Justices heard arguments Monday in two disputes involving U.S.-Cuba relations that could be worth more than $1 billion. Oil giant ExxonMobil is a plaintiff in one of the cases, while major cruise lines, led by Royal Caribbean, are defendants in the other. A majority of justices seemed poised to side with ExxonMobil, while both conservative and liberal justices seemed skeptical about the claim against the cruise companies. The cases are based on the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996, also known as the Helms-Burton Act, which formalized the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba. Title III of the law allows for lawsuits in U.S. courts against entities that traffic in property confiscated by the Cuban government after the communist revolution of 1959. However, only recently did a president allow for lawsuits to proceed under the law. President Donald Trump lifted the suspension of lawsuits in 2019 that led to about 40 complaints.  Presidents Bill Clinton, who signed the law, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama all suspended Title III, seeking to avoid diplomatic conflicts with U.S. allies such as Canada and Spain that are heavily invested in Cuba. Obama also expanded relations with Cuba during his second term. This is the first time the high court has ruled on the 30-year-old law.  ExxonMobil is seeking more than $1 billion in compensation for oil and gas assets seized by a Cuban state-owned company CIMEX. It filed the lawsuit in federal court in 2019 in the District of Columbia, CNBC reported.   ExxonMobil wants the high court to reverse a 2024 lower court ruling that this was a foreign sovereign immunity matter, meaning a foreign government could not be sued. CIMEX has countered that the lower court ruling safeguards congressional intent for a sensitive foreign issue. The defense referred to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, or FSIA. Justice Neil Gorsuch noted the 1996 law seemed to defer such questions to the president.  “Why would Congress have put that toggle switch in giving the president the opportunity to turn on and off liability if it weren’t concerned there would be international law possible concerns, and it was essentially saying, we’re not doing the FSIA?” he asked.  CIMEX lawyer Jules Lobel argued that “Title III violated international law, extended U.S. territorial jurisdiction in many different controversial ways.” Justice Brett Kavanaugh later followed: “The president has a huge role in the statute. That’s looking at the text. Then you look at the real world of what’s happened since the enactment of the statute, and the president has been front and center. That effect was that those suits couldn’t go forward. The president is the person who can weigh all of that.”  The second case, with the cruise lines as the defendants, is entirely a dispute among private companies, lacking any sovereign immunity questions.  The question is whether a plaintiff must establish a present-day property interest if the assets in question were not monetized. The plaintiff is Havana Docks, a U.S. company that built docks in Havana’s port before the Cuban revolution. The Castro regime revoked the company’s legal right to the docks.  In 2019, the docks company sued four cruise companies that used the confiscated docks from 2016 through 2019; these companies were Royal Caribbean, Carnival, Norwegian Cruise Line, and MSC Cruises.  A lower court found the cruise companies were liable for $440 million. The companies appealed, arguing that they followed the U.S. government’s lead on reopening travel to Cuba, part of the Obama administration’s overtures to Cuba.  Justices both liberal and conservative expressed skepticism toward the docks company, since it was talking about a lease rather than property as traditionally defined.  Justice Clarence Thomas asked what property the plaintiffs were claiming.  “We’re treating it as essentially ownership of a leasehold,” the company’s lawyer Richard Klingler responded. “The facilities themselves are what was seized and are set off limits, but that’s the underlying property. We don’t own the docks other than in the sense of having held a leasehold interest in relation to them.” Thomas asked, “But you normally don’t think of someone as confiscating a lease.”  Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson followed, “It seems to me that property is a defined term here and that the statute itself includes the kinds of interests that you’re talking about.” The post $1 Billion on the Line as Supreme Court Could Rewrite US–Cuba Lawsuits appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Gov. Shapiro Claims Squatters' Rights Over Neighbors' Land

Don't Wreck My Column, You Hoser

Give me a phone and a list of registered Democrats, and I’ll find you one who thinks Donald Trump's the greatest thing since sliced bread — and Gavin Newsom is the devil incarnate. That’s essentially the level of polling rigor Audie Cornish brought to Tuesday’s edition of CNN This Morning. Discussing issues ahead of the State of the Union address, Cornish said: “We called up one of the people we polled, a Republican voter, Sean from New Mexico. He said: ‘I think people were expecting Trump to provide a bit of relief to their suffering. Grocery prices are just through the roof. Everything is so expensive.’ So this is even, like, a Republican voter.” One Republican voter. Out of tens of millions nationwide. From that lone voice, viewers were invited to infer broader Republican discontent. If your sample size is one, your confidence level is zero. Margin of error: 100%. CNN didn’t present data showing a measurable shift among GOP voters. It presented a single phone call. Finding one Republican unhappy about grocery prices proves only that somewhere in America, a Republican is unhappy about grocery prices. That’s not analysis. That’s anecdote dressed up as insight. In reality, CNN found 82 percent of Republicans approve of Trump -- down eight points from a year ago. But "Sean from New Mexico" is typical? Cornish also highlighted polling showing that only 12% of independents want Trump to focus on immigration in his address. The implication: immigration no longer ranks high among voter concerns. There’s a simpler explanation. Trump acted. Enforcement tightened. Crossings dropped sharply. He brought the immigration crisis under control. When the border was overwhelmed, and cities strained under record migrant inflows during the Biden administration, immigration dominated the news cycle. Now that the chaos has been curtailed, the sense of crisis has declined. Issues voters believe are being handled tend to fade from the top of the list. But campaign season has a long memory. Expect Republican TV ads replaying footage of mass illegal crossings during the Biden administration — migrants flooding across the Rio Grande, overwhelmed processing centers, cities straining under migrant inflows — followed by a blunt contrast: “Chaos under Democrats. Security under Republicans.” CNN's @AudieCornish Cites ‘One Republican’ to Question Trump Support pic.twitter.com/zyngtFoChS — Mark Finkelstein (@markfinkelstein) February 23, 2026 To discuss immigration, CNN political analyst Seung Min Kim referred to Trump hosting at the White House “so-called Angel Moms” — mothers whose children were killed by illegal immigrants. Putting air quotes around "Angel Moms" diminishes them, as if they're just easily exploited Trump tools. Standing next to Trump somehow ruins your cause. From a one-man poll to “so-called” grieving mothers, the framing spoke volumes — about CNN’s liberal bias. Here's the transcript. CNN This Morning 2/23/26 6:54 am ET AUDIE CORNISH: This just in: with just a day to go until President Trump addresses the nation in his first State of the Union of his second term, a new CNN poll finds he's got some convincing to do.  When he addressed Congress nearly a year ago, his approval rating stood at 48%. That's the highest across both terms. Now, that is down to 36%. I'm bringing in the group chat to talk today.  Margaret Talev, senior contributor for Axios, Francesca Chambers, White House correspondent for USA Today, and Seung Min Kim, CNN political analyst and White House reporter for the Associated Press.  I'm going to turn to my White House folks first, because you guys, this is when, this week, we start to hear them setting expectations for the speech, and setting expectations for what he feels he needs to accomplish.  What are you hearing about what they think he needs to do on Tuesday? SEUNG MIN KIM: Oh. I think what, we're actually getting a little preview of kinda of the theme of his address later today at the White House when he hosts the so-called Angel Moms. And so he's really focusing on immigration as he kicks off his State of the Union week. But as we see in the poll, the number one concern for voters continues to be affordability.  CORNISH: Yes. Let me show that part of the poll, because it's interesting. You mentioned immigration. But when you look at, at least in this, among independents, immigration, 12% of them want to hear about this in this address.  KIM: Right, right. I mean, this is a base issue. I mean, this is something that his core voters really care about. But if he wants to appeal to the broader public, the, the, the the population of the vote, or the segment of the voters that he actually brought in,in the election because they were concerned about the economy, that's the target audience that they want to hit.  I'm sure we'll hear about it at the State of the Union tomorrow night, but how much of a focus is it? I think that's still to be determined. CORNISH: So, we called up one of the people we polled, a Republican voter, Sean from New Mexico. He said, I think people were expecting Trump to provide a bit of relief to their suffering. Grocery prices are just through the roof. Everything is so expensive.  So, this is even like a Republican voter knowing, like, look, we all knew what the ask was when voters supported him for a second term. 

On Monday, ABC’s Good Morning America was surprisingly the only major broadcast network morning newscast to pitch a fit over FBI Director Kash Patel’s attendance at Sunday’s gold medal game in men’s ice hockey at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics and subsequent postgame locker room appearance with the victorious United States over the losers to the north in Canada. Chief Justice correspondent Pierre Thomas decried this as “causing controversy” and cited the Nancy Guthrie kidnapping and possible military against Iran was reasons he shouldn’t have gone. WATCH: ABC’s Pierre Thomas goes on ‘Good Morning America’ to blast @FBIDirectorKash Patel for going to Milan for the gold medal game and celebrating with @USAHockey afterward, arguing “critics cit[e]...the kidnapping of Savannah Guthrie’s mother” and Iran as examples why he… pic.twitter.com/NxwguEMNS7 — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) February 23, 2026 Thomas had tacked this onto the end of his report on the latest wannabe assassin of President Trump, who was shot dead when he climbed onto Mar-a-Lago with a rifle and can of gasoline. Thankfully, the President was not at the so-called Winter White House this past week. “Overnight, FBI Director Kash Patel’s trip to Milan during the winter games causing controversy after he was seen celebrating with Team USA after the American men won their gold medal hockey game. The FBI director, a long time hockey fan, is seen chugging what appears to be beer and yelling, banging his fist in the locker room,” Thomas complained. Following a snippet of President Trump’s call from Patel’s phone to the victorious locker room, Thomas huffed “[o]ne video shared on social media Patel is seen apparently talking to President Trump about the victory.” The longtime ABC correspondent said “Patel traveled to Italy using the agency jet funded by the American public,” which was an example of travel “[c]ongressional Democrats have criticized” as Patel using the government jet for “personal outings, including a golf trip to Scotland, and a luxury hunting trip.” He at least allowed three sentences for Patel’s team explaining the game was part of a broader trip to observe security measures (which, left unsaid, made sense given the next Olympics are the 2028 summer games in Los Angeles): FBI officials have said these are coordinated with official business and any personal expenses are reimbursed. Patel proudly says that he was invited to the locker room by the U.S. hockey team to celebrate. FBI officials saying that he was in Milan discussing security measures while on a previously scheduled trip planned months in advance. His spokesman says on social media that any personal expenses on the trip would be reimbursed.  It was here in his conclusion that Thomas offered some bizarre linking of unrelated current events as reasons why Patel has faced supposed blowback: “Critics citing the elevated threat environment, the kidnapping of Savannah Guthrie’s mother, and ongoing tensions with Iran, calling the entire trip a boondoggle at taxpayers expense.” As has become the case for the leftist Good Morning America, they added their own personal opinions instead of thanking the reporter and moving on. Here, Robin Roberts huffed: “Mmhmm! Many feel that way.” If this had been an official with, say, a Harris administration if she had won in December 2024, it’s an almost guarantee Roberts and Thomas wouldn’t have been irked. To see the relevant ABC transcript from February 23, click “expand.” ABC’s Good Morning America February 23, 2026 7:12 a.m. Eastern [ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: FBI Director in Locker Room with U.S. Hockey Team] PIERRE THOMAS: Overnight, FBI Director Kash Patel’s trip to Milan during the winter games causing controversy after he was seen celebrating with Team USA after the American men won their gold medal hockey game. The FBI director, a long time hockey fan, is seen chugging what appears to be beer and yelling, banging his fist in the locker room. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You were all unbelievable. THOMAS: One video shared on social media Patel is seen apparently talking to President Trump about the victory. Patel traveled to Italy using the agency jet funded by the American public. Congressional Democrats have criticized Patel’s use of the jet in connection with personal outings, including a golf trip to Scotland, and a luxury hunting trip. FBI officials have said these are coordinated with official business and any personal expenses are reimbursed. Patel proudly says that he was invited to the locker room by the U.S. hockey team to celebrate. FBI officials saying that he was in Milan discussing security measures while on a previously scheduled trip planned months in advance. His spokesman says on social media that any personal expenses on the trip would be reimbursed. Critics citing the elevated threat environment, the kidnapping of Savannah Guthrie’s mother, and ongoing tensions with Iran, calling the entire trip a boondoggle at taxpayers expense. ROBIN ROBERTS: Mmhmm! Many feel that way.

President Donald Trump has been falsely accused of racism since before his first term in the White House, but one CBS reporter suggested that no one has ever falsely accused the president of being racist — and press secretary Karoline Leavitt quickly called him out.“Yesterday in his statement about Jesse Jackson, the president said, ‘Despite the fact that I’m falsely and consistently called a racist by the scoundrels and lunatics on the radical left, Democrats all, it was always my pleasure to help Jesse along the way,’” CBS correspondent Ed O’Keefe recited from Trump’s Truth Social post — which was a tribute to the late Jesse Jackson — at a White House press briefing.“Where or when does the president believe he’s been falsely called racist?” O’Keefe asked.“You’re kidding, right?” Leavitt asked, stunned. “I will pull you a plethora of examples. I’m going to get my team in that room to start going through the internet of radical Democrats throughout the years, Ed, who have accused this president falsely of being a racist.”“And I’m sure there’s many people in this room and on network television across the country who have accused him of the same. In fact, I know that because I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” she added.“I realize what Ed O’Keefe is trying to do here,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales comments. “He’s trying to say, ‘Well, he’s never been falsely accused. We were always dead on the money with that.’ And to that point, Ed O’Keefe himself called President Trump a racist.”O’Keefe once posted on X that President Trump received “backlash and support over his racist tweets.”While O’Keefe and many others in the Democratic Party believe Trump to be a racist, Jesse Jackson did not, and Gonzales plays a decades-old video of Jackson thanking Trump for being “inclusive” and creating a “comfort zone.”“I don’t think I’m going to be able to recover after all of those racist remarks. Hear that racist rhetoric? Oh my gosh. Helping the NAACP, helping Jesse Jackson. Boy, if President Trump is a racist, he’s doing it very wrong,” Gonzales says.“He is the worst racist in history. ... He was rapped about in rap songs before he ran for president as a Republican. He has a very long history of black people in America actually loving him, singing about him, talking about him,” she continues.“They thought he was the coolest until there was an R in front of his name, and then everyone had to hate him, and then we all had to pretend like he’s definitely a racist,” she adds.Want more from Sara Gonzales?To enjoy more of Sara's no-holds-barred takes on news and culture, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

It's magic when guitarists find an instrument that suits their style, sound and preferences. Guitar World's Founding Editor takes a look. The post 7 Class Axes & the Guitarists Who Wielded Them appeared first on Best Classic Bands.

King Adolf Frederick ruled Sweden from 1751 to 1771, but he’s better remembered for his legendary death than for his 20-year reign. Public DomainAdolf Frederick was the king of Sweden from 1751 until his death in 1771. The 60-year-old monarch suddenly fell ill on Feb. 12, 1771, after attending a feast for Fettisdagen, the Swedish equivalent of Fat Tuesday. He’d been in poor health for years and likely perished from heart failure or a stroke. However, rumors quickly began flying that he had eaten himself to death. As the story goes, Adolf Frederick polished off his meal of lobster, caviar, and sauerkraut with 14 cream-filled buns called semlor. His intense stomach cramps started soon after, and he was dead within hours. While there is no real evidence that King Adolf Frederick gorged himself into his deathbed, the legend persists to this day, and the Swedish royal will forever be associated with semlor. The Uneventful Reign Of King Adolf Frederick Born in the Duchy of Schleswig (located near the present-day border of Germany and Denmark) in 1710, Adolf Frederick was never meant to be king. His paternal grandfather was a duke, but his father’s older brother had inherited the title. Adolf Frederick himself had several older siblings, further separating him from any major positions of power. He ruled over a small fief, but he was nowhere near the throne — particularly not for a country he didn’t even live in. However, Adolf Frederick’s mother descended from Swedish royalty. And his first cousin on his father’s side, Charles Frederick, married Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia, the daughter of Peter the Great. When Anna died in 1728 and Charles followed in 1739, a decade after Anna, Adolf Frederick became the administrator for their underage son, Charles Peter Ulrich. Then, in 1741, Anna’s younger sister Elizabeth became the empress of Russia and appointed Peter Ulrich her heir. Around the same time, the Russo-Swedish War broke out. Russia ultimately emerged victorious, and Elizabeth wanted to ensure that an ally ruled Sweden. So, she essentially forced the Swedish government to appoint Adolf Frederick as the heir to the country’s throne by threatening to annex Finland if they didn’t. Nationalmuseum SwedenAn 18th-century portrait of King Adolf Frederick by Swedish artist Lorens Pasch the Younger. Thus, when Frederick I died in 1751, Adolf Frederick became the king of Sweden. Despite his title, however, Adolf Frederick was more of a symbolic figurehead. The actual ruling was done by the Riksdag, Sweden’s Parliament. He did try to overthrow the institution on two occasions, but he never completely succeeded. Otherwise, King Adolf Frederick’s reign was largely uneventful — at least until his death. The Fat Tuesday Feast That May Have Killed A King In 1771, Ash Wednesday fell on Feb. 13, marking the beginning of Lent. That meant that Feb. 12 was Fettisdagen, which translates literally to “Fat Tuesday.” There was a feast at Stockholm Palace to celebrate the occasion, and King Adolf Frederick purportedly dined on seafood, duck, and a variety of vegetables, washing it all down with champagne. Then, he turned to what’s said to have been his favorite dessert: semlor, also called hetvägg when soaked in hot milk. The sweet buns are filled with cream and traditionally served as part of the Fettisdagen meal. As the legend goes, Adolf Frederick ate 14 semlor before calling it a night. Frugan/Flickr Creative CommonsSemlor are sweet buns flavored with cardamom, filled with an almond paste, and topped with whipped cream and powdered sugar. They are sometimes served in a bowl of warm milk. Shortly after dinner, the king was gripped by a sharp pain in his stomach. As his postmortem report noted: “His Majesty little more than three hours after the meal, which was strong and of steady food, was attacked by the most violent colic and spasms in the abdomen, which in haste also moved the head and brain… and thereby squeezed together the parts indispensable to life, and quickly concluded in a killing asphyxia, and perfect apoplexia serosa, to the greatest sorrow and loss of all the inhabitants of the Swedish Kingdom.” The doctor also observed that the monarch’s stomach held “remains of food, partly melted, partly still in smaller pieces, which had not begun to transform,” and the “large intestines were mostly empty but congested with gases.” Nothing in the autopsy report suggests that Adolf Frederick ate himself to death. In fact, the doctor noted that the king had been in poor health for years. Back pain, colic, severe migraines, hemorrhoids, constipation, diarrhea, and frequent severe colds all plagued the royal, suggesting there may have been an underlying gastrointestinal disease. Public DomainThe post-mortem report of King Adolf Frederick. It’s most likely that King Adolf Frederick died from a stroke or perhaps heart failure. So, why does everyone still believe that he ate himself to death? How The Rumors About King Adolf Frederick’s Death Began Shortly after Adolf Frederick’s death on February 12, 1771, Swedish poet Count Johan Gabriel Oxenstierna recorded in his diary, “His Majesty’s death has occurred from indigestion of hetvägg, sauerkraut, meat with turnips, lobster, caviar, duckling, and Champagne wine.” It’s unclear exactly how the news of the king’s demise was reported to the public, but many modern scholars believe that the story that he gorged himself was spread as propaganda. Adolf Frederick was buried at Riddarholmen Church in Stockholm alongside many more of Sweden’s monarchs. His son Gustav was in Paris at the time of the king’s death, but he returned to Sweden to address the Riksdag. He then successfully seized power from the Parliament, something his father had never been able to do. Public DomainThree of Adolf Frederick’s sons, including King Gustav III (left). This 1772 coup, known as the Swedish Revolution, ended the country’s Age of Liberty and expanded royal power. As King Gustav III, he abolished torture, introduced more religious freedom, and gave commoners the right to hold higher offices that they were previously banned from. Of course, this stirred discontent amongst nobility — and Gustav was killed by a group of disgruntled noblemen in 1792. So, in the end, King Adolf Frederick’s death probably wasn’t as fascinating as it’s been portrayed — but it did pave the way for a new Sweden. After reading about the life and death of King Adolf Frederick of Sweden, go inside 10 other weird royal deaths. Then learn the true story of Marie Antoinette’s execution. The post The Bizarre Story Of King Adolf Frederick, The Swedish Monarch Who Allegedly Ate Himself To Death appeared first on All That's Interesting.

A decision as consequential as this one deserves a real debate in Congress.

Can They Sink Any Lower? NJ Dems Use Vulgar Acronym for Their New Anti-ICE Law