In case you missed it this week, President Trump announced his intent to nominate Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche to the permanent position.
The House Committee on Appropriations approved the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Fiscal 2027 spending bill. Among the industry priorities, a prohibition of funds from being used to ban traditional ammunition absent sound scientific evidence, as well as blocking the use of funds to limit fishing and hunting on federal lands for reasons other than public safety.
He was one of us…until he wasn’t…but he won’t be a U.S. House of Representatives member…Gun control activist Ryan Busse lost his latest try for public office, this time in Montana’s Democratic primary for the House Seat of current U.S. Representative (and former Interior Secretary) Ryan Zinke.…the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has added the Chicago White Sox baseball team to their “Don’t Feed Them” list because White Sox were supporting Everytown for Gun Safety and other gun control groups on “Gun Violence Awareness Day.” The CCRKBA now has 200 companies and their CEOs on “Don’t Feed Them” list.
Despite being anti-gun, Oregon Governor Tina Kotek has voiced her opposition to Initiative Petition 28, a ballot proposal that would erase legal protections for regulated outdoor activities, including hunting. Gov. Kotek says the measure risks criminalizing many “common agricultural practices” and seeks to penalize “the Oregonians to feed us.”
In the business world, West Marine’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy reformation plan was unveiled, with the company naming 34 locations scheduled to begin “Store Closing Sales” on June 11. West said the closures were necessary business decisions to keep the company going….not sure what’s ahead for Aero Precision, Ballistic Advantage, Stag Arms and VG6, but the outlook’s not good. According to the Aero Precision instagram account, they are “currently operating through a receivership process while a transition to new ownership is underway.” The same post also acknowledges that production and fulfillment are “currently moving at a slower pace than we would like…”
And as if we didn’t have enough to be worried about…the New World screwworm is back. Texas and the USDA announced preventative measures to halt the spread of the flesh-eating fly larvae. Thought to have been eliminated in 1982 via the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT), five cases were reported across Texas this week. Reducing the wild NWS population is a slow process. The USDA estimates the cost of an outbreak to be $1.9 billion annually for Texas alone.
In California, the trial of an Uber driver accused of starting the Pacific Palisades fires that destroyed more than 6,000 structures began on Wednesday. If/when convicted, Johnathan Rinderknecht, 30, faces up to 45 years in prison.
And… no resolution of the U.S./Iran hostilities. As the conflict passed the 100-day mark, U.S. inflation rose 4.2 percent to reflect the economic uncertainty those hostilities have caused. And as the week drew to a close, hostilities resumed.
Finally...SpaceX debuted as a public company yesterday. It is now the 6th largest public company in the United States behind Nvidia, Alphabet, Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon. We can all remember fondly the "good old days" when Elon Musk was only worth a paltry $800 billion...it was last Thursday.