Light-Hearted Reflections and Serious Undertones

OA1082 - Donald Trump recently promised that he and House speaker Mike Johnson have a “little secret” about how they are going to win next week’s election. Is he just trolling, or have Republicans identified real vulnerabilities in our federal election system? We assess the legal realities surrounding one particularly doomerist prediction in The Nation to try to understand just how concerned we really should be.

The Washington Post has just revealed that Elon Musk has his own little secret: his numerous past violations of federal immigration law. How much does this matter, and what would happen if ICE received this information about someone who didn’t happen to be the world’s wealthiest person? 

Finally, for our dessert course Matt has the scoop on a tasty footnote from this week’s news about how the Librarian of Congress just helped to fix the ice cream machine at your local McDonald’s.

• “That “Little Secret” Between Trump and Johnson? Here’s What It Could Mean,” Elie Mistal  The Nation (10/29/2024)

• “Election certification under threat,” Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (8/12/2024)

• “Elon Musk, enemy of ‘open borders,’ launched his career working illegally,” Maria Sachetti et al, The Washington Post (10/26/24)

• “Melania Trump modeled in US prior to getting work visa,” AP News (11/4/2016)

• “They Hacked McDonald’s Ice Cream Machines—and Started a Cold War,” Andy Greenberg WIRED (4/20/2021)

• “Exemption to Prohibition on Circumvention of Copyright Protection Systems for Access Control Technologies,” U.S. Copyright Office Docket No. 2023-5 (10/28/2024)

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