Even by 2019 standards, this last week has been a doozy; we've had police allege Empire actor Jussie Smollett faked his attack in an attempt to promote his career, a new election called in North Carolina, and another potential government revolt in the UK over Brexit, which has also resulted in the formation of a new political party. Oh, and the Trump administration did something genuinely good in announcing a campaign to fight anti-LGBTQ laws around the world, even if the president doesn't actually seem to know such a thing exists. Oh, and Eminem is upset about the end of The Punisher, because that's a thing, too. What is even happening?

Well, That's One Way to Stop Trump's Wall

What Happened: What does it take to unite the country? Based on the number of states coming together to push back on President Trump's plan for border wall funding, the answer might be "the declaration of a national emergency." Go figure.

What Really Happened: A little over a week ago, just as President Trump was signing a spending bill that would keep the government open, he declared a national emergency to fund his border wall. The Presidential Proclamation on Declaring a National Emergency takes around $3.6 billion in funds earmarked for military construction—as well as $600 million in asset forfeiture funds and around $2.5 billion drawn from Department of Defense funds aimed at drug interdiction—and adds it to the $1.375 billion Congress had included in the actual spending bill to build a wall along the US southern border wall almost all experts agree won't actually work.

During the speech announcing the national emergency, Trump not only admitted he didn't need to do it, but he predicted legal challenges to the declaration itself. Last week, those challenges got underway, with one lawsuit in particular catching a lot of people's attention.

As if the idea of the state of California suing the president wasn't eye-catching enough, it turned out that it wasn't just California, in case the screenshot attached to that tweet didn't make it clear enough. Lots of states were jumping on board this particular bandwagon.

Yes, 16 states are coming together to sue the president over this issue. Aside from the fact that, again, Trump said in his announcement "I don't need to do this," what else could the legal teams use to argue their case that this national emergency is anything but a national emergency?

Admittedly, that's a pretty good case. The president responded as you might expect, where you might expect.

Still, at least the people are on Trump's side. Actually, never mind.

The Takeaway: And the hits keep coming, with a further lawsuit being announced by the county of El Paso, Texas even as of this writing. Remember the days when then-candidate Trump talked about so much winning? Who knew he was thinking about the number of lawsuits headed his way…

Double Standards

What Happened: A white nationalist was arrested and detained before he had the chance to carry out an alleged plan to kill several prominent Democrats and journalists. President Trump, meanwhile, seemed unavailable for comment on the matter.