The Justice Department told lawyers for @usatoday on Saturday that it is withdrawing a subpoena seeking information about readers who accessed a particular article. An official said the FBI has identified a suspect "via other means."
DOJ's decision to withdraw the subpoena came right around the same time it said it would no longer secretly try to obtain records of reporters' communications.
Pillow magnate Mike Lindell says he'll file a lawsuit tomorrow against election machine firms Dominion and Smartmatic, which he falsely claims rigged the 2020 election.
"There's going to be stuff in this lawsuit that is going to ... stuff that's not been done before."
Update: Lindell filed it today.
He's boasted that this suit will prompt the Supreme Court to overturn the election, 9-0. It won't, because 1) he sued private parties that don't have the power to do that even if the court ordered it and; 2) he's only seeking monetary damages.
The Justice Department redacted the names of the news organizations. It's been reported previously that CNN and NBC each paid $35,000. And the description of this $10,000 payment to Sullivan pretty clearly refers to The @washingtonpost.
Each paragraph of MyPillow's lawsuit against Dominion is a unique little work of art.
I'm not sure how to reconcile MyPillow's claim that it was harmed by Dominion squelching debate about the election with its claim that it really wasn't involved in any of this election stuff at all, but maybe you're meant to read it more as a collection of short stories.
Also I'm not sure how MyPillow can credibly claim that it wasn't commenting on the 2020 election and wasn't interested in commenting on it, and also that Dominion's litigation unconstitutionally silenced its election commentary.
DOJ filed a lawsuit today against ex-Trump adviser Roger Stone saying he owes nearly $2 million in unpaid taxes and penalties and that he and his wife used an LLC to "shield their personal income from enforced collection and fund a lavish lifestyle."
DOJ says Stone and his wife moved $1 million to their LLC in 2018-19, then had the LLC pay "a substantial amount of their personal expenses," including groceries and dentist bills. This "evaded and frustrated the IRS's collection efforts."
DOJ straight-up accuses Roger Stone and his wife of fraud. (This is a civil case, though.)
Wisconsin @GovEvers asked a court to impose $106,780 in sanctions over ex-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell's failed effort to overturn the presidential election there. "There is no reason for Wisconsin taxpayers to bear the expense of this attempt to hijack the democratic process."
The brief walks through the short history of the case, which is a compendium of things you should not do in litigation.
Nearly two years after the Justice Department IG recommended it, the DEA hasn't committed to conducting a "rigorous legal review" before using its subpoena power to launch "bulk collection" surveillance programs.
"Next time check to see whether it's legal *before* doing it" might be the most anodyne recommendation ever from an IG. The recommendation doesn't actually say that the DEA needs to conclude the program is legal - just that it should pause to think about it.