midst of Ongoing Investigations

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) officials earlier this week fined JPMorgan Chase $4 million after the company allegedly deleted roughly 47 million emails while in the midst of security investigations.

The settlement order states that the messages were allegedly deleted from about 8,700 mailboxes that belonged to about 7,500 employees who had regular contact with Chase customers.

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Supreme Court Sides with Biden Admin on Immigration Enforcement Plan

The Supreme Court sided with the Biden administration Friday, ruling 8-1 against two states that challenged its immigration enforcement priorities.

Texas and Louisiana challenged guidelines issued by the Department of Homeland Security in 2021 that prioritized arresting and removing certain groups of illegal immigrants, including suspected terrorists and criminals. The Supreme Court held Friday that the two states lack standing to challenge the guidelines, noting that the states “have not cited any precedent, history, or tradition of courts ordering the Executive Branch to change its arrest or prosecution policies so that the Executive Branch makes more arrests or initiates more prosecutions.”

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Whistleblower: Top FBI Official Made ‘Chilling’ Threat to Agents Questioning January 6 Cases

A top official with the FBI has filed a protected disclosure to the Office of the Inspector General alleging that FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate told the bureau’s internal critics of its Jan. 6-related cases to seek employment elsewhere and offered to personally address his subordinates’ agents concerns.

In a sworn affidavit, the 15-year veteran FBI special agent alleges that, during a routine meeting in February 2021, the deputy director addressed internal concerns that the bureau had not taken the same approach to its investigations into the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot as it did with the 2020 riots and protests related to the death of George Floyd.

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Court Rules Against Attempt to Force Religious Company to Violate Beliefs on Sexuality

A federal court of appeals ruled Tuesday that a religious management company was within its rights under the First Amendment to require employees adhere to its religious beliefs.

Braidwood Management Inc. and Bear Creek Bible Church filed a lawsuit against the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in 2018, but judgment was withheld until the Supreme Court ruled in Bostock v. Clayton County in 2020 that LGBTQ employees could sue employers for discriminatory practices, according to the decision. Braidwood argued following the higher court’s decision that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prevents them from adhering to their religious beliefs, and the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that “Title VII post-Bostock would substantially burden its ability to operate per its religious beliefs,” according to the decision.

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Minnesota Police Union Says Biden DOJ’s Report ‘Condemns an Entire Agency’ Based on ‘Anecdotes’

While acknowledging that it “can always strive to be better,” the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis criticized a recent U.S. Department of Justice report because it “condemns an entire agency and its employees based on anecdotes.”

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland was in Minneapolis Friday to announce the findings of the federal government’s “pattern or practice” investigation into the Minneapolis Police Department.

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Durham: Feds Had No Real Evidence to Investigate Russian Collusion, Monitor Trump Campaign

Former President Donald Trump has a slight lead against President Joe Biden in national polling even after being charged with 37 criminal counts in an indictment related to his handling of classified documents. 

Real Clear Politics’ polling average has Trump ahead of Biden by 2.4 points in a general election matchup, showing that the federal indictment against Trump has so far not sunk his chances to return to the White House. In fact, it may have bolstered them.

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Congress Prepares to Unseal Testimony, Evidence from IRS Whistleblower in Hunter Biden Case

The House Ways and Means Committee took final steps Tuesday to release to the public as early as this week the testimony and evidence from an IRS whistleblower who alleges the Justice Department gave favorable treatment to Hunter Biden and engaged in political interference in the criminal tax case against the first son.

Committee Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., scheduled an executive session for 8 a.m. Thursday where lawmakers are expected to vote to free the whistleblower evidence and testimony of IRS supervisory criminal agent Gary Shapley from the 6103 privacy requirements that normally shield Americans’ tax information from public disclosure.

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Famous Rapper’s Attorney Rips DOJ for Letting Hunter Biden Walk on Crime While His Client Spent Years in Jail

The attorney for rapper Kodak Black blasted the Justice Department Tuesday over the plea deal reached with Hunter Biden, questioning whether there is “2 tiers of justice” in America’s legal system.

Black was sentenced to serve over three years in prison for illegal possession of a firearm in 2019, the same charge the younger Biden reached a plea agreement on Tuesday, Fox News reported. Biden will be put into a pre-trial diversion program on the gun charge, the Justice Department announced, although U.S. Attorney David Weiss, who was appointed by then-President Donald Trump in 2017, said the investigation is still ongoing.

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State Bar of California Begins Trial to Disbar Trump’s Attorney John Eastman Over 2020 Election

The State Bar of California (SBC) began a trial on Tuesday seeking to disbar conservative legal scholar John Eastman over his role advising former President Donald Trump and state legislatures on challenging the 2020 election results. The proceedings arose out of a complaint against him made by the States United Democracy Center (SUDC). SUDC is run by a former Obama appointee, Norm Eisen, and its advisory board includes former Arizona governor and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

The SBC charged Eastman with 11 ethics violations in January. Eastman filed a 100-page response containing thousands of attachments, and published a rebuttal on his Substack. He said the SBC’s complaint “is filled with distortions, half truths, and outright falsehoods.”

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Biden Administration Backs Down from Forcing Religious Hospitals to Perform Gender Transition Procedures

The Biden administration declined to appeal a federal court ruling that blocks the government from forcing religious doctors and faith-based hospitals to perform gender-transition procedures against their conscience and professional medical judgment. The administration’s decision not to appeal the federal court ruling in Sisters of Mercy v. Becerra to the U.S. Supreme Court by a June 20 deadline means its mandate will be laid to rest.

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Judge Sets Trial Date for Trump Classified Documents Case

A Florida Judge has set a trial date of Aug. 14 for former President Donald Trump in his ongoing case related to his handling of classified documents.

According to court filings made public Tuesday, District Judge Aileen Cannon set the trial date, giving two months time to prepare for the case. However, Trump’s team is expected to push to have that date delayed, likely successfully.

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Commentary: The ‘Get Trump’ Games Continue

It all started with a self-important official at the National Archives and Records Administration. Or at least that’s the official story.

In May 2021, William Bosanko, NARA’s chief executive officer, noticed two presidential documents were missing from the Trump Administration: the letter Barack Obama wrote to Donald Trump and correspondence between Trump and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.

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U.S. Treasury Dept. Announces Sanctions on Mexican Migrant-Trafficking Gang

The U.S. Treasury Department on Friday announced sanctions against a migrant-trafficking gang based in Mexico that has operated since at least 2018. 

The Hernandez Salas organization, based in the border city of Mexicali, Mexico, across the border from Calexico, California, has organized travel for countless migrants seeking to cross into the United States, the Treasury Dept. said in a statement. 

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Ramaswamy: Plea Deal Keeping Hunter Biden out of Prison Is a ‘Joke,’ the ‘Perfect Fig Leaf’

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy is blasting a plea deal announced Tuesday that will keep President Joe Biden’s troubled son out of prison on two federal misdemeanor counts of failing to pay his taxes and a separate felony charge of possession of a firearm by a known drug user.

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Hunter Biden Reaches Plea Deal on Gun, Tax Charges

Hunter Biden has struck a deal with federal prosecutors to avoid prison by pleading guilty to two tax crimes and admitting to a gun charge that could be dismissed, court records released Tuesday show. Under the deal, President Joe Biden’s son will plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax charges. Prosecutors also charged him with felony possession of a firearm while using illegal drug, but that charge would be dismissed if he successfully completes a two-year probation.

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Chinese Intelligence Arm Quietly Operates ‘Service Centers’ in Seven U.S. Cities

by Philip Lenczycki   A Chinese intelligence agency quietly operates “service centers” in seven American cities, all of which have had contact with Beijing’s national police authority, according to state media reports and government records reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) United Front Work…

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Alleged Crime Family Orchestrated Multi-State Illegal Immigrant Smuggling Ring, Feds Say

Several members of a family allegedly coordinated a scheme to smuggle illegal immigrants across the southern border and into the U.S. interior, according to Border Report.

Authorities arrested six members of the Lopez family, while four others remain on the run, according to Border Report. The group allegedly operated in New Mexico, Arizona, California and Virginia, Jorge H. Uribarri, assistant special agent with Homeland Security Investigations in El Paso, said, according to Border Report.

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Nearly Half of U.S. States Now Have Measures Limiting Transgender Surgery for Minors, but Lawsuits Abound

At least 20 states have either restricted or banned transgender procedures for minors, with many of them facing lawsuits and temporary blocks by courts as a result, while future litigation is possible in states considering adopting such laws. 

The states that have enacted legislation against such procedures are: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia – essentially all conservative-leaning.

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Youth Homicide Rate Spikes to Highest Level in Two Decades

The homicide rate among individuals ages 10 through 24 in 2021 reached its highest level in 20 years, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

In 2021, there were 10.7 homicides for every 100,000 people ages 10 through 24, up from 8.3 in 2016 and 7.3 in 2011, according to the CDC. Suicide and homicide are the second and third leading causes of death, respectively, for people ages 10 through 24, behind accidental deaths that involve motor vehicle crashes and falls, according to the CDC report.

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Commentary: The Supreme Court’s Ruling on Race-Based Redistricting Is a Real Head-Scratcher

Chief Justice John Roberts made a major error in judgment last week in rejecting the State of Alabama’s 2022 congressional redistricting plan in Allen v. Milligan, an error that, as dissenting Justice Samuel Alito says, puts the Voting Rights Act “on a perilous and unfortunate path.”

Joined by the three liberal justices and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Roberts, writing for the majority, approved race being the driving factor in drawing up the boundary lines of political districts, while glibly denying he was doing that. That violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution.

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White Former Starbucks Manager Wins $25 Million Suit After Being Fired over Arrest of Black Men

On Monday, a federal jury awarded a White former Starbucks manager with $25 million after she successfully convinced them that she had been fired by the coffee chain due to her race.

As the New York Post reports, Shannon Phillips previously oversaw several locations in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, as a regional manager who had been with the company for 13 years. Her lawsuit stems from a 2018 incident in which two black men attempted to use the restroom of a Philadelphia Starbucks, and were denied due to not being paying customers. When the men subsequently refused to leave, the police were called and the men were arrested and forced off the property.

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Prominent Trans Activist Jailed For Murdering Entire Family: ‘Most Depraved Crime I Ever Handled’

Dana Rivers, a longtime transgender activist, was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday for the 2016 murder of a lesbian couple and their son.

Rivers garnered national fame in 1999 for suing the Center Unified School District in Sacramento and winning a $150,000 settlement after being fired for talking to students about transitioning genders, according to Mercury News. Rivers attacked two women, aged 56 and 57, in their bed as they slept, shooting both women and their 19-year old son before stabbing one of the women 47 times and setting their garage on fire.

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Commentary: Trump Should Fight Fire with Fire and That’s Exactly What He Says He Will Do

Fight fire with fire.

That was the message of former President Donald Trump to his supporters in Bedminster, N.J. on June 13 following his arraignment in federal court in Miami, Fla. for alleged violations of the Espionage Act over documents that Trump retained following his presidency that he says he declassified, warning that the “seal is broken.”

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