Tex's Place

By Greg Piper When the Supreme Court reinstated an Amish challenge to New York's ban on religious exemptions for school vaccine mandates last year, without oral argument or a written opinion, a critic warned that SCOTUS had "quietly unsettled" the law profession's reading of its precedents: that religious liberty stops short of vaccine opt-outs.  The high court now has a chance to loudly unsettle that narrow reading of the First Amendment's free exercise clause and overturn one of its most controversial remaining precedents, penned by the late conservative icon Justice Antonin Scalia. Amish schools and parents petitioned SCOTUS to slap down the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a second time for rubber-stamping its initial ruling for New York, after the justices told the lower court to review their recent precedent affirming parents' right to direct the religious upbringing of their children, in that case through LGBTQ curriculum opt-outs . The 2nd Circ...

Christa Pike was set to become the first woman executed in Tennessee since the early 1800s for the 1995 killing of Colleen Slemmer By Michael Ruiz Convicted Tennessee killer Christa Pike has been spared at the last minute from becoming the first woman executed in the state since the early 1800s after the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay Wednesday morning. In a 2-1 split decision, the court issued a stay "until further notice" as the court weighs motions filed by Pike's attorneys and the Tennessee Attorney General's Office. The state immediately appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, seeking to have the stay lifted. Pike, 50, was 18 in 1995 when she, her boyfriend and another person beat, kicked and stabbed their 19-year-old classmate Colleen Slemmer to death in a brutal "satanic" attack that Pike claimed took between 30 minutes and an hour, according to court documents. An undated portrait photograph of Colleen Slemmer provide...

By Shawn Fleetwood ‘It’s not a fight about climate science. … It’s a fight about whether we’re going to allow this maneuver to be what reshapes American society.’ The U.S. Supreme Court will kick off its 2026 term next week with what will be one of its biggest cases of the year. And according to several legal specialists, there’s much more to the dispute than meets the eye. The case in question is Suncor v. Boulder , which deals with the lawfare that Boulder, Colorado, launched against Suncor Energy companies and the Exxon Mobil Corporation. The city is seeking monetary damages based on claims that the oil giants’ activities are contributing to “climate change” and that such activities are harming Boulder residents. Before SCOTUS is the question of whether federal law prevents state-law claims “seeking relief for injuries allegedly caused by the effects of interstate and international greenhouse-gas emissions on the global climate.” The justices will also consider whether they h...

By Benn Smith ICE is planning to hire 5,000 more employees by the end of the year. Most will be deportation officers. Trump ran on mass deportations and won. This is what keeping that promise looks like. Four people familiar with the hiring plans told The New York Times about the push. ICE had about 29,000 employees in July, according to federal data cited by the paper, roughly 8,000 more than when Trump took office. Meeting the new hiring goal would add another 17 percent to the workforce. Some agents have been under pressure to work seven days a week. They’re making arrests and managing cases, and ICE wants thousands more officers to share that workload. Congress has already approved the funding. Seven-day workweeks are a pretty good argument for using it to get more people hired. DHS says the new positions come from that congressional funding and are separate from replacing employees who left after the earlier hiring surge. The agency has money available to expand the deportat...

By Jerry Wilson Geddy Lee , bassist/keyboardist/lead vocalist for the veteran Canadian progressive hard rock power trio Rush , has moved away from his usual public avoidance of political matters to make an endorsement in the upcoming Toronto mayoral election on Monday, October 26, 2026. Lee has come out in favor of Toronto City Councilor Brad Bradford , who, among others, is running against current mayor Olivia Chow. I was born in Toronto and have built a life with my family here. It was always a place I’ve been proud to call home. But it’s changing, and not for the better. I’m not one to make public statements about politicians, but I truly fear for the future of Toronto with its current leadership, and believe that Brad has energy, fresh ideas and really cares about ALL of this city’s communities. Lee has expanded on his endorsement in a statement on Bradford’s website . “I'm a kid from Willowdale. I've spent 50 years travelling the world and every time I returned home,...

According to the report, the information Netanyahu presented included details about new construction work at the mountainous site known as “Pickaxe Mountain,” about 140 miles south of Tehran. By IDAN KWELLER Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan with new Israeli intelligence according to which Iran is renewing its progress in its nuclear program according to a report overnight Wednesday by CNN, citing an Israeli official familiar with the details of Sunday's Abu Dhabi meeting. According to the report, the information Netanyahu presented included details about new construction work at the mountainous site known as “ Pickaxe Mountain ,” about 140 miles south of Tehran. The site is considered a possible key location in Iran’s efforts to restore its nuclear program. However, the report does not determine that uranium enrichment is already being carried out at the site. Talks included Israel, U...

By Kyle Becker Former Special Counsel Jack Smith appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday morning, and Chairman Chuck Grassley wasted little time revealing new details about the extraordinary reach of the investigation that eventually became Smith's election case against President Donald Trump. The biggest revelation may be just how far investigators reached beyond Trump himself. Grassley said investigators subpoenaed 87 phones belonging to Trump White House officials and obtained records containing communications with journalists at major news organizations, including CBS News, CNN, Fox News, the Associated Press, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Washington Times and The Federalist. CBS News reported the disclosure live from Tuesday's hearing. That comes on top of the previously disclosed collection of phone records belonging to Republican members of Congress. "In the end, Mr. Smith indicted one person," Grassley said Tu...

By Ronny Reyes Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps put out a 25-page letter addressed to Americans urging them to oppose President Donald Trump during the upcoming midterm elections. The IRGC, which has repeatedly tried to sway the Nov. 3 US elections, claimed that the president and his support of Israel were the cause of the war — as they urged voters to reject both in the voting booth. “America’s national security and the lives of its service members are entrusted to someone who is not only an inveterate liar but is also an insanely avaricious man whose only motivation in life ​is the accumulation of ​greater wealth,” IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohebbi said in the regime’s latest attack on Trump. Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps spokesman Hossein Mohebbi called on US voters to reject President Trump during the November 3rd midterm elections. Anadolu via Getty Images The letter accuses Trump of concealing the “peaceful nature” of Iran’s nuclear program despite allegations f...

By Ella Morrison Mo Money Mo Problems? Not for Diddy. Disgraced music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs is reportedly living high and large inside the Fort Dix federal prison in New Jersey — with access to a cellphone, booze and people catering to his every need, NBC News reported.  While he’s serving a 50-month sentence for prostitution-related offenses, Combs, 56, spends thousands of dollars a month to bring his pampered lifestyle to the Garden State lockup, according to four men who spent time in the same unit as the former hip-hop producer, speaking to the outlet on the condition of anonymity. “This is not some normal s–t you see in jail. This is some rich s–t,” one of the men said. “It looks crazy, but again, it’s Diddy.” Sean “Diddy” Combs spends thousands of dollars a month to live a lavish lifestyle behind bars, NBC reported. NBC 4 According to the sources, the “Bad Boy for Life” rapper has men at the low-security prison who cook and clean for him, make his b...