Just Four People Show Up to Pro-Redistricting Rally in Red State

President Donald Trump’s plot to push out Republican Indiana state senators who killed his redistricting scheme may demonstrate just how much power the president has lost.

Last week, Turning Point USA held a get-out-the-vote event for Brenda Wilson, a Trump-backed candidate challenging state Senator Greg Goode in the upcoming primary election on May 5.

A team from Turning Point USA gathered at the Fairbanks Park Amphitheater in Terre Haute, Indiana, flush with law signs and fliers, blasting a playlist called “Trump Rally,” NOTUS reported Monday.

But only four people came, three of whom were from the same family, according to the outlet.

It seems that Turning Point USA has hosted other events with higher attendance, as part of a wider effort aimed at unseating so-called RINOs and moderates, or anyone who has not supported Trump’s meddling in state elections.

Eight of the Republican legislators who voted against Trump’s congressional redistricting scheme are up for reelection in Indiana’s primary, and seven are being challenged by Trump-endorsed opponents.

In addition to funding promised from Trump’s allies in the state, including Governor Mike Braun and Senator Jim Banks, the Trump-backed challengers have invited an influx of outside spending from groups such as Club Growth for Action, which is spending $2 million across eight races.

But as Trump’s approval ratings have fallen to 37 percent nationally and roughly 49 percent in Indiana, a state he won in 2024, it’s not clear that being tied to the president, his unpopular war in Iran, and his poor economic report card won’t be a liability to candidates instead of a boost.

The U.S. military on Monday denied claims in Iranian state media that Iran bombed a U.S. Navy ship in the Strait of Hormuz, shortly after President Trump announced a new plan to help guide ships through the critical waterway.

Iran’s Fars Media reported that a Navy vessel in the southeast sector of the strait was struck for “violating maritime security and navigation norms” and that the ship turned around after being hit. One Iranian official told the BBC that there was one warning shot but could not confirm if there was damage.

U.S. Central Command is denying any reports of serious damage.

“CLAIM: Iranian state media claims that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps hit a U.S. warship with two missiles,” CENTCOM wrote Monday on X. “TRUTH: No U.S. Navy ships have been struck. U.S. forces are supporting Project Freedom and enforcing the naval blockade on Iranian ports.”

This comes as the U.S. begins attempts to enact Trump’s recently announced “Project Freedom”—a bid to escort merchant and allied ships through the strait while continuing to blockade Iranian vessels, something Trump is calling a “humanitarian gesture.” Iran continues to hold its own blockade of the strait, as well.

President Trump is insisting that states rig elections in Republicans’ favor—even if it means people have to vote multiple times until they win.

On Sunday night, Trump took to Truth Social and posted, “We cannot allow there to be an Election that is conducted unconstitutionally simply for the ‘convenience’ of State Legislatures.”

“​​If they have to vote twice, so be it. We should demand that State Legislatures do what the Supreme Court says must be done. That is more important than administrative convenience. The byproduct is that the Republicans will receive more than 20 House Seats in the upcoming Midterms! President DONALD J. TRUMP,” he wrote.

Trump didn’t even bother to repeat the false Republican claim of widespread voter fraud, instead blatantly stating that his goal is additional congressional seats for the GOP. He hopes that these newly redrawn seats would mitigate or even prevent losses in November’s midterm elections.

All of this comes after the Supreme Court basically nullified the Voting Rights Act last week, throwing out decades of precedent and giving many Republican-led states the ability to redraw their districts and disenfranchise Black voters. Louisiana, South Carolina, Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, and other states either have already started redrawing their congressional maps or are preparing to do so.

Democrats are scrambling to sue over these new maps, while also fighting efforts from the Trump administration to gain access to voter rolls in blue states. The midterms are six months away (sooner with early voting), and the Republican Party, led by Trump, is doing everything—other than reverse its unpopular policies—to rig the results in its favor.

The Trump administration has canceled federal funding for test strips used to find out if a substance contains fentanyl. 

CBS News, citing a letter from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, reports that government funds can’t be used to purchase the strips anymore, increasing the risk of drug overdoses. The strips also test for other dangerous substances such as xylazine and medetomidine, which are normally used to sedate animals and have been linked to overdose deaths in people. 

Public health organizations are shocked at the move, because test strips only cost about $1 each and can be used to check illicit drugs in powder or pill form. The director of federal policy  at the Drug Policy Alliance, Maritza Perez Medina, called them a “critical, lifesaving tool.” 

“People are just astonished,” Medina told CBS. “There has been a lot of confusion about where this came from.”

The letter cites a July 2025 executive order from President Trump that prohibits SAMHSA, a branch of the Department of Health and Human Services, from using its funding for programs that “only facilitate illegal drug use.” An HHS spokesperson told CBS that the letter clarifies what SAMHSA funding can be used for, which excludes “practices that facilitate illicit drug use and are incompatible with federal laws.”

In 45 states as well as Washington, D.C., test strips are not considered drug paraphernalia, and Nevada as well as California provide information on where to find them online. Congress protected their use in 2018, and as of last July, the agency still allowed its funding to pay for test strips. 

But that’s over now, and organizations around the country will lose badly needed money to prevent drug overdoses. The executive director of the Kentucky Harm Reduction Coalition, Shreeta Waldon, told CBS that the organization was told it would lose a $400,000 grant, and only has a month’s supply of test strips left after distributing 48,465 strips in the first quarter of 2026. 

“It doesn’t make sense that one day something is an evidence-based protocol, and you decide, because of political climate, it is no longer evidence-based,” Waldon said. “If they follow the science and the data, we would never move in this direction.” 

The Trump administration’s public health decisions, from discouraging vaccines to cutting cancer research, don’t seem to be based on preventing deaths. Drug overdoses occur everywhere, including in rural areas where support for the president is strongest. Now many of those places won’t have a critical tool to save lives. 

Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry has been hit with multiple lawsuits in the 24 hours since he announced a halt on statewide primaries so that Republicans can redraw favorable congressional districts in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to gut the Voting Rights Act in Louisiana v. Callais.

On Friday, several civil rights organizations, including the ACLU, the Louisiana chapter of the NAACP, and the National Council of Jewish Women, sued to block Landry from suspending the May 16 primary election.

“Under Louisiana law, the legislature, not the Governor or the Secretary of State, sets the state’s election schedule. Yet, Governor Jeff Landry, aided by Secretary of State Nancy Landry, has purported to unilaterally cancel Louisiana’s 2026 congressional primary election after it has already begun,” read the lawsuit from the National Council of Jewish Women and Louisiana voters. “Ballots were sent to military voters and overseas voters as required by federal law a month ago. Mail ballots were sent to other voters entitled to vote by mail under Louisiana law almost a week ago. As a result, many voters—including among the Petitioners here—have already voted.”

The lawsuit also cited other Supreme Court decisions to argue that Landry cannot change the map this close to the election. “Quite to the contrary, the Supreme Court has historically found that when voting in an election is within months of beginning—and, here, it has already begun—the state must proceed under the invalidated map, and any infirmities must be corrected for future elections,” the suit read.

The lawsuit from the ACLU, the NAACP, and other voting rights organizations is requesting that a state court block Landry’s decision on the grounds that the Supreme Court ruling did not constitute an “emergency” under state law. Landry had already been hit with another lawsuit on Thursday from Democratic House candidate Lindsay Garcia, who argued the suspension infringes on the First, Fourteenth, and Fifteen Amendments.

The aggressive backlash is no surprise, given that this is perhaps the most egregious example of the GOP’s attempt to force through its own congressional maps, no matter how many Black and brown voters are disenfranchised. Prepare for more to come, and from both sides.

Donald Trump has nearly tripled his net worth since being elected president a second time, and it’s all thanks to cryptocurrency. 

The president is now worth an estimated $6.5 billion, up from $2.3 billion in 2024, economic analyst and former Obama administration adviser Steve Rattner told MS NOW Friday. Between August 2025 and January 2026, Trump profited to the tune of $3.02 billion from crypto. It all started a few days before his inauguration in January 2025 when he released his $TRUMP meme coin. 

MAGA supporters rushed to buy the coin, which quickly shot up to a $30 billion valuation and peaked at a price of $45. The president was able to cash in, but many of his supporters were left holding the bag as the price plummeted to only $10 four months later. Now, it is worth less than $2.50, according to Rattner. 

“It is a coin that means nothing,” Rattner said on Morning Joe. “It is like buying a pet rock, except you don’t even get a rock. It has no value. It has no trading value. It’s not used in commerce—nothing.”  

In contrast, Trump’s net worth actually went down during his first term as he restricted his company from making international deals. This time around, his sons Eric and Donald Jr. created World Liberty Financial to handle cryptocurrency assets, including the USD1 stablecoin. The venture has taken in billions from funds connected to foreign governments, including the United Arab Emirates,  

Trump’s business activities, whether they pertain to cryptocurrency or his real estate investments, are blatantly unethical for any government official, let alone the president. His family is taking in billions from foreign governments and profiting off the presidency itself, violating the Constitution’s emoluments clause. Thanks to the Supreme Court giving him near-total immunity and Republicans in Congress purposefully turning a blind eye, he won’t face any consequences. 

Alabama is pushing ahead with a racist redistricting scheme after the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act.

Republican Governor Kay Ivey called Friday for a special session next week of the Alabama state legislature to pass new congressional and state Senate maps, and prepare legislation to hold special primary elections.

The move came one day after Alabama’s Attorney General Steve Marshall asked the Supreme Court to allow the state to implement new congressional and state Senate maps that were redrawn in 2023 before being barred by the Voting Rights Act.

In Wednesday’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais, the court’s six-justice conservative majority effectively dismantled Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on race. While the decision did not eradicate it entirely, the court has raised new hurdles for those seeking to prove a racial gerrymandering claim, and gave its blessing to those who would claim partisan gerrymandering as a legal defense.

The new maps would effectively redraw Alabama’s two Black-majority districts: the 2nd district and the 7th district.

Alabama’s 2nd congressional district, led by Representative Shamari Figures, contains Mobile and Montgomery and would see its Black population shrink from 49 percent to 40 percent, according to the Alabama Reflector.

Alabama’s 7th congressional district, led by Representative Terri Sewell, is Alabama’s oldest majority-Black district and has consistently sent Black Democrats to Washington since 1993. This district includes Selma, as well as parts of Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, and Montgomery.

CJ Pearson, a right-wing influencer, wrote on X that the decision “will likely lead to a COMPLETELY REPUBLICAN DELEGATION!” Pearson, who was one of the first to report Ivey’s move, said that it had been the result of lobbying by Marshall, attorney general candidate Katherine Robertson, and Secretary of State Wes Allen.

Pope Leo XIV has named three new bishops in the United States, each of whom have been vocal critics of President Trump.

Evelio Menjivar, a formerly undocumented immigrant, will be the new bishop for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston in West Virginia, and Gary Studniewski and Robert Boxie III will be auxiliary bishops in Washington, D.C. The appointments indicate a deliberate choice on the pope’s part to select representatives in the United States who will be similarly unafraid to raise their voices against the Trump administration.

Menjivar, who immigrated from El Salvador to the U.S. in the trunk of a car when he was a teenager, decried Trump’s immigration crackdown last year in the National Catholic Reporter. “The federal government has pursued a ‘shock and awe’ campaign of aggressive threats and highly visible operations of questionable legality that go far beyond mere immigration ‘enforcement,’” he wrote. “We must stand with those at risk … and we cannot let the dark side of anti-immigrant animus take hold.”

Father Studniewski, a former U.S. Army chaplain who serves in the Chevy Chase area, called the January 6 insurrection “very disturbing, very disheartening.”*

“It was a normal day, until all that sickening unrest in the afternoon,” he told Today’s Catholic in 2021. And Father Boxie, who serves at Howard University, was deeply critical of Trump’s war on diversity, equity, and inclusion last year.

“In a lot of ways we have made great progress, but in so many ways, I feel like we’re regressing,” said Boxie. “It’s really frustrating—especially this moment that we’re living in. The attacks on ‘DEI’—I don’t even know what that means anymore. It’s a term that’s been hijacked. It means a lot of things to a lot of different people.”

* This article previously misstated the location of Father Studniewski’s church.

President Donald Trump claimed Friday it’s unconstitutional to seek congressional approval for war.

Speaking to the press outside the White House, Trump whined that he should not have to comply with the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which requires the president to withdraw his forces from a conflict after 60 days unless Congress declares war or approves an extension.

“There’s no other country that’s ever done it, it’s never been uh, as you know—most people consider it totally unconstitutional. Also we had a ceasefire so that gives you additional time,” he falsely claimed.

“We’re on our way to another victory, a big victory. And I don’t think that it’s constitutional what they’re asking for. These are not patriotic people that are asking,” he said.

The irony is that the War Powers Resolution is the only reason Trump’s reckless military campaign in Iran could even be considered constitutional in the first place. According to Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the United States Constitution, Congress has sole power to declare war. The 60-day window is an exception to that rule.

If the War Powers Resolution were totally void, Trump’s war in Iran would be illegal. (It already is, according to international law.)

Trump has simultaneously tried to sidestep Congress’s 60-day deadline by buying into the argument that the clock stopped when a ceasefire was announced halfway through April.

However, the U.S. is already testing the boundaries of its tenuous ceasefire with Iran by installing a military blockade on Iranian ports, an act of war according to international law, and even seizing an Iranian cargo ship. Meanwhile, Israel, America’s ally in its joint military operation, has not stopped its intense strikes in Lebanon, in violation of the ceasefire agreement.

President Trump is claiming that the war on Iran is actually over in an effort to avoid any sort of accountability.

Trump on Friday officially informed Congress that the war was “terminated,” writing, “There has been no exchange of fire between the United States and Iran since April 7, 2026.... The hostilities that began on February 28, 2026, have terminated.”

The War Powers Resolution states that a president must formally alert Congress of any new war they entered into within 48 hours of hostilities. After that, they have 60 days to end the conflict before Congress steps in and either orders them to stop or allows them to continue. Trump’s 60 days are up on Friday, and it appears that even Republicans want to hold him accountable.

“That deadline is not a suggestion; it is a requirement,” GOP Senator Susan Collins said. “Further military action against Iran must have a clear mission, achievable goals, and a defined strategy for bringing the conflict to a close.”

To avoid any of that, Trump is insisting that the war actually ended with the ceasefire announcement in early April, even as Iran continues to block the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. continues to block Iranian ships from leaving, and Israel continues to bomb Lebanon. The ceasefire seems to be holding on by a thread, and does not appear to be an end to the conflict in any way.

Trump on Friday called it “unconstitutional” for Congress to try to rein in his powers.

“We’re on our way to another victory, a big victory. And I don’t think that it’s constitutional what they’re asking for,” he said on Friday. “These are not patriotic people that are asking.... Even the losers, even the ones that say all the wrong things admit that it’s been amazing what we’ve done. The strait is totally shut down, it’s flawless.”

If this truly is the end of the war, then it’s unclear who the victor even is.