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Utah Supreme Court has ruled a lawsuit alleging state lawmakers illegally nullified an anti-gerrymandering initiative passed by voters in 2018 can move forward, Court documents filed Thursday show.

Proposition 4 demanded that an independent redistricting commission be created that would draw district lines non-partisanly.

But the Utah legislature then passed Senate Bill 200, which diminished the redistricting commission to nothing more than an advisory role and continued allowing lawmakers to draw their own districts.

The League of Women Voters and the Mormon Women for Ethical Government responded with a lawsuit saying the newly drawn maps were illegal.

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The legislature tried to block the case, a decision that went to the top court in the state.

The Campaign Legal Center, which represents the petitioners in the case, called out the state asselmbly members, saying the case, "exemplifies how a ruling political party can skew the electoral process by 'cracking' voters from the minority party into multiple congressional districts to dilute their voting power."

They asked that the courts block the maps for the next election.

“When Utahns exercise their right to reform the government through a citizen initiative, their exercise of these rights is protected from government infringement,” the court ruled unanimously.

“Although the Legislature has authority to amend or repeal statutes, it is well settled that legislative action cannot unduly infringe or restrain the exercise of constitutional rights,” the opinion continues.

Read the full opinion here.

A senior official from former President Donald Trump's administration just made an ominous threat to the immigrant community during a recent gathering of far-right political activists.

Semafor reporter Dave Weigel reported that during the National Conservatism conference (also known as "NatCon") in Washington, D.C., several of the speakers eagerly expressed how they would help the former president accomplish his goal of pursuing vengeance against his political opponents if elected to a second term. During one panel, Tom Homan – who was director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Trump's Department of Homeland Security – suggested he was already working behind the scenes to make Trump's promise to deport millions of immigrants as draconian as possible.

"Trump comes back in January, I’ll be on his heels coming back, and I will run the biggest deportation force this country has ever seen,” Homan said. “They ain’t seen s— yet. Wait until 2025.”

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As the New York Times reported last year, one key plank of Trump's second-term policy agenda is the rounding up and detainment of undocumented immigrants on an unprecedented scale. Trump immigration advisor Stephen Miller — an outed white nationalist — previously suggested Trump would deport approximately 10 million immigrants during a second term. Earlier this year, Ronald Brownstein — a senior editor for the Atlantic — tweeted excerpts from a speech Miller gave to National Rifle Association activists about how Trump would create “standing facilities” to detain immigrants by the thousands “where planes are moving off the runway constantly.”

Deporting millions of immigrants in a short number of years would likely be a major blow to the economy and result in significant price hikes for Americans. New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman, Charlie Savage and Jonathan Swan reported last month that it's likely "production falls and labor costs go up" in the event of mass deportations.

"For example, if farmers could not find enough workers to pick all their crops, there would be a smaller supply of produce and it would get more expensive," they wrote. "And businesses would be forced to offer higher wages to attract or retain workers — passing on some of their higher costs to consumers."

According to Weigel, the NatCon audience that met at the Capital Hilton in D.C. consisted of "Trump administration veterans mingled with conservative writers and think tankers who had conquered the old 'Bush-Romney' Republican Party." Attendees reportedly viewed Trump as "a conquering hero who’d have a confident, well-trained movement behind him next year," and NatCon speakers often echoed Trump's promises to use the force of the federal government to punish Trump's enemies.

READ MORE: Trump will 'reignite' inflation with 'fiscally irresponsible' policy: Nobel economists

In a segment featuring former Trump attorney John Eastman (author of the so-called "Eastman Memo" that outlined the plot to disrupt Congress' certification of the 2020 Electoral College count), the now-disbarred lawyer proposed punishing federal judges who ruled against Trump in his unsuccessful election litigation.

"We’ve got to start impeaching these judges for acting in such an unbelievably partisan way from the bench," Eastman said, just a week after the six conservatives on the Supreme Court ruled that presidents are free to break the law as long as it's deemed an official act.

John Yoo, who was a top DOJ official in former George W. Bush's administration, also encouraged political reprisal under a second Trump administration. He specifically called on Republican prosecutors to be Trump's political foot soldiers should he win in November.

"People who have used this tool against people like John [Eastman] or President Trump have to be prosecuted by Republican or conservative DAs in exactly the same way, for exactly the same kinds of things, until they stop," Yoo said.

READ MORE: Conservative admits Trump's policies 'would result in price spikes' for most Americans

The Florida social club where Donald Trump, a convicted felon and former president, stands accused of illegally storing official classified documents is raking in cash with ramped up prices that grants patrons the privilege of easy-access sycophancy, a new analysis finds.

Mar-a-Lago has taken in $4.7 million from candidates and political committees since Trump left the White House in 2021 and bumped its initiation fee from $100,000 to $600,000, the New York Times reported Wednesday.

Mar-a-Lago reported $22 million net profits in 2022, with new club members paying about $12 million to join, according to the report.

Fred Rustmann, a former club member and current Trump supporter, told the Times he left because of the new the vibe these new patrons brought.

“[The clientele] started to change to people who were kissing his butt all the time,” Rustmann said. “There was a lot of hand-shaking, and applause, and everybody stands up, and wow-wow-wow.”

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Mar-a-Lago’s roughly 500 members aren’t the only people paying through the nose to gain access to the gilded Palm Beach club, according to the report.

Trump’s club reported $11 million in profits from food and beverage operations with customers that include the Republican Party of Palm Beach County, according to the Times.

The local party group reportedly paid $318,000 for is 2023 Lincoln Day dinner, up from $158,000 in inflation-adjusted dollars seven years earlier, the Times reports.

“You can’t ask for a better venue,” said Michael Barnett, chairman of the county G.O.P. until 2023. “We would never consider going anywhere else.”

This influx of big cash stands in stark contrast to Mar-a-Lago’s state of financial affairs in 2012, when records reportedly show it was losing money.

“Its profits began to climb as Mr. Trump entered politics,” the Times reports. “They hit a peak in 2017, as the club added new customers — including the U.S. government, which paid for bedrooms used by Secret Service agents and liquor drunk by Mr. Trump’s aides — without losing its existing ones, like the charities that rented out the club’s ballrooms for fund-raiser galas.”

Visuals in the stunning Times report show a bill for more than $1,000 in liquor charges paid by the U.S. Department of State in 2017.

The money buys Mar-a-Lago attendees and guests front row seats for a parade of Trump adoration and praise.

Speakers and guests call Trump “greatest president” “since Abraham Lincoln,” hand him awards, profess their love and sing him songs, the Times notes.

Guests include conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec, white nationalist Laura Loomer, powerful politicians such as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), reality television stars and convicted felon Roger Stone.

The Times’ readers professed themselves stunned by the report.

“Mar-A-Lago comes across as more of a carnival rather than an exclusive club,” commented reader Belinda. “And Trump is the carnival barker.”

“This is what Germany in the 30s would have been like if they had social media,” added a Times reader from Secaucus. “God help us if [T]rump wins.”

Just like the other gangsters and autocrats he compared himself to, [Trump] has judges and justices on his payroll, but it’s indirect and untraceable,” Steve Ell commented. “The taxpayer end up responsible for the bill.”

Donald Trump’s former aide Hope Hicks could be the key to bringing his effort to appeal his hush money conviction crashing down, a former federal prosecutor said.

Legal analyst Joyce Vance said evidence from Hicks presented in his trial is likely not covered by a recent Supreme Court ruling that Trump’s team is expected to rely on to overturn his conviction on falsifying business record charges.

Trump was scheduled to be sentenced Thursday, but Judge Juan Merchan agreed to delay it until September to consider the impact of the Supreme Court’s ruling that presidents have immunity from prosecution for official acts while in office.

But Vance, speaking on the Cafe Insider podcast, said Hicks’ testimony, given during a tearful appearance in the witness box, would likely not be affected.

Hicks had been a Trump Organization employee long before Trump became president, and a lot of her core evidence involved that time, Vance said.

She added that evidence was central to the conviction.

ALSO READ: Hope Hicks bursts into tears on witness stand in Trump hush money trial

"It'll be hard to say prosecutors didn't ask the jury to rely on that evidence,” she said. "So I think the better argument for the government here is that it's just not evidence of official acts. And you know, Hope Hicks is in a really unique position because she was not a White House assistant who went to work for the president, she traveled with Donald Trump."

"She was involved in the initial acts here where the decision was made that Stormy Daniels would be paid off," she added. "She was around for the whole Michael Cohen thing, and so I think the government has a great argument that this is just transferring pre-presidency Donald Trump — candidate Trump — into the White House."

"I mean, when Donald Trump writes checks to pay his utilities in Trump Tower, if he does that while he's sitting in the White House, that doesn't make it an official act just because of where he's sitting or who he has a conversation with or gives the check to," she said. "So I think the prosecution has a strong argument here."

Former Tea Party congressman turned anti-Trump activist Joe Walsh raised the alarm about Project 2025 on CNN Wednesday morning with anchor Sara Sidner.

Project 2025, a policy blueprint crafted by the ultra-right-wing Heritage Foundation with the help of people who previously served in the Trump administration, calls for the total replacement of the federal civil service with an ideological army that will do the GOP's bidding, along with the enshrinement of Christian nationalism in law and the abolition or defunding of a wide range of federal programs, from Social Security and Medicare to military family benefits to public transportation grants.

Trump has lately sought to distance himself from the proposal, but make no mistake, Walsh warned — it's his plan.

"Joe, do you think that this sort of extreme plan ... called Project 2025, it's actually the true blueprint of what Donald Trump wants to do, and he's just trying to soften it ... for the general election?" asked Sidner.

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"Absolutely," said Walsh. "It's a wishlist, but it's a wishlist coming from Donald Trump and the Republican Party."

The Heritage Foundation, Walsh continued, is getting too much credit for its role in all this.

"This is what the Republican Party voters want. Project 2025 is all about ending our democracy and making the president a king and a dictator. If you read all of it, Sara, it's all about strengthening the president, giving the president control, but complete control, over the Justice Department and the FBI, most every aspect of the executive branch, it is utterly un-American.

"But no, this isn't the Heritage Foundation. This is exactly what Donald Trump has promised that he wants."

"He wants to be a dictator, a strongman, a king," he added. "And this is what Republican base voters have said they want."

Watch the video below or at the link here.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

The far-right House Freedom Caucus' troubles might only just be getting started.

The infamous group, known for its firebrand politics, suffered an earthquake this week after Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH) was booted from membership, quickly followed by the resignation of Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX). But according to Politico's Olivia Beavers, another member, Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC), thinks more departures could be coming soon.

"The House Freedom Caucus is facing a watershed moment, as several internal clashes risk ripping the group apart," wrote Beavers, noting that some members expect more resignations in protest of the Davidson removal. Speaking to reporters about the possibility of these resignations, Norman said, “I’m sure we’ll have some. We’ve got a lot of issues to address.”

The House GOP's razor-thin majority, earned after a surprising underperformance from expectations in the 2022 midterms, left the Freedom Caucus with an unusually high amount of power over the Republican caucus, as leadership can only afford to lose a small handful of votes on any party-line issue.

Freedom Caucus members played a key role in ousting former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) from power last year, even though a majority of the group's members voted against vacating him. Other drama from the group in recent years included the expulsion of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) over concerns about her being too close to House GOP leadership, with whom members routinely clash.

This week's departures come shortly after the group's chair, Rep. Bob Good (R-VA), went down in his primary against a Trump-endorsed candidate who was present at the Jan. 6 attack, contributing even further to the chaos within the group.

The Freedom Caucus' continued power is heavily dependent on Republicans retaining control of the House in this year's election, where Democrats have long been thought to have a good chance at reclaiming the majority but whose fortunes may be tied to President Joe Biden's performance at the top of the ticket.