Tag: lawsuits

Election Interference Litigation: Trump’s Case Against the Des Moines Register and Pollster Moves Forward

Back in 2018, I launched a podcast very loosely tied to what I’ve done for a living for many years, and so I called it “Shaping Opinion.” The very first topic I sought to cover was how political polls are used to shape public opinion and influence the vote. 

Needless to say, I didn’t get any takers who were willing to put themselves out there on this issue, and not just in that first year. This has always been one of those topics I’ve been ready to seize on if any new studies or indisputable proof would come up that would give me a chance to dig in. But no matter who I approached, people got awful shy on this one, especially after the presidential race of 2020. 

Of course, this is one of those topics where you can trust your own eyes and ears, and your powers of observation over time. In every presidential election cycle, Democrats are over-sampled and Republicans are not. Pollsters say there are reasons for this, but they never tell the full truth. 

You can count on public polls telling you early and often that the Democrat candidate is dominating. At some point around the conventions, polls will say each candidate saw a “post-convention bounce,” but the Republican candidate’s bump is always temporary and fleeting. The Democrat candidate’s bounce is always framed as the start of the home-stretch run where he or she is a likely winner. 

This is to condition the voters into assuming the Democrat will win. Social psychologists often say that most people like a winner, so for many, once they have a sense from the polls who the likely winner will be, that’s who they decide to vote for. 

Anyone with common sense who has seen this pattern over at least three election cycles can detect for themselves that polls are commonly used to shape opinion, not reflect it. 

So last year, when a well-respected pollster from Iowa named J. Ann Selzer published her final numbers for “The Iowa Poll” three days before election day, many of us were extremely curious. She released what was the final Des Moines Register presidential election poll, which had Kamala Harris leading Donald Trump by three points. 

Fox News called this a “shock poll” that “showed a seven-point shift from Trump to Harris from September, when he had a four-point lead over the vice president in the same poll.” 

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ExxonMobil Sues California Over Climate Regulations

Energy giant ExxonMobil filed a lawsuit on Oct. 24 against California officials—including Lauren Sanchez, chair of the California Air Resources Board, and Attorney General Robert A. Bonta—accusing the state’s climate disclosure regulations of harming the company.

The complaint, filed in the District Court for the Eastern District of California, is about two climate laws approved by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October 2023: SB 253 and SB 261.

SB 253 requires businesses with total annual revenues of more than $1 billion that operate in California to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, while SB 261 requires businesses with more than $500 million in annual revenues operating in the state to develop a report on their climate-related financial risks.

The bills are scheduled to come into effect in 2026.

“Both bills require ExxonMobil to espouse California’s preferred framing for issues of immense public concern,” the company said in its lawsuit.

The bills require the company to “serve as a mouthpiece for ideas with which it disagrees,” it said, while using frameworks that place “disproportionate blame” of emissions and climate risks on companies like ExxonMobil just for “being large.”

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A D.C. Man Was Arrested for Mocking National Guard Troops with Star Wars’ ‘Imperial March.’ Now He’s Suing.

A Washington, D.C., resident who was handcuffed and detained in September for mocking National Guard soldiers by playing “The Imperial March” from Star Wars on his cellphone is suing the soldiers and police officers for their stormtrooper-like behavior.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of D.C. filed a federal lawsuit today on behalf of Sam O’Hara, arguing that his detention violated his First and Fourth Amendment rights by cutting off his peaceful protest.

“The law might have tolerated government conduct of this sort a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” O’Hara’s lawsuit states. “But in the here and now, the First Amendment bars government officials from shutting down peaceful protests, and the Fourth Amendment (along with the District’s prohibition on false arrest) bars groundless seizures.”

After President Donald Trump deployed National Guard troops to D.C., O’Hara began following National Guard soldiers around playing “The Imperial March” on his cell phone as a form of protest. His lawsuit says O’Hara wanted “to encourage the public to view the deployment as a waste of tax dollars, a needless display of force, and a surreal danger.”

According to his lawsuit, on September 11, O’Hara was tailing four Ohio National Guard soldiers and doing his usual bit. 

“Less than two minutes after the protest began,” the lawsuit says, “Sgt. [Devon] Beck turned around and said, ‘Hey man, if you’re going to keep following us, we can contact Metro PD and they can come handle you if that’s what you want to do. Is that what you want to do?'”

O’Hara allegedly did not respond but continued to follow, at which point the Empire decided to strike back. 

Beck called the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) of Washington, D.C. The lawsuit claims that shortly after several MPD cars arrived. The MPD officers allegedly accused O’Hara of harassing the soldiers, and they detained and handcuffed him.

When O’Hara argued that he was engaged in protest, one of the MPD officers allegedly responded, “That’s not a protest. You better define protest. This isn’t a protest. You are not protesting.”

However, recording and mocking law enforcement are both firmly protected by the First Amendment, as long as one doesn’t interfere with their duties.

Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr. wrote in 1987, in a ruling striking down a Houston ordinance that made it unlawful to oppose or interrupt a police officer, that “the freedom of individuals verbally to oppose or challenge police action without thereby risking arrest is one of the principal characteristics by which we distinguish a free nation from a police state.”

To put it another way, if you act like an autocratic villain when someone compares you to an autocratic villain, you just might be an autocratic villain.

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Trump Fights Back — Seeks to Proceed with $10 BILLION Lawsuit Against Wall Street Journal Over Epstein ‘Birthday Book’ Hit Piece

President Donald J. Trump is fighting to move forward with his massive $10 billion defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones, and News Corp, accusing them of launching a “deliberate smear campaign” intended to destroy his reputation.

According to ABC News, Trump’s legal team filed a motion late Monday night urging a Florida federal judge to deny the Journal’s request for dismissal, arguing that the outlet’s July article, which tied Trump to a bawdy letter allegedly penned in Jeffrey Epstein’s so-called “birthday book,” was “malicious, defamatory, and politically motivated.”

In their latest filing, Trump’s attorneys blasted the Journal:

“Defendants did not publish the article on the front page of The Wall Street Journal based on a mere harmless joke between friends. Indeed, such an assertion strains credulity beyond repair. The article, and the surrounding media around it, were all a deliberate smear campaign designed to damage President Trump’s reputation.”

Trump’s lawyers are now pushing for oral arguments to expose a coordinated media effort to smear the president.

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Ninth Circuit Hands President Trump Sweeping Win Over Gavin Newsom — Trump Can Federalize California National Guard to Enforce Federal Immigration Law

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has denied en banc rehearing in Newsom v. Trump, effectively upholding the earlier panel decision that sided with Trump and affirmed his authority to federalize the California National Guard to support federal immigration enforcement.

When California officials refused to cooperate with federal agents, Trump invoked § 12406(3), federalizing and deploying 4,000 members of the California National Guard to Los Angeles to secure ICE facilities and restore order.

California Governor Gavin Newsom and the State of California sued over President Trump’s order, claiming it was unconstitutional and violated state sovereignty.

Newsom wrote at the time:

“We are suing Donald Trump. This is a manufactured crisis. He is creating fear and terror to take over a state militia and violate the U.S. constitution. The illegal order he signed could allow him to send the military into ANY STATE HE WISHES. Every governor — red or blue — should reject this outrageous overreach. There’s a lot of hyperbole out there. This isn’t that. This is an unmistakable step toward authoritarianism that threatens the foundation of our republic. We cannot let it stand.”

US District Judge Charles Breyer (brother of retired SCOTUS Breyer), a Clinton appointee, granted Newsom a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) and said Trump’s decision to federalize the National Guard was illegal.

But the appellate panel ruled that the statute clearly empowers the President to act whenever he is “unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.”

In practical terms, this means the Commander-in-Chief may call Guard troops into federal service when local or federal law-enforcement personnel cannot safely or effectively enforce the law.

After Senior Judge Marsha S. Berzon, joined by several liberal colleagues, requested a full-court rehearing, a vote of active Ninth Circuit judges failed to secure a majority, and rehearing en banc was denied on Wednesday. That denial makes the earlier Trump victory final within the circuit and binding precedent across nine Western states.

Judge Marsha Berzon’s 38-page dissent argued that the ruling “invited presidents, now and in the future, to deploy military troops… in response to commonplace, short-lived, domestic disturbances.”

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DUDE BREAKING: Robby Starbuck is suing Google over INSANE attacks against him by Google’s evil AI

Google’s AI has been targeting Robby Starbuck in an insane way with completely fake attacks on him, which Starbuck says their AI worked overtime to make believable with links to fake articles and fake official records.

He’s warned them to cease and desist and now he’s suing them.

He explains it all below:

HUGE NEWS: I’m suing @Google today.

What you’re about to see is insane.

Since 2023, @GoogleAI (Bard, Gemini & Gemma), has been defaming me with fake criminal allegations including sexual assault, child rape, abuse, fraud, stalking, drug charges, and even saying I was in Epstein’s flight logs.

All 100% fake. All generated by Google’s AI. I have ZERO criminal record or allegations.

So why did Google do it? Google’s AI says that I was targeted because of my political views.

Even worse — Google execs KNEW for 2 YEARS that this was happening because I told them and my lawyers sent cease and desist letters multiple times.

This morning, my team @dhillonlaw filed my lawsuit against Google and now I’m going public with all the receipts — because this can’t ever happen to anyone else.

Google’s AI didn’t just lie — it built fake worlds to make its lies look real:

• Fake victims
• Fake therapy records
• Fake court records
• Fake police records
• Fake relationships
• Fake “news” stories

It even fabricated statements denouncing me from President Trump, @elonmusk and @JDVance over sexual assaults that Google completely invented.

One of the most dystopian things I’ve ever seen is how dedicated their AI was to doubling down on the lies. Google’s AI routinely cited fake sources by creating fake links to REAL media outlets and shows, complete with fake headlines so readers would trust the information. It would continue to do this even if you called the AI out for lying or sending fake links. In short, it was creating fake legacy media reports as a way to launder trust with users so they would believe elaborate lies that it told.

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‘Massive legal siege’ against social media companies looms

Thousands of plaintiffs’ complaints, millions of pages of internal documents and transcripts of countless hours of depositions are about to land in U.S. courtrooms, threatening the future of the biggest social media companies.

The blizzard of paperwork is a byproduct of two consolidated lawsuits accusing Snap Inc.’s Snapchat; Meta Platforms Inc.’s Facebook and Instagram; ByteDance Ltd.’s TikTok; and Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube of knowingly designing their platforms to addict users — allegedly resulting in youth depression, anxiety, insomnia, eating disorders, self-harm and even suicide.

The litigation, brewing for more than three years, has had to overcome numerous hurdles, including the liability shield that has protected social media platforms from facing user-harm lawsuits. The social media companies have filed multiple motions to dismiss the cases on the grounds that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act prevents them from being held accountable for content posted on their sites.

Those motions have been largely unsuccessful, and courtrooms across the country are poised to open their doors for the first time to the alleged victims of social media. The vast majority of cases have been folded into two multijurisdictional proceedings, one in state and the other in federal court, to streamline the pretrial discovery process.

The first bellwether trial is scheduled to begin in Los Angeles Superior Court in late January. It involves a 19-year-old woman from Chico, California, who says she’s been addicted to social media for more than a decade and that her nonstop use of the platforms has caused anxiety, depression and body dysmorphia. Two other trials will follow soon after, with thousands more waiting in the wings. If successful, these cases could result in multibillion-dollar settlements — akin to tobacco and opioid litigation — and change the way minors interact with social media.

“This is going to be one of the most impactful litigations of our lifetime,” said Joseph VanZandt, an attorney at Beasley Allen Law Firm in Montgomery, Alabama, and co-lead plaintiffs’ attorney for the coordinated state cases. “This is about large corporations targeting vulnerable populations — children — for profit. That’s what we saw with the tobacco companies; they were also targeting adolescents and trying to get them addicted while they were young.”

Matthew Bergman, founder of the Social Media Victims Law Center in Seattle, makes a similar comparison to tobacco litigation in the Bloomberg documentary Can’t Look Away: The Case Against Social Media. “In the case of Facebook, you have internal documents saying ‘tweens are herd animals,’ ‘kids have an addict’s narrative’ and ‘our products make girls feel worse about themselves.’ You have the same kind of corporate misconduct,” Bergman says in the film, which will be available to view on Bloomberg’s platforms on October 30.

Bergman’s firm was the first to file user-harm cases against social media companies, in 2022, after Frances Haugen, a former Meta product manager-turned-whistleblower, released a trove of internal documents showing the company knew social media was negatively impacting youth mental health. The first case, which is part of the consolidated federal litigation, alleged that an 11-year-old Connecticut girl killed herself after suffering from extreme social media addiction and sexual exploitation by online predators.

What set that case apart was how it got around Section 230’s immunity blanket. Bergman argued that his case wasn’t about third-party content, which the federal law protects. Instead, he said it hinged on the way social media companies were intentionally designing their products to prioritize engagement and profit over safety.

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Cincinnati Police Chief Who Was Sued For Anti-White Discrimination Placed on Leave

Cincinnati Police Chief Terri Theetge was placed on paid administrative leave after she was sued for anti-white bias.

“The City continues to face serious public safety challenges that underscore the need for stability at the command level. Therefore, I’ve named Assistant Chief Adam Hennie as Interim Police Chief. Our focus remains on maintaining stability within the department and ensuring the highest standards of service to our residents. I have full confidence in Interim Chief Hennie and the department’s command staff to continue their dedicated work at this time,” said City Manager Sheryl Long, WLWT reported.

“Assistant Chief Adam Hennie has been named interim chief,” the outlet reported.

Recall that Theetge previously blamed social media after a violent mob of mostly black males beat a white couple at jazz festival over the summer.

Teresa Theetge held a press conference on the beating of the white couple.

Theetge said five people in connection to the mob beating were charged. She also blasted social media posters for their coverage of the mob beatings.

“The post that we’ve seen does not depict the entire incident. That is one version of what occurred,” Theetge said.

“I think by the irresponsibility with social media is it just shows one side of the equation quite frequently without context, without factual context, and then people run with that and then it grows legs and it becomes something bigger that we then have to try to manage as part of the investigation,” she said.

“Social media and mainstream media and their commentaries are misrepresentation of the circumstances surrounding any given event,” she added.

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Texas Is Sued Over Digital ID Age Verification Bill

A major technology association is suing the State of Texas over a new law that threatens both privacy and free expression.

The Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) has filed a federal lawsuit challenging Senate Bill 2420, which is set to take effect on January 1, 2026.

We obtained a copy of the lawsuit for you here.

The group argues that the law forces both app stores and developers to impose invasive ID age checks, obtain parental consent, and label content in state-approved ways that violate the First Amendment.

Under SB 2420, anyone with an app store account would need to complete an age-verification process before downloading or updating applications.

If an app store determines that a user is under 18, that user would be blocked from downloading most apps or making in-app purchases unless a parent gives consent and assumes control of the account.

Minors who cannot link their profiles to a parent or guardian would lose access to app store content entirely.

App developers would also face new rules.

They must classify their apps into multiple age categories and provide written explanations for each rating. Every update, feature addition, or design change would require written notice to the app store.

CCIA says these mandates compel developers to describe their products in ways dictated by the state and pressure companies to collect personal data that users should not have to disclose.

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Judicial Watch Sues CIA for Jeffrey Epstein Records

Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for records involving any role Jeffrey Epstein might have played in connection with the agency, his business dealings, travel, victim or witness information, and records concerning his death (Judicial Watch Inc. v. Central Intelligence Agency (No. 1:25-cv-03618)).

Judicial Watch filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after the CIA failed to respond to a July 9, 2025, FOIA request for:

  • Intelligence activities and connections, including any records indicating whether Epstein was ever an asset for any U.S. or foreign intelligence agency and/or reports analyzing his potential connections to foreign intelligence services.
  • Financial and business activities, including analyses concerning Epstein’s wealth accumulation, estimated at approximately $560 million at the time of his 2019 arrest.
  • Associations and networks, including records documenting Epstein’s interactions with high-profile executives, royalty, or other prominent figures, where such interactions were of interest to the CIA due to national security concerns. Also, records about his so-called “Black Book” or contact lists, as well as his properties that may have been referenced in CIA reports.
  • Criminal investigations and legal proceedings, including records about coordination with other federal agencies, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Department of Justice (DOJ), or U.S. Marshals Service, regarding Epstein’s criminal activities. Also, records about his death in 2019 at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York.
  • Surveillance and evidence collection.
  • Foreign connections and travel.
  • Victim and witness information.

 In May 2023, Epstein was reported to have met “dozens of times” with former Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak between 2013-2017. Epstein reportedly donated $110,000 to former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers wife’s online poetry project in 2016 and held meetings with many other high profile individuals “long after he was a registered sex offender. He had pleaded guilty in 2008 to soliciting and procuring a minor for prostitution.”

Attorney General Pamela Bondi released a long-awaitedtrove of documents related to Epstein in February 2025, but “the much-hyped, roughly 200-page document dump provided no big revelations, instead listing celebrities and politicians who were already known to have palled around with the notorious pedophile.”

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