Winning Wednesday: The sky’s the limit

Your top five wins this week!

5. Federal Judge Tells DOJ To Back Off  Rhode Island Voter Files

By February 2026, according to the Brennan Center, at least 10 states, including Texas, had handed their voter files over to the Justice Department.  Most states have refused, and the administration is suing 29 of them over that issue. DOJ is asking them to sign an agreement to allow the Federal government to, among other things, remove specific voters from the rolls. 

On April 17, a federal judge in Rhode Island has joined those in CA, OR, MI and MA in dismissing the DOJ lawsuits.   The Rhode Island Current notes that PA is now looking to the Rhode Island decision to buttress their own case.

4. Public Outcry Moves DHS on Warehouse Detention Centers

 

DHS wants to detain thousands of immigrants, and this has led them to buy up empty warehouses around the country, planning to convert them into detention centers. Pushback is growing fast.  

NPR’s 1A program noted on April 21 that “last week, hundreds of protestors showed up outside a Maryland courtroom while a federal judge temporarily blocked the construction of a detention center in the state. And last month, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro blocked ICE’s access to water and sewage systems in two different counties where warehouses were bought. Local leaders argue these warehouses would overwhelm city resources.”

New DHS secretary Markwayne Mullins is reviewing these plans, which originated with Kristi Noem, and centers are being pushed back and postponed.

Stateline reports that in Surprise, Arizona, DHS “agreed to scale back the number of prisoners by two-thirds and pay a city for lost taxes.” And in Georgia, a small city cut off the water supply to a proposed immigrant holding site.  The city held that the town of 5,000 people did not have the capacity to serve a center scheduled to hold 10,000 people.  Centers in Kansas City, Indiana, and Orlando are also in play.

3. Maine Passes First Statewide Data Center Moratorium

Resistance to data centers fueling AI is also growing fast. To date it’s happened mostly at the local level.  Now it’s moving to the statewide level, as Maine passes the first US moratorium on data center construction. 

To stay on top of what’s happening or join in, check out

https://datacentertracker.org/ and Truthout’s excellent discussion with organizers, describing what they’ve encountered and what they’ve done to organize around data centers.

Maine’s moratorium bill represents a “seismic shift in public opinion,” according to Greg LeRoy of Good Jobs First, speaking to Mother Jones.

Twelve additional states are now considering legislative moratoriums on data center construction, and dozens of municipalities have already passed such laws. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez introduced a proposal for a nationwide moratorium in late March. “A year ago, nobody was entertaining a moratorium,” LeRoy said. “Now a fourth of the states are.” 

Issues include the pressure on local water and power infrastructure and energy prices, and also pollution generated by construction, especially important in Memphis.  The big opportunities here are the potential to push data companies to pay a premium for electricity, generating money for communities, and to build renewable energy infrastructure.

2. Astronauts Take A Small Step For Democracy

More than 100 former NASA astronauts are launching a nonpartisan nonprofit, Astronauts for America, that will advocate for the rule of law and bringing back civic responsibility.   The group includes Republicans, Democrats and independents.

They plan to score political candidates on the issues, and meet with federal policymakers to share concerns about the state of U.S. democracy.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Garrett Reisman, 58 years old, a registered Democrat and one of the group’s co-founders, said he decided to start the organization last year after the conduct he saw while witnessing an immigration raid at a local carwash.

“What I saw, seemed to me, just fundamentally un-American,” said the veteran of two Space Shuttle missions. “It seemed to be more like what I was used to seeing when I lived in Russia, where basically the security services can act with impunity.”

Here is the open letter announcing the group’s formation.

 

1.     Orban’s Loss in Hungary Unlocks Billions For Ukraine

Hungary’s authoritarian and pro-Russian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban, lost the parliamentary election to Péter Magyar earlier in April.  Under Orban, Hungary vetoed European Union (EU) financial support for Ukraine, as they fight on into the fifth year of their war with Russia.

Now, as the Wall Street Journal reports, Ukraine is poised to receive more than $100 billion of aid from the EU, after Hungary dropped its veto.  Today, EU ambassadors agreed to a €90 billion two-year loan, and the formal approval is expected to conclude Thursday, April 23.

The move came after Ukraine said it had fixed a damaged oil pipeline which carries Russian oil through Ukraine to Hungary and Slovakia.