THE SHOW NOTES: The No Labels Shtick, The Populist Uprising in Suburbia, & The Climate Witch Trials
BREAKING: The Southern Baptist Convention just voted to deem Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church “not in friendly cooperation.” Messengers from the church will not be allowed to participate in voting at the Convention.
HEADLINE: Bud Light loses title as top-selling beer. - CNN
NEW: How Tobacco Companies Are Crushing ESG Ratings - Free Beacon
Queering Jesus: How It's Going Mainstream at Progressive Churches and Top Divinity Schools - RCP
MUST WATCH: Biden HHS threatens to withhold funds to hospitals that won’t offer transition surgeries for kids. - Twitter
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The Arraignment
Special Council Jack Smith was in the Miami courtroom when Donald Trump made his appearance, marking the first time both men have met face to face. Trump pleaded not guilty to dozens of charges related to possessing and concealing classified documents.
The courtroom process largely followed the expected procedure with no phones or cameras allowed inside. Trump left the courtroom and jumped right back on the campaign trail taking selfies and signing paraphernalia in a well-known Cuban restaurant in Miami before departing for New Jersey.
Related: Biden ordered the White House team, his reelection team, and the DNC to remain silent over the Trump indictment.
Pence: “Having read the indictment, these are very serious allegations. And I can’t defend what is alleged. But the President is entitled to his day in court, he’s entitled to bring a defense, and I want to reserve judgment until he has the opportunity to respond.”
Haley: "If this indictment is true, if what it says is actually the case, President Trump was incredibly reckless with our national security"
DeSantis: "As a naval officer, if I would have taken classified [documents] to my apartment, I would have been court-martialed in a New York minute… Is there a different standard for a Democrat secretary of state versus a former Republican president?… I think there needs to be one standard of justice in this country. Let's enforce it on everybody and make sure we all know the rules. You can't have one faction of society weaponizing the power of the state against factions that it doesn't like and that's what you see."
No Labels, No Biden
No Labels is a centrist political organization working to gain ballot access for a moderate third-party presidential candidate under the working assumption that Donald Trump and Joe Biden are historically unpopular options. Earlier this week a poll was released supporting this premise claiming Trump and Biden have an equally appalling 31% approval rating.
This moderate group is unnerving Democrats who are increasingly panicked that a third-party candidate could elect Donald Trump. Because of this, an off-the-record DC meeting took place where prominent Democrats and anti-Trump Republicans came together for a confidential discussion, aiming to develop a strategy that would counteract the aforementioned group.
Gavin Newsom's shadow campaign for President
Democratic governors don't tend to jump at the chance for a sit-down interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News. They also don’t tend to do tours of states they consider hostile to their own, like Florida.
But then there's California's Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom. He prefers the national stage to dealing with the rampant dysfunction happening in his own state. And while Newsom claims he isn't running for president, the evidence suggests he actually is. True, Newsom may not be mounting a primary campaign against a sitting president of his own party who has announced he is running again. But Newsom is clearly running a shadow campaign just in case President Joe Biden doesn't fulfill his pledge to become the Democratic 2024 presidential nominee.
Read the full story at The Washington Examiner.
Ukraine Advances
Pressure is beginning to mount (paywall) on the Ukrainian military to make substantial progress in its widely anticipated military offensive in southern Ukraine after Western leaders funded the war-torn country with multiple rounds of billion-dollar military assistance packages. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters, “everybody’s hopeful that, you know, you’d see overwhelming success.”
All signs point to early progress being made in Ukraine’s southern region which is currently occupied by Russian forces. As growing dissent between Russia’s military and the Wagner Group intensifies, an opening appears to be taking shape that Ukrainian forces can capitalize upon.
The Wall Street Journal (paywall) has an exclusive interview of a captured Russian soldier who surrendered to a Ukrainian drone. The liquor store manager turned soldier was forcibly drafted by the military and thrown into the battle of