Fat former President Trump faces another contempt hearing Thursday morning on four separate gag order violations he committed last week. Then testimony from former Stormy Daniels lawyer Keith Davidson resumes in Donald’s criminal 2016 election interference trial, building towards hotly anticipated bits from former lawyer Michael Cohen and Daniels herself. Not clear which goes first.

An unspecified number of House Republicans, four of them actually quoted, tell Semafor they’re not particularly concerned with Marjorie Taylor Greene‘s vow to use their votes against vacating Jesus Dork House Speaker Mike Johnson as a purity test in still-ongoing primaries and in November.

“Even if it did, I wouldn’t care,” Texas Congressman Jake Ellzey – who already won his primary on Super Tuesday and thus does not have to worry – said in response to a question of whether backing the speaker could cost him the votes of disaffected Catturd followers who hate Johnson. “There is no support for this.” Freedom Caucasians chair Bob Good, a far right asshole who faces a possibly tough primary challenge back home in Virginia (one backed by Greene and at least four other incumbent House Republicans) for the sin of having endorsed Ron DeSantis before switching back to Trump, is at least not outwardly worried about the “distraction,” saying “We have a three-vote margin. We should be focused on reelecting President Trump. This does not help President Trump.”

Former Nikki Haley backer South Carolina Republican Ralph Norman similarly brushed off any potential backlash. “In this business you get some happy, you can get some mad. That what comes with the territory,” said Norman. “Moderate” shitbag Don Bacon said Greene and antisemite Thomas Massie’s Wednesday presser was “just two people being dumb and hurting the whole team.”

A “senior GOP aide” told Semafor that even if “the crazies won’t like” members siding with Johnson, it wouldn’t be a “nail in the coffin” for any of them. And goddamn it, that an anonymous high-level staffer describes the Republican base as “the crazies” should’ve been the lede here because it says so freaking much about the relationship between GOP leadership and the Americans whose votes they rely on to maintain their power. Opportunity cost is such a cruel and unforgiving bitch.

Records show Archives official met with Biden WH counsel the day of indictment against Trump https://t.co/t6tXGK7HJk

— John Solomon (@jsolomonReports) May 2, 2024

Antisemitic anti-vax candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr this week qualified for the ballot in California and said he’ll accept the nomination of the American Independent Party, a far-right outfit with a history of supporting fringe candidates such as segregationist former Alabama Governor George Wallace in 1968 and racist extremist President Donald Trump in 2016, the Washington Post reports.

The party “had its own rebirth, even before I came along,” Kennedy said in a video posted Monday, adding that the group had recently drafted a new charter and thus now “represents not bigotry and hatred, but rather compassion and unity and idealism and common sense.”

A 78 year-old The Villages, Florida man pleaded no contest Wednesday to a charge of indecent exposure for having been “nude from the waist down masturbating in front of an open kitchen window” on January 4th when he “knocked on the window” to get a passing woman’s attention, according to an arrest report from the Sumter County Sheriff, and then “began vigorously masturbating while looking at the victim,” Villages-News.com reports. A judge slapped James L Martin of the Village of Sanibel to six months probation and 50 hours of community service.

Negotiators with Gaza-based terrorist group Hamas on Thursday rejected US Secretary of State Tony Blinken’s terms for a ceasefire in the besieged territory, Jewish Insider reports on a reminder that Benjamin Netanyahu’s regime isn’t the only obstacle to peace.

Fulton County co-conspirator John Eastman lost his latest bid to push off the inevitable revocation of his law license in California on Wednesday when a judge ruled against his latest gambit to continue his practice while essentially being unlicensed.  Eastman wanted to retain his license, which was revoked for various ethical breaches concerning his role in Donald Trump’s 2021 coup attempt, while he appealed his law license’s revocation. But the court wasn’t playing games, saying Eastman continues to be a threat to the public:

The court’s decision determined that Eastman made deceptive and misleading claims in legal documents, public forums, and other contexts concerning the 2020 presidential election and the extent of Vice President Michael R. Pence’s authority to override the electoral process. Eastman’s motion fails to demonstrate that he no longer presents a threat to the public. Despite his clients’ desire for Eastman to continue representing them, based on the gravity of Eastman’s transgressions, particularly those involving moral turpitude, and the increased likelihood of future misconduct due to his refusal to acknowledge any wrongdoing, there is insufficient evidence to justify a stay of his involuntary inactive enrollment.

We’ll spare you the fifty-second build-up the King of Victimization Framing and Trump advisor Sean Hannity provided unrepentant dog killer Kristi Noem to help her clean up her political disaster.  And that’s why we know that the real victim of the roadside gravel pit slaughter was Kristi Noem, not Cricket, not the Goat (not named Sylvia).  The Republican is always the victim.

Nearly two months after the primary election was held and four weeks after the race was called a draw, the second-place finisher in the jungle primary for California’s 16th Congressional District has been named:  Democratic state assembly member Evan Low beat fellow Democrat Joe Simitian, a county supervisor, by five votes, 30,261 to 30,256, NBC News reports.

Although the race was poised to be a three-way election in November with the two second-place finishers on the ballot with Sam Liccardo, the Democratic former mayor of San Jose, a former campaign staffer of Liccardo filed paperwork demanding a hand recount to determine a single second-place finisher, as any voter in the district could do.

Both Jonathan Padilla, the voter who requested the recount, and the Liccardo campaign denied they were in contact or coordinated ahead of the announcement of a recount.  It’s unclear how having a single challenger would benefit Liccardo; he would have an easier campaign if his opposition were split between two candidates.  It’s also unclear who paid the cost of the recount.

Following an announcement of a school shooting threat on Wednesday morning at a middle school in Mount Horeb Area School District west of Madison, Wisconsin, police announced that the threat, a student from the district, had been “neutralized” using “deadly force,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul during a press conference said the unnamed suspect did not enter the school and no one in the school was injured, but that “a number” of officers were put on leave following the shooting.  It’s unclear if the suspect, identified as a male and a minor, fired any shots or how many officers were involved in the incident.  Witnesses told reporters that they heard “a number” of shots fired.

Texas Republican Trey Nehls tells everyone what the agenda for the Republican House Conference is, and you won’t be surprised to learn the GOP mission is not to provide competent governance for all Americans.  “Everything that we do in the House of Representatives should be in the best interests in getting Donald Trump reelected–this guy, right here,” cult member Nehls says displaying a necktie feature a miscolored image of Trump’s typically orange face.

The law firm that has represented Donald Trump in various sexual harassment cases including the E. Jean Carroll case that has cost Trump at least $90 million to date, has asked a federal judge to release them from representing Trump and his campaign in a little-followed sexual discrimination case filed by former Mediaite and 2016 campaign staffer A.J. Delgado.

Delgado got pregnant by Trump advisor Jason Miller–the same man who allegedly induced an abortion in a pregnant former lover by slipping her medication in a smoothie without her knowledge–while working on the campaign in 2016.  She claims Miller raped her; Miller denies the rape charge but doesn’t deny fathering the child.  After she became pregnant, Delgado claims the campaign, directed by Stephen Bannon, Sean Spicer, and Reince Priebus, took responsibilities away from her.

Per the Daily Beast, the firm, LaRocca, Hornik, Greenberg, Kittredge, Carlin & McPartland, claimed its relationship with its clients has suffered an “irreparable breakdown” that precludes the firm from acting as counsel.  It did not specify the event, but Donald Trump has repeatedly ignored counsel’s advice, leading to deeper legal troubles.

Researchers saw promising results in tests for a new mRNA-based vaccine to treat an aggressive form of brain cancer, with the treatment helping dogs as well as humans in early trials, IFL Science reports.  The process extracts mRNA from the patient’s tumor and manipulates it to spur that patient’s immune system to attack the cancer cells after it’s reinjected.

The tests have shown promise in human patients as well as dogs in the clinical test, but these aren’t typical animal testing.  Because dogs, like humans, are one of the rare animal species known to develop spontaneous brain tumors, the treatment was tested on ten dogs recently diagnosed with cancer tumors in their brains that were volunteered by their owners.

It was a rare case of animal drug testing benefiting the animal patient as well.  While dogs had a typical 30 to 60 day lifespan after diagnosis of the cancer, dogs treated with the mRNA vaccine lived for a median 139 days. “The demonstration that making an mRNA cancer vaccine in this fashion generates similar and strong responses across mice, pet dogs that have developed cancer spontaneously and human patients with brain cancer is a really important finding, because oftentimes we don’t know how well the preclinical studies in animals are going to translate into similar responses in patients,” said study co-author Dr. Duane Mitchell.

Enjoy the LIVE feed of these adorable little aquatic mustelids frolicking around and eating mollusks on their bellies in their habitat in the Monterrey Bay Aquarium in California.

The Pennsylvania state House on Wednesday passed House Bill 847 allowing the pre-canvassing of mail-in ballots up to seven days prior to Election Day, thereby removing the lag that took four days for the 2020 election to be called. It’s unclear if the GOP-controlled state Senate will take it up though, since they were happy to give fat former President Trump room to claim fraud that year.

Treasury Department: “Today, the Department of the Treasury is taking action to further degrade Russia’s ability to sustain its war machine, continuing a multilateral campaign to limit the Kremlin’s revenue and access to the materiel it needs to prosecute its illegal war against Ukraine. Today’s actions target Russia’s military-industrial base and chemical and biological weapons programs as well as companies and individuals in third countries that help Russia acquire key inputs for weapons or defense-related production. The United States, along with many international partners, is particularly concerned about entities based in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and other third countries that provide critical inputs to Russia’s military-industrial base.”

“This support enables Russia to continue its war against Ukraine and poses a significant threat to international security. The almost 300 targets being sanctioned by both Treasury and the Department of State include sanctions on dozens of actors that have enabled Russia to acquire desperately needed technology and equipment from abroad.”

Two Arizona state Senate Republicans joined 14 Democrats on Wednesday voting in favor of passing the state House’s bill repealing the 1864 ban on abortions, ABC15’s Garrett Archer reports, adding that recently indicted fake Trump 2020 elector state Senator Anthony Kern kind of lost his shit after the vote, saying Republicans gave up on the marriage issue, now the abortion issue, and wondering out loud if pedophilia was going to be the next one they surrender.

Joining a few minutes late and already we missed the fat bastard simultaneously denying and taking credit for Biden’s economy with “They call them fake numbers. They call them bounce back numbers,” saying “GOP growth is plunging,” struggling to pronounce “infrastructure,” and just generally making himself look like the demented megalomaniacal asshole that he is.

“The United States, by and through its attorneys, respectfully files this notice to inform the Court in advance of the May 2, 2024 status conference that, during its trial preparations, the government discovered that the defendant violated his pretrial conditions in this matter on at least two occasions by traveling out of state without providing notice to his Pretrial Services officer, as discussed below.”

“On March 9, 2023, the Court set the defendant’s pretrial conditions in this matter, which included in relevant part as follows: ‘Defendant must notify the Pretrial Services-Middle District of Florida in advance of any travel outside of the district.’ Based on publicly available information, it appears the defendant traveled to Greeley, Pennsylvania in or around October 7, 2023 to attend and speak at the ‘Rod of Iron Freedom Festival.’ Again in or around March 16, 2024, the defendant traveled to Morristown, Tennessee to attend and speak at another iteration of the same event, the ‘Rod of Iron Freedom Festival,'” write DC federal prosecutors in their notice to the court of pretrial restriction violations in the case of Capitol rioter Jesse James Rumson, aka “Sedition Panda” because he wore a giant panda furry costume head while storming the Capitol on January 6th.

The “Rod of Iron Ministries” are a cult of gun worshipping freaks based in the state and a sub-sect of the far-right South Korean Unification Church, aka the “Moonies,” led by the Rev Sean Moon, son of the late Unification Church founder and Jesus Christ-reincarnate megalomaniac Sun Myung Moon (hence “Moonies”), their services featuring a golden, jewel-encrusted AK-47 touted in the aisle.

Calling anti-vax dipshit Robert F Kennedy Jr’s ubiquity “concerning and beyond logic,” Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita tells Politico how frustrated he is “that there are some conservative platforms that continue to give a voice to someone that has called the NRA a terrorist group, who believes in eliminating gas powered engines, believes in a 70% tax bracket and generally subscribes to the same school of thought as Karl Marx,” as if it wasn’t a conscious decision by MAGA to hype him up and to run against Joe Biden in the Dem primary and then as an independent.

It’s almost like they could have seen this coming last year when they encouraged their allies in the right wing media to platform Kennedy to make his candidacy into a thing, which Politico writes is now “beginning to raise alarms at Mar-a-Lago” over the “rising threat” he “poses to Trump.”

“They see an opening, they see a robust ecosystem on the right that they can pull votes from,” said former Tim Scott campaign official Matt Gorman. “I think sometimes, Republicans tend to lull ourselves into believing, ‘Oh, he’s just taking votes from Biden.’ No, he’s going after everybody.”