No More Escaping Consequences
What to know: Captured Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro is unlikely to beat the charges he now faces in the U.S., legal experts say.
The TPPF take: The era of escaping consequences is over.
“Venezuela’s corrupt leaders got away with it for too long,” says TPPF’s Joshua Treviño. “They sent forth millions of their own citizenry to be trafficked, and they got away with it. They trafficked the drugs that killed and addicted millions of our neighbors and family, and they got away with it. They invited the worst enemies of the United States into the Americas — the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians — and they got away with it. They got away with it until the dark hours of Jan. 3, 2026.”
For more on Maduro, click here.
The End of a Monopoly
What to know: The Texas Supreme Court has made it official and ended the American Bar Association’s monopoly on law school accreditation.
The TPPF take: The ABA has strayed far from its role as an impartial arbiter of educational quality.
“In Texas, the ABA gets to decide which schools’ students can take the bar exam, a prerequisite to practicing law,” says TPPF’s Noah Pederson. “Entrusting a private, out-of-state organization with control over Texas legal education is problematic for three reasons: the ABA pushes politically biased standards, and it’s an unconstitutional delegation of power, and it imposes burdensome requirements.”
For more on the ABA, click here.
Fraud
What to know: Vice President J.D. Vance is adding his voice to the many calls for Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz to resign over the massive fraud uncovered in that state’s welfare programs.
The TPPF take: It’s not just welfare fraud; election fraud is also a huge problem in Minnesota.
“Recent reporting has brought renewed attention to just how permissive Minnesota’s election framework has become,” says TPPF’s Josh Findlay. “The state allows voters to ‘vouch’ for up to eight other individuals at the polls — a practice that requires no voter identification and relies entirely on personal attestation. In isolation, that policy would raise red flags. In combination with broader governance failures and ongoing fraud investigations, it becomes a serious liability.
For more on elections in Minnesota, click here.