Politics/Religion Consolidated Megathread Extravaganza

[DKG]

The U.S. Supreme Court late on May 11 cleared the way for Alabama to redraw its congressional election map to comply with the court's landmark ruling limiting the use of race in redistricting.

The court's new decision took the form of a brief, unsigned order.

The Supreme Court vacated lower court rulings that required Alabama to use a congressional map that included two majority-black districts out of the state's seven districts.

[Herman]

Joe Biden was stumbling long before he took office. He fell behind in the first three Democratic primary elections of 2020, placing fourth, fifth, and second, respectively.

James Clyburn, South Carolina's lone Democratic congressman, is credited with turning things around for the campaign and propping Biden up by delivering him a timely endorsement and South Carolina's delegates.

Now, Biden's political crutch is poised to lose his own footing.

During a heated meeting on Tuesday, lawmakers on the South Carolina House Constitutional Laws Subcommittee discussed legislation that, if successfully passed by both chambers of the legislature and ratified by the governor, would ultimately redraw the Palmetto State's congressional maps and eliminate Clyburn's district.

[Herman]

The Trump administration is investigating the U.S.-funded Ukrainian biolabs that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was previously smeared as "treasonous" and "traitorous" for bringing to the public's attention.

Gabbard issued a video statement while a private citizen in 2022 where she claimed that "there are 25-30 U.S.-funded biolabs in Ukraine. According to the U.S. government, these biolabs are conducting research on dangerous pathogens."

In order to mitigate the risk of breaches at the facilities, Gabbard said that "these labs need to be shut down immediately, and the pathogens that they hold need to be destroyed."

Gabbard was viciously attacked over the video even though days earlier, then-Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland — a woman whose meddling in Ukrainian affairs helped pave the way for the ruinous overthrow of its previous government — admitted that such labs existed.

[Herman]

Nebraska voters heading to the polls on Tuesday are facing a convoluted Senate primary in which both parties are trading accusations of spoiler candidates intended to manipulate the November general election.

Incumbent U.S. Senator Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.) is up for re-election and defending his seat in the Tuesday primary against several Republican challengers.

Meanwhile, the Democrat primary election has sparked controversy, with candidate Cindy Burbank accusing her competitor, William Forbes, of being a Ricketts plant.

"Pete Ricketts, who is running for reelection, is putting in a candidate loyal to him in the DEMOCRATIC primary — to split the vote against him, so he wins easily. He's running an anti-abortion activist named Bill Forbes, who has posted in support of Pete Ricketts!" Burbank's campaign website states.

Burbank claimed that Ricketts planted Forbes because he is concerned that he will lose his re-election bid in the November general election to independent candidate Dan Osborn.

[DKG]

The mayor of Arcadia, California, a small town outside Los Angeles, has agreed with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to plead guilty to acting as an agent for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Eileen Wang, who resigned on May 11 within hours of her case going public, is accused of secretly carrying out tasks for the CCP while in her capacity as mayor, and she's not alone in these accusations—her former fiancé and campaign treasurer, Yaoning "Mike" Sun, has already been convicted on the same charge.

"All Americans should be alarmed to learn an elected official was brazenly spreading propaganda on behalf of the Chinese government," Patrick Grandy, assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles Office, said.

[Brent]

Tennessee state Republicans passed a new congressional map last week that, applying the logic of the U.S. Supreme Court's recent Callais ruling, carves up a Democrat-held district that was the product of a racial gerrymander. They managed to do so despite obstruction and gross incivility from their Democrat colleagues.

Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones, for instance, walked around the chamber blowing a bullhorn in the faces of lawmakers and subjecting them to potential noise-induced hearing loss. Jones — a Democrat who was caught on film throwing a traffic cone at a driver during a 2020 Black Lives Matter blockade — also set fire to a printout of the Confederate flag and repeatedly accused Republicans of racism.

Democrat state Sen. Charlane Oliver — the radical who threatened riots in 2024 over the passage of a bill she didn't like — danced atop her desk in the chamber, yelling and holding up a banner that said, "No Jim Crow 2 Stop the Steal."

[Brent]

Trump is visiting China. The visit to China is a first for a sitting U.S. president in nearly 10 years, when Trump visited last.