LIBERTY ROUNDUP
Daily Newsletter · July 28, 2026
The American Right, every morning, in five minutes.
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TODAY'S BIG STORY
Who Gets to Write Election Rules?
President Trump is asking the Supreme Court to restore three concrete mechanisms before the midterms. Executive Order 14399 requires DHS to send states citizenship lists 60 days before federal elections, directs the Postal Service to prescribe official markings and barcodes and withhold mail ballots from voters outside state-specific eligibility lists, and gives DOJ priority to investigations of officials who issue ballots to ineligible voters. The injunction blocks those sections in 23 states and the District of Columbia through Nov. 3.
The administration is not yet defending those mechanisms’ legality in the stay fight. The First Circuit noted that DOJ argued only standing and ripeness: the states sued before the agencies finalized implementation. Solicitor General John Sauer’s Supreme Court application calls the order general policy guidance, says agencies must act lawfully and may decide not to implement parts of it, and argues states can sue after a concrete agency action causes injury.
The government’s own concessions explain why the First Circuit refused to wait. It acknowledged that DHS was building infrastructure to compile and transmit the lists, USPS was creating an eligibility portal, and the lists could support investigations and criminal prosecutions of state or local officials. Several states had already ordered ballot envelopes; Massachusetts alone had spent $3 million. The government also conceded that new designs or barcodes would add state costs. With September and November election deadlines approaching, the court said the states had no practical choice but to prepare now.
Coverage splits over those details. Townhall presents the lists and Postal Service checks as minimum election safeguards. MishTalk attacks the order from the right and foregrounds the court’s constitutional objections. The Right Scoop labeled Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s refusal of an immediate administrative stay a denial of Trump’s appeal, although its own item says she declined only that temporary request. The states’ response remains due Aug. 3, and the application remains pending.
THE TAKEAWAY DOJ says the states sued too early because DHS and USPS have not finalized implementation. The states point to citizenship-list infrastructure, a USPS eligibility portal, possible prosecutions and ballot-envelope costs already underway.
Sources: Executive Order 14399 · First Circuit · Supreme Court application · Townhall · MishTalk · The Right Scoop
QUICK ROUNDUP
Security — Berlin Pride attack exposes a preventable failure. One woman was killed and 29 people were injured; none of the wounded remained in life-threatening condition Sunday afternoon. The suspect, whom police later killed, had a prior conviction that included spreading Islamic State propaganda. Official prosecutor record.
Business — Cracker Barrel’s CEO exits after the rebrand backlash. Julie Masino steps down Aug. 10, and David Deno, the former Bloomin’ Brands CEO, takes over the same day. Masino will advise the company until Oct. 9; Cracker Barrel said the change followed a comprehensive succession process.
Intelligence — Jay Clayton advances toward a final DNI vote. The Senate invoked cloture 51–43 on Clayton’s nomination as director of national intelligence. A final confirmation vote is scheduled for Tuesday at about 6:30 p.m. Eastern; if confirmed, Clayton will oversee the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies. Official Senate schedule.
Courts — Comey asks to dismiss the ‘86 47’ seashell case. Comey’s motion says “86” usually means to eject or get rid of someone and that the indictment fails to allege a true threat. Prosecutors say a reasonable recipient would read “86 47” as a serious expression of intent to harm Trump. Comey faces two threat counts.
Markets — A judge blocks Minnesota’s prediction-market ban. Judge Katherine Menendez paused Minnesota’s Aug. 1 ban while DOJ, the CFTC, Kalshi and Polymarket argue federal law preempts it. The law makes operating or assisting a prediction market a felony and reaches CFTC-regulated weather contracts; the order bars enforcement against registered contract markets.
ACROSS THE MEDIA
HOW THE COVERAGE SPLITS
Townhall calls federal citizenship lists and Postal Service validation a crucial election-integrity measure, treating the injunction as a barrier to keeping ineligible names out. American Greatness emphasizes that 23 Democratic-led states brought the case and describes the order’s blocked provisions as safeguards. The Washington Examiner reports the administration’s narrower legal position: agencies are still deciding how, or whether, to implement the order, so the states sued too early. The First Circuit answers with the implementation already underway—DHS list infrastructure, a USPS eligibility portal, possible prosecutions and ballot-envelope costs. MishTalk adopts that objection from the right and calls the order unconstitutional. The Right Scoop turns Jackson’s refusal of an immediate administrative stay into a headline saying the Supreme Court denied Trump’s appeal; its own text identifies the narrower action. SCOTUSblog keeps the posture straight: the emergency application is pending. Right-of-center coverage is split between defending the mechanisms, challenging the president’s authority and overstating a procedural order.
BEST READS
Big Tech’s War on Human Achievement — Compact. Daniel Markovits argues that AI abundance separates output from effort and reduces people to “prompters” for machines. He tests that thesis against claims from Dario Amodei, Jack Clark and Elon Musk about AI surpassing human work.
Who Gets Custody of the Latin Mass? — First Things. Stephen Daisley traces how Benedict XVI’s 2007 rules widened access to the 1962 Mass and Francis’s 2021 rules returned control to bishops. He proposes allowing the old rite only alongside established ordinary-form Masses, with catechesis affirming both, to keep younger Catholics from drifting to the SSPX.
As Netanyahu and Zelensky Visit Trump, Their Wars Converge — The American Conservative. Andrew Day links Ukraine’s strike on Iranian-linked shipping in the Caspian Sea to Zelensky’s and Netanyahu’s meetings with Trump. His argument is that both leaders benefit if Washington treats the Ukraine and Iran wars as one Eurasian conflict.
THE ONE TO READ
What Elon gets wrong about England — UnHerd. Mary Harrington challenges a monocausal account of English decline by connecting social trust to enforcement, discipline and shared expectations as well as immigration. The historical links are interpretive, which makes the essay a provocation to test rather than a proof to repeat.
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