Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson earned a jab from one of her liberal colleagues on Tuesday as the justices increasingly feel compelled to single her out in legal opinions.
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The IRS says churches and other houses of worship can endorse political candidates to congregations while maintaining their tax-exempt nonprofit status.
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Tennessee House Majority Whip Johnny Garrett (R-Goodlettsville) announced he is running to represent Tennessee’s 6th Congressional District in Congress.
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Tennessee State Representative Lee Reeves (R-Franklin) launched a bid for Congress to represent Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District on Monday.
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After his first-place win in the New York City mayoral primaries, Zoran Mamdani is furiously denying everything that he once glibly thought was cutting-edge and cool.
So, like a good postmodern relativist, Mamdani now claims he didn’t really mean that violence was merely a “construct.”
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Just four days before she filed paperwork to run as a Democrat for the upcoming special election in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional district, the Dickson County Democratic Party described State Representative Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville) as “our very own AOC of TN,” in a reference to U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY-14).
The Dickson County Democrats offered the description for Behn in a Thursday post to Instagram, where the local party said Behn provided a speech that was both “inspiring and energizing” in order to motivate the party “to push for a change.”
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State Representative Jody Barrett (R-Dickson) officially launched a campaign for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District following the retirement of U.S. Representative Mark Green (R-TN-07).
Barrett made the announcement on Nashville’s Morning News with Dan Mandis Monday morning.
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U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, during the Monday court appearance for the lawsuit brought against the federal government by Kilmar Abrego Garcia, called for an additional hearing on Thursday, when she instructed the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to provide additional information about the possible fate of the alleged human smuggler if he enters the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Currently held by the DOJ in pretrial confinement after being returned to Tennessee on June 6, the Thursday court date for the immigration case will occur less than one week before U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw will hear arguments over the possible reversal of an earlier ruling by Magistrate Barbara Holmes, which denied prosecutors a detention hearing for Abrego Garcia.
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Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard’s office unveiled new details Monday about how an unaccountable Deep State came to be embedded in the intelligence community (IC) and how she will uproot it.
A new task force in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) first announced in April has unearthed new information about the corruption of the IC, it announced. Former longtime DNI James Clapper and former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan centralized their own power by elevating politically aligned operatives to influential posts at the National Intelligence Council and the President’s Daily Briefing, according to an ODNI official.
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State Representative Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville) filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) on Monday formally declaring her candidacy for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District.
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Governor Bill Lee named Will Reid as the next commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT).
“Will Reid is a proven leader whose unwavering commitment to excellence and innovation has elevated the work of TDOT and the future of transportation in Tennessee,” Lee said.
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President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador on Saturday raised the April remarks made by U.S. Senator Chris van Hollen (D-MD) at a press conference held following his return from El Salvador, where he met with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, in response to the alleged human smuggler’s claims of experiencing torture during his stay at the country’s prison complex, the Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT).
The foreign leader posted the video of Van Hollen’s comments to X in rebuttal to the Thursday claims made by Abrego Garcia’s immigration attorneys in Maryland, which alleged he was subjected to mental and physical torture at CECOT, which left him bruised, and caused him to dramatically lose 31-pounds over a two-week period.
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For a while, it looked like it might be one, big, beautiful mess, but now Congress has officially enacted, H.R. 1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, fulfilling Republicans’ legislative agenda on tax cuts, the border and immigration enforcement that President Donald Trump and Congressional Republicans campaigned on in 2024 that swept them into majorities.
The final votes were 51 to 50 in the Senate, with Vice President J.D. Vance casting the tie-breaking vote, and 218 to 214 in the House after weeks and months of preparation, drafting and debate. Now the work is done. The job is finished.
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Representative Mark Green (R-TN-07) announced his official retirement from Congress on Friday.
In his retirement video, he stated that he would be stepping down as the representative of Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District and as chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security.
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The Shelby County Health Department on Wednesday approved a construction permit for the installation of 15 turbines to power Elon Musk’s xAI Colossus supercomputer in Memphis, which the billionaire said would become the world’s largest. Colossus is used to power the artificial intelligence (AI) chat bot Grok.
According to the permit, xAI has authorization to install 15 combustion turbine units that will be powered using natural gas, with many of the turbines turbines subject to regular testing, and the facility required to keep regular emissions records. Should xAI be deemed out of compliance with the permit, it explains the company can be fined up to $10,000 per day, per violation.
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President Donald Trump on Friday signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act into law after a hard-fought battle to secure his second-term agenda.
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The first six months of the Trump administration have not been kind to the experts and the degree-holding classes.
Almost daily during the tariff hysterias of March, we were told by university economists and most of the PhDs employed in investment and finance that the U.S. was headed toward a downward, if not recessionary, spiral.
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Governor Bill Lee weighed in on the executive order amended by Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell in response to the May federal enforcement operation that saw nearly 200 illegal immigrants detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), reportedly describing it as “not helpful” during a Wednesday press conference.
As it currently stands, the executive order amended by O’Connell requires Metro Nashville employees to report any contact with federal immigration officials directly to the mayor, as well as his Office of New Americans, who publish the information on a Metro web page.
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The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has requested the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee to set a trial date for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the citizen of El Salvador who was deported in March, then returned to the United States last month to face federal human smuggling charges in Nashville.
Acting U.S. Attorney Robert E. McGuire submitted the DOJ motion requesting Chief District Judge Waverly Crenshaw set a trial date on Wednesday, when he noted that Abrego Garcia is legally entitled to receive a jury trial within 70 days of his initial court appearance on June 6, as he has not waived his right to a speedy trial.
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Murray Osorio, the immigration law firm representing Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the citizen of El Salvador now facing federal human smuggling charges in Tennessee, on Wednesday submitted an amended complaint seeking new relief that includes the supervised release of the alleged human smuggler back into Maryland.
The amended complaint claims that Abrego Garcia was first misled by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after he was detained in March, when he claims he was reassured he would go before an immigration judge following his detention by agents who identified themselves as part of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).
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Tennessee U.S. Representative Andy Ogles (R-TN-05) sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum on Thursday requesting that he “explore” the addition of President Donald Trump’s figure to Mount Rushmore.
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Tennessee U.S. Representative Mark Green (R-TN-07) confirmed that his vote to pass the “big beautiful bill” on Thursday morning will mark the end of his career in Congress as he is set to enter the private sector.
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Previously unreported documents obtained by The Minnesota Sun reveal new details about two trips taken by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison at the expense of the Attorneys General Alliance (AGA), a nonprofit organization that received more than $3 million from the political action committee run by Pfizer.
These documents reveal that Ellison was one of 14 attorneys general who attended the AGA-paid trip to South Africa from November 27 to December 3, 2022, and then, the following year, was one of 17 who attended the all-expense-paid trip to Spain from November 27 to December 3, 2023.
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Tennessee U.S. Representative Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) was one of the Republicans who met with President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance at the White House on Wednesday to negotiate the “big beautiful bill.”
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Progress on President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” ground to a halt Wednesday in the U.S. House as Republican leaders continue to haggle with fiscal hardliners behind the scenes.
As of early Wednesday evening, four Republicans continue to refrain from voting on an amendment that would allow House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to delay or reschedule the vote on the bill’s final passage if needed.
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Putnam County Sheriff Eddie Farris on Tuesday claimed reports indicating the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office (PCSO) entered into a full 287(g) agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were misreported by Tennessee media outlets, telling the Herald-Citizen that his agency is only working with federal immigration officials to screen inmates after their arrest.
While agreements between ICE and local law enforcement agencies allow police and sheriff’s deputies to perform a wide range of immigration enforcement actions with federal oversight, Farris told the outlet that the agreement between PCSO and ICE only involves additional screening capabilities for arrested suspects.
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State Representative Justin Jones (D-Nashville) on Monday filed legislation that would establish a new criminal offense for law enforcement officers, including federal agents at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to wear face masks when dealing with the public.
Titled the Stop American Gestapo Act (SAGA), the Democrat’s House Bill (HB) 1442 would make it a Class C misdemeanor in Tennessee for law enforcement officers, including federal agents, to “wear a mask, face covering, or personal disguise while interacting with the public in the performance of the law enforcement officer’s official duties.”
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CIA Director John Ratcliffe on Wednesday released a scathing review of the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment of Russian influence in the 2016 election, criticizing then-CIA Director John Brennan for joining the FBI in pushing to include British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s baseless anti-Trump dossier.
In the review, Ratcliffe also critiqued the CIA and FBI’s “high confidence” assessment that Russian leader Vladimir Putin had “aspired” to help Trump win.
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Former Republican South Carolina Lt. Gov. André Bauer on Wednesday mounted a bid to unseat Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham in the 2026 GOP primary.
Bauer, a former CNN contributor, emphasized his relationship with President Donald Trump, saying in his announcement that he “will unapologetically stand with … the America First agenda.” The former two-term lieutenant governor’s announcement video also showed Trump introducing Bauer at a rally as a man who could “run for almost any office and win,” and it highlighted Trump’s unsuccessful nomination of Bauer to be the U.S. Ambassador to Belize.
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Tennessee U.S. Representative Andy Ogles (R-TN-05) introduced an amendment following the U.S. Senate’s passage of the White House-backed “big beautiful bill” on Tuesday that would revert the Senate-passed version of the bill back to the version the House approved in May.
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House Republican leadership on Tuesday promised to work quickly in order to pass President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” and send it to the president’s desk by a self-imposed Fourth of July deadline.
The statement comes after the Senate passed its version of the bill earlier Tuesday, after hours of debate and voting on amendments. The vote-a-rama process took more than 24 hours.
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President Donald Trump nominated four individuals to serve on the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Board of Directors on Tuesday.
TVA’s nine-member board is nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed by the Senate. Each member serves a term of five years.
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U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Monday identified a murder suspect arrested in Nashville as an illegal immigrant from Honduras who entered the country without inspection by immigration officials more than a decade ago.
An ICE press release revealed Josue Hernandez-Moxje, 23, to be a citizen of Honduras. The agency confirmed he “entered the United States without inspection around 2013 or 2014,” and was arrested in Louisiana after being charged with committing the April the murders Jaime Valdez-Garcia and Amir Wilkerson in Nashville.
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Tennessee immigration laws passed by the General Assembly earlier this year took effect on Tuesday, including legislation authorizing state grant funding for law enforcement agencies who sign 287(g) agreements to assist U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE), as well as legislation prohibiting illegal immigrants from legally driving in Tennessee, where they are barred from applying for a driver’s license, by using a driver’s license issued by another state.
Among the legislation passed during the special session called by Governor Bill Lee earlier this year was Senate Bill 2, which authorizes the creation of the Centralized Immigration Enforcement Division (CIED) within the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security (TDOSHS), where the new division’s chief executive will manage collaboration and communication with federal immigration officials, create statewide immigration enforcement strategies, and coordinate the “participation in federal immigration programs” by local law enforcement.
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The Senate approved President Donald Trump’s landmark bill largely along party lines Tuesday morning after senators took dozens of votes on amendments and procedural motions in a marathon session that lasted more than 24 hours.
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U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn on Tuesday celebrated the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act by the U.S. Senate in a statement released hours after she successfully passed an amendment to kill a controversial part of the bill.
“Senate Republicans kept our promise to the American people and accomplished a once-in-a-generation victory for our country,” Blackburn said in a statement obtained by The Tennessee Star after she voted to pass the bill. “The One Big Beautiful Bill Act prevents the largest tax hike in American history and secures the largest tax cut ever for individuals and families who endured four years of crushing inflation and reckless spending.”
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U.S. District Court Magistrate Barbara Holmes for the Middle District of Tennessee on Monday agreed to the request by Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s defense attorneys to delay her consideration of his potential release until July 16, when District Court Chief Judge Waverly Crenshaw will have reviewed her decision to deny the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) a detention hearing for the citizen of El Salvador.
Because Abrego Garcia is subject to a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer, the prosecutors, Holmes, and Abrego Garcia’s attorneys previously acknowledged her order to release the alleged human smuggler on his own recognizance would functionally facilitate his transfer from DOJ custody, where he is currently held by the U.S. Marshals, to the custody of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), where the citizen of El Salvador will be held by ICE.
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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday suggested he would be open to replacing Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell as President Donald Trump renews his criticism of the central banker.
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North Carolina GOP Sen. Thom Tillis’s announcement Sunday that he will not seek 2026 reelection has resulted in the expected shortlist of likely Republican candidates to replace him – including marque names Lara Trump and Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley.
Tillis announced his retirement after voting against advancing President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” in the Senate on Saturday evening, then Trump vowing to field a primary challenger to his reelection.
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Acting U.S. Attorney Robert McGuire said in a filing submitted on Friday that the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee lacks the authority to instruct the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to house Kilmar Abrego Garcia in Maryland.
McGuire submitted the filing after the Maryland immigration attorneys for Abrego Garcia, the firm Murray Osorio, made their own submission to U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, requesting the judge issue an order demanding Abrego Garcia be housed by DHS in Maryland, and that such a ruling is necessary to force compliance with an earlier ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.
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A “comprehensive dossier” was submitted last week to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Weaponization Working Group, which was created by President Donald Trump in February, urging the administration to examine a series of cases which purportedly reveal a “deliberate, coordinated” attempt by the Biden administration to curb parental rights.
The Parents Demanding justice Alliance (PDJA), a coalition led by parental rights advocate Kelly John Walker and filmmaker Sam Sorbo, announced its submission of the dossier last Tuesday, when it urged the Weaponization Working Group to confront an alleged “systemic and unconstitutional campaign of intimidation, prosecution, and suppression directed at parents across the United States.
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The U.S. Department of Justice on Friday informed U.S. District Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in a legal filing that “it does not oppose” the request by Kilmar Abrego Garcia and his attorneys for a delay in her ruling on whether to release the citizen of El Salvador from Department of Justice (DOJ) custody, but appeared to question the attorneys and Holmes over their apparent “surprise” that Abrego Garcia may be deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Abrego Garcia’s request to remain in DOJ custody until July 16 was submitted by his attorneys in the federal case out of Tennessee after immigration lawyers representing the alleged human smuggler asked U.S. District Court Judge Paula Xinis to order ICE to detain Abrego Garcia in Maryland.
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The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) intends to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador following the conclusion of his federal trial in the Middle District of Tennessee, said assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin.
McLaughlin made the remarks during a Friday appearance on Newsmax’s “Wake Up America” in the wake of a federal prosecutor indicating on Thursday that the federal government planned to deport Abrego Garcia to a third country if he is released from U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) custody, and White House Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson later indicated the statement were misreported.
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The attorneys representing Kilmar Abrego Garcia in the federal case against him in the Middle District of Tennessee claimed in a Friday legal filing that the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) offered a reduced sentence to an alleged co-conspirator in exchange for incriminating information about the citizen of El Salvador.
Submitted to U.S. District Magistrate Barbara Holmes, the request by Abrego Garcia’s attorneys request their client be kept in DOJ custody until at least July 16, which would give District Court Judge Paula Xinis time to consider the Thursday request by his immigration lawyers to force the U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to detain him in Maryland.
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Following a years-long surge in illegal immigration, the Trump administration is poised to challenge a longstanding but legally fraught practice: counting illegal aliens in the U.S. census.
President Trump tried to end the practice during his first term, but President Biden overturned his predecessor’s policy before it was implemented. Now, buoyed by red state attorneys general and Republican legislators, the second Trump administration is determined “to clean up the census and make sure that illegal aliens are not counted,” White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller said last month.
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No other American president has faced as much hostile, ideologically driven judicial warfare as has President Donald Trump. But there was a president who also faced a slew of new, hostile judges appointed by his predecessor — and his example provides an interesting historical lesson.
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Like public libraries across the country, branches in North Carolina’s capital city turn rainbow-hued each June in celebration of Pride Month. Festive book displays featuring “queer-themed” titles written for all ages – from toddlers to teens and adults – are set out for the public as innocently as if the subject in question were cooking, gardening, or personal finance.
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Republican senators on Thursday urged U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) was urged to drop a provision from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act which establishes a 10-year moratorium on state-level laws regulating artificial intelligence (AI), with Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) reportedly leading her colleagues.
Blackburn’s role in the letter was her latest move to quietly oppose the bill, according to Punchbowl News, which noted her stated concerns over the language invalidating Tennessee’s Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security Act (ELVIS) of 2024, which prohibits using AI to impersonate musical artists.
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Following pushback from a growing coalition of politicians and public interest groups, U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, proposed an amended version of his plan to sell off public lands.
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Attorneys confirmed in court on Thursday that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) plans to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the citizen of El Salvador returned to the United States to face human smuggling charges, to a third country, if he is released from Department of Justice (DOJ) custody on Friday.
The remarks were made in a hearing called by U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in response to an emergency motion filed by Murray Osorio, the immigration attorneys representing Abrego Garcia in his Maryland lawsuit over his March deportation, which would compel ICE to detain Abrego Garcia in Maryland.
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