BREAKING: Republican-Controlled U.S. Senate Gives Trump a Huge Win and…ll
BREAKING: Republican-Controlled U.S. Senate Gives Trump a Huge Win and…
Louisiana Supreme Court Justice Among Newly Confirmed Trump Judges
Louisiana Supreme Court Justice William Crain, nominated by President Donald Trump in October, has been confirmed by the U.S. Senate for a federal judgeship on the Eastern District Court in New Orleans.
Crain was approved in a 49–46 vote on Dec. 9, with Republican Sens. John Kennedy — who recommended Crain to the White House — and Bill Cassidy voting in favor. Three senators did not vote.
Another Trump nominee, former U.S. Attorney Alexander C. Van Hook, is still awaiting Senate action for a seat on the federal bench covering Louisiana’s Western District, which includes Shreveport, Alexandria, Lafayette, and Monroe.
Van Hook is a graduate of Centenary College and LSU’s law school and has spent much of his legal career practicing in Shreveport, USA Today reported.
“I have total confidence that Alexander will continue to serve his state and our country with great distinction in this new role,” Trump said after nominating Van Hook in October.
Both Crain and Van Hook cleared the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on which Kennedy sits in November.
“Former acting U.S. Attorney Alexander Van Hook and Louisiana Supreme Court Justice William Crain are both intelligent and experienced lawyers, and I have every confidence that President Trump made the right choice in nominating them to be district judges in Louisiana,” Kennedy said.
Crain, 64, is a graduate of LSU Law School who was first elected to the Louisiana Supreme Court in 2019. He had previously served as a judge on the First Circuit Court of Appeal and was a state district court judge before that.
Meanwhile, Senate Republicans pushed through the first procedural hurdleWednesday as they moved to confirm nearly 100 of President Trump’s nominees. The vote sets up a later decision on 97 of Trump’s picks and marks the third time Republicans have advanced a large bloc of nominees since changing Senate confirmation rules in September.
The final confirmation vote on this group is expected next week, Fox News reported.
If Republicans complete the process, they will have confirmed more than 400 of Trump’s nominees during the first year of his second term.
That total would place Trump well ahead of former President Joe Biden, who had 350 nominees confirmed at the same point in his presidency.
The nominees include former Rep. Anthony D’Esposito of New York for inspector general at the Department of Labor and two selections for the National Labor Relations Board, James Murphy and Scott Mayer, as well as others across nearly every federal agency.
Murphy and Mayer were included in the package after Trump fired National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox, a move the Supreme Court upheld earlier this year.
This is Republicans’ second effort to advance the package after Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado objected last week in an attempt to delay the process.
Senate Republicans changed the confirmation rules to break through Democrats’ months-long blockade of Trump’s nominees, limiting the new process to sub Cabinet level positions that can be approved with a simple majority.
One nominee in the original package, Sara Carter, a former Fox News contributor legally named Sara Bailey, was designated a “Level 1” nominee, meaning she would hold a Cabinet level post.
Trump selected Carter in March to be his drug czar as director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy.
Her inclusion meant Republicans would have needed to overcome a 60 vote threshold to advance the entire slate of 88 nominees.
That was unlikely given Democrats’ near unanimity in opposing several of Trump’s picks and their claims that some were not qualified to serve.
Republicans instead chose to assemble a new and larger package, adding nine more nominees to move forward under the revised rules.
On my birthday, my sister smashed the cake straight into my face, laughing as she watched me fall backward, blood mixing with the frosting. Everyone said, “It’s just a joke.” But the next mo
On my birthday, my sister smashed the cake straight into my face, laughing as she watched me fall backward, blood mixing with the frosting. Everyone said, “It’s just a joke.”
But the next morning in the emergency room, the doctor studied my X-ray and immediately called 911—because what he saw… exposed a horrifying truth.
Part One: “It’s Just a Joke”
On my birthday, the room smelled like sugar and candles and cheap champagne. A pink cake sat in the center of the table, my name written across it in looping frosting. Everyone was laughing. Phones were out. Someone shouted for me to make a wish.
My sister stood closest to me.
She grinned, eyes bright with something that wasn’t kindness. Before I could even lean forward, her hands slammed the cake straight into my face.
The impact was harder than anyone expected.
I felt myself stumble backward, my heel catching on the rug. There was a sharp crack as my head hit the edge of the table, then the floor. For a split second, the room spun in white and pink. I tasted sugar—and then iron.
Blood mixed with frosting, dripping down my chin.
People screamed, then laughed nervously.
“Oh my God,” someone said, still chuckling. “It’s just a joke!”
My sister laughed the loudest. “Relax! You’re so dramatic.”
I tried to sit up. Pain exploded behind my eyes. My vision blurred, and the ceiling swayed like it was floating. Someone wiped my face with a napkin, smearing blood across my cheek.
“You’re fine,” my mother said quickly. “Don’t ruin the mood.”
I remember thinking how strange it was that my ears were ringing louder than the music.
I remember the taste of frosting as I swallowed blood.
I remember waking up hours later in my bed, alone, my head throbbing, my phone full of messages telling me not to be “too sensitive.”
By morning, I couldn’t lift my arm.
Part Two: The X-Ray That Changed Everything
The emergency room smelled like disinfectant and sleepless nights. The doctor asked how it happened. I hesitated, then said quietly, “I fell.”
He nodded, unconvinced, and ordered X-rays “just to be safe.”
I lay on the cold table staring at the ceiling, replaying the laughter over and over in my head. It’s just a joke. That sentence hurt almost as much as my skull.
When the doctor returned, he wasn’t smiling.
He stared at the image on the screen for a long time. Too long.
Then he left the room without a word.
Minutes later, he came back—with a nurse, a security officer, and his phone pressed to his ear.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “I need emergency services. Immediately.”
My heart started pounding. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
He turned to me, his voice careful. “This isn’t a simple fall.”
He pointed to the X-ray. Even I could see it—fine fractures branching like cracks in glass, not just in my skull, but along my collarbone and ribs. Old fractures. Healed wrong. Layered.
“These injuries happened at different times,” he said gently. “Some weeks apart. Some months.”
I stared at the screen, my mouth dry.
“I don’t understand,” I whispered.
He met my eyes. “This pattern isn’t accidental. And the impact that brought you in today could have killed you.”
The word killed echoed in my ears.
“Who did this to you?” he asked softly.
I thought of my sister’s grin. My parents’ laughter. All the times I’d been shoved, tripped, “joked” into walls. All the times I’d been told I was clumsy. Sensitive. Overreacting.
My hands began to shake.
“I think…” My voice broke. “I think it was never a joke.”
Part Three: When Laughter Turns Into Sirens
The police arrived quietly. Calmly. Like this wasn’t the first time they’d seen something like me.
They didn’t accuse. They asked questions.
Who was there last night?
Who pushed you?
How often do you get hurt?
For the first time, I didn’t minimize. I didn’t protect anyone. I told the truth.
By evening, my phone was exploding.
My mother crying.
My father furious.
My sister screaming that I had “ruined everything.”
“You’re exaggerating!” she yelled over voicemail. “It was cake! Everyone saw it!”
Everyone had seen it.
That was the horrifying truth.
Everyone had seen it—and laughed.
The investigation didn’t take long. Videos surfaced. Old medical records were reviewed. Witnesses contradicted themselves. Patterns became impossible to ignore.
What started as a “birthday prank” became an assault case.
What they called humor was documented as violence.
I was moved to a different room that night, monitored closely, safe for the first time in years. As I lay there, ice wrapped around my head, I realized something terrifying and freeing all at once:
If that cake hadn’t been smashed into my face…
If I hadn’t fallen just right…
The truth might have stayed buried forever.
Sometimes it takes breaking something visible to expose what’s been shattered for years.
