Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor torched a lawyer Tuesday for suggesting that Elon Musk didn’t buy his way into the White House.

While hearing oral arguments in a case on campaign finance law, Sotomayor warned that if the Supreme Court removed the limits on coordinated expenditures, then there would be “no control” over how much one donor could give to a presidential campaign—opening the door for blatant corruption.

“So, with all respect your honor, I don’t have a problem with the various statistics you just cited in the absence of any evidence or any suggestion it was tied to quid pro quo corruption,” replied Noel Francisco, the attorney for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

“You mean to suggest that the fact that one major donor to the current president—the most major donor to the current president—got a very lucrative job immediately upon election from the new administration does not give the appearance of quid pro quo?” Sotomayor pressed. She was clearly referring to Elon Musk, who was appointed as head of the Department of Government Efficiency after donating a whopping $288 million to Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign.

Prior to bringing up Musk, Sotomayor also cited Hillary Clinton’s 2016 joint victory fund with the DNC, “which allowed a single donor to give up to $356,000” just to show it wasn’t a solely Trumpian problem.

Francisco tried to dismiss Sotomayor, saying that Musk’s meager salary was not “an effective quid pro quo bribery, which may be why nobody has even remotely suggested that.”

Actually, a lot of people have suggested that—and it has nothing to do with his salary as a special government employee. It’s no secret that Musk used his time as DOGE czar working to dismantle the very agencies that regulate his companies, clearing the way for the richest man in the world to amass even more money.

Musk also used his proximity to Donald Trump to boost his many businesses in foreign countries. In some cases, the administration even pressured foreign governments into approving his products. Not to mention that Musk was the biggest individual winner when Trump announced a 90-day pause on tariffs, sending Tesla stock shooting up 23 percent.

Just because their plan didn’t work perfectly—and Musk ended up losing twice as much as he cut in government spending—doesn’t mean it wasn’t still corrupt.

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is taking aim at the Trump administration’s violent and excessive immigration actions.

On Tuesday, Pritzker signed a bill that makes it easier for Illinois residents to sue federal immigration agents for up to $10,000 if they believe their rights have been violated, and also restricts those agents from enforcement outside courthouses. The bill also requires hospitals to safeguard patient access, and prohibits schools from disclosing the immigration status of students, employees, and contractors unless required by law.

Democratic lawmakers passed the bill in October in the midst of Operation Midway Blitz, the Trump administration’s attempt to crack down on illegal immigration in the Chicago area. The initiative was met with protests and a violent crackdown from federal agents including ICE and Border Patrol.

“Residents should be able to go to court, take their kid to day care and have access to the university they attend without fear they will be kidnapped off the street,” said state Representative Lilian Jiménez, who represents parts of Chicago, in a statement at the time.

Pritzker has sharply criticized President Trump and his federal actions in Illinois. Last month, he called out Border Patrol agents for mocking a neighborhood they had tear-gassed while staging a photo op in front of the Chicago art installation The Bean.

“Making fun of our neighborhoods and communities is disgusting,” Pritzker posted online at the time. “Greg Bovino and his masked agents are not here to make Chicago safer. As children are tear gassed and U.S. citizens detained, they are posing for photo ops and producing reality TV moments.”

Pritzker again called out the Trump administration after signing the bill on Tuesday.

“After what our communities have experienced, we understood that our response needed to be deep and comprehensive to counter the Trump administration’s depravity,” Pritzker said.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division are pretending to care about prisoners’ human rights in an apparent effort to get conspiracy theorist, former state official, and convicted 2020 election fraudster Tina Peters out of a Colorado jail.

“Under my direction, @CivilRights has opened an investigation into the entire Colorado prison system following multiple reports of unconstitutional and legally insufficient carceral conditions. Prisoners have civil rights,” Dhillon wrote Tuesday afternoon.

Dhillion’s letter is addressed to Colorado Governor Jared Polis, and accuses the Colorado prison system of “failing to provide adequate medical care and safe sanitary physical conditions of confinement,” and will determine if the state violates prisoners’ rights by “housing biological males in units designated for females.”

On Monday, a federal judge refused to release Peters, who is Trump’s only 2020 ally still behind bars. Trump can’t just pardon her like he’s done with virtually everyone else who’s committed felonies in his name, since she is being held on state charges, not federal—so instead, the administration has to use this “prisoners’ rights” loophole.

Those on both the left and the right acknowledged that Dhillon’s move is part of a larger plan to free the woman........

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