Supreme Court Rejects Purdue Pharma’s $6 Billion Opioid Settlement

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The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected Purdue Pharma’s proposed $6 billion bankruptcy settlement. A 5-4 majority opinion by Justice Neil Gorsuch sided with the Biden administration‘s argument that Purdue’s settlement is an abuse of bankruptcy protections meant for debtors in financial distress, not for the owners of the multibillion-dollar opioid company, the Sackler family, who withdrew $11 billion from Purdue before agreeing to contribute $6 billion to its opioid settlement.

The Sackler family’s plan to settle lawsuits and transform Purdue Pharma into a nonprofit organization dedicated to addiction treatment was initially approved by a bankruptcy judge in 2011. The U.S. Trustee Program, a Justice Department watchdog, intervened and claimed settlement terms required unanimous consent by the roughly 60,000 people who have filed personal injury claims, despite the plan’s approval by over 95% of the voting claimants.

After years of litigation, the Supreme Court in August temporarily barred the pharmaceutical from moving forward with bankruptcy proceedings and agreed to hear Biden administration’s challenge to the plan on the merits.

Justices Brett Kavanaugh, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.

The Sackler family’s plan to settle lawsuits and transform Purdue Pharma into a nonprofit organization dedicated to addiction treatment was initially approved by a bankruptcy judge in 2011. (Read more from “Supreme Court Rejects Purdue Pharma’s $6 Billion Opioid Settlement” HERE)

Supreme Court Blows Up DOJ’s Biggest Charges Against Donald Trump

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The Supreme Court ruled Friday that the government cannot prosecute January 6 defendants under 1512(c)(2), the “Enron” statute, for generally obstructing “an official proceeding” unless they interfered with objects or documents.

The bombshell decision could result in hundreds of convictions against non-violent January 6 defendants being overturned — and could result in at least some charges being dropped against President Donald Trump as well.

1512(c)(2) was passed after the Enron scandal, when it was discovered that federal law had a loophole: it was illegal to instruct others to destroy evidence, but not illegal to destroy evidence oneself. Consequently, Congress passed a law prohibiting tampering with witnesses or evidence that is to be used in an “official proceeding.” The Department of Justice used that law to prosecute participants in the Capitol riot based on the idea that they had “obstructed” an official proceeding — i.e. the certification of the Electoral College vote in the 2020 presidential election. But critics said that 1512(c)(2) had never been intended to apply to protests or other First Amendment-connected activities.

In a 6-3 decision, with the majority opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Court overruled the (heavily anti-Trump) D.C. Circuit and said that 1512(c)(2) could not be used as broadly as the Department of Justice had done.

“To prove a violation of Section 1512(c)(2), the Government must establish that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or as we earlier explained, other things used in the proceeding, or attempted to do so,” Roberts wrote. The term “otherwise” — as in “otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding” — could not be used so broadly as to include trespassing. (Read more from “Supreme Court Blows Up DOJ’s Biggest Charges Against Donald Trump” HERE)

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Reporters Say Biden Campaign Staff Tried to Stop Them From Interviewing Critical Voters

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Reporters claimed Friday that President Joe Biden’s campaign staffers tried to halt their interviews with voters once they started to turn critical of the president following a rough debate showing.

Biden faced off against former President Donald Trump in a rather unprecedented debate format, as the two appeared in the CNN studio on Thursday with no live audience and mics with the ability to be cut off on Friday. Panic set in among Democrats all but 30 minutes into the debate, as the president stumbled through answers, even once appearing to freeze before moderator Jake Tapper bailed him out. The panic became so full-fledged that Democrats even began to call on the president to bow out of the 2024 presidential race.

In the aftermath of the first presidential debate, several reporters claimed that while at campaign events with voters on Friday, Biden campaign staffers tried to cut off the conversation as they moved in a negative direction.

“As I spoke to voters at a Las Vegas rally for Vice President Harris, a Nevada Biden campaign staffer followed me and twice asked that voters end their interviews when their comments turned critical of President Biden,” Simon Levien, a New York Times reporter, wrote.

“You can’t tell me that there’s not anyone better —” a voter told Levien, expressing the desire for a different Democratic presidential candidate.

(Read more from “Reporters Say Biden Campaign Staff Tried to Stop Them From Interviewing Critical Voters” HERE)

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SCOTUS Hands Down Huge Decision Affecting J6 Defendants

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The Supreme Court has taken a judicial katana to a statute that federal prosecutors weaponized to go after those who participated in the January 6 incident. The question before the court was whether the “obstruction of an official proceeding” statute could be used in how the Justice Department weaponized it to go after hundreds of January 6 defendants. As SCOTUS Blog covered in April, the plaintiff, Joseph Fischer, a former police officer, argued that the statute only pertained to evidence tampering in a congressional investigation. During oral arguments, justices weren’t convinced by the government’s interpretation, arguing that it could cast too much of a net.

In a 6-3 opinion, the Supreme Court handed down a massive blow to federal prosecutors, concluding, per SCOTUS Blog’s Amy Howe, that for the statute to be used in this way, there must be evidence to the fact that “the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records.” In a blow to the narrative that the Supreme Court is rogue and right-wing, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joined the majority. Justice Amy Coney Barrett dissented (via SCOTUS Blog):

The court holds that to prove a violation of the law, the government must show that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or other things used in an official proceeding, or attempted to do so.

The court reverses the D.C. Circuit, which had adopted a broader reading of the law to allow the charges against Fischer to go forward. The case now goes back to the D.C. Circuit — which, the court says, can assess whether the indictment can still stand in light of this new and narrower interpretation.

Justice Jackson, who joined the majority opinion, also has a concurring opinion. She stresses that despite “the shocking circumstances involved in this case,” the “Court’s task is to determine what conduct is proscribed by the criminal statute that has been invoked as the basis for the obstruction charge at issue here.”

(Read more from “SCOTUS Hands Down Huge Decision Affecting J6 Defendants” HERE)

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Biden Just Put on the Most Disastrous Debate Performance in Presidential History

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Sure, it might sound like hyperbole, but I can’t think of a more devastating presidential debate performance than the one Joe Biden had in his first meeting with Donald Trump. Indeed, even with abnormally low expectations, Biden tripped over them as if they were sandbags. After watching post-debate reaction, it’s safe to say no presidential debate has ever rattled a political party quite like this one.

The scratchy and frail voice. The speedy mumbling — it was like watching a TV at 2x speed. The overall incoherence. The confused and angry stares. The jumbling of thoughts —“I was recently in, in, in, um, France for D-Day, and I spoke to — all about those heroes that died …” and so on — was relentless. It was difficult to watch.

Recall that Biden’s team, down in the polls, pushed for this debate. Remember that video the president cut mocking and challenging Trump to face him? The Biden team reportedly fought for the strict rules implemented by CNN. Then the president took an entire week off from his job just to prepare for the contest. Letting him debate was political malpractice. Letting him run for the presidency is a dereliction of basic decency.

You remember all that solemn talk about 25th Amendment during Trump’s presidency? Where are these patriots now?

Incidentally, CNN’s debate format was — whether the former president liked it or not — good for Trump. It reined in many of his worst inclinations, while leaving Biden to wander off into verbal dead ends. And though CNN’s Jake Tapper tried to save Biden once or twice, it’s fair to say, on balance, the questions weren’t terrible. (Read more from “Biden Just Put on the Most Disastrous Debate Performance in Presidential History” HERE)

Biden Peddles ‘Very Fine People’ Hoax After Even ‘Fact-Checkers’ Admitted It Was a Lie

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During Thursday’s presidential debate, Biden accused Trump of calling neo-Nazis “very fine people,” repeating a long-debunked claim regarding Trump’s remarks following a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville.

“[Trump] said, ‘I think there are fine people on both sides,’” Biden claimed at Thursday’s debate. “What American president would ever say Nazis coming out of fields carrying torches, saying the same antisemitic bile, carrying swastikas, are fine people?”

Biden’s claim centers on Trump’s remarks following a 2017 Charlottesville rally, which involved protests and counter-protests over the removal of a Robert E. Lee statue from a park. The protests ended violently when a self-proclaimed “white nationalist” drove his car into the crowd, killing one and injuring 19.

With the help of corporate media, the claim that Trump called neo-Nazis “very fine people” spread shortly after the events, despite Trump condemning them outright.

“But you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides,” Trump said of the Charlottesville protesters and counter-protesters in a news conference days after the events. “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally.”

(Read more from “Biden Peddles ‘Very Fine People’ Hoax After Even ‘Fact-Checkers’ Admitted It Was a Lie” HERE)

‘He Failed’: Biden’s Debate Performance Sparks Serious Concern Among Democrats

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Some Democrats expressed disappointment about President Joe Biden’s performance in Thursday’s debate against former President Donald Trump—even suggesting he should step down as their 2024 nominee.

A lack of energy, a raspy voice, stuttering, and rambling answers to questions plagued the 81-year-old president, who faces widespread voter concerns about his age.

Media figures reported that Democrat campaign operatives, strategists, and fundraisers considered the debate a blow to Biden’s chances in November.

(Read more from “‘He Failed’: Biden’s Debate Performance Sparks Serious Concern Among Democrats” HERE)

Biden Has a Debate Disaster for the Ages

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“I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence—and I don’t think he knows what he said either.”

That line from former President Donald Trump on Thursday night pretty much sums up the first—and who knows, maybe the only—2024 debate between Trump and President Joe Biden.

I wrote not long ago that corporate media gaslighting about Biden’s vigor wouldn’t work because the American people can plainly see that Biden is in steep mental and physical health decline.

That was on full display for all to see during the 90-minute, CNN-hosted debate Thursday night as an often barely audible Biden coughed, looked dazed, couldn’t finish sentences, muttered incoherently, and frequently lost his train of thought in what was almost certainly the worst presidential debate performance in the history of television.

You don’t have to be a policy wonk or a constitutional scholar to see that the president isn’t well, and no amount of sophistry is going to change what the public can now see on full display.

(Read more from “Biden Has a Debate Disaster for the Ages” HERE)

In Bizarre Debate Moment, Off-Track Biden Challenges Trump to Golf Game ‘If You Can Carry Your Own Bag — Think You Can Do It?’

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Amid a debate question Thursday night asking President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump what they would say to voters concerned about their ages — Biden is 81 while Trump is 78 — Trump responded by saying that he “aced” two cognitive tests and noted that Biden took no cognitive tests.

Shifting to his physical abilities, Trump said, “We knock on wood wherever we may have wood that I’m in very good health.” He added, “I just won two club [non-senior golf] championships … to do that you have to be quite smart, and you have to be able to hit the ball a long way.” Speaking of Biden, Trump said “he can’t hit a ball 50 yards.”

Biden’s response began with him saying something unintelligible about Trump’s height and weight, after which Biden said he’d “be happy to have a [golf] driving contest” with Trump — and then claimed “I got my [golf] handicap when I was vice president down to a six.”

Trump turned away in mirth, likely because such a handicap is considered excellent.

Then things got comical, as Biden turned to Trump in schoolyard fashion and threw down hard: “And by the way, I told you before I’m happy to play golf with you if you carry your own bag.”

(Read more from “In Bizarre Debate Moment, Off-Track Biden Challenges Trump to Golf Game ‘If You Can Carry Your Own Bag — Think You Can Do It?'” HERE)

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‘Weird Sh*t’: Obamas Reportedly Believe Biden Family is a Total Mess

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Former President Barack Obama reportedly once referred to President Joe Biden’s family dynamics as “weird shit,” a person familiar with the remarks told Axios.

Former First Lady Michelle Obama is reportedly frustrated with how her close friend Kathleen Buhle, Hunter Biden’s ex-wife, was “exiled” and “wronged” by the Biden family following the divorce, two people familiar with the relationship told Axios. The former first lady’s feelings towards the situation coupled with her emotions towards politics, have kept Obama off the campaign trail despite President Barack Obama’s participation, the sources told Axios.

President Obama has frequently appeared on the campaign trail with Biden and has appeared in several social media videos with the president, Axios reported, making note that Michelle has often not appeared in these settings. After attending one event with Biden in 2017, Obama called the Biden family dynamics “weird shit,” a source told Axios. The event was for the Beau Biden Foundation and circulated around the Biden family, coming shortly after Hunter Biden had divorced Buhle and was in a relationship with his late brother’s widow, Hallie Biden, Axios reported. (Read more from “‘Weird Sh*t’: Obamas Reportedly Believe Biden Family is a Total Mess” HERE)

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