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Today in Politics, Bulletin 335. 3/24/26

Ron Filipkowski Mar 24 ∙ Preview

… MN filed a lawsuit against the Trump for withholding evidence in the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, as well as the shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis. They’re seeking court order to force DHS and DOJ to hand over records about each of the shootings.

… MN Star Tribune: “The state of MN has sued the Trump admin, accusing its top law enforcement agencies of withholding evidence from the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti and the shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis in order to protect agents deployed for Operation Metro Surge from potential criminal charges.”

… “The lawsuit, filed Tues in US District Court for the District of Columbia, argues that attempts by state officials to gather evidence into the shootings, including the names of the federal agents involved, have been shut down at the highest levels of the Trump admin.”

… From the lawsuit: “Principles of federalism do not permit the federal government to withhold investigative evidence for the purpose of shielding law enforcement officers from scrutiny where a State is investigating serious potential violations of its criminal laws, targeting its citizens, within its borders.”

… MN asked the court to “Declare that Defendants’ policy or practice of refusing to share investigative materials with Minnesota authorities concerning the federal officer–involved shootings arising out of Operation Metro Surge is arbitrary, capricious.”

… Migrant Insider: Somewhere in a federal storage facility in MN, sits a car. It belongs to Renee Good, or rather it belonged to her. The car is shrink-wrapped. It has never been examined. It has never been processed. MN’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension obtained a judicial search warrant for it. They asked the FBI, repeatedly, to hand it over or let them execute the warrant. The FBI either refused or didn’t bother to respond.”

… “Alex Pretti was an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA. Hours after the shooting, Trump logged onto Truth Social and posted a photograph of what he said was Pretti’s firearm — sitting on the seat of a car, surrounded by charging cords. Not in an evidence bag. Not in a crime lab. Surrounded by charging cords.”

… “The BCA arrived at the Pretti scene that morning to do what investigators do. A federal agent - serving as incident commander - told them he’d been ordered not to let them in. Even after they went to the Whipple Fed Bldg and waited for hours to conduct interviews, the HSI Asst Special Agent in Charge eventually walked out and told the BCA: you’re not allowed to participate in any part of this investigation. They still don’t have the names of the masked agents who shot him.”

… “3 shootings in 17 days. 3 times, federal agents initially signaled they’d cooperate with their state counterparts. 3 times, within hours, the cooperation evaporated - not because of any case-specific investigative need, the lawsuit says, but because senior officials at DOJ and DHS intervened and said no.”

… Reuters: “Trump's approval rating fell in recent days to its lowest point since he returned to the WH, hit by a surge in fuel prices and widespread disapproval of the war he launched on Iran, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found. 36% of Americans approve of Trump's job performance, down from 40% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted last week.”

… “Americans' views on Trump soured significantly with regard to his stewardship over the cost of living, as gas prices have surged since the US and Israel launched coordinated strikes on Iran on February 28. Just 25% of respondents approved of Trump's handling of the cost of living.”

… Reuters: “Iran launched waves of missiles at Israel on Tues, the Israeli military said, a day after Trump said there had been ‘very good and productive’ talks aiming at halting the conflict raging across the Middle East. Iranian missiles triggered air raid sirens in Israel’s biggest city, Tel Aviv, where gaping holes were torn through a multi-storey apartment building.”

… Axios: US and Israeli officials are planning for another 2-3 weeks of war regardless of whether peace talks take place.

… Alan Dershowitz on Newsmax: “Had Trump been in charge in 1936-36, I think the Holocaust would’ve been prevented. I think he would’ve gone in after Nazi Germany, he would have destroyed it the way he’s destroying Nazi Iran, and the Holocaust would’ve been prevented.”

… At the swearing in ceremony for DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin today, Trump claimed that he was close to making a deal with Iran where they are going to almost completely surrender to all of his demands. As with all things Trump, his words mean nothing and we need to see details in writing signed by both parties, but this is what he said:

• Q - “Are you going to send Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff to do direct negotiations with the Iranians? Trump: We are in negotiations right now. They doing it along with Marco Rubio and JD Vance.”

• “Today we would’ve had the privilege of shooting down a very big electric generation plant, one of the biggest in the world and one shot to the right location ends the plant and it collapses. And we held off based on the fact that we are negotiating.”

• “We really had regime change. This is a change in the regime because the leaders are all different. I think we can say this is regime change.”

• “They gave us a present today. And it was a very big present worth a tremendous amount of money and I'm not going to tell you what that present is but it was a very significant prize. It said to me that we are dealing with the right people.”

… Trump then called Pete Hegseth up to give a few remarks about the war:

• “We have the president when he sends warfighters to fight, he unties their hands to actually go out and destroy the enemy as viciously as possible.”

• “At the War Dept, we see ourselves as part of these negotiations as well. We negotiate with bombs.”

… Trump then returned to the podium and said this: “You were the only two people that were quite disappointed - I don’t want to say this but I have to. I said to Pete and General Caine, I think this thing is going to be settled soon. They said, oh that’s too bad. Pete didn’t want it to be settled.”

… Mehdi Hasan: “We have a child masquerading as president and no one willing to say it out loud to his face. We wouldn’t tolerate such ridiculous rhetoric and behavior from any other politician. Yet he continues to be treated with kid gloves and enabled by the adults in the room. Embarrassing.”

… Right-wing podcaster Owen Shroyer: “This Trump press conference is the all time low. Nothing but an hour talking about the war, slurring his words, insulting everyone, contradicting himself constantly, absolutely nothing as far as success for America, just war and propaganda. Truly pathetic.”

… Chip Somodevilla with Getty Images took a photo of Hegseth while Trump was speaking.

… CNN: Updated number of US troops injured in ongoing combat operations targeting Iran, per CENTCOM: Approximately 290 wounded (up from 200 last week).

… Nayef Nahar, Professor at Qatar Univ: “Trump postponed striking Iran’s energy infrastructure out of fear of fluctuations in US market prices. Yet for over 20 days, he has watched Gulf societies come under Iranian missile strikes, as Gulf economies incur tens of billions of dollars in damages - without this prompting any change in his decisions.”

… “When the Qatari Minister of Energy warned his American counterpart that striking Iran’s gas fields would inevitably trigger retaliatory strikes against gas fields in the Gulf, he was disregarded. They attacked Iran anyway, leaving the Gulf states to face their fate alone against Iranian missiles.”

… “Striking Iran’s gas fields did not create any strategic advantage, but rather inflicted massive losses upon the Gulf’s energy sector, which ultimately benefits American gas companies. Trump only speaks about the Strait of Hormuz or the price of oil. In his eyes, the Gulf societies are barely worth a single barrel of crude.”

… Telegraph: “Trump’s 5-day deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz will end on the same day that thousands of US Marines are expected to arrive in the Middle East. The US president told reporters that he would ‘see how’ negotiations went and if a deal was not agreed by Friday, ‘we’ll just keep bombing our little hearts out’. But the entry of the 31st Marine Exped. Unit gives Trump the option of launching a ground operation, alongside a continuation of air strikes against the regime.”

… “The USS Tripoli will arrive on Friday, with roughly 2,200 marines on board, under the control of US Central Command, which is responsible for US forces in the Middle East. The Pentagon has ordered a second marine unit, also composed of around 2,500 personnel, to depart from its base in CA and head to the Middle East.”

… Fox: “The Commander of the 82nd Airborne Div Maj Gen Brandon Tegtmeier and his ‘command element, members of his HQ staff, have been ordered to deploy to the Middle East as the Pentagon and WH weigh whether to send the 82nd Airborne Div to the Middle East for possible land operations. There has been speculation that the US would use ground forces to possibly take Kharg Island or for other missions inside Iran.”

… Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) on CNBC: “They want to kill us. We have to grow up. We have enemies. People want to destroy our way of life - if we don’t destroy theirs first, they’re gonna kill ‘em, more kill ‘em - kill more Americans. They’ve been killing us for 47 years.” 

(RICK SCOTT: DIDN'T HE MAKE HIS $$$ FROM THE LARGEST MEDICARE FRAUD IN HISTORY?)

… Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) on Fox: Q - “When it comes to the war in Iran, soon they’re gonna put a bill before you saying we need $200 billion more to fund the war. How do you feel about that? Cornyn: Well, a denuclearized Iran and eliminating the number one state sponsor of terrorism is a whole lot cheaper than fighting a regional war. I support it.”

… Gas market analyst Patrick De Haan: “The average price of diesel in the US has reached $5.35/gal and is less than 50 cents from setting a new all-time record high.”

… Puck: “Vladimir Putin is completely spooked by the US-Israeli war against Russia’s old ally, particularly the reports that Israel targeted the ayatollah by hacking traffic cameras in Tehran. Earlier this month, the Russian president stopped going to the Kremlin and all his public events vanished from the calendar. Now, Moscow has virtually no cell service and it’s become impossible to message, call, or surf the web in large parts of the city.”

… “The Kremlin has experimented with shutting off cell service in other, smaller cities, but to do this in the nation’s capital—a city of 13 million people, where so many of the country’s businesses are headquartered—is shocking. The official explanation is that Moscow is protecting itself from Ukrainian drones, but even pro-Kremlin propagandists are speculating that this has more to do with the war in Iran than the one in Ukraine.”

… Punchbowl on the DHS shutdown and SAVE Act negotiations: “The framework under discussion would fund all of DHS except for ICE’s migrant removal operations, and could eventually include some reforms that Democrats have been demanding. Republicans would then try to fund the rest of ICE via a party-line reconciliation bill.”

… “GOP leaders would also try to use reconciliation to enact elements of the SAVE Act, which mandates photo IDs and citizenship verification for federal elections. There’s enough in this proposed outline for everyone to hate. Hardline Rs will say that their party has given up on taking the fight to Ds on the SAVE Act and failed to hold the line on DHS funding.”

… “Dems will gripe that the bulk of their list of more than a dozen demands to reform ICE has gone unfilled, and that funding the rest of DHS removes some of their leverage. This will be especially acute in the House, where Democrats have been let down by the Senate time and time again.”

… “It’ll be up to the Senate parliamentarian - Elizabeth MacDonough - to OK the use of reconciliation to enact the voter ID and citizenship verification provisions in the SAVE Act. Many Republicans privately view this as highly unlikely. It also raises the possibility of a vote to overrule the parliamentarian, though Thune has cast doubt on this idea in the past.”

… Politico: “The list from House Admin Chair Bryan Steil (R-WI) is a peek at what sort of provisions Republicans could try to pass under reconciliation, which is strictly reserved for legislation with a direct fiscal impact. Steil’s proposals would mandate or financially incentivize states to implement voter ID laws, require proof of citizenship for voter registration, share voter data with federal agencies for verification and conduct post-election audits, among other items.”

… The reason why that is important is that a “reconciliation bill” is not subject to filibuster, so would only require a simple majority in the senate. But it must only concern a fiscal matter. That is why Steil is trying to play games by linking it to funding for administration of elections. Won’t work.

… The right-wing House Freedom Caucus issued a statement that they are not happy with John Thune: “Senate Republicans refused to force a talking filibuster to pass the SAVE Act because it would have allowed Democrats to offer unlimited amendments. Now, Senate R’s claim they will pass SAVE Act via reconciliation (which may not even be possible under the Senate’s arcane rules), which would allow Dems to offer unlimited amendments.

… “This is gaslighting. The American people are not stupid and will not accept more failure theater from Republicans in Congress.”

… Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) was asked by Punchbowl if they should try and get the Save Act past the parliamentarian as part of a reconciliation package: “I don’t think that’s a good approach.”

… SAVE Act sponsor Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) isn’t happy: “It’s hard to imagine how the SAVE Act could be passed through reconciliation. And by ‘hard’ I mean ‘essentially impossible’.”

… Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts: “Agree. So when our conservative base doesn’t turnout for the midterms, complaining that ‘Congress does nothing,’ they won’t be wrong.”

… Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX): “Agree, it’s gaslighting.”

… Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL): “This idea that they’ll get funded through a reconciliation package is a pipe dream. We’re not going to get a reconciliation package done.”

… Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL): The Senate is sidestepping the SAVE America Act. During the last reconciliation, the parliamentarian stripped out a significant amount. Now the Senate is looking to play the blame game with the parliamentarian. Under reconciliation, you can’t legislate policy, meaning you CANNOT include the Save America Act. I will be a NO on reconciliation.”

… Republican political consultant Caroline Wren: “The GOP is looking for a scapegoat to blame their failure of passing the Save America Act on. They are going to make the Senate Parliamentarian (that Schumer hired), Elizabeth MacDonough, the boogeyman who kills it. She should have been fired in June but John Cornyn saved her.”

… What’s happening is John Thune wants to kill the SAVE Act but he doesn’t have the courage to do it himself, so he wants the parliamentarian to do it for him so MAGA will attack her instead.

Reminder there is no Bulletin tomorrow because I do my weekly podcast Uncovered where I do a deeper dive into the top stories of the week. I will post the link in a Substack Note tomorrow before the show. If you missed yesterday’s Bulletin, you can find it here.

Thank you to everyone who supports our work at Meidas.

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… CNN: “A trader made nearly $1 million since 2024 from dozens of well-timed Polymarket bets that correctly predicted US and Israeli military actions against Iran. The bettor won a staggering 93% of their 5-figure wagers about Iran, even though the events they predicted were unannounced military operations.”

… “The trader had a pattern of prescient bets, including hours before Israeli strikes in Oct 2024 during its tit-for-tat conflict with Iran, hours before US airstrikes against Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025, and hours before the joint US-Israeli surprise ...