Think More: Thursday, August 20, 2026
McKinsey's diversity data, the Fauci diary, gender surgery at the Ninth Circuit, California's tire rule, and Mamdani's city groceries.
Lead · The Evidence Behind the Mandate
Congress Wants the Data Behind the Four Reports That Made DEI a Boardroom Standard
Rep. Brandon Gill, who chairs the House task force on institutional abuses, has opened an investigation into McKinsey & Company over four reports, published from 2015 to 2023, that tied corporate diversity to financial performance and were cited by asset managers and banks to justify hiring targets. Gill says outside researchers could not replicate the findings, and McKinsey has never released its data.
The Evidence Behind the Mandate
The Justice Department Urges the Ninth Circuit to Let Insurers Decline Minors’ Transition Surgery
Douglas H. Napier | City Journal
Writing in City Journal, Douglas Napier reads the Justice Department’s 39-page brief for Premera Blue Cross as a turning point. The brief argues that declining elective mastectomies for healthy adolescents turns on diagnosis rather than sex, invoking Skrmetti. Napier, who chairs the 1792 Exchange, counts more than 550 companies still covering the procedures.
The Fauci Files
Legal Experts Map the State-Law Routes Around Fauci’s Federal Pardon
Shawn Fleetwood | The Federalist
Shawn Fleetwood reports that Chad Mizelle of the America First Policy Institute and Hans Mahncke of the Counterlawfare Institute see openings for state prosecutors, whom Biden’s federal pardon does not bind. Both warn that Westfall Act immunity will be the obstacle. Florida, Louisiana, and West Virginia have already subpoenaed Fauci.
Comer Presses Becerra on the Fauci Diary That Never Reached the Subcommittee
House Oversight Committee | oversight.house.gov
Chairman James Comer has given former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra two weeks to explain why Anthony Fauci’s diary and phone never reached the coronavirus subcommittee. The 2023 request covered records mentioning gain-of-function research and Wuhan, terms that run throughout the diary. Becerra’s response never acknowledged it existed.
The Local Leviathan
California Invokes a 2003 Statute to Decide Which Replacement Tires May Be Sold
Don Surber | donsurber.substack.com
The California Energy Commission voted Monday to set the nation’s first efficiency standards for replacement tires, invoking a 2003 statute. It projects $1 billion a year in fuel savings, at $1.50 per tire rising to $6.50 in 2033. Don Surber notes the estimate is the commission’s own. Seventy percent of tires sold fail the standard.
City Hall Weighs Grants to the Bodegas Its Own Grocery Stores Will Undercut
Thomas Stevenson | The Post Millennial
Waverly Neer, who runs Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s city grocery program, told reporters the administration is weighing grants and incentives for the independent stores its five municipal outlets will compete against. The first, in an East Harlem lot, carries a reported $30 million price tag. Mamdani promises staples at 30% below retail.
Sean Davis Traces the Sanctuary Movement From a Berkeley Resolution to a National Regime
In Hillsdale’s Imprimis, Federalist chief executive Sean Davis traces sanctuary policy from a 1971 Berkeley resolution sheltering draft dodgers to a regime spanning 12 states. His case rests on Kate Steinle, shot dead on a San Francisco pier in 2015 by a repeatedly deported illegal immigrant the city had released.
The sanctuary map: Justice Department, Center for Immigration Studies, and CBP counts cited in Imprimis
12 + D.C.
States DOJ counts as sanctuaries
200+
Sanctuary cities and counties
8 million+
Border encounters under Biden
The Long Cold War
Why Thirty-Two Cubans Died a Thousand Miles From Home Defending Nicolás Maduro
Melissa Ford Maldonado | The American Mind
Melissa Ford Maldonado opens with the 32 Cubans killed when American forces took Caracas in January to capture Nicolás Maduro, then argues Havana has survived since 1959 by making itself indispensable to stronger patrons. Russia has forgiven billions in Cuban debt; Russia and Iran have supplied more than 300 attack drones.
Buckley’s First Book Turns 75, and Yale Files It Among Complaints
Bill Meehan | Philanthropy Daily
Bill Meehan revisits God and Man at Yale on its 75th anniversary, dwelling on the 32-page introduction Buckley wrote for the 1977 second edition, in which he answered his critics. Yale’s new Committee on Trust in Higher Education cites the book, filing it among complaints. Seniors called the resulting mission revision directionless.
