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Jordan Chiles ruling: CAS won’t reconsider decision that stripped medal

USA Gymnastics said Monday that the Court of Arbitration for Sport will not reconsider its ruling on the scores in the women’s floor exercise final at the 2024 Paris Olympics − a decision that effectively stripped Jordan Chiles of her bronze medal.

USA Gymnastics claims it has conclusive video evidence that would disprove the factual basis for CAS’ original ruling. But the federation said in a statement on social media that it was informed by CAS that its rules ‘do not allow for an arbitral award to be reconsidered even when conclusive new evidence is presented.’

‘We are deeply disappointed by the notification and will continue to pursue every possible avenue and appeal process, including to the Swiss Federal Tribunal, to ensure the just score, placement and medal award for Jordan,’ USA Gymnastics said.

A CAS spokesperson has not replied to multiple messages seeking comment.

The news comes a little more than a week after the floor exercise competition, where a late inquiry by Chiles’ coaches first triggered the saga that has played out in the days since.

2024 Paris Olympics: Follow USA TODAY’s coverage of the biggest names and stories of the Games.

How the Jordan Chiles controversy began

In the last routine of the floor exercise final, Chiles garnered a score of 13.666, which included a deduction of one tenth of a point for an improper split leap, known as a tour jete full. That score put her fifth, behind both Ana Barbosu and another Romanian gymnast, Sabrina Maneca-Voinea. They both had scores of 13.700. 

But then, in a move she later acknowledged was a bit of a Hail Mary, Chiles’ coach, Cecile Landi, formally appealed that specific deduction – and the judges agreed. Chiles’ score was thereby increased to 13.766, which moved her into third place ahead of the two Romanians, one of whom had already climbed onto the podium with a flag to celebrate. 

The Romanian Gymnastics Federation felt the last-minute reversal was unfair, so they took the matter to CAS, claiming that Landi had submitted the scoring appeal – officially known as an inquiry – four seconds past the allotted one minute in which she was permitted to do so. The Romanian federation did not specify how it knew that Landi was four seconds late and it has not replied to a request for comment. (It also filed a separate appeal on behalf of Maneca-Voinea, saying she shouldn’t have been penalized for stepping out of bounds.)

It wasn’t until Saturday that CAS issued its ruling – a decision that triggered a trickle-down effect through various acronymic Olympic organizations and, eventually, led the International Olympic Committee to announce that Barbosu would get a bronze medal and Chiles would be stripped of hers. 

Controversy overshadows gymnasts’ brilliance

The reallocation of Olympic medals had, to this point, largely been confined to athletes whose finishes were impacted by doping.

Then, on Sunday, USA Gymnastics announced that it had found new video footage that essentially disproved the Romanian Gymnastics Federation’s timeline. The U.S. said it submitted the video to CAS for review as part of its appeal of the Swiss-based court’s ruling. 

Caught in the middle of all of this, of course, are the athletes – namely Chiles and Barbosu. 

Barbosu, 18, was distraught when the standings were adjusted right after the competition and dropped her Romanian flag on the ground in disbelief. Chiles, meanwhile, was thrilled to win what was her first individual medal – though she likely experienced some of the same frustrations as Barbosu when the IOC said Sunday that it would be asking for the return of the 23-year-old’s bronze medal.

The Romanian Gymnastics Federation, in fact, had requested that CAS decide that Barbosu, Chiles and Maneca-Voinea all receive bronze medals. Instead, it punted that decision to the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), which has since said all medal decisions are made by the IOC. The IOC then said the medal allocation is dependent upon the order of finish and referred a reporter’s questions to the FIG.

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All-Star, Olympian files federal lawsuit against WNBA, Las Vegas Aces

Three-time WNBA All-Star and recent Olympic bronze medal winner Dearica Hamby filed a federal lawsuit Monday against the WNBA and the Las Vegas Aces, her former team, alleging discrimination and retaliation over Hamby’s pregnancy.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada and claims Hamby suffered ‘a loss of reputational prestige and brand value’ and ‘loss of marketing and/or endorsement opportunities’ after the Aces traded her to the Los Angeles Sparks in January 2023. The lawsuit is seeking damages through a jury trial.

‘The WNBA is, at its core, a workplace, and federal laws have long shielded pregnant women from discrimination on the job,’ Hamby’s legal team said Monday in a statement. ‘The world champion Aces exiled Dearica Hamby for becoming pregnant and the WNBA responded with a light tap on the wrist. Every potential mother in the league is now on notice that childbirth could change their career prospects overnight. That can’t be right in one of the most prosperous and dynamic women’s professional sports leagues in America.’

The lawsuit alleges that the Aces offered Hamby incentives outside of a two-year contract she signed in June 2022 in an effort to retain her services. Those incentives, per the filing, included ‘an agreement by the Las Vegas Aces to cover private tuition costs’ for Hamby’s daughter, Amaya, and team-provided housing that the filing states Hamby used for family to assist with childcare duties when she was traveling for away games.

Weeks after she signed the contract, the lawsuit states that Hamby discovered she was pregnant and informed Aces coach Becky Hammon and general manager Natalie Williams. The filing, however, alleges that Hamby ‘experienced notable changes in the way she was treated by Las Vegas Aces staff’ after she made her pregnancy public.

That included the team allegedly withholding the promised tuition relief for her daughter’s school and her alleged forced removal from the team-provided housing.

The lawsuit also alleges that Hammon ‘questioned Hamby’s dedication and commitment to the team’ during a January 2023 phone call, and that Hammon ‘did not deny the accusation that Hamby was being traded because she was pregnant.’

Hamby, through the WNBA Player’s Association, requested an investigation in January 2023 into the Aces following the trade. The league opened the inquiry in February and in May announced that it had completed the investigation. The WNBA found that the Aces violated league rules for impermissible player benefits — docking the team its 2025 first-round draft pick selection — and suspended Hammon two games without pay for ‘violating league and team Respect in the Workplace policies.’

The Las Vegas Aces did not immediately respond to a message requesting comment on the matter.

In September 2023, Hamby had filed a charge of discrimination complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which then sent Hamby a ‘notice of right to sue’ in May 2024. The notice follows an EEOC investigation into a complaint and grants a prospective plaintiff the opportunity to file a lawsuit against an employer in federal or state court.

This season for the Sparks, Hamby, 30, has been averaging career-highs in points (19.2), rebounds (10) and assists per game (3.5). At the 2024 Paris Olympics, Hamby won the bronze medal as part of Team USA’s 3×3 women’s basketball team.

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Fox News Power Rankings: Five themes emerge in the battle for the House gavel

Republicans have more districts in their corner in the first Fox News Power Rankings House forecast, but overall, the race for a majority is a toss-up.

Political junkies will tell you that it has been a chaotic couple of years in the House. 

With speaker battles, a debt ceiling crisis, the sixth-ever expulsion of a House lawmaker and the first ever shrinking of the ‘Squad,’ there has been plenty to talk about on television and social media.

At the same time, Americans continue to hold congress in low regard, with only 16% saying they approved of its job in July. (It has been two decades since congress had an approval rating of over 50%).

These might seem like vulnerabilities for the ruling party, but when it comes to their congressional ballot, Americans are putting drama and dissatisfaction aside.

The top issues in the race continue to be the economy, immigration and abortion, and voters are locked in to their preferred party for each of them.

Because of that, you can expect similar electoral dynamics in the House as in the Senate. A win for former President Trump will help the GOP stay in power in the lower chamber, as we saw in 2016. A win for Vice President Kamala Harris will likely give the Democrats a win in the House too, as President Biden was able to deliver in 2020.

In the meantime, the race to rule the House starts off as a toss-up.

Every House seat is up for election every two years, but only a fraction are competitive. In this forecast, 16% of the 435 districts are firmly in play.

There are 19 toss-up races, and with Republicans enjoying a razor-thin majority in the House today, the results in those districts alone will decide which party gets the gavel.

Many of the highly competitive races share key features.

The redistricting process occurs at the beginning of each decade, but a mountain of litigation over racial or partisan gerrymandering issues has left some states redrawing boundaries as recently as May.

The upshot is that several seats are likely to change hands early on election night.

each have redrawn seats with higher Black voter populations after court rulings. Both seats are represented by vacating Republicans and are Democrats’ best flip opportunities of the night. 

Meanwhile, a state Republican supermajority approved a more favorable map in North Carolina. Three seats currently represented by Democrats will now be open in November, and Republicans are favored in all of them.

Redistricting will also affect a highly competitive race in New York.

A district containing Syracuse that currently belongs to Rep. Brandon Williams will shift leftward this year, putting the first-term congressman in a much tougher fight to hold on for a second. New York’s 22nd district is rated Lean D.

One of the reasons Republicans underperformed expectations in the midterms was candidate quality. In other words, the party fielded nominees who were poor matches for their district, had baggage, or were ineffective campaigners.

This year, the party is working with a stronger bench.

The most notable example is . In 2022, moderate Democrat Mary Peltola pulled off a historic upset when she beat former Governor Sarah Palin in the final round of the state’s ranked choice ballot tabulation.

This year, Republicans hope that either second-time candidate Nick Begich or Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom will retake the seat; both have been stronger campaigners.

Peltola is well-liked in her state and has been an advocate on local issues, chiefly the state’s fishing industry. This seat is rated Lean D.

Back on the mainland, Ohio’s 9th district has been in Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur’s hands since 1983. She has crafted a brand around her pro-agriculture and anti-free trade views.

But with Ohio’s rightward drift, this is a very competitive seat.

In the midterms, Republicans fielded a candidate who was in lock step with Trump but struggled to appeal to centrists. This time, state Rep. Derek Merrin will be on the ballot for the GOP, bringing conservative principles and a wealth of campaign experience along with him.

This seat is a toss-up.

Republicans still have candidate issues in some key races. Washington’s 3rd district will be a rematch between first-term Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Blue Dog Democrat who recently suggested that Biden resign from office, and Joe Kent, her Republican challenger.

Kent, a veteran and former CIA officer, was mired in controversy in 2022. That will continue to be a liability, but Republicans are hopeful that he will run a more disciplined campaign this time. This race is also a toss-up.

Trump struggled in the suburbs when he last ran for president. According to the Fox News Voter Analysis, he lagged Biden by 10 points with all suburban voters and 19 points with suburban women, leaving him with critical deficits in the battleground states.

House Republicans in city and suburban districts did not fare so poorly. Challengers like Nicole Malliotakis in New York’s 11th district, Young Kim and Michelle Steel in the California suburbs and Maria Elvira Salazar in Miami flipped Democratic districts.

This all suggests that Trump is more helpful to House Republicans than the conventional wisdom might say. He brings out core ‘MAGA’ voters who vote red down the ballot, while allowing candidates to make inroads with moderates and independents.

The best example is in Nebraska’s 2nd district, containing Omaha and its surrounding suburbs.

At the presidential level, this is a Lean D district (and unlike most, it gets an electoral vote in November). The area has a larger proportion of college-educated voters, who dislike Trump and show up to vote against him.

However, in the House, the race is rated Lean R.

That is thanks to Rep. Don Bacon, a moderate conservative, veteran and Trump critic who has won the district four times from 2016 onwards.

He has another tough battle against state lawmaker Tony Vargas this year, who is running a disciplined and well-funded campaign.

Unlike the presidential race, the Republicans have an edge here so far.

There are several departing Democrats in competitive districts, including Elissa Slotkin in Michigan’s 7th district and Abigail Spanberger in Virginia’s 7th. 

These moderate congresswomen in swingy parts of their states are running for Senate seats this year, leaving highly competitive races behind.

Republicans are hopeful that the departure of these well-known incumbents will give their challengers a boost, but with both parties fielding high-quality replacements, these races will be close (Democrats have an edge in Virginia’s 7th).

Democrats will also play defense in dozens of districts with first-term incumbents, like Rep. Yadira Caraveo in Colorado’s 8th district. This newly created district includes the northern Denver suburbs and surrounding areas, and Caraveo won it by less than a point last time. This race is a toss-up.

California and New York run deep blue at the statewide level, but just outside highly populated liberal cities, plenty of districts are in play.

In California, keep an eye on the 13th district, home of Modesto; the 27th district, north of Los Angeles; and the 41st district, which includes Palm Springs.

Republicans won all three seats by narrow margins in the midterms and are now locked in tough re-election battles with well-funded Democratic opponents. The forecast has Democrats with an edge in the 13th and 27th districts at Lean D, while the 41st is a toss-up.

Across the continent in New York, and Brandon Williams is not the only Republican fighting for his political career.

New York’s 17th, 18th and 19th districts, all in the Hudson Valley region, were hotly contested in the midterms, and two out of the three are now represented by Republicans with strong bipartisan brands. Rep. Mike Lawler is the best known but also has the bluest territory to defend of the two, with Rep. Marc Molinaro in another tight race nearby. Both these races are toss-ups.

In between them is Democratic Rep. Pat Ryan, whose race starts at Lean D.

Voters in 11 states will cast a ballot for governor this year; tomorrow’s Power Rankings takes a look at the most competitive races on the map.

Then, on Sunday, Fox News Democracy 24 special coverage for the Democratic National Convention begins with an all-new Power Rankings Issues Tracker.

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Countdown to 2028 Games is on as Olympics flag lands in LA

LOS ANGELES — Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass emerged from a plane, waving the official Olympic flag while dozens of LA 28 organizers cheered, understanding the next phase of their work has arrived.

Los Angeles is officially on the clock for 2028.

‘We’re ready to get started,’ LA 28 chief executive officer Reynold Hoover told USA TODAY Sports.

It was a party inside a hanger at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday as Bass and several Olympians returned to their home soil after their time at the 2024 Paris Olympics. The Olympic flag symbolically made its way to the City of Angels during the closing ceremonies, which included performances from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Billie Eilish and Snoop Dogg in Long Beach.

But this was the real deal. The actual flag arrived in a special Delta aircraft designed with LA 2028 emblems, and joining Bass was LA 28 chair Casey Wasserman, Olympic diver Delaney Schnell and skateboarder Tate Carew. The flag will now reside at Los Angeles City Hall until the Games begin in four years. There, it will serve as a constant reminder that the pressure is on to deliver a successful, thrilling Games of the XXXIV Olympiad.

2024 Paris Olympics: Follow USA TODAY’s coverage of the biggest names and stories of the Games.

‘It is on,’ Bass said.

Bass and several LA 28 organizers were in Paris the past few weeks observing, learning about what they could do when the Olympics come to Southern California. The early impression of the 2024 Summer Games is it was a rounding success that displayed all the great qualities Paris and France have to offer, making it quite the challenge to top it in the next edition.

Casey Wasserman, president of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee, said while in Paris that the goal of the committee is to not try to one-up Paris and to authentically showcase Los Angeles in its own unique way. But there were elements in this year’s Games organizers want to attempt in 2028. One of the next steps in preparations is getting feedback from all of the athletes and individuals involved to see what worked and what didn’t.

‘We’ll take the good and we’ll peel back the bad,’ said Janet Evans, four-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming and member of the organizing committee. ‘Paris was an incredible games, but there are things that can be learned and things that can be changed, and things that we can do unique to Los Angeles in our region.’

Could 2028 Los Angeles Olympics really be a no-car Games?

Nearly every Angeleno probably turned their head when they heard Bass say the plan for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics is for it to be free of cars. It was another point of emphasis from Bass as she spoke to reporters, emphasizing public transport will be heavily encouraged. To most, that goal sounds just as ludicrous as thinking the Seine would be completely safe to compete in.

As crazy as it sounds, it’s something Los Angeles has achieved. When the city hosted the 1984 Summer Games, freeways and streets known to be packed were void of cars. It’s something Inglewood mayor James Butts, who was a police officer at the time, remembers. He said the fears residents had of all of the traffic nightmares was enough to scare people away from the roads. Maybe the desire to be near any street hosting events will be enough again.

‘We couldn’t hope to be that fortunate, but if it is, everybody will be happy,’ he said.

The goal for the 2028 Olympics is for public transportation to be the only way to get to events, which will range from Inglewood to Los Angeles to Long Beach. It sounds like a lofty goal given the public transportation system already in place in the system is widely seen as subpar, to put it lightly.

Hoover said public transportation was something organizers studied in Paris and the success of it is something that can hopefully be replicated.

‘I think it’s obtainable,’ Hoover said. ‘In 2028 we’ll have better transportation system. The metro system is improving. I’m very confident that we’ll be able to do it.’

Transportation is just one of several ways Los Angeles will try to keep up with Paris. Hoover added it set the bar for future Olympics and reinvigorated the excitement of it. Not only does Los Angeles want to deliver in the same way as Paris, it also wants to continue to maintain the Olympic spirit.

‘We all feel pressure,’ Bass said. ‘We feel the pressure to make sure that our city and region is prepared and ready and that we take full advantage of what’s going to come our way.’

The USA TODAY app gets you to the heart of the news — fast. Download for award-winning coverage, crosswords, audio storytelling, the eNewspaper and more.

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Viral Olympic breakdancer Raygun spotted busting moves, Adele pokes fun

Rachael Gunn, also known by her breakdancing name Raygun, went viral during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, but the Australian is garnering even more attention after she was recently filmed busting a move or two in front of adulating fans.

Gunn is a 36-year-old university lecturer from Sydney who made waves with her performance at Place de la Concorde during the Paris Games’ breakdancing competition. Many people online, and even Grammy-winning singer Adele, poked fun at Gunn’s unique moves.

‘I think it’s the best thing that’s happened in the Olympics the entire time,’ the British singer said about Gunn’s dancing while on stage during a concert in Munich, Germany. ‘Did anyone see the breakdancing lady? Now I didn’t even know that breakdancing was an Olympic sport these days. I think that’s (expletive) fantastic.’

Adele continued to say that she and her friends had been ‘laughing’ for ‘nearly 24 hours’ about Gunn’s dancing, but she said it made her ‘very very happy.’

Despite the jokes, Gunn continues to embrace the spotlight and some lucky fans even got a chance to see her breakdance in person. TikTok user @jeanmitchell posted a video of Gunn dancing in the street as fans surrounded her and yelled after each move. The caption was: ‘(Expletive) QUEEEEN’

2024 Paris Olympics: Follow USA TODAY’s coverage of the biggest names and stories of the Games.

How did Raygun do at the Paris Olympics?

Although Gunn is gaining fans, the Olympic judges were anything but as they didn’t give the ‘B-girl’ a single point throughout the competition. She was defeated by USA’s Logistx, France’s Syssy and Lithuania’s Nicka, losing 18-0 on each occasion.

Gunn, who wrote her PhD thesis on the intersection of gender and Sydney’s breaking culture, also repped Australia at the world championships in 2021 and 2022 before earning a spot at the Olympics through the Oceania championships in 2023, CNN reported.

‘In 2023, many of my students didn’t believe me when I told them I was training to qualify for the Olympics and were shocked when they checked Google and saw that I qualified,” Gunn told CNBC earlier this month.

While most of the 32 B-boys and B-girls at the Paris Games had been breakdance battling since they were young, Gunn did not participate in her first battle until 2012.

“All my moves are original,” Raygun told CNN after competing in Paris. “Creativity is really important to me. I go out there and I show my artistry. Sometimes, it speaks to the judges, and sometimes, it doesn’t. I do my thing and it represents art. That is what it is about.”

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Putin lashes out at West over Ukrainian incursion into Russian territory: report

Russian President Vladimir Putin is continuing to blame the West for his nation’s difficulties subduing opposition forces in Ukraine.

The Russian president told regional governors and national defense officials on Monday that the Ukrainian military’s current campaign in the territory of the Kursk region will not affect negotiations.

‘The West is fighting us with the hands of the Ukrainians,’ Putin told them at his home outside the capital city of Moscow, according to a report from The New York Times.

‘The enemy will certainly get the response he deserves, and all our goals, without doubt, will be accomplished,’ he continued.

Ukraine launched incursions into the Kursk, Belgorod and Bryansk districts last week, continuing the campaign since last Tuesday. 

The events have put the Russian military command under fire over the intelligence and tactical lapses that allowed such an attack to happen. 

‘One of the obvious goals of the enemy is to sow discord, strife, intimidate people, destroy the unity and cohesion of Russian society,’ Putin told government officials in a televised meeting this week, according to the Moscow Times. ‘The main task is, of course, for the defense ministry to dislodge the enemy from our territories.’

Experts attribute the Ukrainian gains to ‘unconventional’ tactics that have caught the much larger Russian military off-guard.

‘Given the significant disparity of combat potential favoring Russia on the battlefield, Ukrainian forces appear to be switching to, or at minimum, intensifying, unconventional warfare, bringing war deeper into Russia,’ Rebekah Koffler, a strategic military intelligence analyst and author of ‘Putin’s Playbook,’ told Fox News Digital last week. 

‘With the latest surprise incursion into Kursk oblast, Zelenskyy likely aims to demonstrate to Putin that as long as there’s no peace in Ukraine, the Russian people will not sleep peacefully either,’ Koffler said. ‘Kyiv is probably also seeking to beef up its negotiating position in a potential peace settlement with Moscow.’

Approximately 121,000 people have evacuated the Kursk region — residents of the Belovsky and Krasnoyaruzhsky districts have also joined the exodus.

Ukraine has been the beneficiary of tens of billions of dollars from Western powers providing weapons and resources in order to push back against Russian expansion through the remote conflict.

Fox News Digital’s Peter Aitken and Caitlin McFall contributed to this report.

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Red Sox star suspended for directing homophobic slur at fan

The Boston Red Sox suspended Jarren Duran for two games on Monday after the All-Star outfielder directed a homophobic slur at a fan during Sunday’s game at Fenway Park.

Duran, 27, uttered a profanity and homophobic epithet toward a fan seated behind home plate. His response to the heckler was picked up by a field mic and was audible on NESN’s broadcast of Boston’s 10-2 loss to the Houston Astros. He later apologized in a statement released by the team.

He becomes the most recent player who has been suspended for an on-field slur or inappropriate language. The Red Sox announced that his discipline came ‘in consultation with Major League Baseball.’

In 2022, now-retired infielder Josh Donaldson was suspended for a game for calling White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson ‘Jackie.’ Others have received two-game suspensions by either their team or the league for homophobic slurs; then-Blue Jays outfielder Kevin Pillar, like Duran, was suspended by the team.

Duran’s suspension will begin with Monday night’s game against the Texas Rangers and the Red Sox said his salary from the two-game ban will be donated to PFLAG (Federation of Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), an LGBTQ advocacy, education and support group.

All things Red Sox: Latest Boston Red Sox news, schedule, roster, stats, injury updates and more.

Duran was the MVP of the All-Star Game last month after hitting a go-ahead two-run homer. He leads the American League with 36 doubles and the majors with 13 triples, and has produced a career-best .853 OPS this season.

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Morning Glory: Kamala Harris is not ready to be president

Former President Trump has a record of doing the many jobs involved in being president. COVID obscured his many achievements, especially with an inflation-free period of economic growth, but his record is still there. We know how he will govern and we know he now has experience with selecting senior officials. While he is never predictable in persona or postings, his legislative agenda will be a continuation of his first term: renewal of his tax cuts, a defense build-up to deter our enemies abroad, support for our allies especially Israel, a huge push for energy production and deregulation and, hopefully, massive downsizing of the size and reach of the federal government. 

By contrast, Vice President Harris does not possess the minimum skills set necessary to be president. To borrow from the jargon of baseball, which highly prizes ‘a five tool player’ or even a ‘five tool prospect,’ the vice president unfortunately lacks any of the tools needed to be even a minimally qualified president. She’s a ‘zero tools’ political player. 

The 5 ‘tools’ in baseball are (1) hitting for power; (2) hitting for average 3) fielding ability 4) throwing ability and 5) running speed. A list of presidential tools is considerably longer but would include (1) great ability to absorb complex data sets and intelligence information and make hard decisions on difficult issues; (2) deep experience in national security issues; (3) deep experience in the federal administrative state (not familiarity with the mission of all 2.8 million non-military employees of the federal government, of course, but facility in the discussion and assessment of the hundreds of agencies in the executive branch which all answer to the president and which are guided by his or her appointees); (4) the ability to communicate with the American people via a variety of means, but especially the set-piece big speech designed to convey important decisions or choices and regular interviews and press availabilities and (5) the political skills of negotiation and compromise, both within a president’s own party but also across the aisle and with the governors of states and territories and of course other nations, both friends and enemies. 

Harris is eligible for the office of President to be sure. She is old enough and born in the U.S. We also know she has passed the California Bar Exam after graduating from Hastings Law School following her undergraduate education at Howard University. Harris failed the first time she sat for the Bar but that does not signify much. It is not typical of talented lawyers that they fail their first Bar, but it’s also not unheard of. In a New York Times 2016 profile Harris had recently consoled a young law student who also failed the test, telling her: ‘It’s not a measure of your capacity.’ Actually it is evidence sufficient to lose some young would-be lawyers their jobs which are often given on the condition of taking and passing a state’s Bar Exam, but it’s not dispositive on the question of legal ability. You can retake the Bar as Harris did and she passed on the second go around.

Harris’s career as an assistant district attorney in San Francisco is already a talking point in her stump speech, as was her time as the Attorney General of California and brief stay in the United States Senate. There are hundreds of thousands of current and former assistant district attorneys in the United States and some are brilliant and others are dumb as rocks. There are scores and scores of former and current state AGs and United States Senators. Those titles don’t tell us much. What has she done?  What did she accomplish? What does she think needs to be done by the Congress? What is her agenda?

She has been a loyal if bumbling number two to an increasingly frail president whose capacity to do the job is a question on the mind of everyone paying attention. It should also be on every voter’s mind: Is Harris up to this job? 

In answering that, we have zero interviews of Harris since Biden withdrew more than three weeks ago. We only have hours of cringe-inducing tape from decades in the public eye. It is her tenure as Vice President that should matter the most to voters, and neither she nor the president she served has accomplished anything of lasting positive significance. They spent a vast amount of money the country didn’t have on projects that have not come to fruition. That spending unleashed ruinous inflation. They failed to secure our southern border and more than 10 million migrants have crossed it without invitation since Biden and Harris assumed office. Their record on national security is awful and the support originally offered to Israel after the massacre of 10/7 waxed and since last year has steadily waned. The influence of America on the world has never been this low. 

The resume of actual accomplishments by Harris isn’t there and the record that is there is terrible. 

If the country chose its chief executive randomly out of one of many ‘hats’ marked only by vocation, I would pick from the hat labeled ‘president of local or regional bank’ or ‘successful principal of a large high school’ and—crucially—’successful real estate developer’ over the bag marked ‘local prosecutor’ any day. I would especially do so if informed that the ‘local assistant DA’ bag only included folks who had flunked their first Bar. 

Nor does election to any local or statewide office in California signify much beyond the backing of large public employee unions, for those unions in fact run the politics of the state now and have for more than a dozen years. Harris won the election to be San Francisco’s District Attorney in 2004. She then ran for and won the California Attorney General job in 2010 and again in 2014, and won a United States Senate race in 2016. Of course she was on the ticket with President Biden in 2020. She’s a standard-issue left-wing pol from the most left-wing city in America. 

All we have to judge Vice President Harris’s ability to be president by are her hundreds of votes, interviews and statements over an electoral career now approaching two decades. She hasn’t won a single presidential primary or caucus—ever. If you lived in California you already knew that Harris was never going to impress with eloquence or ability. Harris is the product of the San Francisco Democratic machine which competes, usually successfully, with the Los Angeles Democratic machine. Harris paid her dues in San Francisco and she rose in predictable fashion. When President Joe Biden picked Harris as his running mate in 2020 he did so because he had promised to name a black woman as his running mate. Biden, whose judgment is no longer even debated, chose badly and we have Harris’s record as ‘border tsar’ as the single point of assessment, the single certain role she has held under President Biden.  Of course she failed there —which is why we have the elaborate ruse of a border bill talking point. To cover up her actual record as President Biden’s lead on all border issues. She has had no other high-profile designated role. 

Kamala Harris would be the least credentialed, least impressive and least prepared presidential candidate elected in the modern era. It’s impossible to imagine the damage her policies and personnel would do because they would be so far to the left of anything the country has ever experienced. Her campaign of invisibility is brilliant, but if it succeeds, the country is in for a terrible four years until she can be replaced. The legacy media has gone along with 23 days of silence. How long will it remain complicit?

Hugh Hewitt is host of ‘The Hugh Hewitt Show,’ heard weekday mornings 6am to 9am ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh wakes up America on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990.  Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcast, and this column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.

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Kamala Harris’ campaign criticizes Trump for serving ‘self-obsessed rich guys’ after interview with Elon Musk

Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign is blasting former President Trump’s interview with billionaire Elon Musk, saying Trump’s campaign is in service of ‘self-obsessed rich guys who will sell out the middle class.’

Trump joined Musk on X Spaces, a live audio chat feature on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, for an interview Monday night, although it had a shaky start due to technical difficulties. Millions of people ultimately listened to the interview, according to the live tracker throughout the discussion.

Musk said in a post after the interview that he would also be happy to host Harris on X Spaces.

During Monday’s interview, Musk gave Trump ample time to explain his stance on various issues such as immigration, the assassination attempt he survived at a campaign rally last month, inflation and the idea of eliminating the Department of Education to allow states authority over school systems.

‘I want to close up the Department of Education, move education back to the states … Of the 50 [states], I would bet that 35 would do great. And 15 of them, or, you know, 20 of them, will be as good as Norway. You know, Norway is considered great,’ Trump said, adding that deep blue states like California may struggle if the department is eliminated.

The Harris campaign hit Trump following the interview for the policy proposals the former president touched on and took a jab over the technical difficulties the X Space endured.

‘Donald Trump’s extremism and dangerous Project 2025 agenda is a feature not a glitch of his campaign, which was on full display for those unlucky enough to listen in tonight during whatever that was on X.com,’ Harris campaign spokesperson Joseph Costello said in a statement. ‘Trump’s entire campaign is in service of people like Elon Musk and himself — self-obsessed rich guys who will sell out the middle class and who cannot run a livestream in the year 2024.’

Project 2025 is a controversial initiative organized by conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation that was authored by a number of conservatives, including some former Trump administration officials.

The initiative offers right-wing policy recommendations for Trump should he win the presidency, including replacing civil service employees with Trump loyalists, abolishing the Department of Education, criminalizing pornography, eliminating DEI programs, cutting funding for Medicaid and Medicare, rejecting abortion as health care and infusing the government with Christian values.

Trump has sought to distance himself from the initiative, which has been criticized as being an authoritarian and Christian nationalist plan that would undermine civil liberties, saying he knows nothing about it, that parts of it are ‘absolutely ridiculous and abysmal’ and that its backers are on the ‘radical right.’

Monday marked Trump’s return to X after nearly a year of not posting on the social media platform, posting a series of campaign ads prior to the interview with Musk.

Before Musk purchased X in 2022, Trump was suspended from the platform following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, when the platform was still known as Twitter. But even after Musk reinstated his account, Trump’s only post was sharing his mugshot in August of last year.

‘This country is going down, and these people are bad people that we’re running against. And they’re liars. They make statements. They do things that are so bad. They say they’re going to make a strong border. They say they’ve been great on the border, and they’ve been the worst in history. They say they’ll stop crime,’ Trump said towards the end of the interview.

Trump also addressed President Biden’s decision last month to suspend his re-election campaign, saying it was a Democratic ‘coup’ that pressured the president to step aside. Biden’s decision came amid pressure from Democrats to drop out of the race over concerns about his mental acuity.

‘This was a coup. This was a coup of a president of the United States. He didn’t want to leave, and they said, ‘We can do it the nice way, or we can do it the hard way,” Trump said.

‘They just took him out back behind the shed and basically shot him,’ Musk responded before Trump criticized Biden as ‘the worst president in history.’

Fox News’ Emma Colton contributed to this report.

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Kevin Durant invests in successful European soccer club

Basketball star Kevin Durant left Paris with more than just Olympic gold. 

Durant has become an investor in soccer club Paris Saint-Germain, announced Monday through his company Boardroom. 

Paris Saint-Germain remains a soccer powerhouse in Europe, winning 10 French League titles since 2012, but has seen the exodus of stars like Kylian Mbappe, Lionel Messi and Neymar in the last year. 

The PSG investment is another venture into sports ownership for Durant, the NBA star who led the U.S. men’s basketball team to the gold medal alongside Stephen Curry and LeBron James at the 2024 Paris Olympics. 

Durant and longtime business partner Rich Kleiman visited the PSG campus with club president Nasser Al-Khelaifi earlier this month, according to a social media post. 

“They witnessed first-hand how the Club’s values of innovation and excellence are embodied in this new environment, where Paris Saint-Germain is nurturing the stars of tomorrow,” the social media post said. “They also spent time with Paris Saint-Germain’s professional football teams, with a particular focus on the women’s and youth academy teams – areas of strong interest for him both in terms of sport and investment.” 

Boardroom, Durant and Kleiman’s sports and entertainment media network, will also work with PSG on content and strategy. Durant is invested in the club through Boardroom Sports Holdings, LLC via Arctos Partners. 

Durant purchased a 5% stake of the Philadelphia Union in Major League Soccer in 2020. He became a minority owner of NJ/NY Gotham FC in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) in 2022. He is also a co-owner of the Brooklyn Aces in Major League Pickleball. 

Durant, 35, is a two-time NBA champion and four-time Olympic gold medalist. He will enter his 17th NBA season with the Phoenix Suns later this year. 

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