US Politics
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced that SNAP anti-fraud efforts in President Donald Trump’s second term have prevented $5.8 billion in taxpayer losses by shutting down nearly 1,840 illegal Electronic Benefit Transfer devices and disqualifying 5,335 retailers identified as fraudulent. A May 2025 integrity team matches state rolls to federal databases after a March 2025 executive order opened program data for spending audits. A June finding showed 185,986 deceased people in 29 states were receiving food stamps. Monthly SNAP outlays fell from $13.4 billion in October 2022 to $6.8 billion in May 2026 as pandemic allotments ended. More than 40 states and territories exceeded the 6 percent error-rate penalty trigger in fiscal 2025.
In other news, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing the Interior, Agriculture, War, and Commerce departments to expand hunting access on public lands and waterways, including unlocking landlocked and checkerboarded parcels through voluntary easements, land exchanges, and cooperative agreements that respect private property. Forest Service river lotteries are to prioritize U.S. citizens and prior applicants who have not previously received access via lottery and to prohibit automatic computer entries. The order also provides for assistive technology for people with disabilities, traditional lead ammo and tackle, streamlined migratory bird seasons, Sunday hunting, recruitment of young hunters and veterans, larger game populations, and wild-game donations to schools, food banks, and the Emergency Food Assistance Program.
On Second Amendment rights, Jonathan Turley reports that the Third Circuit granted the National Shooting Sports Foundation standing to challenge New Jersey’s 2022 A1765 law, which exposes gun industry members to public-nuisance suits and requires reasonable controls on manufacture, sale, distribution, importing, and marketing. Turley argues the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act and the Supreme Court’s 2025 Smith & Wesson Brands v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos ruling preempt the statute. After an earlier dismissal for suing before enforcement, New Jersey sued firms including GLOCK. NSSF reopened the case, and the court held that members’ intended actions are arguably precluded by A1765 and implicate constitutional interests. A New Jersey Attorney General spokesperson called the ruling merely procedural and said the state would continue defending the law.
In other Second Amendment news, the Department of Justice sued San Jose and its police department over a $1,591 firearm licensing fee, which rose about $300 over three fiscal years, alleging it is an unconstitutional burden on the right to carry. The complaint contrasts the fee with $75 in Washington, D.C., $340 in New York, $100 in Boston, and $20 in Philadelphia and seeks a permanent ban on what it calls abusive licensing fees. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon said the right is not a luxury for a privileged few. In January 2025 San Jose also required liability insurance and an annual nonprofit fee. San Jose has described the fee as cost recovery for 6.5 hours of staff time per application, reviewed annually.
Epstein Files
Reps. Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna have 218 commitments, including Republicans Massie, Ralph Norman, Nancy Mace, and Brian Fitzpatrick, to force a discharge vote on the Epstein Files Transparency Act II after Speaker Mike Johnson ended the week a day early, postponing action until after November midterms. The measure would let victims, lawmakers, and states sue the Justice Department for unlawfully concealing Epstein files. Millions of records already emerged under a near-unanimous prior law, yet a judge has warned Attorney General Todd Blanche of possible contempt over missing FBI interview notes and foreign-language materials. Massie alleged the early adjournment was intended to block the petition as well as a privileged resolution to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Energy
The House passed the Ratepayer Protection Act 417-3, requiring AI and other data centers to cover the full incremental cost of generation, transmission, or distribution upgrades needed to serve them so households do not absorb those expenses. Problem Solvers Caucus co-chairs Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA) and Tom Suozzi (D-NY) said private costs should not be shifted onto working families. Data centers now use about 4 percent of the U.S. grid, roughly 176 terawatt-hours a year, enough for 16 million homes, a share analysts say could reach 12 percent. Neighbors have reported higher bills, water strain, and noise from cooling fans.
Scientists at China’s Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics described laboratory molecular refining that separates crude oil with chemical membranes at room temperature instead of repeated distillation. Membranes act as sieves matched to molecule size, distinguishing groups only about one one-hundredth of a nanometer apart. In a test of light sweet crude with 15 chemicals, two membranes yielded three high-value product groups at 85 to 90 percent recovery and used 91 percent less energy, according to National Science Review. A 2021 estimate ranked oil refining as the third-largest stationary source of carbon dioxide, about 1.3 gigatons a year.
Health
Chief U.S. District Judge Lance E. Walker refused to dismiss internist Dr. Meryl Nass’s First Amendment suit against Maine’s medical board. The board suspended her in January 2022 over COVID-19 comments and hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin prescriptions, dropped misinformation charges, then in 2023 ordered a 39-month suspension, a $10,000 fine, and a psychological evaluation. A state court in October 2025 called the evaluation arbitrary and capricious. Walker found it lacked judicial process, cited no mental-illness evidence, and treated it as retaliation for disfavored speech. He noted Nass has been licensed in Maine since 1997 with no prior discipline and testified to Congress six times.
In autism news, the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health launched SPECTRA, combining biological, clinical, behavioral, and real-world data with privacy-preserving AI for earlier autism diagnosis and tailored care. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said autism is not one-size-fits-all. One in 31 U.S. 8-year-olds have been identified with the condition, which varies widely and is often paired with sleep, gastrointestinal, and neurological complications. A widely cited analysis projected about $461 billion in annual U.S. costs by 2025. Four tracks seek factor analysis, trajectory models, precision interventions, and everyday communication tools, moving past late, observation-only assessments.
Related to light health, Senator Mike Lee introduced the Liberating Incandescent Technology Act to take general-service lamps out of the Energy Department’s Appliance Standards program, repeal 2022 rules setting a 45 lumens-per-watt floor and a 2024 rule of 120 lumens per watt effective 2028, and bar future federal lightbulb mandates. Cosponsors are Sens. John Curtis, Jim Justice, Tom Cotton, Bill Hagerty, and Eric Schmitt. The 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act first pushed the 45-lumen standard that the Biden administration finalized in 2022. Ben Lieberman of the Competitive Enterprise Institute said the measure would put lighting choice back with homeowners. Democrats and the lighting industry have opposed the bill, with some warning it would increase electricity demand.
Privacy & Surveillance
A free iPhone and Android app called ZuckOff, from Polish developer Pawel Szydlowski, detects nearby Ray-Ban Meta, Snap, and similar camera glasses by Bluetooth signatures, UUIDs, and names. It reports proximity but not direction and cannot tell if recording is active, while some glasses stay radio-silent. Szydlowski, unaffiliated with Meta, said people deserve to know they may be filmed. Meta sold more than 7 million AI glasses in 2025, up from 2 million over the prior two years, and expects at least 20 million a year by the end of 2026.
Environment
Mexico released 44 American bison, 38 females and 6 males, on November 26, 2025, at El Santuario Wildlife Reserve in Coahuila’s Cuatrociénegas landscape, returning the species to the Chihuahuan Desert after more than 200 years. Their hooves, wool, and dung break soil, spread seed, and improve water infiltration on a 324-square-mile mosaic of pools, gypsum dunes, and grasslands. Gerardo Ruiz Smith of Fundación Pro Cuatrociénegas called it the return of a fundamental species, after an earlier transfer of 48 animals by a multi-institution alliance that also frames visits as regenerative tourism supporting the aquifer.
Sources
USDA Crackdown Prevents $5.8 Billion in SNAP Fraud Losses
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced nearly $6 billion in total savings tied to efforts to eliminate fraud in the government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
DOJ Sues San Jose Over Unconstitutional $1,600 Gun Fee
San Jose is a national outlier when it comes to burdening the exercise of fundamental rights. Its fees are abusive and violate the Second Amendment.
House Votes 417-3: Data Centers Must Cover Their Own Grid Costs, Not Families
Economic growth should never depend upon shifting private costs onto working families.
Trump EO Expands Hunting Access, Unlocks Landlocked Public Lands
The Trump administration is looking to open up this land for the public with property easements and land swaps.
ZuckOff App Sniffs Out Nearby Meta Camera Glasses via Bluetooth
It cannot tell you who is recording, but it can tell you that the future has wandered nearby.
Chinese Scientists Pioneer Room-Temp Molecular Refining, Cutting Crude Oil Energy Use 90%
Chinese scientists have found a way to separate the mixture molecule by molecule at room temperature, cutting energy use by 90%.
Massie and Khanna Secure 218 Signatures to Force Epstein Files Vote After Leadership Cuts Session Short
“Thomas Massie and I have defied history a second time, securing commitments for 218 signatures on Epstein 2.0,”
ARPA-H’s SPECTRA: Feds Bet Big Data and AI Can Untangle Autism’s Complexity
Autism is not one-size-fits-all, and our science and care cannot be either.
Third Circuit Greenlights NSSF Challenge to New Jersey Gun Liability Law
These laws are designed to achieve indirectly what the Court denied directly to the states: to effectively suppress the availability of guns.
Judge Lets Maine COVID Critic’s Free-Speech Suit Against Medical Board Proceed
“I will eagerly move forward with the legal case to clear my name and defend the free speech right of medical practitioners to tell the truth to their patients, especially if it goes against government or medical orthodoxy,”
Bison Return to Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert After 200 Years
A series of reintroductions have seen the bison return to a landscape in Mexico’s Chihuahua Desert after a 200 year absence.
Lee’s LIT Act Aims to Repeal Biden Lightbulb Ban, Restore Choice
These regulations have nothing to do with saving the planet—they’re about controlling people.
In addition to sources submitted by community members, the following were also used in the creation of this report: Courthouse News, The Legal Current, The Reload, Quartz, Axios, The Hill, T Grogan, and 2paragraphs.
by mike-from-jersey 
