The Dictatorship
Supreme Court rejects Alabama’s attempt to conduct nitrogen gas execution
The Supreme Court rejected Alabama’s attempt to execute Jeffery Lee with nitrogen gas after lower courts stopped the state from executing him with that method.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch voted to side with the state, according to the court’s unexplained order on Thursday night denying the state’s emergency application.
On Tuesday, a Trump-appointed judge in Alabama blocked the state from executing Lee under its nitrogen-hypoxia protocol. U.S. District Judge Emily Marks found that Lee proved the state’s method violates the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
She emphasized that although she was issuing a permanent injunction against the nitrogen method, she wasn’t banning the state from executing Lee. She said the record showed his alternative proposal of the firing squad “significantly reduces a substantial risk of severe pain as compared to nitrogen-hypoxia.”
Under precedent adopted by the Supreme Court’s GOP-appointed majority, an inmate who challenges an execution method as unconstitutional must propose an alternative method that is feasible, readily implemented and significantly reduces a substantial risk of severe pain.
Having scheduled Lee’s execution for Thursday, Alabama officials moved to lift Marks’ injunction in an effort to proceed as planned. Procedurally, they first had to ask Marks herself for relief. In their motion to the judge, they said she downplayed the risks of the firing squad, as well as the state’s concern about finding willing and able executioners for the shooting method.
State officials further said the fact that they scheduled Lee’s execution for Thursday “should have sunk his claim.” They said that “however easy or hard it would be to implement a firing squad in the abstract, there’s no support for the view that it could be done two days from the Court’s decision that it satisfies the Eighth Amendment test.”
Marks rejected the motion to lift her injunction, noting that the state’s urgent motion did “little more than repeat the arguments it made previously,” which she also had rejected. She added that the state had no right to complain about the timing because it was the state that set Lee’s execution while litigation was pending.
A divided three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit declined to disturb Marks’ ruling. The panel’s majority recounted that a judge’s permanent injunction like the one Marks issued is entitled to deference and can be overturned only if the judge abused her discretion. With that in mind, the majority said her findings were “amply supported by the evidence presented.”
And noting that courts reviewing motions for urgent relief consider the “irreparable harm” at stake, the majority observed: “It goes without saying that Mr. Lee would suffer irreparable harm if he were executed pursuant to a method that the district court has found unconstitutional.”
On the other hand, the majority said the state’s preferred Thursday execution timing “is not a magical date” and that “the injury to the State caused by a delay would not be irreparable because the district court’s injunction allows it to execute Mr. Lee by any other authorized method (including lethal injection or the electric chair).”
Trump-appointed Judge Robert Luck was the panel dissenter. He began by recalling that Lee was sentenced to die for robbing and murdering Jimmy Ellis and Elaine Thompson 26 years ago. “Unlike his victims, Lee was allowed to choose his method of execution,” he added, referring to Lee’s initial choice of nitrogen hypoxia as an alternative to lethal injection during a previous round of litigation.
“For as long as we’ve had an Eighth Amendment, the Supreme Court has never held that a state’s method of execution qualifies as cruel and unusual under the Eighth Amendment,” Luck wrote. “Because we shouldn’t do so here, I would grant the state’s motion to stay the injunction.”
Lee’s jury had recommended a life sentence, but the judge sentenced him to death under Alabama’s “judicial override” option, which has since been abolished.
The state cited Luck’s dissent in seeking emergency relief from the Supreme Court on Thursday. Officials told the high court that if the lower court ruling in Lee’s favor stands, it would be “unprecedented in American history.” The state said it would not only “portend the first-ever permanent ban on a legislatively enacted method” but would also “expand the concept of cruelty well beyond the bounds of the Eighth Amendment.”
Georgetown University law professor Steve Vladeck, an expert on the Supreme Court’s so-called shadow docketsubmitted an amicus brief opposing the state. He said Alabama was trying to do something procedurally that it shouldn’t be allowed to do. He explained that unlike in other emergency challenges that states have brought to the justices, Alabama wasn’t challenging a temporary execution stay issued by a lower court, but rather a permanent injunction.
“After all,” Vladeck said in the brief, “allowing Alabama to execute Mr. Lee through a grant of emergency relief would necessarily frustrate this Court’s ability to conduct plenary review of the district court’s final, permanent injunction.”
Highlighting that point, Lee’s lawyers told the justices that the case was “in a procedural posture unlike every previous method of execution challenge that this Court has considered.” They noted that unlike other emergency litigation in capital cases, “this case comes to the Court following a full three-day bench trial on the merits — the first such trial anywhere on the constitutionality of nitrogen asphyxiation.”
They said Lee wasn’t challenging his death sentence or the state’s ability to execute him but rather “only the method that Alabama intends to employ.” They said the state wanted to make the case moot by executing Lee “using an unconstitutional and permanently enjoined method,” but that the state hadn’t “cited a single case in which this Court has intervened in a capital case in such an extraordinary way.”
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Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro,” a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MS NOW, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.
DETROIT (AP) — The opening of a Canadian-U.S. bridge across the Detroit River, which President Donald Trump had previously threatened to block, was delayed Thursday due to unresolved issues.
In a statement released before a scheduled Friday ribbon-cutting ceremony at the bridge, the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority said that “Canada and the United States have agreed to delay the opening of the bridge, taking the necessary time to resolve any outstanding issues.” It didn’t elaborate on what those issues are or how long the delay would last.
The 1.5-mile-long (2.4-kilometer-long) Gordie Howe International Bridge spans the Detroit River and connects the Motor City with Windsor, Ontario. The bridge is jointly owned by Canada and Michigan and was expected to open to traffic later this month.
But the opening had been thrown into question after Trump in February demanded in a social media post that Canada turn over at least half of the bridge’s ownership to the U.S. federal government and agree to other unspecified demands in one of the Republican president’s many salvos over cross-border trade issues.
Michigan officials and the White House had been in contact for months about the bridge following Trump’s post, with the understanding that the opening would move forward Friday. Invitations for the bridge’s opening went out this week following a conversation between Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.
“This project is a powerful example of bipartisan and international cooperation, and the governor looks forward to attending the ribbon-cutting ceremony when it happens,” a statement from Whitmer spokesperson Bobby Leddy said.
New bridge a “long-term play”
Internal disagreements within the Trump administration threw those plans into question, as Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick pushed back on the opening, according to two people with knowledge of the matter who insisted on anonymity to discuss the private talks.
The White House did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday evening, “At the request of the United States we agreed to delay the opening and take the necessary time to resolve outstanding issues.”
He added, “There are some things that have been raised, a series of technical aspects, which we will work through with the United States.”
Even with the delay, officials remained optimistic that the bridge — a roughly $4.4 billion project — is still expected to open.
“We need to keep this very much in perspective,” said Sandy Baruah, president of the Detroit Regional Chamber and former U.S. assistant secretary of commerce. “Our organization, the state of Michigan and others have been working on this bridge for 20 years. If it opens July 1, Aug. 1 or Sept. 1, I’m not going to get overly agitated about it. This is a long-term play.”
Named after the late Canadian Hockey great Gordie Howe, who spent 25 seasons leading the Detroit Red Wings, the bridge is expected to be another vital economic artery between Canada and the United States.
The construction project was negotiated by Rick Snyder, the former Republican governor of Michigan, and paid for by Canada to help ease congestion at the existing Ambassador Bridge and the Detroit-Windsor tunnel. Work has been underway since 2018.
U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a Michigan Democrat, said she’s taking people at their word that the holdup is “a minor hiccup.”
“This is probably the most bipartisan issue in the state of Michigan, so it’s ridiculous that we can’t just seal the deal,” Slotkin said.
Commerce and border crossings
Detroit and Windsor have been neighborly for generations, with residents in both countries frequently crossing the shared river border for entertainment and shopping. Windsor’s population in 2021 was about 230,000. Like Detroit, the Canadian city’s economy has a strong focus on manufacturing and the auto industry.
Commercial trade between the two cities primarily has been across the nearly century-old and privately-owned Ambassador Bridge, which is closer to downtown Detroit than the Gordie Howe Bridge.
The Ambassador Bridge had been the busiest commercial border crossing between the United States and Canada until last year, when truck traffic along the Blue Water Bridge connecting Port Huron, Michigan, to Sarnia, Ontario, surpassed the Ambassador Bridge’s numbers, according to the Bridge and Tunnel Operators Association.
In 2025, about 2.1 million trucks crossed the Blue Water Bridge compared to just over 1.8 million that used the Ambassador Bridge. About 3.5 million passenger vehicles used the Ambassador Bridge last year, while 1.6 million crossed via the Blue Water Bridge.
Combined, more than 9.2 million vehicles crossed the border on those two bridges in 2025, according to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
More than 3.7 million cars and SUVs also traveled between the United States and Canada last year via the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel.
Both bridges and the tunnel are working at full capacity, and the new bridge will help improve the efficiency of commercial and personal traffic between the two countries, Baruah said.
“This is what government is supposed to do, make it easier for business to conduct commerce,” he said.
___
Cappelletti reported from Washington.
President Donald Trump’s planned UFC fight on the White House’s South Lawn has required a monumental effort from more than seven federal agencies, hundreds of staff working onsite daily and at least $60 million, according to a legal filing that offers a glimpse into the preparations.
The event is part of the 250th anniversary of America’s founding, and is scheduled for the weekend with the main attraction — seven mixed martial arts matches — on Sunday.
That is, if a judge doesn’t halt the proceedings, which is sought by two Virginia residents in a federal lawsuit against the National Park Service, which oversees the South Lawn.
The agency filed a rebuff of the request Tuesday in court, and, in it, laid out the operations for the event.
“Well over $60 million and tens of thousands of hours of labor have been expended,” the document read, adding that the money came from the UFC and groups affiliated with it.
The Octagon
It’s the eight-sided cage that surrounds the sometimes bloodied combatants and sits at the center of the constructed arena on the South Lawn.
The arena is expected to hold 4,000 spectators, with another 120,000 visitors — who swung tickets from an online lottery — anticipated to watch from the nearby Ellipse.
The installation began May 20, and the Secret Service worked with the UFC to screen between 20 and 30 trucks of equipment — as well as between “700 and 900” staff — that came in daily for the installation.
The document did not specify the extent of government resources spent on the project, but said seven agencies, including Homeland Security and the Federal Aviation Administration, have “allocated significant resources and manpower.”
The schedule
It’ll kick off Saturday with a ceremonial weigh-in at the Ellipse, followed by a concert by country musicians The Zac Brown Band.
A UFC Freedom 250 Fan Fest will be ongoing through the weekend, with “interactive experiences,” live shows, celebrity appearances, “exclusive on-stage moments,” meet and greets, live music and interviews with the athletes.
Sunday night is when the seven bouts kick off. At the close, Trump is scheduled to fly to France for the G7 summit.
Disassembly of the installations will begin the next day, and they are expected to be entirely removed by June 23.
The athletes’ Epsom salt baths
There are 14 athletes competing, and their training is rigorous.
Preparations start months in advance, working toward more intense weight cutting and diet alteration in the final week that can include fasting, extreme sauna use and hot Epsom salt baths.
They could be shaving as many as 20 pounds before weigh-ins, which are designed to keep the competition fair between similarly weighted combatants.
Lawsuit calls it ‘corrupt’
It was filed Saturday by the Public Integrity Project on behalf of the two Virginia residents and argues that Trump’s authorization of the event violated National Park Service regulations prohibiting sporting events on federal parklands.
One of the attorneys, Brendan Ballou, characterized it as a “corrupt use of our most sacred national monuments for private gain.”
The National Park Service pushed back on that claim, but also detailed the event’s preparations to make a point.
“All these hopes could be dashed at the very last moment,” it read, “by the whim of two people who believe they have superior taste and want to spoil the event for everyone else.”
FBI agents on Thursday raided the Cleveland offices of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, a pro-democracy organization that helps register voters in that state, according to three people briefed on the search.
Agents also fanned out across the state, showing up at the homes of the group’s leaders and staff members, carrying some subpoenas and seeking information and electronic devices, according to the people, two of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive ongoing investigation. Members of the group had made contact with lawyers on Thursday to determine their legal options, the people said.
Prentiss Haney, a board member for Ohio Organizing Collaborative, told MS NOW Thursday night that agents approached people with connections to Ohio Organizing Collaborative, including some who had performed basic canvassing and volunteer work for the group, and began pressing them for information.
Agents were “basically trying to fish for information,” said Haney.
“They had agents all across the state going to civil rights leaders and community leaders’ doors intimidating them, coming and demanding that they talk about literally anything they would ask,” Haney said, adding that agents “asked them if they’re committing voter fraud, just on their doors, in front of their houses with their children, and just following them to work and school.”
Haney said some of the people said the agents approached without warrants.
“Just straight-up intimidation tactics,” he said.
Spokespeople for the FBI and the Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment late Thursday night.
Those sources familiar with the investigation said they are concerned this new effort in Ohio is part of the Trump administration’s efforts to sow doubt and distrust in voting integrity in key swing states ahead of the midterm elections.
Federal agents have in recent months launched inquiries and investigations into voting protocols in Georgia and Wisconsin, have subpoenaed voting records in Arizona and sought reviews of voting machines in Puerto Rico.
According to its website, the Ohio Organizing Collaborative facilitates statewide voter registration through grassroots, community-led programs, including its “Democracy Builders” initiative. This collaborative works in Ohio’s major metropolitan areas, such as Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati, to help underrepresented communities register to vote and provides other support.
The group has also joined lawsuits challenging redistricting efforts that it argues reduce Black voters of representation. These lawsuits also “stand your ground” laws that allow a person to shoot someone if they feel threatened.
Haney said the Cleveland raid and harassment of staff are unjustified and that investigators lack any evidence of wrongdoing.
“How can they distract and intimidate civil rights leaders and voters and community leaders who are helping people get registered to vote and create a national spectacle about it?” he said.
“That is the only reason why they would choose to do that, do it now, in the middle of a contested political election in the state. There’s no other reason. They have no evidence of that.”
Carol Leonnig is a senior investigative reporter with MS NOW.
Will McDuffie is a reporter for MS NOW.
Alex Tabet is a reporter for MS NOW.
Laura Barrón-López covers the White House for MS NOW.
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