August 25, 2025

On Thursday night, I appeared on Chris Hayes’ television show to discuss Donald Trump’s attacks on free and fair elections. He began by asking me why Trump is once again attacking mail-in voting: “Is it just a paranoid obsession, or is there some angle he is working?”

Without hesitation, I responded with the obvious: “Democrats benefit from mail-in voting. One of the mistakes people make is they try to make Donald Trump’s thinking more complicated than it is.”

Trump does not play three-dimensional chess. In fact, he doesn’t play chess at all — checkers would be a stretch. Trump is more like a tic-tac-toe aficionado who aspires to be a Wordle champion.

When Trump says he wants to ban mail-in voting, it is because it is an easy way to prevent Democrats from voting. When he says he wants to ban certain voting machines, he means the equipment most likely to be used in blue cities and states. When he says he wants to take control of vote counting and tabulation, it is because he wants to stop victorious Democrats from taking office.

The worst advice we ever received was to take Trump seriously but not literally. Trump is not a serious person. He is a simpleton who typically says what he means. So, if I must choose between taking Trump seriously or literally, I will bet on literally.

Trump ran for president on a platform of retribution against his political enemies. We should take that threat literally. He has made clear that the DOJ exists to execute his wishes. We should take that threat literally. He has even said that he “needs the kind of generals that Hitler had.” We should definitely take that threat literally.

We saw this on display over the weekend, when it was reported that Trump is planning to send the National Guard and military into additional cities — starting with Chicago. There is no doubt in my mind that Trump intends to deploy troops in Chicago, as well as in several other cities.

His purpose is twofold. First, it makes Trump — who is a very weak man — feel strong. Second, it sets the stage for these kinds of deployments to be normalized before the 2026 elections, when, according to Trump, he hopes to gain 100 congressional seats. That would literally require him to cheat on a scale we have never seen in this country.

You should be literally and seriously alarmed.

The Weekend’s Topline

The biggest story of the weekend — perhaps of the month — was Texas’ new gerrymandered congressional map. At around 2:00 a.m. Saturday morning, Republicans pushed their monstrosity of a map through the state Senate. They accomplished this middle-of-the-night feat by breaking their own rules and denying Democrats the ability to filibuster.

By 8:00 a.m., my law firm had already filed the first legal challenge to the new map. On Sunday afternoon, we filed a motion for a preliminary injunction. In essence, the lawsuit argues that the new map violates the U.S. Constitution and federal law by discriminating against minority voters and by conducting mid-cycle redistricting under these unusual circumstances. The case seeks to block Texas from using this map in 2026.

Now we wait to see what happens next. In Texas, the court will hold a status hearing on Wednesday to set a schedule for considering our preliminary injunction motion.

But in the meantime, we will also be watching several other states. In California, Gov. Newsom’s plan to redraw the map to add five Democratic seats will be on the ballot this November.

It is less certain what will happen in Republican-controlled states like Florida, Indiana and Missouri — or when it will happen. Nor is there clarity about blue states like Illinois, Maryland and New York.

My advice: pay attention, and make sure you read Democracy Docket every day for critical updates and important information.

Fools and Cowards of the Weekend

Republicans are still scrambling to escape the trap they fell into regarding the release of the Epstein Files. First, they tried to ignore it. When that didn’t work, they asked the courts to release largely irrelevant grand jury transcripts. That failed, too.

On Friday, the Department of Justice sent the House Oversight Committee the first tranche of documents from the files. Yet it apparently consists almost entirely of documents already in the public domain.

When Congress returns to Washington after Labor Day, House Republicans will face a vote on whether to release the files or continue to protect Trump. Any Republican who thinks the public has forgotten about this issue is a fool. And Republicans who choose to protect Trump are cowards. Expect plenty of cowards in the Republican cloakroom.

Siren of the Weekend 🚨

On Friday afternoon, Donald Trump’s errant secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, fired two senior military officers. The highest-profile firing was of Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Be warned: this is part of a broader purge of senior intelligence officials.

Less prominent, but perhaps more ominous, was the termination of Vice Adm. Nancy Lacore. One could chalk her firing up to misogyny, but it is notable that she was serving as chief of the Navy Reserve. As Trump expands his misuse of the military for domestic operations, reservist commanders will become critical — either as enablers or as obstacles. The fact that a highly regarded naval officer was removed from this position should be setting off sirens.

Overlooked This Weekend 👀

Earlier this year, Ohio enacted a 225-page Transportation Appropriations Bill. Hidden on a single page was a nine-line provision restricting one of the most popular methods of voter registration in the state.

This new provision adds a burdensome “proof of citizenship” requirement for anyone registering to vote at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV), with no clear guidance on what documents will suffice. Nearly 30% of Ohioans register through the BMV, so this is a major change to ballot access in the Buckeye State.

This stealth attack on voting rights creates a two-tiered system that treats citizens differently depending on where they register — and will inevitably make it harder for some eligible Ohioans to vote.

If Ohio lawmakers thought they could slip this restriction through without scrutiny, they were wrong. On Friday, my firm filed a new federal lawsuit seeking to strike down this discriminatory law.