Badlands Brief

We're Winning, plus Cuban Dominoes & Weaponized Ethics

The Badlands Brief is your daily drop of Badlands’ takes on the narratives dominating the info war. Read on, and join the conversation in the comments section.

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DOJ, DHS, USPS Officials Hold Talks to Expand Federal Involvement in Election Integrity Effort

A Trump administration effort to expand federal involvement in voter verification and mail-in ballot rules is advancing through coordinated discussions across multiple agencies, involving the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and the US Postal Service.

White House officials have held recent interagency talks on implementing the plan, involving DOJ Civil Rights Division head Harmeet Dhillon and her deputies, USPS CEO David Steiner, and DHS election integrity official Heather Honey, a former aide described as a protege of attorney Cleta Mitchell, who advised Trump during post-2020 election legal efforts.

The effort stems from Trump’s March executive order, titled “Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections,” which directs DHS to develop a “state citizenship list,” instructs the DOJ to prioritize prosecution of state and local officials who distribute ballots to ineligible voters, and calls on USPS to draft rules requiring states to provide voter registration lists in order to process mail-in ballots.

According to internal disclosures, additional officials involved in the discussions include Deputy Homeland Security Advisor Anthony Salisbury, DOJ associate deputy attorney general Aakash Singh, principal associate deputy attorney general Trent McCotter, and counselor to the attorney general Henry Whitaker.

USPS has stated it is reviewing the executive order and working on draft regulations, while DHS and USCIS officials have said internal deliberations are ongoing.

Ashe in America: we need to pause and appreciate this moment.

Kiddos, we made it.

This is so hilarious. The first two words of this article are “Clay Parikh” – who, of course, is a friend of Badlands, frequent guest on Why We Vote and SitRep, and multi-GART attendee.

“Clay Parikh, a cybersecurity expert from Alabama, spent years as a bit player in the world of election denial. He wasn’t a star with his own media platform, like the MyPillow guy. But he still gained a modest following by circulating conspiracy theories about President Trump’s 2020 defeat, including that poll workers gave Trump supporters—but not other voters—felt-tip markers to fill out their ballots, rendering them invalid and unreadable by voting machines. More recently, he’s asserted that a group of federal lawmakers is covering up foreign election interference.”

Okay, those are some of the least offensive things that Clay Parikh has asserted about the fake eletions. What a lazy assessment of the full range of the election denialism at play. Disappointing… (Note: Everybody be cool, because Brian invited the author on the show…)

Clay Parikh is a certified ethical hacker, and the only public expert that has been hands-on-keys for penetration testing on the voting systems. He has been certified as an expert in court proceedings around the nation, and he’s worked at the highest levels of classification, specifically on critical infrastructure and elections.

Bit player.

Shame, The Atlantic.

Also, they’re right. The election deniers are winning.

We’re winning because our message is the true.

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Saudi Arabia Floats Iran Non-Aggression Pact Modeled on Helsinki Accords

Saudi Arabia has floated the idea of a Middle East non-aggression pact with Iran as part of postwar planning discussions with allies once the US-Israeli conflict with Tehran ends, according to Financial Times reporting.

Diplomats said Riyadh has pointed to the 1970s Helsinki Accords, which eased Cold War tensions in Europe, as a possible framework for reducing regional conflict and expanding economic cooperation.

Arab diplomats said most Muslim and Arab nations would likely support the concept, though including Israel remains a major obstacle as regional anger over Israeli military operations in Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria continues to grow.

The report also said Saudi Arabia is strengthening coordination with Pakistan, Turkey, and Egypt following the conflict. Pakistan’s defense minister said Islamabad wants Qatar and Turkey added to the Saudi-Pakistan defense pact to build a broader regional economic and military alliance aimed at reducing dependence on outside powers.

GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: For months, there has been relentless gaslighting that Saudi Arabia was secretly supporting and/or conducting warfare against Iran.

For years, there have been similar efforts to convince people that Saudi Arabia is subservient to Israel; That MBS is a Zionist puppet. That the Saudis had betrayed the Ummah and were effectively serving the Deep State.

The reality is that Saudi started serving the Deep State in 1975 when King Faisal was assassinated (if not sooner).

For decades, many of the Saudi royals were in bed with the CIA, funding their operations and otherwise collaborating on projects. This relationship reached its apex under the George W Bush administration.

The dynamic seemed to have changed during the Obama years. I can’t pinpoint a moment when this happened, or really be certain of anything, but in 2011, the lifelong governor of Riyadh—Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud—was appointed Crown Prince by his brother, King Abdullah.

That decision began a series of events that led where we are today. Salman became King in January 2015, appointing his son, Mohammed, as Deputy Crown Prince and Defense Minister.

The Son immediately went to work dismantling and rebuilding the government, on paper, and after 10 days, a new government was in place.

The Son was then elevated to Crown Prince in June 2017, one month after President Trump first visited Riyadh. In November, Salman named Mohammed acting sovereign of The Kingdom, and Mohammed immediately arrested all of his corrupt relatives that were working with the CIA, and by extension, Mossad.

There’s no doubt that Mohammed bin Salman harbors animus toward Iran—he has expressed this on countless occasions. But would he embark on a campaign to topple this rival, if doing so would destroy the region? Is it reasonable to believe that his animus was so strong? The Reformer? The one expelled the radical clerics and effectively ended Wahhabism as a state institution?

The one who has spent the past 11 years implementing his ambitious Vision 2030 plan, which requires historic development and investment into The Kingdom? To transform the economy into tourism, hospitality and high tech?

How could any of this be achieved if the Middle East is destroyed in a war?

The reason the Deep State is targeting Saudi Arabia is because of the significance it has played in uniting the Muslim world behind a common vision. Not a caliphate that is built to destroy, instead a society built to prosper economically.

But to achieve this economic vision, Saudi needed partners. It needed a security architecture that could provide stability to the region so that this ambitious economic plan could be implemented. The countries that MBS has brought together are not historic allies. Their partnership is predicated on a vision of a common future that is driven by Mohammed bin Salman and Saudi Arabia.

That is why Saudi Arabia must be torn down, in the eyes of the Deep State.

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Taiwan on Deck as Trump & Xi Provide Signal in the Noise

Taiwan emerged as the clearest flashpoint in President Trump’s Beijing summit with Xi Jinping, even as both sides publicly emphasized stability, trade and cooperation. Xi warned Trump that mishandling Taiwan could lead to “clashes and even conflicts,” while US statements largely avoided the issue and said policy remains unchanged.

The signal in the noise: Beijing put Taiwan at the center of the meeting, Washington did not publicly concede ground, and Taipei said there were “no surprises” while urging China to end military pressure. The result was not a breakthrough, but a visible marker that Taiwan is moving higher on the board as Trump and Xi test whether economic détente can survive the hardest security question in US-China relations.

Burning Bright: This is the Multipolar Margin Call thesis I laid out in October during the height of the manufactured (ie: fake) economic tensions between Trump and Xi playing out in real time, now translated through the very apparatus that refused to recognize it at the time.

The US-China trade war wasn’t a bug of the dissolution of the rules-based international order; it was the core feature, as it has forced the rerouting of monetary flows, supply chains and manufacturing capacity back toward sovereign balance sheets on both sides of the Pacific.

Now layer in the Strait of Hormuz squeeze—with Xi offering to help reopen it, both sides agreeing it must stay open and China signaling it will buy more American oil to reduce reliance on the old collectivist chokepoints—and you see the pincer in motion.

Energy and capital are being pulled away from the globalist circulatory system and redirected into sovereign arteries.

Regions of Responsibility are hardening.

Appeals to borderless governance are being dashed on the rocks of pragmatic nationalism.

So, exactly as the Margin Call thesis predicted, and as we have seen in multiple theaters over the last few months, the apparent conflict is the cover story for the true disentanglement in the offing.

And the machine knows what comes next, as this Sovereign Disentanglement cascade is accelerating.

Vladimir Putin opened the sequence with Ukraine—the first major globalist proxy to be peeled away from the board in the modern age, Trump continued it with Venezuela, Iran and the looming Cuba chapter, and Xi is positioned to put the capstone on the entire arc with Taiwan.

That is the last remaining globalist forward operating base of any real consequence.

The machine fears this final disentanglement more than any kinetic exchange because a clean sovereign resolution in Taiwan doesn’t just remove a flashpoint—it completes the trilogy of hard lessons the world has been forced to learn the expensive way.

Iran has demonstrated the folly of relying on distant nations for energy security.

Russia has demonstrated the folly of relying on distant nations (and their proxies) for national security.

And China, through an inevitable Taiwan crisis will finish the trilogy by demonstrating—emphatically—the folly of relying on distant nations for logistical and technological security.

Semiconductors. Rare earths. Advanced manufacturing.

The entire just-in-time global supply chain house of cards has come crashing down, a trend that first started in earnest in the wake of an engineered pandemic that was meant to stop the Sovereign Alliance dead in its tracks, but which only served to accelerate its inevitable victory.

When that realization lands, the on-shoring and reshoring efforts both Trump and Xi have pursued for years will look less like protectionism and more like prophecy.

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Conditions in Cuba Worsen as Trump Puts Pressure on the Regime & Ratcliffe Meets Castro For Talks

Cuba is facing worsening blackouts, fuel shortages and economic deterioration as the Trump administration increases pressure on Havana through tighter sanctions and regional isolation efforts. Reports indicate the island’s energy infrastructure is under severe strain, with dwindling fuel imports and recurring nationwide outages intensifying public frustration and putting new pressure on the Communist government.

The developments come as CIA Director John Ratcliffe reportedly met with Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and senior regime officials for talks, signaling that despite escalating pressure, backchannel communication between Washington and Havana remains active.

Analysts view the combination of economic pressure and quiet diplomatic engagement as a sign the administration may be attempting to force concessions from Cuba while preventing broader regional instability.

GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: It seems like President Trump is queuing up Cuba to be the next domino to fall, which will take all of the inertia out of the Middle East and the animus toward Iran.

Will we see the Castro Family return to power as a partner of President Trump?

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DOJ Sues DC Bar Officials, Citing “Weaponization” Claims

The Justice Department has filed a complaint against DC disciplinary authorities, alleging they are improperly using the attorney discipline process to regulate the official actions of federal government lawyers.

The filing seeks to nullify the DC Bar’s unlawful prosecution of former Assistant Attorney General Jeff Clark, which centers on internal deliberations related to potential fraud in the 2020 presidential election. The case remains tied to ongoing litigation nearly six years later.

Officials argued the disciplinary process improperly targets executive branch deliberations and risks restricting federal attorneys from providing candid legal advice.

The Justice Department said the action advances President Trump’s executive order on ending the weaponization of the federal government and a related memorandum on preventing abuses of the legal system and federal courts.

View the complaint here.

Ashe in America: Jeff Clark drafted an internal memo that represented his personal legal theory about election irregularities in Georgia. That’s not in dispute. In the filing linked above, everyone concedes that Jeff Clark believed the substance of his memo. The memo was never finalized or sent.

The DC bar authorities held a sad and demoralizing hearing – CannCon and I covered it – and then recommended disbarment despite admissions over what they characterized as dishonest conduct tied to the draft letter.

[WATCH]

But the whole thing may be boomeranging, depending on the outcome of this action.

“The United States asks this Court to (i) enter a judgment declaring that Defendants’ investigations, proceedings, adjudications, and findings against Mr. Clark violate the Supremacy Clause and Article II and are therefore void; (ii) issue an injunction that prohibits Defendants, as well as their successors, agents, and employees, from commencing or maintaining any investigations, proceedings, or disciplinary actions against Mr. Clark based on his conduct as a Federal Government attorney; (iii) award the United States its costs and fees in this action; and (iv) award other relief as the Court deems just.”

The US argues that DC bar authorities are violating the Constitution when they punish federal executive officials for internal legal advice and deliberative discussions inside the Executive Branch. In my opinion based on the information available, this is the kind of thing the US should argue, by the way: Rights protected under law.

This complaint argues that local bar regulators have no oversight of presidential legal decision-making through “ethics” reviews. can we apply to all levels of government? Maybe eventually. We need the precedent…

And weaponized ethics is being adjudicated…

Accelerate.

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BONUS ITEM

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House Dems Say Redistricting Losses Require a War Posture, Threaten to “Crush” MAGA Souls

Congressional Democrats are escalating their rhetoric over the national redistricting battle ahead of the 2026 midterms, with some lawmakers and strategists openly describing the fight as requiring a “war posture” after Republican-led map changes in states like Texas and elsewhere threatened Democratic House prospects.

According to reports, Democratic operatives argued the party must abandon “unilateral disarmament” and aggressively counter GOP redistricting efforts using every available legal and political tool.

One Democratic strategist quoted in the discussion said the goal was to politically “crush” the “souls” of the MAGA movement, reflecting the increasingly existential tone surrounding control of the House. The comments come amid a growing nationwide push for mid-decade redistricting battles, as both parties prepare for what is expected to be one of the most aggressively litigated and politically charged election cycles in modern US history.

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