Author: nick

[ad_1] From Judge Donald Middlebrooks (S.D. Fla.) in Ahmed v. Dist. Bd. of Trs. for Indian River State Coll., decided June 17 but just posted on Westlaw (appeal pending): According to the First Amended Complaint (“FAC”), Plaintiff Syed Ammar Ahmed … is a practicing Muslim of Pakistani descent who served as an adjunct instructor at IRSC from 2019 until his termination on March 1, 2024. IRSC informed Plaintiff that he was being terminated based on a purported “security alert” indicating that he appeared on an “FDLE Homeland Security database” for “terrorist threats.” Plaintiff alleges that no such database exists and…

Read More

[ad_1] The United States Marine Corps has quietly placed its first production order for a fleet of fully autonomous ground vehicles that can navigate battlefields, plot their own routes, and execute resupply missions without a human behind the wheel. This is no longer science fiction. Under a $19.7 million production award issued through the Pentagon’s Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies program, Seattle-based Overland AI will deliver more than a dozen autonomous ground vehicles to the Marine Corps by early 2027, marking the first time a ground autonomy company has served as the prime contractor for a production contract…

Read More

[ad_1] In a scathing decision issued on Monday, a federal judge in Florida ruled that President Donald Trump’s January 29 lawsuit against the IRS was nothing more than a pretext for a “settlement agreement” granting him, his family, and his supporters huge favors at the expense of U.S. taxpayers. The plaintiffs and the defendants “worked in tandem and were never actually adverse,” writes U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams, who ordered sanctions against Trump’s lawyers. “Because this fact was so obvious and so insurmountable, the Court finds that this matter was brought for an improper purpose—to gain the imprimatur of judicial…

Read More

[ad_1] Not long after announcing the sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs in April 2025, President Donald Trump claimed the taxes on imports would be good news for American small businesses. “I’m proud to be the president for the workers, not the outsourcers—the president who stands up for Main Street, not Wall Street,” Trump said in a speech to the National Republican Congressional Committee. A recent survey of small businesses by the Federal Reserve tells a very different story. Small businesses were “particularly challenged by higher tariffs in 2025,” reports the Federal Reserve of New York, drawing on last year’s annual Small…

Read More

[ad_1] Great moments in unintended consequences—when something that sounds like a great idea goes horribly wrong. Watch the whole series. The year: 2010. The problem: Yosemite National Park’s popular Half Dome trail is crowded, and people are getting hurt! The solution: Institute a lottery system, cutting the number of hikers from 1,000 per day to just 250—reducing congestion on the trail to improve safety! Sounds like a great idea, with the best of intentions. What could possibly go wrong? Turns out: When permits become scarce, caution becomes optional. Getting a permit became so difficult that when lucky hikers finally got one,…

Read More

[ad_1] Amid growing speculation about Mitch McConnell’s health after he spent weeks out of the public eye following a hospitalization, the Republican Kentucky senator’s office released a statement and image July 12. The image shows McConnell wearing jeans and a red checkered shirt, supported by pillows, alongside his wife, Elaine Chao, and holding a newspaper in his right hand.   Statement From Senator Mitch McConnellWASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) released the following note to constituents regarding his hospitalization and recovery:“To my fellow Kentuckians – “When you elected me to a seventh term and made me our… pic.twitter.com/kfx2GKqd38— CSPAN…

Read More

[ad_1] NA My Cato Institute colleagues Scott Lincicome, Alfredo Carrillo Obregon, and Chad Smitson have a helpful post updating the situation on refunds for Trump’s illegally imposed IEEPA tariffs. In February, the IEEPA tariffs were invalidated by the Supreme Court, in a case I helped bring and litigate (along with the Liberty Justice Center, and others). But before that happened, the Trump administration collected some $166 billion in illegally collected tariffs. As Lincicome, Obregon, and Smitson  (LOS) explain, there has been important progress getting refunds for the importers who were illegally forced to pay, but serious problems remain: Here’s where…

Read More

[ad_1] National self-sufficiency beats globalism’s mass dependency. What makes a nation wealthy?  It’s not just arable lands surrounded by other lands filled with water, timber, coal, gas, oil, metals, and minerals.  It’s the farmer who knows best how to cultivate those lands in order to maximize food production.  It’s the woodsman, miner, fisherman, and oilman who can extract nature’s bounty and provide the raw materials for every kind of manufacturer.  Producing things requires knowledge and skill.  Competition between producers creates an incentive to innovate.  This motor of discovery — in which human ingenuity uses established knowledge and long-harnessed skills as inputs for creating new forms…

Read More