Politics/Religion Consolidated Megathread Extravaganza

[DKG]

After winning the 2024 Republican primary for Kentucky's 4th Congressional District, Rep. Thomas Massie cleaned up in the general election, securing 99.6% of the vote. Yet his political career still may not survive 2026.

The MIT-trained engineer proceeded to force the issue of the Jeffrey Epstein files' release, speak out against the joint U.S.-Israeli entanglement in Iran, and pad his 86.79% lifetime Turning Point Action score. He also managed to once again draw the ire of President Donald Trump, who faulted Massie for being "an automatic 'NO' vote on just about everything."

Months after vowing in March 2025 to "lead the charge" against Massie, Trump officially named his champion: Navy SEAL veteran Ed Gallrein.

Gallrein — who not only enjoys the president's backing but the support of numerous powerful individuals and organizations, including War Secretary Pete Hegseth, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — is now poised to possibly oust Massie from the congressional seat he has held since 2012.

[Lokmar]

GTFO Massie.

[Brent]

Polish MEP Dominik Tarczyński: "We don't need your doctors, we don't need your engineers. Take them all, and pay for them. We don't need them. You know why? Because there are zero terrorist attacks in Poland. Why? Because there is no illegal migration in Poland."

Poland is becoming one of my favourite countries.

[Thiel]

The German populist party AFD is seeing rising support from gay men.

[Herman]

Trump endorsed Ken Paxton in a Texas senate race.

[Herman]

A May 2026 AtlasIntel national poll found that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is now leading the 2028 Republican field with 45% support, ahead of Vice President JD Vance (30%), who was leading the same poll by 24 points in December 2025.

On a recent episode of the "Steve Deace Show," Deace and his panel of co-hosts Todd Erzen and Aaron MacIntyre along with Rob Eno, Blaze News managing editor, addressed the legitimacy of the "Rubio surge" and what it means for the MAGA movement.

[Herman]

The U.S. Supreme Court on May 18 ordered lower courts to reconsider rulings in two redistricting cases that concern whether private individuals may sue to enforce a federal law that bans discriminatory voting practices.

The court directed the lower courts to take another look at the cases from Mississippi and North Dakota in light of its recent landmark ruling limiting the use of race in redistricting efforts.

Justice Ketanji Brown jackassson dissented from both new rulings.

In Louisiana v. Callais, a majority of the court had said April 29 that race may not be the predominant, overriding reason for how congressional district lines are drawn. The case focused on the Pelican State's decision to add a majority-black district after a lower court said omitting the district would violate the Section 2 nondiscrimination provisions of the federal Voting Rights Act.

[Herman]

Former Georgia Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan appears to be a washed-up politician without a party after Democrat voters showed on Tuesday they want nothing to do with him.

Duncan spent nearly a decade in state elected office as a Republican. He was a representative in the Georgia House from 2013 until 2017 and lieutenant governor from 2019 until 2023, so he was an executive in charge during the controversial 2020 presidential election.

A month after the 2020 race in Georgia was called for Joe Biden over Donald Trump, Duncan claimed that persistent GOP challenges to the results would damage the Republican Party. "I'm very, very worried that this affects our brand of conservatism," he said at the time.

By 2024, Duncan had morphed into an ardently anti-Trump activist. Not only did he endorse Biden for re-election as well as Biden's replacement, Kamala Harris, but Duncan even made an appearance at the Democratic National Convention, begging voters to "dump Trump."

In January 2025, the Georgia Republican Party formally expelled Duncan, prohibiting him from entering party events or property, banning him from running for state office again as a Republican, and expunging its endorsements of his previous campaigns.

By mid-September, Duncan had fully transitioned into a donkey, declaring his candidacy to run for Georgia governor as Democrat in 2026.

It didn't go well.

In the Democratic primary on Tuesday, Duncan finished a humiliating fourth, garnering just 7% of the total vote.

Trump, meanwhile, claimed victory after victory Tuesday night as his preferred candidates in Georgia, Alabama, Idaho, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Oregon either won their races outright or at least advanced to an upcoming runoff.

[Herman]

The American trucking industry has been plagued by companies that rack up safety violations and penalties, then shut down and quickly reopen under a new identity to evade regulatory enforcement and hide poor safety records. Such companies have become known as chameleon carriers.

But the Department of Transportation is taking action to prevent chameleon-carrier fraud by rolling out a new, modernized registration system.

The DOT and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced on Tuesday the live launch of Motus, a system that "replaces a decades-old network of loosely connected applications rife with fraud, waste, and abuse."

FMCSA Administrator Derek Barrs called Motus "a major advancement."

"This system improves efficiency for legitimate carriers while strengthening FMCSA's ability to detect fraud, improve data quality, and identify unsafe operators," Barrs stated.

The previous "fractured" registration system allowed bad actors to easily exploit loopholes and "game the system," according to the DOT.

"This outdated registration system operates on a low-barrier, minimal-validation framework — making it alarmingly simple for fraudsters to register as motor carriers. All they needed was an email, name, and physical address," the DOT stated.

The department estimated that there are "several thousand suspicious registration numbers tied to fraudulent carriers."

The DOT's new unified registration system will rely on biometrics and data analytics to verify the identities of carrier applicants. Motus mandates identity verification protocols, such as government-issued identification and digital facial scans.

[Herman]

Germany's AfD leader Alice Weidel: "We will leave the European Union. We will send back illegal immigrants and increase border security."