Brad Heath

How to reach me: Email: Brad.heath@tr.com Phone, Signal: 202 527-9709 WhatsApp: 703 835-7998 1333 H St., NW, Suite 700 Washington, DC 20005

👀 A Trump admin declaration in its lawsuit against California describes its process for flagging potential noncitizen voters but also indicates that the review is “ongoing” and that it discovered “minor data discrepancies” for 189 people it identified storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Over on the bad site, a defense of the ad featuring Amy Acton's mother is that Acton's story doesn't make sense because someone can't just escape justice by leaving the state for such a serious crime. That's simply not true. Over a decade ago @bradheath.bsky.social did a great piece on this:

The DOJ late Thursday sued Alaska to block certification of its U.S. Senate election if Dan J. Sullivan appears to spoil a victory for Sen. Dan Sullivan storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

In much the same way the ballroom became about security over time, the arch has become about history. On the administration's closing argument for it (at NCPC and in court): www.nytimes.com/2026/10/23/u...

New: Brian Krebs says that a ransom negotiator — unnamed in his story — helped *run* ShinyHunters’ extortion site. That’s separate from and in addition to Ed Dubrovsky, another negotiator facing charges allegedly connected to ShinyHunters. krebsonsecurity.com/2026/10/feds...

SCOOP: Trump DOJ leaders have halted prosecutors' long-running grand jury probe of Meta Platforms over permitting illicit drug sales. Officials intervened just after Meta execs were subpoenaed to testify. Case likely headed for non-criminal resolution. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

President Trump called for executing individuals who leak information to the media during a campaign rally as he railed against what he saw as critical coverage of the Iran war

The federal investigation into Rep. Ilhan Omar aims to build a case to strip her of her U.S. citizenship and ultimately deport her, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the probe on.wsj.com/4zBOcZ9

I’m not sure the courts of California would agree with this. And I’m sure D.C. doesn’t.

New: Hackers heat French supermarket fridges, sparking fires and food losses Note: We've seen similar refrigerator outages recent ... at U.S. military bases. www.reuters.com/business/ret...

Good morning. Federal prosecutors in Chicago filed partially redacted documents overnight in the "Broadview Six" case. The redactions appear to include the signature block (including the name) of one of the attorneys representing the United States government:

Mr. Trump’s demands for revenge have divided the Justice Department, diverted resources from other investigations and continued the erosion of the principle that politics must be kept strictly separate from federal law enforcement. www.nytimes.com/2026/10/09/u...

Kurt Olsen, a Justice Department lawyer who has been a leading Trump administration proponent of false claims the 2020 ​election was stolen, had his DOJ security clearance terminated last month after failing a polygraph test. www.reuters.com/legal/govern...

A new Reuters poll makes pretty clear that Republicans aren't willing to follow President Trump on some of his vanity projects. 80% of Republicans don't like his taxpayer-funded political ads. Only a quarter approved of Trump adding his name to the Kennedy Center. www.reuters.com/world/americ...

NEW: DHS agents tracked people observing ICE arrests, photographed them, ran their plates, pulled personal information, and added them to a Palantir database, according to newly unsealed court filings. w/ @regret.bsky.social

NEW: Director of White House Press Operations states in a declaration that access was restored and press passes available before 10 a.m. after a brief process of locating physical passes and restoring access this morning. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Six of the seven active federal judges in Minnesota spoke to The New York Times about the fallout from the Trump administration's surge there. One judge had to go into hiding. Another said it "created a grave threat to the rule of law.” www.nytimes.com/2026/09/17/u...

FBI Director Kash Patel told lawmakers on Tuesday he changed the bureau's hiring standards to eliminate bestiality as an automatic disqualifier because he did not want ​to bar trafficking victims who had been forced to have sex with animals. www.reuters.com/legal/govern...

The Defense Department Inspector General has this disclaimer about what it calls itself.

Border Patrol, not ICE, just FYI.

By a 60%-23% margin, Americans say the US government should be able to require a news outlet to take down a story if it poses a threat to national security. And by a 51%-33% margin, they say it should be able to do that if the story contains false info. www.pewresearch.org/journalism/2...

Everyone's focused on bestiality but don't forget that the same report says per new FBI rules "a person who stole from an employer is not automatically disqualified as long as the incident occurred more than three years ago" www.cbsnews.com/news/fbi-can...

Two months before Americans vote in midterm elections that, local and state officials across the country are rehearsing for a crisis that once seemed unthinkable: What if the U.S. president tries to use the power of the federal government to tilt the vote his way? www.reuters.com/investigatio...

A National Guard member who had been assigned to patrol Washington is being held in the D.C. jail on a felony charge after allegedly unholstering his loaded firearm and pointing it at another Guard member during an argument in a van.

A swarm of rogue OpenAI agents hijacked a German website this spring and transformed it into a bulletin board for other AI agents, according to ​new research published Friday and two people familiar with the matter. www.reuters.com/world/europe...

Short version: SCOTUS already ruled on this

From street names to supply chains to vacation bookings, Canadians are severing everyday ties in ways that could outlast the current trade dispute. Ottawa is moving to rename "Trump Avenue." www.reuters.com/business/str...

The DOJ Inspector General found that a federal prosecutor "engaged in prostitution."

The Justice Department is pursuing unlawful-entry charges against a person who was caught in a subway station "holding his phone recording and following National Guard members around the station."

The Pentagon has secretly installed several conservative military veterans with large online followings in government roles, declining to disclose their assignments as they amplify Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s viewpoints www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

Russian-speaking hackers used SpaceX’s new tab AI coding assistant, Cursor, to help break in to a Belgian chemical company and at least six other ​firms earlier this year. www.reuters.com/world/russia...

UPDATE: Judge in the League of Women Voters of Mass. case lifted the injunction there blocking the mail voting part of the EO — for now — but makes clear there could (and, imho, likely will) be a new injunction once the plaintiffs file their amended complaint addressing the final USPS rule.

The United States has filed a lawsuit against approximately 85 dogs.

The central point of the Justice Department's latest filing in the ongoing litigation over the Kennedy Center is that only the Trump administration has the expertise to save the place, but they'll only do it if it ends up with Trump's name on it somewhere. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Homeland Security spent 250,000 fewer hours working on fentanyl cases last year because agents were told to focus on immigration matters instead, the DHS Inspector General says. www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/defaul...

The nation's acting deputy attorney general, Trent McCotter, was technically still Steve Bannon's listed lawyer until this morning. (Bannon asked to swap him out in July, three months after McCotter joined the DOJ.)

BREAKING: Supreme Court lets Trump continue building his ballroom, for now.

More than 150 wallets on Polymarket International may have traded on inside U.S. military information, attracting copycat ​bets and raising concerns that the market could broadcast signals exploitable by foreign adversaries. www.reuters.com/business/fin...

Been a minute since I had a story in @usatoday.com: www.usatoday.com/story/news/p...