Politics

Brickbats: May 2026

News of politicians, police, and bureaucrats behaving badly from around the world

Charles Oliver and Peter Bagge | From the May 2026 issue

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(Illustration: Peter Bagge)

In 2025, the United Kingdom paid a record £1.5 billion ($2 billion) in "constraint payments" to keep wind farms from producing energy. When high winds cause turbines to produce more energy than the nation's outdated power grid can handle, the government must pay wind farms to shut down to prevent an overload; it must then pay other sources, such as gas plants, to turn on in order to meet demand. The government spent nearly £380 million ($512.5 million) paying wind farms to shut off, and it paid power plants £1.08 billion ($1.46 billion) to make up the difference.

Leticia Mariscal of Madera County, California, pleaded guilty to aggravated identity theft for using her position in social services to steal food assistance funds. Prosecutors say Mariscal accessed county databases to steal the........

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