Raw Story

"Never Back Down," the Super PAC supporting Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' presidential campaign, is, in fact, backing down, quitting its door-knocking operations in four key primary states as both the campaign and PAC struggle with money and former President Donald Trump's dominance in the polls.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is warning all 19 defendants, including Donald Trump, in her case alleging racketeering and numerous other charges of election subversion that invoking Georgia’s “speedy trial” law but demanding to have their cases tried individually instead of en masse will bring consequences and deprive them of valuable advantages.

Willis’ goal is to have one trial for all 19 defendants in October.

Attorneys Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesebro have already requested to have their cases severed from the group. Chesebro’s trial is now scheduled for October 23, as The Messenger reports.

But The Messenger’s senior legal correspondent Adam Klasfeld adds, “Willis wants to advise all of the defendants in the Trump racketeering case that decisions by Ken Chesebro and Sidney Powell to invoke speedy trial rights come with certain consequences.”

Those consequences, based on Georgia law, according to a legal filing Klasfeld posted, include four constraints on the ability to demand discovery materials and call witnesses:

“Defendants cannot now argue that they are entitled to the State’s discovery responses ten (10) days in advance of trial.”

“Defendants cannot now argue that they are entitled to notice of the State’s similar transaction evidence ten (10) days in advance of trial.”

“Defendants are now precluded from calling any witnesses whose statements were not provided to the State at least ten (10) days in advance of trial.”

“Defendants cannot now complain that they received less than seven (7) days notice of the trial date in this case.”

Klasfeld notes, “Willis prompts the defendants to choose their paths in light of these consequences: ‘Should they refuse to waive their speedy trial demand and request a continuance, then any harm to the Defendants would be invited by the Defense and, therefore, not reversible error.'”

Over at The Messenger, Klasfeld writes that Willis’ office has asked the judge “to issue a ruling requiring ‘that the defendants personally place upon the record that this is their decision and preference to proceed in this fashion prior to the trial of the case.’”

Jared Kushner should be subpoenaed by the House Oversight Committee over a $2 billion deal his company made with Saudi Arabia, Democrats said Thursday.

In a letter to committee chairman James Comer (R-Ky), the group's leading Democrat Jamie Raskin (Md) asked that records relating to the deal be released for scrutiny, The Messenger reported.

Kushner, the son-in-law of Donald Trump and a senior advisor in the former president's administration, received a $2 billion investment from the Saudi Public Investment Fund, which is controlled by the country's government, on behalf of his company, Affinity Partners. The payment was made six months after he left the White House.

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During his tenure working for Trump, Kushner had worked on a peace deal between Israel and Palestine.

The committee has most recently been mired in an investigation into the business dealings of Hunter Biden, and if they involved his father, President Joe Biden.

Raskin and other House Democrats want to find out if “the investment was tied to Mr. Kushner’s pro-Saudi policies while in office," the letter said.

Even Comer has said in the past that Kushner's deal with the Saudis was suspect.

“I’ve been vocal that I think that what Kushner did crossed the line of ethics,” Comer said to CNN earlier this month.

Karl Rove, the famed Republican political advisor nicknamed "The Architect" by his party, has given an eviscerating anti-endorsement to GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy,

A discussion about transgender athletes on Twitter descended into a heated spat between former collegiate swimmer Riley Gaines and commentator Keith Olbermann. On Wednesday evening, Nebraska State Sen. Megan Hunt called out Gov. Jim Pillen for signing an Executive Order to establish a “Women’s Bill of Rights.” The legislation states firm definitions for “men” and […]

After the Supreme Court eliminated the rights outlined in Roe v. Wade and "left it up to the states" to decide regulations, citizens have gathered signatures to bring ballot measures allowing voters to decide what their state laws should be.

But the right-wing has responded by trying to twist the language on the ballot to intentionally "undermine" and confuse voters, reported "News From the States."

Ohio, where a recent ballot measure that tried to raise the threshold for future ballot initiatives to succeed was defeated, came under fire for using "deceptive" language. But is isn't the only state where ballot language is confusing, leading to lawsuits.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to run for office?

"In recent weeks, officials in Missouri — where another abortion-rights measure is at issue — and Idaho also have been accused in lawsuits of seeking to thwart citizen initiatives they oppose by using biased and negative ballot language to describe the issue to voters," said the report.

"Arkansas last year saw a similar court fight after a state board rejected a proposed ballot measure that had gained the required number of signatures, claiming the ballot language didn’t explain the issue in enough detail."

Interest groups that support direct democracy think this is part of the larger war to remove ballot initiatives as an option for the citizenry.

States Newsroom has revealed that over the past several years, states have tried to crack down on laws that regulate ballot initiatives, adding extra requirements before it makes it to the ballot.

In recent years, a slew of states have imposed more onerous signature requirements or raised the threshold for voter approval above a simple majority, among other steps. It’s no coincidence that in all four of the states where controversies over ballot language have flared most prominently, Republican lawmakers have tried other tacks — so far unsuccessfully — to restrict ballot measures more broadly, the report said.

Even if the new language is thrown out by the court, the process has already added expense to those supporting the ballot measure, the report said. Some states can't issue ballots at all if there is pending litigation.

“This has been an escalating effort to attack ballot titles,” said Sarah Walker, director of legal and policy advocacy at the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center. “It’s just more of a long trajectory of efforts to undermine the will of the voters. And it shows how far politicians who are out of step with voters are willing to go to consolidate their power.”

Kevin Johnson, executive director of Election Reformers Network, explained to News From The States that a partisan secretary of state has the power to "completely distort public understanding of a ballot question."

In Missouri, for example, the Republican secretary of state, Jay Ashcroft, wrote the ballot measure asking voters if they want to protect “dangerous, unregulated, and unrestricted abortions, from contraception to live birth.” The title goes so far as to ask voters if they want to “nullify longstanding Missouri law protecting the right to life.”

The Missouri state legislature went further, trying to pass a Republican bill that requires 57 percent approval for a ballot initiative, instead of a simple majority. It hasn't passed, but they plan to try again next year.

Republicans tried the same thing in Ohio where the secretary of state described Issue 1 as a measure that would “elevate the standards” for constitutional amendments, News From The States reported.

Read more about the states and their tactics from News From The States.