The Justice Department has concluded that the Department of Agriculture’s preferences for “socially disadvantaged” farmers violate the Constitution's promise of equal protection.  “Racial discrimination is illegal," acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said Monday in making the announcement, "and the government cannot show preference to certain groups when awarding special benefits without a compelling reason to justify the classification."

The Senate passed a piece of bipartisan legislation Monday that aimed to lower the cost of housing. The upper chamber passed the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act in a 85-5 vote, which aimed to tackle the housing affordability crisis by cutting red tape and increasing the housing supply, expanding loans to build housing and curbing Wall Street’s ownership of single-family homes. While the House and Senate initially had their own versions of the bill, both chambers reached a deal Tuesday.

Rhode Island Senate president Valarie Lawson allegedly used her office to advance her teachers union’s political agenda. Lawson is salaried as National Education Association of Rhode Island’s (NEARI) president in addition to presiding over the state Senate, Defending Education stated in an ethics complaint Monday. The complaint alleges that she used her overlapping roles to advance NEARI’s legislative priorities.

Civil rights attorney Ben Crump on Saturday claimed Tennessee's new law requiring those applying for a driver's license to demonstrate their lawful residence status in the country and take an English proficiency exam has the potential to undo "30 years of progress" in the Volunteer State.  Crump made the comments on social media while sharing an article about House Bill (HB) 1708, the legislation signed into law by Governor Bill Lee earlier this year. Once effective in January 2027, it will require those applying for a Tennessee driver's license to submit documentation providing citizenship, and to complete an English proficiency exam.

Somewhere in Charleroi, Pennsylvania, a small steel-town school district of about 1,400 kids, a school board member is looking at a budget line that didn’t exist a decade ago. In 2014, the district had approximately seven English Learner or “EL” students. In 2024, that number crossed 200. Charleroi is a small story with a national plot. Over the past decade, the number of students who require extra support with English or multilingual education has exploded nationwide. From Georgia to Ohio and from Texas to Colorado, we are seeing the same thing: as the share of students needing English language services has gone up, the share of the budget going to core classroom instruction has gone down.

FBI Director Kash Patel announced Monday the capture of a man in Turkey who allegedly helped orchestrate a $3.7 billion Medicare fraud scheme and said the man has been brought back to the United States to face charges. The bureau said Ibrahim Khaldoon Hilmi, who fled the U.S. in May 2025, was recently detained by Turkish authorities and the FBI's Critical Incident Response Group flew to the country and transported Hilmi to the U.S. last week through a foreign transfer of custody operation, according to Fox News.

Only a small percentage of U.S. voters who oppose data centers live near one, a new poll by a consulting firm that counsels leading AI labs and tech startups found. The poll, conducted by Milltown Partners, which surveyed more than 6,500 registered U.S. voters nationwide, suggested that Americans are not opposed to data center building projects as much as to what they represent. As first reported by Axios, the backlash comes from a broader anxiety about an AI future that many Americans do not want but will have to pay for.

The FBI on Monday identified the sixth suspect in an alleged terror plot on the Ultimate Fighting Championship 250 event at the White House earlier this month.  At least five people were initially arrested in the plot, but agents are working to identify as many as 19 others who appear to be involved in the planning on encrypted chats communicating with the alleged plotters, officials said.

The year after the COVID-19 pandemic reached the United States, a U.S. intelligence official flagged a video circulating online showing a government-funded scientist admitting publicly that his colleagues in China had manipulated spike proteins on coronaviruses.  During this time, leading health official Dr. Anthony Fauci continued to double down on his claim his office had not funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan lab in China where scientists conducted such experiments. 

Several top American beverage companies announced Monday an online platform aiming to “empower consumers” with transparent information about their drinks’ ingredients. The digital platform lets U.S. consumers scan product QR codes included on beverage cans and bottles and connect to GoodtoKnowFacts.org, an online database from the American Beverage Association that “provides factual, non-industry information about more than 140 beverage ingredients,” according to the announcement. The beverage companies involved in this ingredient transparency effort include The Coca-Cola Company, Keurig Dr Pepper and PepsiCo.