The Court’s Big Day

Today’s notice: The Supreme Court’s biggest day yet. MAHA Monday was promised at the Great American State Fair, but not exactly delivered. Colorado primary preview. How campaigns plan to beat AI chat bots. And: One way to resolve campaign debts.

THE LATEST

What will be remembered from this Supreme Court term? The last words on it come today, and they could be very loud.

The high court is expected to deliver a birthright citizenship decision: a ruling on Donald Trump’s effort to alter the way the 14th Amendment has been understood for more than a century.

Since his executive order limiting birthright citizenship to the children of legal residents was signed on the first day of his second term, the issue has spawned lawsuits and roiled the courts. Then, as today, legal scholars/observers/anyone with a political pulse say the belief is Trump loses, and loses big.

Of course, no one outside the court really knows what the justices will do, ever, but on this one most people think they do.

If they’re right, will it carry the same force it would have last summer, when the power of this administration seemed limitless to so many? Immigration enforcement — the seminal “80/20 issue” MAGA talks about — has become a negative for this White House. Sixty-eight percent of independents disapproved of the job Trump is doing on immigration, the most recent AP-NORC poll found. A midterm some Republicans hoped would be an immigration victory lap is going to be another one where the incumbent party is on defense over prices.

There’s another ruling expected that could have a huge impact on these midterms. A challenge to long-standing coordinated spending rules brought against the FEC by Republican campaign groups could significantly boost the power political parties have in elections, and make it easier for congressional races to be nationalized.

There’s no real consensus on how the court will rule on that one. Get that refresh button ready as cases drop at 10 a.m.

Open tabs: Trump Nominates Acting Labor Secretary to Lead Department (WSJ); SCOTUS justices disclose millions in book earnings, teaching income (Reuters); Alaska Supreme Court says man with same name as Sen. Dan Sullivan is eligible for primary ballot (AP); White House Considers Granting 250 Pardons for the Nation’s Birthday (Atlantic)

From the National Mall

It was just another manic Monday at the Great American State Fair yesterday, which may have come as a disappointment to supporters of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Organizers billed the day as “MAHA Monday,” but NOTUS’ Margaret Manto did not find much on that theme during a visit. CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz spoke, as did a woman professionally known as Holistic Hilda. But the Make America Healthy Again movement wasn’t expressly mentioned, Margaret writes.

Freedom 250 billed the day as a celebration of “Everyday Health and Well Being.” But you could still buy sno-cones, giant pretzels and corn dogs.

From Colorado

Democrats’ next electability argument plays out tonight in Colorado’s 8th Congressional District, NOTUS’ Elena Schneider and Christa Dutton report. Voters there are divided over what kind of candidate to elect: a young social-media star who shares a cultural identity with the area’s large Latino population — state Rep. Manny Rutinel — or an experienced political veteran in former state Rep. Shannon Bird, who some Democrats think is a much safer bet come November.

Primary night in the state should be pretty lit, in general. We already told you about the governor’s race, where two fairly establishment Democrats are battling over who is slightly less establishment. Progressives feel confident they can stretch wins across the country from New York to a recently purple state like Colorado. But moderates are especially worried about losing their hold in places like this to candidates they fear are too radical.

Case in point: Colorado’s 1st District, where Democratic Rep. Diana DeGette is facing a formidable primary challenge from the DSA-backed Melat Kiros, a local attorney born after DeGette began serving in Congress who has found a willing and active base of support, as Elena reported from Denver recently.

From the campaign trail

Gaming the robots: “We have already seen there is so much discrepancy between how a candidate describes themselves and how AI is describing them,” Run for Something’s Amanda Litman told NOTUS’ Jenna Monnin recently of the organization’s new tool that runs AI chats in popular models to show candidates how they’re being presented. The tool is designed to help Run for Something’s candidates create an online profile that results in more positive appearances in chatbot searches.

NOTUS METRO

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Sports desk: Five Questions Facing the Capitals This Offseason, by Scott Allen

NOTUS PERSPECTIVES

We are thrilled to introduce Matt K. Lewis as NOTUS Perspectives’ newest columnist. Today, he writes about the dilemma that likely awaits his fellow Never Trump conservatives in 2028: Should they still believe in Marco Rubio?

NEW ON NOTUS

That’s one way to balance a budget: Former Rep. Robert Pittenger (R-North Carolina) owes a total of around $728,000 to 24 creditors from his last campaign … in 2018. Last week, he filed a debt settlement plan with the FEC, and our Christa Dutton reports that the line reading “Total Amount to be Paid to Creditors” is blank, indicating the committee does not plan to pay its debt. Line items for proposed payments to individual creditors are likewise listed as “$0.”

What might make this a little easier to pull off: The campaign’s largest debt, around $592,000, is to Pittenger himself.

More: Cryptocurrency Industry Courts Democrats by Pouring Millions Into Elections, by Avani Kalra and Jade Lozada

Trump’s July 4 Bash Will Close D.C. Airspace for 15 Hours, by Torrie Herrington

Labor Union to Congress: Our Embezzlement Problems Got Bigger, by Taylor Giorno

NOT US

• Inside the Food Truck Mafia Wreaking Havoc Around the National Mall, by Jessica Sidman for Washingtonian
• The Extremely Online Senate Race Testing Democrats’ Midterm Strategy, by Adam Wren for Politico
• Has Ukraine Turned the Tide? By Ryan Cooper for The American Prospect
• How a Mass Shooting Shattered Australia’s Political Consensus, by Oscar Schwartz for The New Yorker

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The newsletter was produced by Kelly Poe, Thomas Burr and Andrew Burton. Photo by Francis Chung/POLITICO/AP.