In this Federalist Society America250 series, experts analyze modern legal and policy debates through the lens of the Founding generation. The Founders gave us the tools to answer many contemporary questions; join us as we explore those answers.

During the constitutional convention, Alexander Hamilton raised the idea of a presidential pardon power, borrowing from the British monarchy’s prerogative of mercy. Hamilton’s proposal ultimately resulted in Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, which gives the president the authority to pardon individuals convicted of a federal crime.

The first presidential pardon was exercised by George Washington in 1795, when he granted amnesty to individuals who participated in Pennsylvania’s Whiskey Rebellion. Since then, there have been more than 14,000 instances of presidential pardons. From Andrew Johnson’s pardon of Jefferson Davis to Gerald Ford’s preemptive pardon of Richard Nixon to more recent instances including Joe Biden’s preemptive pardon of Hunter Biden and Donald Trump’s January 6th pardons, presidents’ use – and sometimes purported abuse – of the power has been a controversial and fiercely debated executive authority throughout our nation’s history.

Join our panel of experts as they explore the Founders’ views of the pardon power and place recent use in context with the founding generation.

Featuring:

• Paul J. Larkin, Senior Legal Fellow, Advancing American Freedom
• Andrew McCarthy, Senior Fellow, National Review Institute; Contributing Editor, National Review
• James Trusty, Member, Ifrah Law
• (Moderator) Jeffrey DeSousa, Florida Office of the Attorney General 

MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — The far-right Alternative for Germany was projected to win a strong victory in a regional election Sunday, but it wasn’t immediately clear whether it would be able to fulfill its ambition of forming the country’s first far-right state government since World War II.

The party’s 35-year-old charismatic candidate for governor of the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt hailed what he called a historic showing and said that Germany’s unpopular leader, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, had helped his campaign.

Ulrich Siegmund told ARD public broadcaster that “we have written history.” Voters, he said, had sent a signal that “things cannot carry on like this.”

It was “also a signal toward Berlin,” Siegmund said. Of Germany’s leader, he added: “A very good campaigner for us in this election campaign was Friedrich Merz. Every day this man is in the chancellery is one too many.”

Alternative for Germany, or AfD, went into the vote seeking an absolute majority in the state legislature to govern on its own. That would overcome the so-called firewall of mainstream parties’ refusal to work with AfD, but it was unclear after polls closed whether it would happen.

A first state government would be the biggest prize in the anti-migration party’s 13-year history, at a time of widespread discontent with an unpopular national government that has yet to persuade voters that it can get the country’s sluggish economy moving.

Whether or not AfD can form a government, the projected result is a blow to Merz, whose center-right party has led Saxony-Anhalt for 24 years. Unlike other countries in Europe, modern Germany hasn’t yet had a far-right or right-wing populist party leading a national, state or major-city government.

AfD’s regional branch in Saxony-Anhalt is one of several classified by the domestic intelligence agency as a proven right-wing extremist group. AfD vehemently rejects accusations of extremism.

Projections for ARD and ZDF public television, based on exit polls and early counting, put AfD at around 44% of the vote, more than double its showing five years ago in the region of 2.1 million people west of Berlin.

That was far ahead of the Christian Democratic Union, the center-right party of Merz that has led the state for 24 years, which was seen polling 18.5% and losing about half its support. The Left Party and the center-left Social Democrats and Greens were seen taking around 9% each.

It was unclear whether the BSW party would get the 5% of the vote needed to win seats. The projections put AfD at least marginally short of an absolute majority, though that could change.

AfD’s national co-leader, Alice Weidel, described the projected result as “sensational” and said that “we have received a very clear mandate to govern here.” The party’s “hand is outstretched to all who want to make Saxony-Anhalt better and move Germany forward,” she said.

A visibly disappointed incumbent governor, Sven Schulze, congratulated AfD on becoming the state’s strongest political force and said that “we as the CDU will also have to deal with this result,” without specifying how.

Franziska Hoppermann, the national general secretary of Merz’s party, said that it was “a very difficult result for us.” She and others rejected the idea of backing off their refusal to deal with AfD.

Germany’s 16 states have extensive powers, for example in overseeing security matters and running the education system.

Siegmund has listed among his top priorities “the deportation of people who are illegal, a deportation offensive and above all dropping the incentives for why people come here and exploit our social system.” He wants to initiate a long process to withdraw Saxony-Anhalt from the regional public broadcaster, citing concerns about “disinformation.”

AfD in Saxony-Anhalt wants to allow home schooling, which so far isn’t permitted in Germany. It pledges to ban schools from officially raising the rainbow flag and ensure they fly the national flag. It opposes taxpayers’ money being “given away” to Ukraine and says it would push to lift sanctions against Russia, but that isn’t a matter state governments can decide.

___

Geir Moulson reported from Berlin.

https://t.co/oLWg9pr3n4 pic.twitter.com/XQU9AtxbYc— ABC News (@ABC) September 5, 2026

Iran lacks the capacity to replace these tankers, and lacks the resources to buy them. Those attacks on American targets are carrying a high long-term cost for the IRGC without any corresponding benefit.

Strategic patience for the win? Iran’s regime leaders thought they could force the US to buckle by strangling the global economy at the Strait of Hormuz. The US, however, has an actual blue-water navy, and that tends to matter in blockades involving a country entirely reliant on sea trade for its only valuable export economy.

As the Wall Street Journal concedes, Donald Trump’s Hormuz blockade is a lot less “leaky” than the IRGC’s. And as Trump himself pointed out yesterday, the Strait may not matter for very much longer anyway:

By squeezing the Strait of Hormuz, both the U.S. and Iran expected to outlast their foe, believing time would work in their favor.

Now, it looks like the trend is moving against Tehran.

The U.S. naval blockade has prevented Iran from shipping any oil from the Persian Gulf since July. At the same time, despite Iranian drone and missile attacks, Washington has been able to assist Gulf Arab states in moving significant amounts of their crude through the waterway, keeping global oil prices from surging above critical levels.

Talk about a bad bet. The IRGC may have convinced itself that Trump would buckle out of domestic political pressures, not to mention diplomatic pushes from Gulf states concerned about attacks on their own energy infrastructure. And for a few months, anyway, that position looked accurate. Qatar, Pakistan, and Turkey – and at times, Saudi Arabia and the UAE – pushed Trump into fruitless negotiations with the IRGC, which not only went nowhere but changed nothing even when agreements did get reached. 

In July, Trump stopped talking about deals. Instead, he started talking about increasing the blockade, and eventually expanded the economic warfare into Scott Bessent’s “economic D-Day.” Qatar, Turkey, and Pakistan are still trying to get the band back together in Islamabad, but Trump has made clear this week that he has no interest. 

The WSJ reports on the results of the IRGC’s bet, at least at the moment:

But now it is clear that Tehran’s calculation six months ago, as it shut down the Strait of Hormuz and bottled up one-fifth of the world’s crude oil supply, proved erroneous. The move didn’t trigger a worldwide economic crisis or force President Trump to end the war on Iranian terms. …

For now, however, Iran’s leverage over the Strait of Hormuz is slowly but surely being eroded by the U.S. military campaign in the region. Crude oil prices remain below $100 a barrel on international markets, elevated but well below the critical threshold for the global economy. In part, this was due to China drawing on domestic reserves and reducing imports.

It isn’t just about oil, of course. Shipments of liquefied natural gas, fertilizers and other commodities also remain stuck in the Gulf, choking the economies of Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq and Bahrain—nations that don’t have alternative sea outlets.

That’s true – for now. However, the al-Sharaa government in Syria stepped up this week to declare itself open for business in oil distribution. With Syria starting to stabilize in its post-Assad era, al-Sharaa wants to bring investors into his country to turn it into a pipeline for the western Gulf nations to the Mediterranean. Naturally, Donald Trump has enthusiastically endorsed the idea:

US President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that Syria acting as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz would be “great.” This comment was prompted by The Washington Post’s headline, which noted that Syria was “eyeing role as [a] Middle East hub, offers options to bypass Hormuz.” …

There are plans for Syria to serve as a means of transferring oil to the Mediterranean. However, a recent report at Reuters noted that “Iraq’s plans to export oil via a pipeline through Syria to avert future disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz will likely require four years of construction and cost at least $15 billion.” The report added that the idea was receiving “initial support for feasibility studies from a consortium including Chevron.”

Even if the project gets expedited, the construction of a pipeline system will take several years. There are plans to rehabilitate a 1950s-era pipeline and restore it to service, but that won’t happen overnight. However, launching these projects will make clear that Iran’s influence on global economics will be ending sooner or later, with or without a resolution in Hormuz, and most pointedly, whether Iranian crude comes on the market or not. 

The IRGC is running out of options, now and in the future. The US Navy has increased the “leakage” from Iran’s attempted blockage to nearly the normal level of shipping through the Strait, at least for crude. Iran tried to cut a deal with Oman that would eliminate those routes set up by the US Navy, but Trump threatened to make them the next US target if they interfered or attempted to “toll” commercial traffic. Oman caved a couple of days ago:

Oman has quietly rejected Iran’s request to jointly charge service fees on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz, The Post has learned — averting a clash with President Trump, who has threatened to rain down bombs on the US ally.

A high-ranking regional official said that Muscat declined to consent to charging fees — even on a voluntary basis — for environmental and security services, contrary to a statement last week from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The terms of a proposed revenue-sharing deal had not been finalized, even by Tehran, a US official told The Post last week — indicating the IRGC jumped the gun.

The IRGC won’t surrender any time soon, if at all. However, the clock is ticking on their regime, and they know it. As long as Trump maintains his strategic patience, the regime will slowly get strangled to the point where a popular revolt might succeed, especially if the regime’s thugs stop getting compensated. Trump can do this for two more years, by which time the pipeline options might render moot what’s left of Iran’s leverage. The US only needs the political will to maintain strategic patience with the blockade, and the strength to enforce sanctions on the IRGC’s enablers. 

Addendum: Strategic patience does not preclude enforcement of the blockade nor responses to attacks. As Trump warned this week, the US is now applying consequences for Iranian attacks on American targets to its merchant tanker fleet:

BREAKING: U.S. forces “permanently disabled” two Iranian oil tankers and “completely destroyed” another after IRGC launched ballistic missiles toward an American aircraft carrier and destroyer, U.S. Central Command said.

Read more:

https://t.co/oLWg9pr3n4 pic.twitter.com/XQU9AtxbYc— ABC News (@ABC) September 5, 2026

Iran lacks the capacity to replace these tankers, and lacks the resources to buy them. Those attacks on American targets are carrying a high long-term cost for the IRGC without any corresponding benefit.

Ed Morrisey, Hotair

Veteran Democratic strategist James Carville said the Democratic Party faces an ideological “reckoning” in 2028 but rejected the idea that primary voters will choose a democratic socialist presidential nominee.

Speaking on “Saturday in America,” Carville offered his prediction of how Democratic voters will approach the party’s 2028 presidential primary.

“The reckoning will be in a nominating process for the nominee of the Democratic Party in 2028. This has to be taken to Democratic voters,” Carville said while discussing recent victories by candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

I don’t agree. I say Carville is out of touch, living in his more glorious professional past of 35 years ago. Today’s Democrat voters are fine with anything that’s not Republican. They associate Republicans with liberty, free markets, fiscal solvency, low taxes, law and order, a strong military, and low regulations. In practice, most Republicans practice none of these things, but they pay lip service to these conventional American, rational, Western values — and Democrats LOATHE these things. Perhaps most Republicans (Trump was an exception) don’t stand up (when voting) for anything decent, but most Democrats believe Republicans do — and that’s precisely why they despise Republicans.

Granted: Some of the older Democrats, like Carville, are concerned about the rise of radical (i.e., consistent) socialists, but they have no problem voting even for a Communist if the choice is between a Communist and a MAGA Republican. Carville will not vote for Rubio or Vance in 2028; nor will he stay home. He will vote for AOC, or any Democrat Communist served up. Democrat voters will never, ever turn Republican; they WILL vote for any Communist or fascist or Muslim radical any day, any time, not just over a Trump, but over a Marco Rubio, a J.D. Vance, a Bush, anyone. The younger the Democratic voter, the truer this trend is.

I believe America is on a trajectory to complete socialism, if not Communism, over the next 10-15 years tops. The only question is whether everyone will submit, or whether the whole country will break apart, not just state by state, but county by county and town by town — with probably lots of bloodshed. Not an organized Civil War like the first time; just a disintegration and breaking up. I see this as plain as if it’s already happening, because it has already started happening: Observe openly Communist mayors in Seattle, Los Angeles, New York, D.C., Chicago and increasingly in Congress. It starts with the big cities, then the smaller cities, then the purple states and finally the conservative red rural areas. This is not negativity or conjecture. It’s a simple observation of facts developing right before our eyes, daily.

Michael J. Hurd, Daily Dose of Reason

The Democratic Party is radicalized … everywhere. That includes even a reliably Republican state like South Carolina.

Annie Andrews, a rabidly woke pediatrician who suggests you’re not a real doctor unless you support hormonal gender alteration treatments on minors, also favors gun confiscation:

In September 2024, days after a school shooting in Georgia, Andrews went after Gov. Brian Kemp and South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster for supporting gun rights. She said they “continue to prioritize the NRA over our children’s safety” and told them: “You are the bad guys. You are the villains.”

“The lollipops are so the kids will stay quiet during a lockdown, in case you are as dense as you are evil.”

“I hope you see images of bloody school children when you close your eyes at night. I hope you hear their screams… I hope you never get another good night’s sleep.”

Where does her Republican opponent, Darline Graham, stand on gun rights? Anybody’s guess. But there’s no doubt where the Communist totalitarians stand.

If a deep red state like South Carolina sends a monster like Annie Andrews to the U.S. Senate, then America is in bigger trouble than you think.

Michael J. Hurd, Daily Dose of Reason

The Wolverines had 276 yards on 48 plays, but committed nine penalties and were just 3-of-10 on third downs.

Had the clock actually expired on the incomplete pass, the first game of coach Kyle Whittingham’s tenure would have been an unmitigated disaster. The former Utah coach hired to clean up the mess left behind by the fired Sherrone Moore has a lot to go through when he watches film with his coaching staff.

Instead, Michigan is, somehow, 1-0.

No. 16 Michigan avoided an upset loss to Western Michigan on Saturday night with a lot of help from instant replay.

Bryce Underwood hit JJ Buchanan for an incredible 47-yard Hail Mary as time expired for a 13-12 win. The pass came after the ball was snapped with one second left after Underwood’s previous Hail Mary appeared to fall incomplete with no time remaining.

After a short review, a second was added back to the clock. And then Buchanan made the catch.

Hours after the game ended, the Big Ten issued a statement saying that the game clock showed there was still 0:01 remaining when Micah Davis touched the ball and provided a video of Davis synced up to the game clock as proof.

Following video review, it was determined Western Michigan’s No. 18 started his jump from an established out-of-bounds position (left foot) and made contact with the ball with one second remaining on the clock,” the statement said. “As shown in the provided video of what was viewed during the replay process, a side-by-side view of the play and the game clock, using a direct shot of the game clock in the stadium, was used to determine the final ruling.

“Eighty-five minutes prior to the game, all broadcast cameras used for the replay system, including the camera on the game clock, are synced using a strobe system to ensure all cameras are aligned.

“Per NCAA Football rule 4-2-3-a: ‘A ball not in player control, other than. Kick that scores a field goal, is out of bounds when it touches the ground, a player, a game official or anything else that is out-of-bound, or that is on or outside a boundary line,’ and thus the clock is stopped.”

A screenshot from the video the Big Ten provided to back up its assertion there was a second remaining

After the Big Ten released it statement, MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher said that his conference also reviewed the footage and agreed with the explanation.

In the immediate aftermath of the play, NBC’s numerous replays of the first Hail Mary showed that the ball was not close to touching Davis until the clock showed 0:00. Rules analyst and former referee Terry McAuley was unable to come up with a concrete explanation for why a second was added to the clock.

The clock on the bottom left shows 0:00. The ball is circled in red.

“The ball isn’t even close to touching the player when it goes to zero,” McAuley said after he told viewers that he was informed that the clock on the bottom left of the screen was the stadium clock and in sync with the replay. “Now their Hawk Eye system apparently either was — had a different sync or whatever and they came up with one second when it touched the players. I don’t see how that happened assuming our clock is correct. It is clearly not touching the player. It is clearly still in the air when the clock goes to zero on our screen. So the Big Ten’s going to have to tell a lot of us how did they get to one second on this play.”

Here’s how the first Hail Mary looked in real time.

The second-chance Hail Mary was Buchanan’s second massive catch of the final drive. He was responsible for all 75 yards on the drive as he caught a 28-yard pass on third down to get Michigan across midfield and put the Wolverines in position to go for the end zone.

Michigan got the ball back for its final drive with 35 seconds to go after Western Michigan kicked a field goal to go up five points. The Broncos’ fourth field goal of the game came after Underwood fumbled while trying to scramble for a first down with 1:40 to go.

That turnover was Michigan’s third of the game and Underwood’s second. He had a rough game and had just 95 passing yards before the final drive.

Western Michigan’s offensive stats weren’t pretty either, but they controlled the clock. The Broncos had just 221 total yards on 67 plays but held onto the ball for just over 40 minutes. WMU was 8-of-18 on third downs and had 16 first downs to Michigan’s 12.

The Wolverines had 276 yards on 48 plays, but committed nine penalties and were just 3-of-10 on third downs.

Had the clock actually expired on the incomplete pass, the first game of coach Kyle Whittingham’s tenure would have been an unmitigated disaster. The former Utah coach hired to clean up the mess left behind by the fired Sherrone Moore has a lot to go through when he watches film with his coaching staff.

Instead, Michigan is, somehow, 1-0.

Nick Bromberg, Yahoo

Democrat U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico spoke of “dismantling” capitalism while dismissing the future of Texas’ oil and gas industry during a 2020 climate forum, newly resurfaced video shows.

The comments, first reported by CNN, came during a virtual candidate forum hosted by the Austin Sierra Club while Talarico was serving his first term in the Texas House.

During the forum, Talarico was asked what lawmakers could do to address the effects of climate change on minority communities.

“I am so thankful that you asked this question, and also thankful that young activists have really drawn the link between climate change and white supremacy and capitalism in our country,” Talarico said.

“And I think only ending the ways that all three of those oppressive systems work together, are we going to be able to begin the process of dismantling them.”

Earlier in the discussion, Talarico described what he called the “multifaceted threat of a climate crisis, an economic crisis, and a social justice crisis.”

He said a “New Deal effort” would be “the only approach to start to address all three in a thoughtful and meaningful way.”

Talarico also questioned the future of the oil and gas industry, comparing Texas’ position as a national energy leader to dominating an obsolete technology.

“We all know that Texas has been a leader in oil and gas, but in many ways that’s like being the leader in cassette tapes in the 1980s,” Talarico said. “That industry is not gonna last.”

Six years later, Talarico is presenting a markedly different message as he campaigns against Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton for U.S. Senate.

His campaign told CNN that Talarico is now a “proud capitalist” who supports the oil and gas industry.

“James is a proud capitalist and agrees with the majority of Texans that racism, natural disasters, and a billionaire-controlled economy are all problems we need to address,” campaign spokesman JT Ennis said.

The Paxton campaign responded to the resurfaced remarks by pointing to Talarico’s comments about both capitalism and the oil and gas industry.

Campaign spokeswoman Madison Cercy said the report “just confirmed what we already knew: James Talarico is a Democratic Socialist who wants to destroy economic opportunity, ban oil and gas, and raise taxes to pay for his radical agenda.”

“Talarico called capitalism an ‘oppressive system’ and said the Texas oil and gas was ‘not gonna last.’ His views and values are completely antithetical to Texas and are a threat to our way of life,” she added.

Texas Scorecard ^ | 9/1/2026 | Brandon Waltens

By Timothy P. Carney, Washington Examiner

American colleges and universities are panicking, for good reason.

Enrollment across all of academia has been dropping for years, and starting now, there will be fewer and fewer college-aged people every year for the forseeable future.

Colleges are scrambling for a way to survive. Big schools are slashing their course offerings. Small schools are making desperate plays to find a niche in a shrinking market.

The bitter irony is this: American colleges and universities brought this crisis on themselves.

The Baby Bust has a thousand causes, but some of the most significant anti-natal cultural and economic trends were created by America’s colleges and universities.

From anti-family feminism to extended adolescence, through unreasonable expectations and mountains of debt, colleges created conditions that put their own survival at risk by turning out graduates who were indisposed to creating the next generation.

In 2007, the public had 4.32 million babies, and a Total Fertility Rate of 2.12 babies per woman — right about the “replacement level” at which a population can hold stable. Since then, the number of babies born has dropped nearly every year, reaching 3.61 million in 2025, giving us a Total Fertility Rate of 1.79.

As a result, there are fewer Americans under 18 than there were a decade ago. We’ve passed Peak Child as a country.

The Baby Bust began 18 years ago, which means that last Spring’s high school graduating class was the largest one for the foreseeable future. Basically, every year for at least the next 18 years, the number of potential college freshmen will fall. The high school class of 2044 will be about 16% smaller than the class of 2026 was.

American colleges and universities are panicking, for good reason.

Enrollment across all of academia has been dropping for years, and starting now, there will be fewer and fewer college-aged people every year for the forseeable future.

Colleges are scrambling for a way to survive. Big schools are slashing their course offerings. Small schools are making desperate plays to find a niche in a shrinking market.

“The Democrat agenda is to legalize crime and criminalize the middle class.” —Stephen Miller

Not to put too fine a point on it: but whenever a lawfare ninja of the Democratic Party utters the phrase “our democracy,” you must know that they are completely full of shit. For sure, they do not mean anything remotely related to an American commonweal, as understood by people of sound mind and good faith. What they mean by “our democracy” is the state as a racketeering operation run for the sole benefit of their party members, along with the ruthless power to annihilate their opponents and critics.

The war-cry “our democracy” only signifies how degenerate they have become. Though they yearn to win control of Congress in these midterm elections by any means necessary, the party’s actual prospects are not so great, having nominated a pack of obvious morons and reprobates such as Abdul el-Sayed (MI), James Talarico (TX), Angie Nixon (FL), Troy Jackson (ME), and Peggy Flanagan (MN) for the US Senate.

Now, it appears that President Donald Trump is determined to clean up our fraud-ridden election process this year, one way or another. Hopes are nearly dead for Congress passing a comprehensive election reform law, the SAVE Act, so he has looked to other measures. One is a procedure for the US Postal Service to match and track mail-in ballots to real persons with actual addresses listed on state voter rolls. The matter is still working through courts. The DOJ’s Civil Rights Division has pledged to send about 1000 election monitors to polling places around the country as “observers,” which could obviate arrant shenanigans like the broken toilet ploy in Fulton County, GA, 2020.

Mr. Trump could go further, as discussed here recently, and declare a National Security Executive Order with more exacting rules such as requiring proof of citizenship and photo ID at the polls, and reporting election results no later than the day following the election. The Democratic Party is fighting desperately to prevent any changes to current procedure with so much room for fraud. The effort is led by chief lawfare ninja Norm Eisen, who is associated with several activist NGOs: the States United Democracy Center (founder); State Democracy Defenders PAC; Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW); the Brookings Institution; plus his own pro bono litigation practice, Norma Eisen PLLC.

Eisen enjoys many millions of dollars in backing that have enabled him to file hundreds of court cases against Trump administration actions, including the recent suits against the US Postal Service mail-in ballot plan. His own NGOs are backed by hundreds of other NGOs both here and globally, many of which have been involved in color revolutions in foreign countries. Eisen himself has played a part in many episodes of the long-running color revolution here in the USA, including RussiaGate, the 2020 fake impeachment, and the Jan-6 House Committee. All that could be described in totality as a seditious coup attempt — and it’s all currently under investigation by several federal grand juries.

Likewise, lawfare ninja Marc Elias, who operates his election activities through Democracy Docket (founder); the Free election Fund; the Democracy Forward Foundation (board chair); We the Action; plus his own firm, the Elias Law Group. He was formerly a lawyer with the DC law firm Perkins Coie, through which he served as general counsel to the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016. He shepherded the Steele Dossier into the Intel apparatus and around the news media.

All that is a prelude to a disturbing roll-out of events that anyone paying attention can see coming this fall. The Democratic Party has massive resources not just to stall and obstruct pre-election reform, but to mount a vicious resistance after the fact if it doesn’t produce their desired result. They could go as far as to repudiate the election, refuse to accept its results. If the president does issue that NatSec EO prior to the election, blue state officials could refuse to hold elections under new rules. Thirty states have already refused to comply with DOJ demands to submit their official voter rolls for evaluation. Some of the aforementioned activist NGOs have promised post-election street actions (demonstrations that could easily turn into riots).

In the face of that, you can foresee the necessity of the president having to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1878 (10 U.S.C. §§ 251–255). The act provides an exception to the Posse Commitatus Act, also 1878, which forbids the use of the US military to act as police inside the USA. Under the Insurrection Act, the president can federalize states’ national guard units to enforce federal law or protect constitutional rights when ordinary civilian means are not enough.

The Act has been used before in our history about thirty times by fifteen presidents, including the Great Railway Strike of 1877 (Pres. Hayes); the Pullman Strike of 1894 (Pres. Cleveland); the Little Rock School Desegregation resistance of 1957 (Pres. Eisenhower sent in the 82nd Airborne). Pres. Lyndon Johnson invoked it three times: the Selma to Montgomery March of 1965; the Detroit riots of 1967; and the riots that followed the Assassination of Martin Luther King, 1968. Pres. George H. W. Bush used it in 1994 to quell the Rodney King Riots in Los Angeles.

If Mr. Trump invokes the Insurrection Act around any violence or organized election rebellion this year, he will invite the Democrats to label him an autocrat, a tyrant, a wannabe king, as they have been taunting him and goading him with for years. Let’s suppose that will be enough to inflame the party’s activists. I think you can see how this lays the groundwork for something that looks like a new civil war. The repudiation of election results by blue states would be enough.

Know this: it won’t work. It will result in charges of sedition and many Democratic officials will be arrested and charged, probably some governors. It will be a really ugly episode in our history, but we’ll get through it. Of course, it will be the end of the Democratic Party.

James Howard Kunstler

October 27, 2019

I flew to NYC at my own expense to give very important testimony to the American people on Maria Bartiromo’s show. I stayed in a hotel near the studio, again at my own expense. This was during the Special Counsel Durham investigation, which I assisted.

I am an eyewitness to the Grand Conspiracy against President Trump, which started in 2015, directed by Obama and implemented by the CIA, MI6, the FBI, and the media.

I spoke to Maria and her producers for weeks in advance to make sure they understood the importance of the story. I was not paid a cent for all the hours I spent on this. It was really important that a major network finally told the truth to the American people.

On the morning of the interview, I was driven by a car arranged by Fox. I had hair and makeup done. The interview was recorded.

Then someone in the Fox leadership ordered that my interview not be aired. After the public outcry, Maria even retweeted the demand for it to be shown. A one-minute extract was then shown weeks later behind the Fox Nation paywall.

The full interview was never aired. Someone blocked it. The presidential election was one year away.

Svetlana Lokhova @RealSLokhova, x.com