The Gov Hub Newsletter: June 9, 2026

Through a partnership with nonprofit Undue Medical Debt, Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont dropped the curtain on an additional 97,000 state residents having their medical debt erased. The initiative to relieve the burden of medical debt on residents is in its 4th round, with $315M in medical debt slated to be axed.

Delaware is set to get its first medical school as a result of a new partnership between the state and Thomas Jefferson University, which is set to establish a regional campus of its Sidney Kimmel Medical College.

In Kentucky, Gov. Andy Beshear signed an executive order that clarified what medical conditions qualify for medical cannabis in the state, adding 15 conditions such as Crohn’s and Parkinson’s to the list.

A new poll from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the de Beaumont Foundation’s Public Health Listening Lab, revealed that public trust in recommendations from the CDC has plummeted. The poll found that only 50% of respondents trust recommendations from the CDC currently, which vastly contrasts with 77% trusting recommendations just a year ago in 2025.

In what feels like legal ping pong court edition, a federal judge struck down the Trump Admin’s policy requiring a $100K fee on any new H-1B visas, ruling that the Admin had violated the Administrative Procedure Act. The ruling comes after a previous federal ruling had kept the policy in place. Next steps-wise, the Admin plans on appealing the ruling.

Trump’s former personal lawyer turned acting AG, Todd Blanche has been nominated by Trump for a permanent promotion to AG. The plot twists on his road to confirmation come in the form of two GOP senators Trump has pissed off in a way that might cause them to grow a backbone [don’t hold your breath over it] – Sen. John Cornyn [TX] who lost his primary to Trump-endorsed TX AG Ken Paxton and retiring Sen. Thom Tillis [NC] who both sit on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

A hail-Mary lawsuit has been filed in an attempt to stop the UFC fight that’s set to take place at the White House, “in honor of America’s 250th.” The lawsuit hinges on the claim that the White House needed to get Congressional approval and pass through environmental review in order for the UFC structure to be built on the White House grounds.

The Trump Admin is taking aim at another blue state – Hawai’i – over Medicaid fraud, accusing the state’s Medicaid Fraud unit of failure. The Admin lobbed accusations of failure to indict and cut its $3M budget – like the budget used to go after fraud. The move contrasts with what the state has said, sharing that it has recovered double-digit millions of dollars since 2021 and filed criminal charges against two people this year. 

Despite a low mumble of outrage from some Republicans on Trump’s anti-weaponization fund [slush fund for J6’ers and other assorted buddies], the GOP-led Senate passed billions in funding for ICE and Border Patrol for the next three years, without the amendments to permanently ban Trump’s slush fund.

The Trump Admin has set the ball into motion to dismantle a vastly important deep-sea observation system that has been tasked with providing critical ocean and climate data for over a decade. Prior to the notice put out by the National Science Foundation, as in just days before that, Trump fired all of the independent board members that oversee the NSF. Editor’s Note: The equation goes something like this: “if we don’t have the data to say something is harmful to do, then it’s simply not bad, and we can do whatever we want.”

A former Social Security employee turned whistleblower shared 49-pages of details on the Trump Admin’s plan to classify 2.7 million LIVING people as dead – this includes some U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents. The plan is allegedly a part of the Admin’s immigration and deportation strategy. 

Trump got booed until the cows came home at last night’s Knicks game, following protests about his appearance at the game which led to the cancellation of the beloved watch parties around MSG. And yes, he did find time to go to the Knicks game but not his son Don Jr.’s wedding, and he also fell asleep during the game.

The Pentagon managed to piss off the Mormons more than any Mom-tok scandal by releasing a list of the religious designations that service members can register as, and in that list, not designating the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as Christian. The outrage from Mormon electeds prompted a change, albeit a bandaid, by removing which religions count as Christian denominations.

ICYMI Trump nominated the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Bill Pulte to be the interim Director of National Intelligence. Pulte, whose family has vast connections to the Christian Right, is also known for getting into a nerd-squabble with Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent, and being a part of this weird video involving a dildo-slap.

After being denied access to the privately-owned ICE detention facility, Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, Gov. Mikie Sherrill shared that she was allowed in for what she called a “closely controlled and limited tour,” which she also called “unacceptable.” Sherrill was also not allowed to meet or speak with detainees, which is all set on the background of testimony that the conditions inside the facility are inhumane.

Short man, bad buzzcut, and the former Border Patrol commander, Gregory Bovino has announced that he’s exploring a campaign for president in 2028. While his exploratory committee has launched a website, it’s unclear whether he’ll campaign in his Nazi-style long coat.

An investigation by the Treasury Department’s inspector general has revealed that the 2025 data-sharing agreement made between ICE and the Treasury, which had allowed ICE to submit names and addresses of immigrants to the IRS to cross-verify against tax records as part of Trump’s deportation effort, was rife with errors. As reported by AP, the watchdog found that the flawed automated matching process that the IRS used, alongside inconsistent formatting in CIES’s data led to “questionable” and "inaccurate" matches. 

The Washington Post has reported that ICE will now stop reporting the deaths of newly released detainees, changing a policy that required ICE to report deaths that occurred within 30 days of someone being released from their custody.

Jet fuel costs are sky-high, with jet fuel rising in cost by 78% since last year at this time. Credited for the dramatic uptick in pricing: Trump’s war in the Middle East.

Reported cases continue to rise of the flesh-eating New World screwworms, which are screwing over beef producers in Texas and New Mexico. While Trump’s USDA is working to release sterile flies to try and contain the situation, reporting from Texas Public Radio shows that many farmers aren’t even aware of the situation. Alas, while Canada has banned beef imports from Texas, a blame game on whose fault this is [Biden v. Trump] has found the most resonance at the feet of DOGE, which cut funding for screwworm detection and fired 25% of the workers responsible for monitoring the flesh eaters.

The GOP-led House has pushed forward a budget bill for the next FY that would cut funding by $200M for WIC, the federal program responsible for providing pregnant moms and their children with healthy food. Specifically, $141M of the cuts would nix fruit and veggie benefits for 5.4M people.

Politico: More women, Democratic veterans running for Congress this year

AP: The other Dan Sullivan in Alaska’s US Senate race says candidacy was ‘my choice,’ not a sham

NPR: The Supreme Court is in its final stretch this term. Here are the major cases

Vogue: Can Deb Haaland Make History in New Mexico?