The effort to prosecute former Olympic canoeist David Hearn for damaging the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has hit a snag. Judge Todd E. Edelman noted that the government is “operating at its own peril” if it alters the Reflecting Pool before the defense attorneys’ expert has the opportunity to sample the lining. Hearn’s lawyers filed a motion to dismiss the case on Thursday, arguing that the government had not preserved the section of pool liner that Hearn stands accused of slashing.
“Despite the importance of the pool liner to the case, in the brief period since June 19, 2026, the same government that presented and returned the indictment against Mr. Hearn has fenced off the scene, begun draining the pool yet again, and publicly announced its intention to repair the very liner whose condition is at issue,” the motion to dismiss reads.
The case against Hearn already stretches credulity, with President Trump accusing “vandals” of acting to damage the pool after he had contracted a friend to re-line it in the lead-up to America’s 250th celebrations. Though the more conspiracy-minded of us might note that one of Hearn’s lead attorneys is Norman Eisen, the CNN legal analyst who co-runs The Contrarian Substack with NeverTrumper Jennifer Rubin.
Eisen has found himself accused of fomenting a “color revolution” against Trump through his work at the Brookings Institution by a number of leading voices in the MAGAsphere. In 2020 Revolver News branded him “a key architect of nearly every attempt to delegitimize, impeach, censor, sue, and remove the democratically elected 45th President of the United States.” Not that he has an ax to grind, of course.
On our radar
CLOSE RELATIONS Speaker Mike Johnson said he is in favor of banning members of Congress from having relations with staffers on the Hill. “I can’t believe it would be acceptable in any situation,” he told Axios. “I think it’s inappropriate, as it would be in any workplace.”
GOODBYE, 250! Construction crews are currently dissembling the FIFA Fan Zone and the Great American State Fair site on the National Mall.
PUSHING BACK The director of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History challenged the White House’s characterization of the institution as radical. “There is always room for improvement. But I also know the beauty and the inspiration and the expertise that lies in our collections, our exhibits, and our programming,” Dr. Anthea M. Hartig told the House Oversight Committee this morning.
‘Republicans are gay’ is the new ‘Republicans are weird’
The most famous rhetorical sally of the Harris-Walz campaign was its attempt to brand Republicans, especially Trump and J.D. Vance, as “weird.” Now Democrats are ratcheting up the rhetoric going into the midterms – by fixating on Republicans’ supposed sexual preferences.
Representative Becca Balint, Vermont’s first openly LGBTQ+ member of Congress, offered some strong opinions about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s recent announcement that service members would be screened for testosterone levels and offered testosterone replacement therapy.
“There are so many people in this administration that have some weird, intense homoerotic feelings toward men,” Balint said.
“I don’t know if you know who Tom of Finland is?” she asked a reporter. “This is this gay male porn that was drawn by a man. And Pete Hegseth is the embodiment of that, so I feel like they must be looking at that as, like, their example for what men look like.”
At around the same time, Hunter Biden appeared on the I’ve Had It podcast last week, where host Jennifer Welch asked the former president’s son for his “top three MAGA laptops” to acquire and expose.
“Ted Cruz, of course, 100 percent,” Biden responded.
“Do you get a gaydar ping from Ted?” Welch asked.
“No, you know what I get? I get a really, really kinky, weird sex thing,” Biden said. “It may be gay, it may not be gay.”
Vice President Vance was Hunter’s next target. Vance made an unusual attack on former President Joe Biden in an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience last week.
“The thing I couldn’t get over Biden is, just bad staff work, man. The way that he ate ice cream… they would get him eating ice cream in the most ridiculous, suggestive way imaginable,” Vance said.
Hunter posted on X for National Ice Cream Day with a picture of himself eating an ice cream cone and captioned it, “Hey @JDVance. I wish I knew how to quit you.”
Add to this the mounting speculation about the late Lindsey Graham’s sexuality since his sudden death last weekend. The prominent #Resistance influencer Jamie Bonkiewicz joked that the “Flags at Grindr headquarters [had] been lowered to half-staff” at news of his death.
There is something rather forced about this line of attack. The “weird” insult did not ultimately avail Harris-Walz, and Cockburn expects that this time it’ll be little different.
Fight fire with water bottles
Troy Jackson, a lumberjack turned Democratic legislator, has taken on the Herculean task of running for Senate in Maine after the tumultuous end to Graham Platner’s campaign. Yet in the short weeks since stepping into the breach, Jackson has sparked controversy thanks to a reassessment of his temper.
At a meeting in 2021, Jackson reportedly threw a water bottle toward another lawmaker who refused to vote his way. The lawmaker cited the incident as one reason she did not run for reelection. The speaker of Maine’s state House kicked Jackson out of her office in 2024 after an outburst of cursing, yelling and banging on the table. Another lawmaker tweeted that straight, white men such as Jackson were “too emotional” for politics after he yelled at her in public. In all three incidents, Jackson found himself irritated after being scolded by women.
When asked by the New York Times about the “water bottle incident,” Jackson said, “I shouldn’t have thrown it, but I was passionate. Do I wish I’ve never yelled or anything like that? Sure.”
If you don’t like the glibness of that 2021 quote, take comfort from this statement issued yesterday by Jackson’s campaign advisor B.J. McCollister: “Troy regrets the moments when disagreements became too heated, but passion for the issues he advocates for should not be confused with physical intimidation or bullying.”
“Passion” that takes the form of fury toward women isn’t a good look – especially in a candidate trying to transcend his predecessor Platner, whose campaign splintered over allegations of sexual abuse and aggression toward past girlfriends.
But Jackson is still the leading Democratic nominee to challenge Senator Susan Collins in November, with almost two-thirds of the delegates supporting him at a statewide convention this weekend. Cockburn waits to see if Jackson’s unique brand of “passion” is enough to carry him to DC in the fall.
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