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Democrat Lawmaker: Joe Biden Took Part in Hunter’s Calls

By Charlie McCarthy | Monday, 31 July 2023 02:35 PM EDT

Rep. Daniel Goldman, D-N.Y., who served as lead majority counsel in the first impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump, says President Joe Biden took part in phone calls involving Hunter Biden and foreign business partners. Goldman spoke after whistleblower Devon Archer’s appearance Monday before the House Oversight Committee in a closed-door session. Archer is Hunter Biden’s former business partner.

“Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman says Hunter Biden did, in fact, frequently put his dad on speakerphone for his business partners — but they were only talking about the weather,” RNC Research posted on X.

“Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman says Joe Biden spoke with Hunter’s business partners, but they spoke about stuff like the weather not business deals,” The Post Millennial posted on X.

Goldman conceded that Archer had testified that Joe Biden was placed on phone calls with Hunter Biden’s associates perhaps twice a year over the 10 years that Archer was associated with the first son. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., a member of the House panel, took to social media after Archer’s early testimony.

“Devon Archer, Hunter Biden’s former best friend and business associate, asked Hunter why appointees from the Obama/Biden Admin arrested him,” Greene posted on X.

“Hunter explained, ‘It’s democracy … every presidents family is held to a higher standard … it’s the price of being the most powerful group of people in the world … the unfairness to us allows for the greater good.'”

“Hunter continued, ‘Every great family is persecuted prosecuted in the us — you are part of a great family — not a side show not deserted by them even in your darkest moments. Thats the way Bidens are different and you are a Biden. Its the price of power. and the people questioning you truly have none whereas you do through perseverance and poise.’

“Archer’s arrest was just par for the course for Hunter,” Greene posted. “Hunter didn’t just peddle his family’s influence to secure business deals that would otherwise be unattainable, he knew he and his associates would largely be shielded from the scales of justice because of his last name: Biden.”

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House Spending Bills Have Welcome Cuts but Still Leave Billions in Potential Savings on the Table

By: David Ditch / @davidaditch / July 31, 2023

House Freedom Caucus Members Speak To The Press outside US Capitol — The U.S. House has 12 spending bills to fund the government for the upcoming fiscal year. With the national debt at $32 trillion, interest rates at a 22-year high, and ongoing inflation, Congress must pass some serious cuts. Pictured: Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont., speaks at a House Freedom Caucus-held the news conference with other members of the caucus outside the U.S. Capitol Building on July 25, 2023. (Photo: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

The U.S. House of Representatives left Washington July 27 for its lengthy summer recess having only passed 1 of 12 spending bills required to fund the government for the upcoming fiscal year beginning Oct. 1. While all 12 bills have welcome reductions, they lack the more substantial cuts necessary to trim the deficit and stop the rampant inflation being caused by excessive government spending.

While funding for the Veterans Administration passed on party lines, House leadership canceled an expected vote on funding for the Department of Agriculture due to a lack of consensus within the GOP caucus. This same dynamic affects the other 10 spending bills as well. The debate over spending levels will likely be the central legislative battleground for the next few months, and it’s vital for Americans to understand what’s at stake.

There has been an ongoing back-and-forth between House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and conservatives in the House Freedom Caucus over where to set spending levels for fiscal year 2024. The Freedom Caucus has pushed for a reduction to 2022 levels, which Republicans agreed to in passing the Limit, Save, Grow Act this spring. Unfortunately, the flawed bipartisan debt limit deal supplanted Limit, Save, Grow, and in the process, set up tens of billions of dollars in budget gimmicks. This meant that not only would there not be the type of spending cuts needed to help fight inflationary deficit spending, but there could very well be a spending increase when all is said and done.

The House Appropriations Committee has now produced initial versions of all 12 of the annual spending bills. In response, members of the Freedom Caucus have demanded lower spending levels through a combination of dumping fraudulent gimmicks and imposing stronger spending cuts on the swampy federal bureaucracy. There’s no agreement yet between House leadership and the conservatives, meaning it’s unclear what will happen in the fall when Congress resumes work on the spending bills.

The spending bills as they currently stand provide plenty of details to inform congressional negotiators and the public about the worthwhile spending reductions already in the bills and the vital opportunities for further cuts that remain on the table.

Praiseworthy spending reductions in the House bills include:

A 15% cut to the Department of Education, which is irredeemably captured by the Left.
A 12% cut to housing programs, which are an often-overlooked part of the welfare state.
An over 40% cut to Environmental Protection Agency grants to states, many of which are done in service to the Green New Deal.
An over 30% reduction for U.S. Agency for International Development “development assistance,” recognizing that handouts from the U.S. to poor countries are neither effective nor affordable.
Eliminating wasteful spending by entirely defunding programs such as the Endowments for the Arts and Humanities, the duplicative Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and the long-failed Job Corps.

However, there are many areas where the Appropriations Committee either increased funding or gave minor haircuts rather than doing the cutting that’s necessary for the sake of responsible budgeting. Examples include:

Cutting less than 10% of the National Institutes of Health budget, which has been badly discredited as the public learns more about the corruption surrounding Dr. Anthony Fauci and handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the agency’s funding has exploded in recent decades, and it has suffered from a variety of dysfunctions even before the pandemic.
Retaining the vast majority of funding for the Community Development Fund, a slush fund that Congress uses to dole out pork spending.
Increasing spending on the National Science Foundation, which is part of the Big Science/Big Education complex that helps fund the infrastructure of the Left.
Placing tens of billions into the Disaster Relief Fund. While there is understandable sympathy for people suffering from disasters such as hurricanes, a handful of states receive the vast majority of disaster funds. This means adding to the federal debt to give handouts to these states at a time when Uncle Sam is going broke and states are passing tax cuts.
Retaining almost all Department of Energy spending on “efficiency and renewable energy” and the Office of Science. The Department of Energy provides a handful of worthwhile services but spends far too much in support of the Left’s environmental agenda.
Failing to account for faster-than-inflation spending hikes that dozens of nondefense bureaus and programs have received since the end of the Obama administration.

All told, there are tens of billions of dollars in potential savings still on the table.

A complicating factor in spending discussions is that the House Appropriations Committee is touting cuts to things passed by Democrats in recent years, such as the hiring spree for the IRS, in an attempt to “balance” the lack of meaningful reduction to overall spending levels. On one hand, such cuts would be an excellent idea in isolation. On the other hand, the committee is using this approach to shield much of the federal bureaucracy from the sort of dramatic cuts that would actually drain the swamp.

The bottom line: With the national debt at $32.6 trillion, the Federal Reserve raising interest rates to a 22-year high as inflation remains above pre-pandemic levels, and the Biden administration pushing a radical agenda thanks in part to the excessive size and scope of the government, it’s long past time for Congress to pass serious deficit reduction and combat federal bloat.

While the House Appropriations Committee has done some good work, conservatives are right to push for more.

COMMENTARY BY David Ditch @davidaditch

David Ditch is a policy analyst specializing in budget and transportation policy in the Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget at The Heritage Foundation.

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Today’s THREE Politically INCORRECT Cartoons by A.F. Branco

A.F. Branco Cartoon – Light Em’ Up

A.F. BRANCO | on July 29, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-catoon-light-em-up/

Jason Aldean makes the left’s woke mind explode with his hit that goes number one, “Small Town”.

Try That in A Small Town — Cartoon by A.F. Branco ©2023.

A.F. Branco Cartoon – Schooling Schools

A.F. BRANCO | on July 30, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-cartoon-schooling-schools/

Minnesota parents outraged at school board meetings about porn in school libraries.

Get Porn Out Of Schools — Cartoon by A.F. Branco ©2023.

A.F. Branco Cartoon – Dress Code

A.F. BRANCO | on July 31, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-cartoon-dress-code/

The U.S. woke Military is becoming all that our enemies could hope for, weak and stupid.

DONATE to A.F.Branco Cartoons – Tips accepted and appreciated – $1.00 – $5.00 – $25.00 – $50.00 – $100 – it all helps to fund this website and keep the cartoons coming. Also Venmo @AFBranco – THANK YOU!

A.F. Branco has taken his two greatest passions, (art and politics) and translated them into cartoons that have been popular all over the country, in various news outlets including NewsMax, Fox News, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and “The Washington Post.” He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh D’Souza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and President Trump.

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SUMMING UP THE WEEK OF JULY 29, 2023

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Democratic Leaders Tell Biden NYC at ‘Breaking Point’ After Receiving More Than 90,000 Illegal Aliens

By: Virginia Allen / @Virginia_Allen5 / July 28, 2023

Illegal Aliens sleep on the streets of New York City. — New York City is “at a breaking point” after more than 90,000 illegal aliens have arrived in the city since last spring, according to city leadership. Pictured: Venezuelan migrants sleep on the streets of New York City, Jan. 30. (Photo: Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty Images)

New York City is “at a breaking point” after more than 90,000 illegal aliens have arrived in the city since last spring, according to city leadership. A group of 54 NYC Democratic elected officials, including state senators and assembly members, sent a letter to President Joe Biden Wednesday asking him for “help.”

“Our City is experiencing an unprecedented migrant influx, with a surge of asylum seekers arriving here in numbers never seen before in history,” the letter reads.

“We take pride in New York being a beacon of hope for immigrants, but the influx of migrants is so great that the city is running out of resources,” the Democrats told Biden. “New York City is being forced to reduce services to its people.”

You make a big deal in the media about being a “Sanctuary City” and now that they’ve been taken up on that on that claim, they’re screaming, “no fair”. Maybe the other so-called sanctuary cities will follow suit.

BREAKING: 54 Elected Officials in NYC have signed my letter calling on President Biden to address the migrant influx. We are calling on @POTUS to declare a state of emergency, expedite work permits, and lead an urgent response at the southern border. pic.twitter.com/VFf4A89y5w
— Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar (@JeniferRajkumar) July 26, 2023

The New York City officials ask Biden to declare a federal state of emergency in response to the influx of migrants, expedite work authorization for migrants, “distribute migrants fairly” across the country, and provide the city with more federal funding to “manage the tens of thousands of asylum seekers we are hosting.”

The state officials told the president they “take pride in welcoming immigrants” but added that “the current unstructured state of immigration policy and response needs to end.”

New York City Mayor Eric Adams met with Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas Thursday to discuss the city’s immigrant crisis. The New York Post reports the meeting resulted in an agreement from Mayorkas to provide NYC with a liaison to “strengthen ‘communication’ between City Hall and the Biden administration.”

NOW THAT OUGHT TO CUT DOWN ON THE PROBLEMS OF HOUSING, FEEDING, AND CARING FOR THESE PEOPLE WHO BIDEN LET INTO AMERICA ILLEGALLY. BETTER COMMUNICATION. That should do the job.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries were present for the meeting, which is reported to have lasted about an hour.

After the meeting, Adams said he appreciated “Secretary Mayorkas’ commitment to visiting the city and designating someone at DHS to serve as a point-person on our asylum seeker needs. We look forward to his visit and learning more about DHS’ plans for how this role will operate.”

According to Adams, NYC continues to “do more than any other city in the nation, but we need additional support from our federal and state partners.”

Adams’ meeting with Mayorkas comes about a week after the mayor announced that NYC will begin distributing flyers at the U.S. southern border asking illegal aliens to “consider another city” besides the Big Apple.

The bright yellow flyers, which are also written in Spanish, tell illegal aliens “Housing in NYC is very expensive,” and “There is no guarantee we will be able to provide shelter and services to new arrivals.”

In an effort to create shelter space for families with children, Adams announced last week that the city will give “60 days’ notice to adult asylum seekers already in our care to find alternative housing.”

The Center for Immigration Studies released a report in April claiming that the Biden administration has released 2,020,522 illegal aliens into the U.S. The report added that an additional “1.3 million known got-aways” have entered the U.S. interior during the Biden presidency.

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Today’s Politically INCORRCT Cartoon by A.F. Branco

A.F. Branco Cartoon – Ignorance Is Bliss

A.F. BRANCO | on July 28, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-cartoon-ignorance-is-bliss-2/

Hard-core Biden fans are willing to ignore the obvious pay-to-play bribing scandals to continue supporting him.

Bitter Biden Clinger — Cartoon by A.F. Branco ©2023.

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Benevolent Tyranny: US Senator Announces New Epidemic, Nanny State Solution

By Norman Leahy | July 26, 2023

Portrait of stress young woman covering her face with hands and crying.

The federal government has a long, expensive habit of trying to be our national nanny. From dictates on how much water flows through our showers, toilets and dishwashers, to how much meat we should eat and steps we should take, there are few areas of life where government doesn’t butt-in to make matters worse for everyone.

Which brings us to Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy‘s proposal to do something about the “loneliness epidemic.”

Yes, the government believes loneliness is a public health crisis in need of attention. But at least the Surgeon General’s office doesn’t call for legislation and spending to addressing the problem. Instead, it suggests a series of cost-free (to taxpayers) options for individuals:

Make time to share a meal. Listen without the distraction of your phone. Perform an act of service. Express yourself authentically.

Setting aside what, exactly, that last item means, Sen. Murphy is determined to side steps the warm fuzzies, and make this a government matter:

The National Strategy for Social Connection Act would create an Office of Social Connection Policy within the White House to work across federal agencies to develop effective strategies for improved social infrastructure and issue national guidelines for social connection similar to existing guidelines on sleep, nutrition, and physical activity. It would also provide funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to better understand the epidemic of social isolation and loneliness.

Considering government’s track record for making sure we all eat, sleep and exercise right, the only possible outcome of a loneliness czar will be…a loneliness plague.

Underlying Murphy’s thesis for state action, however, is a disturbing embrace of collectivism over individual achievement. As Murphy and Harvard’s Richard Weissbourd wrote in Time Magazine, the big bad behind the loneliness epidemic is…too much individualism:

Much has been written about why we tipped toward ourselves over the last several decades. The villains in this story include declines in religious participation and social outings and clubs, fueled in part by television, which keeps us at home. Workplaces also became more focused on profit than on employee well-being and solidarity, and we started lionizing those who stepped over others to get ahead. While those people always existed in society, they were usually identified and treated as outliers that needed to be constrained, not as examples of American greatness.

“Outliers that needed to be constrained…” Sorry, Og: this so-called “wheel” you’ve invented is just too dangerous to the health and well-being of our cozy cave dwelling community. Into the pit with you…

And as for what government power can do to reknit the fabric of American life, Murphy and Weissbourd wrote that the state should, once it’s finished roughing-up the social media companies, dragoon the young into service:

Expand..national service programs…bringing young people together from various backgrounds to work on common causes, creating ties across the usual divides and strengthening young people’s commitment to their country.

In other words, bring back a version of the old military draft. Because noting says “togetherness” like sacrificing your time and talent to government. On pain of fines and imprisonment for not cheerfully agreeing to do so.

I would suggest Murphy and his fellow nannies stick to their knitting: addressing the federal budget, finding ways to deal with the debt and deficit, and keeping a close eye on world events. And leave the rest of us alone to sort out friendship, family and community on our own terms.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Norman Leahy

Norman Leahy has written about national and Virginia politics for more than 30 years with outlets ranging from The Washington Post to BearingDrift.com. A consulting writer, editor, recovering think tank executive and campaign operative, Norman lives in Virginia.

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Rad more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/07/27/hunter-bidens-plea-deal-wasnt-supposed-to-protect-him-it-was-supposed-to-protect-joe/

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Kentucky nurses ‘required’ to complete ‘implicit bias’ class on ‘history of racism in healthcare’ or they may not be able to renew license: Report

By: CANDACE HATHAWAY | July 27, 2023

Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Nurses in Kentucky were “required” to complete a “mandatory” “implicit bias” class on the “history of racism in healthcare” or risk facing possible loss of license, the Washington Examiner recently reported.

According to the outlet, the Kentucky Board of Nursing, a government agency, threatened to “discipline” health care workers who failed to complete the “mandatory continuing education” training course by July 1.

The class, created by the Kentucky Nurses Association, was presented by KNA Board of Directors Treasurer Arica Brandford and KNA CEO Delanor Manson. In a comment to the Washington Examiner, Manson stated, “Perhaps it would be of value to research the effects of implicit bias in healthcare and the definition of implicit bias.”

“I recommend you take [an] implicit bias class as required by the KBN and then ask questions,” she added. “All of your efforts could be enlightening.”

Nurses were told that “best intentions will not solve implicit bias in healthcare” and “in order to lead to meaningful change,” they must explore “much larger conversations on racism and bias,” the presentation stated.

The outlet reported that one of the presentation’s slides included a picture of Ku Klux Klan members burning a cross. Nurses were shown a diagram of “overt racism” and “covert racism.”

“Overt racism” included examples such as lynching, swastikas, and “public harassment of [persons of color] speaking other than English.” The presentation provided a long list of examples of “covert racism,” including “white silence,” “denying institutional racism,” denying white privilege, “claiming ‘reverse racism,'” and ‘excusing/’white-splaining’ racism.”

The outlet reported that medical professionals were told that racism could lead to many health risks, such as hypertension, low birth weight and prematurity, heart disease, diabetes, increased body mass index, depression, anxiety, and stress.

Laura Morgan, the program manager for the medical advocacy group Do No Harm and former nurse, told the Washington Examiner, “In states that require continuing education hours to maintain licensure, the nurse who fails to do so will not have his or her license renewed.”

“Kentucky is no exception to this. The words ‘mandatory’ and ‘required’ are very well defined,” Morgan added.

The KBN told the Washington Examiner that nurses would not have their licenses revoked if they failed to complete the class. However, it also noted that “failure to do it could result in a civil sanction or discipline.” The license renewal period coincided with the training course, which by Kentucky law, was “a prerequisite for license renewal.”

“No licensee will be denied licensure for failing to meet mandatory CE requirements. Most failures to meet CE requirements result in a non-disciplinary settlement. However, failing to obtain CEs may result in a written reprimand,” KBN told the outlet. The agency refused to explain further what the reprimand could entail.

This does NOT sound like training. It sounds more like INDOCRINATION.

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Christian Coach Fired for Stating Views on Obvious Sex Differences

BY: KIYAN KASSAM | JULY 27, 2023

Snowboarder walking up a snowy hill holding snowboard behind his back.

KIYAN KASSAM

A former high school snowboarding coach filed a federal lawsuit last week alleging his First Amendment rights were violated when he was fired for expressing his views on transgender-identifying athletes. The 31-page complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Vermont by Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) — a faith-based legal advocacy group — on behalf of David Bloch, along with a motion for preliminary injunction seeking Bloch’s immediate reinstatement.

“On February 8, 2023, Coach Bloch and his team were waiting in the lodge for a competition to start. That day, his team was to compete against a team that had a male snowboarder who identifies as a female and competes against females,” the lawsuit states. While in the lodge, Bloch says he overheard a conversation between two of his student-athletes and briefly joined in.

Bloch “affirmed that as a matter of biology, males and females have different DNA, which causes males to develop differently from females and have different physical characteristics.” He added that “biological differences generally give males competitive advantages in athletic events” — something you must pretend is deeply controversial, despite the fact that a large majority of Americans agree.

According to a new Gallup survey released in June, nearly 70 percent of U.S. adults believe transgender-identifying athletes “should only be allowed to compete on sports teams that conform with their birth gender” as opposed to their “current gender identity.” Meanwhile, a Pew Research Center study from last year found that 6 in 10 Americans “say a person’s gender is determined by their sex assigned at birth.”

“The conversation was respectful among all parties and lasted no more than three minutes. It took place entirely outside the presence of the transgender-identifying snowboarder,” the lawsuit states. “Coach Bloch’s team and the team with the male who identifies as a female competed without incident. After the competition, the two teams and their coaches, including Coach Bloch, shared a bus home.”

But it didn’t matter. Bloch had committed wrong-think.

The coach was allegedly handed a notice of termination the very next day by Windsor Central Supervisory Union Superintendent Sherry Sousa. He was accused of violating the school district’s harassment, hazing, and bullying (HHB) policy as well as a related policy of the Vermont Principals’ Association (VPA), which oversees high school sports in the state. Bloch was also “barred from future employment” with the district.

“No one should lose their job for speaking the truth. The First Amendment protects the rights of all Americans to peacefully share their beliefs without fear of government punishment. This means that government officials cannot terminate an employee simply because he expresses a belief that they do not like,” ADF said in a statement.

Specifically, the lawsuit argues that the HBB and VPA policies, as well as a Vermont statute requiring school boards to adopt such policies, “contain content and viewpoint discriminatory, overbroad, and unconstitutionally vague definitions of harassment that … censor protected speech.”

The complaint notes that Bloch is “a practicing Roman Catholic who believes that God creates males and females with immutable sex. His understanding of science complements his religious beliefs. Coach Bloch believes, based on scientific evidence, that there are only two sexes, which are male and female, and that sex is determined by a person’s chromosomes.”

Views like these terrify elites and the corporate press. In a May article, The Washington Post bemoaned that “Most Americans don’t believe it’s even possible to be a gender that differs from that assigned at birth” and worried that (God forbid) some in the country “have become more conservative on these questions.”

It’s worth highlighting the irony that those requiring you to deny the reality of sex today are often the very same people who spent the past three years demanding you “follow the science!”

Suffice to say, these are not good-faith actors; they’re liars and propagandists interested only in advancing a political agenda. Regard them as such.

Kiyan Kassam is a conservative writer. Follow him on Twitter at @kiyankassam.

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Education, LGBTQ+ AND TRANSGENDER, Political, Sports

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Hunter Biden’s Plea Deal Wasn’t Supposed to Protect Him, It Was Supposed to Protect Joe

BY: JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON | JULY 27, 2023

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JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON

VISIT ON TWITTER@JOHNDDAVIDSON

The twists and turns of Hunter Biden’s sweetheart plea deal have been hard to follow, but it’s been clear from the outset that, like his business ventures in Ukraine, the deal was thoroughly corrupt. It’s now clear that the agreement was never meant primarily to shield Hunter from future prosecution, but to protect President Joe Biden.

In a Delaware federal court on Wednesday, Hunter’s lawyers ended up rejecting a plea deal once it became clear the deal would not confer broad immunity on the president’s son. Although the language of the plea deal has not been released, it was supposed to have Hunter plead guilty to two misdemeanor counts of willful failure to pay federal income tax, as well as enter a pretrial diversion agreement for illegal possession of a firearm. The deal fell apart, however, once the federal judge overseeing the case, Maryellen Noreika, started asking questions. Here’s how The New York Times reported it:

The hearing appeared to be going smoothly before Judge Noreika questioned whether the agreement meant that Mr. Biden would be immune from prosecution for other possible crimes — including violations related to representing foreign governments — in perpetuity. When a top prosecutor in the case said it would not, Chris Clark, Mr. Biden’s lead lawyer, initially hesitated and then said the government’s position would make the agreement “null and void.”

After a recess during which the lawyers for both sides scrambled to hash out an agreement, Judge Noreika, who earlier had said she felt she was being asked to “rubber stamp” the agreement, said she could not accept the plea deal. Hunter Biden then pled not guilty to the tax charges and the hearing was over.

What to make of this? The most obvious explanation is that Hunter’s lawyers know what most Americans know: He was involved in complex foreign bribery schemes that implicate his father, President Biden. They were hoping to strike a plea agreement with the Justice Department that would protect him from future prosecution related to corrupt foreign business deals in Ukraine and China that involved trading on his family name, but once it became clear that the judge was not going to sign off on such an agreement, they backed out of the deal.

Why would they want such a deal in the first place? Maybe because they know the Republicans in Congress continue to amass evidence that Joe Biden and his son took millions in bribe money from Ukrainian oligarchs for protection against prosecution. Hunter’s plea deal, in other words, wasn’t meant to shield Hunter from future prosecution, it was meant to protect Joe. A plea agreement granting Hunter broad immunity would make it harder to dig into his murky overseas business deals — deals which increasingly appear to have involved his father.

As we have detailed here in recent days, the Biden bribery scheme in Ukraine is shaping up to be the great political scandal in American history. If it’s true, it would mean the end of Biden’s presidency, either by impeachment and conviction or by abandonment by the Democrat Party establishment ahead of the 2024 election.

Consider what’s come out just recently. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, last week released an unclassified FBI document detailing reports from a “highly credible” informant who says the founder and CEO of Burisma, Mykola Zlochevsky, bragged about paying the Bidens $10 million to make the oil and gas company’s legal problems disappear. Specifically, Zlochevsky wanted Ukrainian authorities to fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin, who was investigating Burisma.

And of course, that’s just what happened — after then-Vice President Joe Biden, by his own admission, threatened to withhold aid to Ukraine unless Shokin was fired.

This same informant says top Burisma executives admitted that the only reason they hired Hunter to sit on their board (for a jaw-dropping $83,000 a month) was “to protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems.”

The FBI, for its part, tried to hide this document from IRS investigators and Congress, and the corporate media have done their best to ignore the story altogether. But ignoring it won’t make it go away. Indeed, the story keeps growing. As Margot Cleveland reported in these pages earlier this week, the Pittsburgh FBI office told the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office it had corroborated multiple aspects of the informant’s claims, including travel records confirming the informant had indeed traveled to the locales detailed in the document during the relevant time period.

We also know the FBI and Justice Department not only prevented a pair of IRS whistleblowers from learning of the document but also kept hidden portions of the materials found on Hunter’s laptop. That’s no small thing. One of those whistleblowers suggested the FBI informant’s claims could corroborate other evidence the IRS special agents had gathered during their investigation.

As this story develops, it’s becoming obvious that the point of the FBI and DOJ’s obstruction is to protect the president and suppress further evidence of the Biden bribery scheme. That’s why a special counsel won’t cut it. The deep state isn’t going to get to the bottom of this, and the corporate press is going to keep aggressively ignoring it. If the federal courtroom circus on Wednesday demonstrated anything, it’s that we’re going to need an impeachment inquiry to find out the truth about President Biden’s corruption.

John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.

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Ted Cruz: Trump Indictment Is Election Tampering for 2024

By Sandy Fitzgerald | Thursday, 27 July 2023 08:59 AM EDT

Democrats “hate democracy” and are “deathly afraid” that voters will elect former President Donald Trump to return to the White House, so they are pushing for him to be indicted on various charges to keep that from happening, Sen. Ted Cruz tells Newsmax.

“They are trying to use the machinery of law enforcement to prosecute him,” the Texas Republican said on Newsmax’s “Eric Bolling The Balance” on Wednesday night. “I think these indictments are a disgrace.”

Trump last week said he got a letter from special counsel Jack Smith to inform him that he is the target of the federal investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021 events at the Capitol. The letter comes after Trump was charged and pleaded not guilty in June to a 37-count federal indictment in connection with his handling of presidential documents. Trump also pleaded not guilty in April to a 34-count indictment filed in New York through Democrat Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

The former president, now a front-runner in the campaign for the GOP’s 2024 presidential nomination, is also under investigation in Georgia concerning allegations that he tried to overturn the state’s results in the 2020 presidential election.

Cruz told Bolling that he not only believes indicting Trump in connection with the Jan. 6 protests would be an “abuse of power,” but he thinks “each of the Trump indictments we’ve seen so far are abuses of power.”

“They are politicizing the Justice Department,” the senator said. “This Department of Justice, this attorney general, this FBI is the most politicized and weaponized we’ve ever seen.”

Further, Cruz called for Attorney Merrick Garland’s impeachment and removal from office “for allowing the Department of Justice to be turned into a partisan hammer to attack the political enemies of the White House.”

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White House Says There Is No Possibility Biden Would Pardon His Son

NEWSMAX : Thursday, 27 July 2023 03:00 PM EDT

The White House said on Thursday there was no possibility President Joe Biden would pardon his son Hunter, who is facing charges of failing to pay taxes on more than $1.5 million in income in 2017 and 2018.

Asked whether Biden might issue such a pardon, White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told a briefing, “No.”

The younger Biden was supposed to plead guilty Wednesday to misdemeanor charges for failing to pay taxes. But U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika in Delaware put the brakes on the guilty plea after raising concerns during an hours long hearing about the structure and terms of the agreement and another deal that allow him to avoid prosecution on a gun charge if he meets certain conditions.

Plea deals are carefully negotiated between defense lawyers and prosecutors over the course of weeks or months and it’s unusual — especially in high-profile cases — for judges to not sign off on them. But Wednesday’s hearing revealed that the two sides apparently did not see eye to eye on the scope of the agreement around a non-prosecution clause for crimes outside of the gun charge.

Here’s a look at what happens now in the criminal case and what’s next for the Biden investigations in Congress:

Noreika — an appointee of former President Donald Trump — told both sides to file written briefs addressing her concerns within 30 days. Among other things, Noreika took issue with a provision in the agreement on the gun charge that she said would have created a role for her where she would determine if he violated the terms. The lawyers said they wanted her to serve as a neutral fact finder in determining if a violation happened, but Noreika said that is the Justice Department’s job — not the judge’s.

Hunter Biden’s lawyers and the Justice Department also disagreed on the extent to which the agreement gave him immunity from future prosecution. A prosecutor said Wednesday their investigation was ongoing, and that the agreement protecting him from other potential charges was limited only to certain offenses over a certain time frame. Hunter Biden’s lawyers said it was broader than that. After intense courtroom negotiations, the two sides appeared to agree to a more narrow non-prosecution clause.

Biden’s lawyers and prosecutors will now continue negotiations to see if they can salvage the agreement in a way that satisfies the judge.

“They are going to have to go back and figure out how they can come to an agreement terms of the plea and they have to come to a meeting of the minds, which is clear they don’t have here,” said Jessica Tillipman, associate dean for government procurement law studies at George Washington University Law School. “So I think what you’ll see is a renewed effort — or it’s just going to collapse.”

The judge may ultimately accept the deal that was proposed or reject it. If the deal totally falls apart, Hunter Biden could eventually face a trial.

Even if the judge ultimately accepts the plea agreement, she will have the final say on whether he serves any time behind bars. Prosecutors have said that they will recommend probation, but the judge can decide not to follow that. The two tax charges carry up to a year in prison. And the judge suggested on Wednesday that it was too soon to say whether she’s willing to sign off on probation.

“I can’t predict for you today whether that is an appropriate sentence or not,” Noreika said. “I can’t say that I will accept the sentence recommendation or whether a different sentence would be more appropriate.”

The collapse of the younger Biden’s plea deal Wednesday came as joyful news to House Republicans vying to connect him and his questionable business dealings to his father. Republicans had already slammed the agreement as a “sweetheart deal.”

“The judge did the obvious thing, they put a pause on the plea deal, so I think that was progress,” Rep. James Comer, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said Wednesday. “I think it adds credibility to what we’re doing.” He added that this will only propel their investigation to get answers “as to what the family did, and what level of involvement the president had.”

Comer has been investigating Hunter Biden’s financial ties and transactions since gaining the gavel in January. The Kentucky lawmaker has obtained thousands of pages of financial records from various members of the Biden family through subpoenas to the Treasury Department and various financial institutions.

Last month, shortly after Hunter Biden reached an agreement with the government, Comer joined forces with two chairmen of powerful committees to launch a larger investigation into claims by two IRS agents who claimed the Justice Department improperly interfered in the yearslong case.

IRS supervisory special agent Greg Shapley and a second agent, Joe Ziegler, testified before Congress last week that there was a pattern of “slow-walking investigative steps” into Hunter Biden, including during the Trump administration in the months before the 2020 election that Biden won.

One of the most detailed claims was that U.S. Attorney David Weiss in Delaware, the federal prosecutor who led the investigation, asked for special counsel status in order to bring the tax cases against Hunter Biden in jurisdictions outside Delaware, including the District of Columbia and California, but was denied.

Weiss and the Justice Department have denied that, saying he had “full authority” and never sought to bring charges in other states. Despite the denials, Republicans are moving forward with their probes, asking Weiss to come in and testify about the case directly. The Justice Department has offered to have the prosecutor come before lawmakers after the August recess.

The Associated Presss contributed to this story.

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Sexual Assault Survivor Describes Trauma of Sharing Locker Room With Lia Thomas

Daily Signal Staff / July 27, 2023

COMMENTARY BY Daily Signal Staff

Paula Scanlan, who swam on the University of Pennsylvania’s women swimming team with transgender athlete Lia Thomas, testified before a House subcommittee Thursday about her experience. Watch the video above or read a lightly edited transcript of her remarks below:

Good morning, Chairman Johnson and Ranking Member Scanlon and members of the subcommittee. I am Paula Scanlan, a spokeswoman and advisor for the Independent Women’s Forum, and a former NCAA athlete. I am here today to share my personal story. I started swimming at a very young age, and by age eight I was swimming competitively, and by late middle school I was devoting at least 20 hours per week to swimming.

I gave up countless Christmas holidays, weekends, and social events to work towards my goal of swimming Division I. A dream that came true when I began swimming for the University of Pennsylvania. While I am not an NCAA champion, I hold the New England Independent School League record in the 400 yard freestyle relay, a record that has stood since March of 2017.

In September of 2021, Lia Thomas began participating as a member of the Penn women’s team. Lia, formerly Will, had personal best times in every freestyle event that were faster than the women’s world records. Once the season began, Thomas was leading the country in multiple events, while only placing in the top 500 in those events on the men’s team.

Thomas later became an NCAA champion in the 500 yard freestyle. The first NCAA champion in our women’s team history program. While many of you already know this, what you do not know is the experiences of the women on the University of Pennsylvania swim team. My teammates and I were forced to undress in the presence of Lia, a 6’4 tall biological male, fully intact with male genitalia, eighteen times per week.

Some girls opted to change in bathroom stalls and others used the family bathroom to avoid this. When we tried to voice our concerns to the Athletic Department, we were told that Lia’s swimming and being in our locker room was a nonnegotiable and we were offered psychological services to attempt to reeducate us to become comfortable with the idea of undressing in front of a male.

To sum up the university’s response, we, the women, were the problem, not the victims. We were expected to conform, to move over, and shut up. Our feelings didn’t matter. The university was gaslighting and fearmongering women to validate the feelings and identity of a male. As an attempt to voice my concern about the situation we were forced into, revealing the unjust and unfair treatment, I wrote an op-ed for the Daily Pennsylvanian, the student run newspaper.

I approached this from a scientific— scientific, statistical perspective where I use my engineering background to discuss how Y chromosomes cannot be changed by any surgical procedure or systemic therapy. This biological fact lends itself to athletic advantages that cannot be mitigated by lowering testosterone levels, which are readily apparent in sports competitions and locker rooms.

The Daily Pennsylvanian published my article on the evening of February 10th, 2022. Only a few hours later, my piece was retracted. I was given no notice nor reasoning. Again, I was silenced for my dissenting viewpoint and felt my First Amendment rights were denied by my university. This is representative of a greater issue, the destruction of free speech.

Today, any discussion maintaining the sanctity of women’s faces is labeled transphobic, bigoted, and hateful. What’s bigoted and hateful is the discrimination against women and the efforts to erase women and our equal opportunities, dignity, and safe spaces. One might ask, why do I speak so passionately about issues that seem hypothetical?

Or some may perceive as only impacting a small number of women? This is not hypothetical. This is real. I know women who have lost roster spots and spots on the podium. I know of women with sexual trauma who are adversely impacted by having biological males in their locker room without their consent. I know this because I am one of these women.

I was sexually assaulted on June 3rd of 2016. I was only 16 years old. I was able to forgive my attacker, but violence against women still exists. Let us not forget the viral Me Too movement that empowered female victims to speak up. It casts a spotlight on the widespread prevalence of sexual assault and abuse, including in scholarly and educational institutions.

Individuals on this committee have previously stated, violence against women is all too common. I am grateful for those members who have brought awareness to the violence against women in the past, but unfortunately, there’s still much to be done. As a sexual assault survivor, many policies pushed today completely ignore my experiences, and many women like me.

I ask the members of this committee, please consider this issue outside the lens of political affiliations, and understand the true impact of ignoring the realities of womanhood. Future generations depend on us. Thank you for the opportunity to speak here today.

This is a breaking news article and will be updated.

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Detransitioner Pleads With Lawmakers: ‘Please Let Me Be Your Final Warning’

By: Mary Margaret Olohan / @MaryMargOlohan / July 27, 2023

Detransitioner Chloe Cole speaks on Capitol Hill to lawmakers about the dangers of so-called “gender affirming care.” (Photo: Screenshot, YouTube)

Detransitioner Chloe Cole pleaded with lawmakers Thursday on Capitol Hill to pay heed to the traumatic struggles she has already endured as a young person who sought to transition to become another gender. Cole spoke before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the “Dangers and Due Process Violations of ‘Gender-Affirming Care’ for Children,” a hearing pushed by Republicans and denounced by Democrats, who decried the need for such a hearing.

But Cole, who underwent an irreversible double mastectomy when she was only 15 years old, emphasized that her story of attempted transition, and then detransition, should serve as a warning to everyone who hears it.

WATCH:

"My childhood was ruined": listen to heartbreaking opening statement of detransitioner @ChoooCole pic.twitter.com/SZqwdFY0c2
— The Daily Signal (@DailySignal) July 27, 2023

She is now suing Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, Permanente Medical Group, and the doctors who pushed her along the path to hormonal and surgical transgender procedures, alleging that her mental health issues were not properly taken into consideration, that she was not fully able to consent to such irreversible procedures, and that as a young teen, she had no concept of whether she might one day want to become a mother.

“This needs to stop,” she emotionally told the lawmakers on Thursday. “You alone can stop it. Enough children have already been victimized by this barbaric pseudoscience. Please let me be your final warning.”

WATCH:

Incredibly powerful plea from detransitioner @ChoooCole to the lawmakers seated before her: "This needs to stop. You alone can stop it. Enough children have already been victimized by this barbaric pseudoscience."

"Please let me be your final warning." pic.twitter.com/pdiOVyAHL1
— Mary Margaret Olohan (@MaryMargOlohan) July 27, 2023

Later on during the hearing, Republican Texas Rep. Chip Roy pointed out that his Democratic colleagues had repeatedly emphasized the importance of protecting trans-identifying youth.

“I just want to make sure that you know, from our standpoint, that your life is worth it,” Roy said. “And that the people have gone through this, that your lives are worth it. I wonder if you would like to comment on the worth of your life, and the social pressures and the pressure placed on you to pursue a path that you now believe is the correct path.”

Cole emphasized that everyone has a right to happiness and that everyone’s life is worthy. She then asked to address another witness — Myriam Reynolds, the mother of a biologically female young person who identifies as a transgender male.

During the hearing, Reynolds had testified that her child was unhappy before receiving so-called “gender-affirming care,” but happier after receiving the treatment (it is not immediately clear what treatment her biologically female child underwent). Reynolds also claimed that this treatment was “life-saving” for her child, and pushed lawmakers to support parents who wish to transition their children.

“I understood that Mrs. Reynolds is scared for her child,” Cole said. “And I just want to set the record straight that I don’t hate her. I don’t think anyone in this room hates her.”

WATCH:

.@chiproytx emphasizes to detransitioner Chloe Cole and swimmer Paula Scanlon that their lives, too, are worth it, responding to his Democratic colleagues' outrage that the GOP would dare hold a hearing examining so-called "gender-affirming care." pic.twitter.com/gefJKPxSJY
— The Daily Signal (@DailySignal) July 27, 2023

“In fact,” Cole said, as she began to cry, “I see my own mother and my own father in her. And that clearly, she dearly loves her child. And she’s doing the best with what she’s been given. And unfortunately, its not much. And for that I’m sorry.”

Cole remained emotional as she continued: “I think every parent deserves the utmost grace and guidance with how to help their child. That being said, I don’t wish for her child to have the same result as I did. I don’t wish for anyone to regret transition or detransition, because it’s incredibly difficult. It comes with its own difficulties, and it’s not easy. I hope that her child gets to have a happy and fulfilling adulthood, whatever that may look like.”

WATCH:

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Today’s Politically INCORRECT Cartoon by A.F. Branco

A.F. Branco Cartoon – By the Book

A.F. BRANCO | on July 27, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-cartoon-by-the-book-3/

Biden and the Democrats always accuse their opponents of what they are doing.

Biden Deflection — Cartoon by A.F. Branco ©2023.

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Republican Lawmakers Call on SCOTUS To ‘Rein In’ The Administrative State

BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | JULY 26, 2023

Dozens of congressional GOP lawmakers led by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., are calling on the Supreme Court to curtail the administrative state’s power through a rollback of the 1984 Chevron decision.

On Monday, McCarthy filed an amicus brief by the House general counsel on behalf of the lower chamber supporting a legal challenge to the nearly 40-year precedent that gives federal agencies wide latitude to interpret congressional statutes.

“As part of our Commitment to America, House Republicans pledged to hold Washington accountable,” McCarthy said in a statement. “The Chevron framework makes it easier for unelected bureaucrats to weaponize federal regulations against the American people. The Court should rein in the power of unelected bureaucrats and restore the separation of powers.”

In May, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, setting the stage for a landmark decision that could narrow the scope of bureaucratic agencies to unilaterally impose burdensome rules and regulations. The conservative majority on the court led by Chief Justice John Roberts already signaled its willingness to “rein in” the administrative state last summer with its decision in EPA v. West Virginia. In that case, justices struck down the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, ruling the Constitution did not allow federal agencies to circumvent Congress by implementing broad regulations to wide effect.

In 1984, the Supreme Court established “Chevron deference” in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, broadly defined as allowing administrative agencies to substitute their own interpretation of congressional statutes when a particular issue is implicit. Justices on the current court have debated whether the 1984 case law has been properly interpreted. Regardless, Republicans say its application has been abused by a burgeoning administrative state run by unelected bureaucrats.

Three dozen lawmakers, led by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., filed another brief on Monday in support of a challenge to the Chevron ruling. The brief includes 18 total signatories from the upper chamber, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and 18 from the House.

“Decades of application of Chevron deference have facilitated the exercise of functions by the executive branch that more properly belong to the legislative and judicial branches,” the brief reads. “Agencies exploit general or broad terms in statutes to engage in policymaking functions of questionable legality with the assumption that courts will grant deference and not independently evaluate the lawfulness of those agency interpretations.”

The court will revisit the nearly four-decade-old doctrine in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, with New Jersey fishermen objecting to rules from the Commerce Department that would force commercial fishing vessels to pay federal observers. Such on-board monitoring could cost more than $700 a day and about a fifth of fishermen’s profits, according to the Cause of Action Institute, which is representing the plaintiffs.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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TRISTAN JUSTICE

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Biden Family Scandals Are So Much Bigger Than Hunter’s Hookers And Burisma Bribery

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 26, 2023

Joe Biden at his desk talking on the phone in black and white

Author Margot Cleveland profile

MARGOT CLEVELAND

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When the New York Post broke the news that documents recovered from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop implicated Joe Biden in a pay-to-play scandal, the corporate media — to the extent they didn’t frame the story as Russian disinformation — pretended the reporting solely concerned Hunter Biden’s personal life. The scandal, however, was never about Hunter’s sordid sex life and history of drug abuse. Rather, it concerned Joe Biden’s abuse of power as vice president for financial gain. But now it reaches much further — including 10 distinct scandals.

Saturated in Scandal

1. The Many (Uncharged) Crimes of Hunter Biden

While the current scandals swirling around the laptop are unrelated to Hunter Biden’s sex life or drug abuse, the president’s son features in the first scandal: Evidence indicates Hunter Biden committed numerous crimes, including felonies. Evidence suggests Hunter Biden acted as an unregistered foreign agent for, at a minimum, Ukraine and China in violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The confidential human source’s (CHS) reporting suggests Hunter also accepted bribes from Burisma or alternatively helped extort $10 million from the Ukrainian oil and gas company for himself and his father.

IRS whistleblowers and federal prosecutors also believed the evidence supported multiple felony tax counts. Lying on a federal firearm application is a serious felony as well.

The evidence that the president’s son likely engaged in extensive criminal conduct for over a decade is a huge scandal, but it also bred a separate scandal: the DOJ and FBI’s efforts to protect him, No. 7 below.

2. Joe Biden’s Business Lie

Hunter Biden’s laptop also exposed the reality that Joe Biden lied to the American public, dating back to September 2019. During a campaign stop, the then-Democrat presidential candidate snapped at Fox News’ Peter Doocy, claiming: “I’ve never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings.”

More than two years later, after The Washington Post and New York Times belatedly confirmed the authenticity of the emails recovered from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop, Doocy asked then-White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki whether “President Biden still maintains he never discussed overseas business deals with his son Hunter,” to which Psaki replied, “Yes.”

While Biden and his team stuck with that lie for two-plus years, his current press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, is attempting to snuff out that scandal by reframing Biden’s denial. “I’ve been asked this question a million times. The answer is not going to change. The answer remains the same: The president was never in business with his son,” Jean-Pierre said on Monday.

Moving the goalposts won’t erase the lie.

3. Joe Biden’s Corruption

The much more serious scandal, however, concerns extensive evidence of Joe Biden’s widespread corruption. Bank and corporate records, suspicious activity reports, emails and text messages recovered from Hunter Biden’s laptop, travel records, reporting from a “highly credible” CHS, and testimony and expected testimony from Hunter Biden’s business partners indicate that Joe Biden, while vice president, exchanged political favors for payments to his family members — with a cut of the cash coming to the “Big Guy.”

People and/or organizations from Romania, Ukraine, Russia, and China, among others, all paid Biden-related business entities millions of dollars, with evidence indicating the now-president received a cut of the bribes. The evidence indicates that in exchange, the individuals received access to the then-vice president. In the case of Ukraine, Biden forced the firing of the prosecutor general who was investigating Burisma, the company where Hunter held a board seat and which allegedly paid Joe and Hunter Biden each $5 million in bribes.

The evidence of Joe Biden’s corruption is bad enough, but the scandal deepens when one considers the president has supplied Ukraine with cluster bombs and billions in American tax dollars.

Cover-Ups

While the first three scandals involve misconduct and likely criminality by Hunter and Joe Biden, there are at least twice as many distinct scandals that flow from cover-up efforts to protect the Bidens.

4. FBI’s Interference in the 2020 Election

By December 2019, the FBI had authenticated the laptop Hunter Biden abandoned at a computer repair shop in Wilmington, Delaware. Yet, knowing the laptop was real and contained spectacularly damaging details implicating Joe Biden in corruption, the FBI spent the months leading up to the November 2020 election grooming tech giants to believe a “hack-and-leak operation” was imminent. The FBI also pushed social media companies to change their terms of service to prohibit the posting of so-called hacked materials.

These combined efforts prompted social media companies to censor the New York Post’s Oct. 14, 2020 blockbuster article, “Smoking-Gun Email Reveals How Hunter Biden Introduced Ukrainian Businessman to VP Dad.” After the story broke and after initially confirming its authenticity to Twitter, the FBI refused to comment on whether the material had been hacked or was Russian disinformation, leading to its continued widespread censorship. Not only did the FBI improperly protect Joe Biden and prompt the censorship of true political speech, it interfered in the 2020 election and likely handed Biden the White House.

5. Intelligence Agencies’ Interference in the 2020 Election

Former and current members of intelligence agencies soon joined the FBI in interfering in the 2020 election. The House Intelligence and Weaponization Committees previously detailed evidence of that interference in their report titled, “How Senior Intelligence Community Officials and the Biden Campaign Worked to Mislead American Voters.”

That report established that the infamous October 2020 letter, which was signed by 51 former intelligence officials and falsely framed the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation, was concocted by Biden-campaign officials, including now-Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who served as a senior adviser to the Biden campaign. Then-candidate Joe Biden would cite that letter in his final debate with Donald Trump to lie to the American people (again), telling the country the laptop was Russian disinformation.

It is scandalous that scores of former intelligence officials would use their prior positions and reputations to deceive Americans in a way that likely affected the 2020 election. That any of those individuals retained security clearances adds to the scandal, as does the role of the Biden campaign and the involvement of at least one CIA employee in soliciting signatories for the statement.

6. Intel Agencies’ Failure to Protect America Against Foreign Influence

Not only did intelligence agencies interfere in the 2020 election, but in their efforts to protect Joe Biden, they likely also failed to provide necessary defensive briefings, putting Americans at risk.

To protect our country, intelligence officials must have frank discussions with leaders (and candidates) about the risks of foreign malign influence. Given how hard the FBI and intelligence agencies tried to bury the news of the laptop, it seems likely they omitted any reference to the laptop and details contained on it in briefings to then-President Trump, then-candidate Biden, and the Biden campaign.

To date, this scandal has been overlooked and merits further inquiry to determine whether the intelligence apparatus fulfilled its duty to the country or omitted inconvenient facts in briefings to protect Joe Biden. Of particular concern is whether intelligence agencies assessed and warned about the risk that the Russians had stolen a second Hunter Biden laptop that contain materials the Biden son believed rendered him susceptible to blackmail.

7. DOJ and FBI’s Handling of Biden Investigations

When it comes to how the DOJ and FBI handled investigations into Biden family corruption, the evidence of potential misconduct is overwhelming.

Broadly, this scandal includes conflicts of interest between Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys — including the Pennsylvania U.S. attorney handling an investigation into the Jim Biden-connected company Americorp, and the California and D.C. U.S. attorneys who reportedly refused to bring felony charges against Hunter Biden. Likewise, Attorney General Merrick Garland’s conflict of interest proves scandalous given the numerous efforts by the DOJ and FBI headquarters to interfere in the investigations.

Beyond conflicts of interest, the IRS whistleblowers and another whistleblower who’s provided information to Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, have revealed numerous instances of DOJ and FBI procedural violations, the burying of evidence such as the FD-1023, the false labeling of derogatory evidence as disinformation, and limits on the investigative steps agents could take. Consequently, the DOJ charged Hunter Biden only with misdemeanors and one firearm felony that could be dropped, and to date it appears no investigation has occurred into Joe Biden or his brother, Jim Biden, on allegations of bribery and money laundering.

While Democrats counter the growing evidence of corruption by wrongly claiming it has not been corroborated, that fact does not vindicate the Bidens: It implicates the DOJ and FBI in a separate scandal.

Cover-Ups of the Cover-Ups

8. DOJ and FBI’s Cover-Up of Failure to Investigate Bidens

Once whistleblowers began exposing the Biden administration’s interference in the family’s pay-to-play investigation, the DOJ and FBI began to cover-up the cover-up. We saw this most clearly when Garland professed that there was no political interference in U.S. Attorney David Weiss’s investigation into Hunter Biden. Garland stressed that, as a Trump holdover, Americans could trust Weiss’s independence.

Garland’s testimony cannot be squared with the extensive interference coming from FBI headquarters and the limitations the DOJ placed on investigative techniques. When Grassley pushed on the point, Garland maintained that Weiss had ultimate charging authority. According to an IRS whistleblower, however, Weiss said otherwise, claiming he wasn’t the ultimate decision-maker.

Here, the cover-up of the cover-up began in earnest, with Garland and Weiss writing a series of letters and making public statements that attempted to obscure the ultimate question of whether Weiss had ultimate authority to charge Hunter Biden and whether DOJ or FBI headquarters interfered in the investigation. This scandal has yet to be unraveled. But on Monday, the DOJ sent a letter to the House Judiciary Committee offering up Weiss to testify — indicating Biden’s Justice Department might be preparing to throw Weiss under the bus.

9. Democrats Lying to Protect Joe Biden

Many Democrats are also wrapped up in lying to protect Joe Biden. Some of these lies predate the election when they spun the laptop as Russian disinformation. But more recently, we saw Democrat Rep. Jamie Raskin lying to the American public about the FD-1023 form. Had former Attorney General William Barr not gone on the record to correct Raskin’s falsehood, the public would have been none the wiser.

Seeking to protect Joe Biden from damning bribery claims, Raskin falsely claimed that Trump appointees Barr and U.S. Attorney Scott Brady had reviewed the CHS’s reporting contained in a June 2020 FD-1023 form and closed out the investigation. Raskin also portrayed the CHS’s reporting as connected to Rudy Giuliani.

But as The Federalist first reported, Barr unequivocally said that Raskin’s claim was “not true.” The investigation into the FD-1023 “wasn’t closed down.” “On the contrary,” Barr stressed, “it was sent to Delaware for further investigation.” Likewise, Barr explained the CHS’s reporting was unrelated to Giuliani.

10. Press Acting as Biden-Run Media

When the Post broke the laptop story, the legacy media either silenced it or framed it as Russian disinformation. Even two years later, after belatedly authenticating the material recovered from Hunter Biden’s computer, the corporate media refused to cover the implications — that the emails, documents, and texts indicated Joe Biden was involved in a massive corruption scandal. The corrupt press still refuses to cover the news fairly, opting instead to brand the evidence as a conspiracy theory.

The media’s refusal to seek and report the truth proves the most dire of all the scandals because without a free press checking government corruption, the corruption will only grow.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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Top Democrat Jeffries Refuses To Defend Right Of Congress To Pass Laws After Environmental Activists Take Other Side

BY: MOLLIE HEMINGWAY | JULY 21, 2023

Hakeem Jeffries — Democratic leadership refused to defend the legitimacy of the lower chamber at the behest of the environmental lobby.

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The top two Democrats in the House of Representatives quietly voted last week against defending the right of Congress to pass laws. The sanctity of democracy and Congress itself has been a major political talking point for Democrat leaders in recent years. But the vote showed the difficulty Democrat Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and other top Democrats have standing up to the intense pressure they face from left-wing billionaires and the environmental activist groups they run.

The vote dealt with litigation from left-wing environmental groups trying to stop provisions in the recently passed Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA), which raised the debt limit. That bill, signed into law on June 5, 2023, contained provisions to ensure the completion of a 303-mile pipeline from natural gas fields in West Virginia to an existing pipeline in Southwest Virginia. Left-wing environmental groups funded by major Democrat donors and a foreign oligarch who finances much of the left’s “dark money” behemoth have fought the completion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline for years. While most of the pipeline has been constructed, the FRA directed expedited approval of the remaining permits, removal from any court the jurisdiction to review agency actions, and directing the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to oversee any claims challenging the pipeline.

Both Jeffries and Democrat Whip Katherine Clark voted for the legislation. Jeffries publicly stated he did so “without hesitation, reservation, or trepidation.” President Biden, the top Democrat in the country, signed it into law. His Department of Justice began implementing the law. But when the time came to defend both that legislation and the very right of Congress to pass laws, Jeffries and Clark refused.

The Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG), comprising the Speaker of the House and the leader and whip of each party, “speaks for, and articulates the institutional position of, the House in all litigation matters,” according to House rules. While it has at times been used in a partisan matter, most notably and aggressively under former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, it also routinely sees unanimous votes on key issues about the rights and powers of Congress.

Earlier this year, for example, all five members voted to intervene in an ongoing legal battle between the Department of Justice and Rep. Scott Perry, R-Penn., over the department’s aggressive efforts to access the conservative member’s phone.

The vote last week was divided on party lines, even though it dealt with an issue that the BLAG had previously worked on twice before and involved a law that both Democrat members had voted for only weeks prior.

Back Story

Blocking an energy pipeline in the region has been a top priority of left-wing activist groups for years. They had successfully asked the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to block and delay permits and approvals for the pipeline.

Once the debt limit bill passed, the Department of Justice moved to dismiss those cases. It argued that the bill had mooted the controversy by explicitly ratifying and approving all necessary permits and by changing the law governing the pipeline in such a way that it rendered meritless the claims put forth by the environmentalist groups.

The Wilderness Society and an array of other left-wing environmentalist groups opposed what the DOJ was doing and asked the Fourth Circuit to issue a stay. Left-wing Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss “has been a leading source of difficult-to-trace money to groups associated with Democrats,” according to an analysis from The New York Times. He serves on the board of governors of the Wilderness Society. That group argued the bill violated the separation of powers and that the Fourth Circuit remained the right court to hear their objections to the previous legislation. Without explaining its reasoning, a trio of judges on the Fourth Circuit that had previously ruled in favor of the environmental groups’ petitions issued a stay.

The pipeline company filed an emergency application at the Supreme Court to vacate the stays and have the Fourth Circuit dismiss the claims so the pipeline could be completed as directed by June’s legislation.

That’s why the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group voted on an amicus brief backing Congress’ own legislation and the right of Congress to pass legislation.

The amicus brief argues that the Fourth Circuit stays are at odds with Congress’s declaration that “the timely completion” of the pipeline “is required in the national interest.” It also notes that the House has twice prior defended the power of Congress to enact changes in law that affect the outcome of pending court cases, and the court upheld the constitutionality of doing so both times. Finally, it argues that the stays are erroneous; that nothing precludes Congress from changing laws simply because they end legal challenges to agency actions.

Jeffries and Clark are refusing to defend Congress, but their vote aligns them with the billionaire environmentalists. It does put them at odds with at least one Democrat lawmaker and the Laborers’ International Union of North America, the country’s “most progressive” union of construction workers.

“The jobs at stake are the exact type of jobs – blue collar jobs for skilled workers that provide good wages, health coverage, retirement security, and funding for training of current workers and new entrants to the industry – that are so badly needed in today’s economy,” the union wrote in its brief.

When Clark whipped for the bill she now refuses to defend, she praised Biden for “standing with our veterans, seniors, and working families” during the negotiations.

Neither Jeffries nor Clark responded to The Federalist’s request for comment.

Tristan Justice contributed to this reporting.

Mollie Ziegler Hemingway is the Editor-in-Chief of The Federalist. She is Senior Journalism Fellow at Hillsdale College and a Fox News contributor. She is the co-author of Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court. She is the author of “Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections.” Reach her at mzhemingway@thefederalist.com

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Put You ‘IN THE GROUND’: Grad Student Threatens State Senator Over Vote to Protect Kids From Trans Drugs

By: Tyler O’Neil / @Tyler2ONeil / July 26, 2023

Protester holds sign reading — A graduate student left a voicemail threatening a Louisiana state senator after he voted to override Gov. John Bel Edwards’ veto of a bill protecting minors from experimental “transgender” medical interventions. Pictured: A protester holds a sign reading “protect black trans women at all f—ing cost” at the Queer Liberation March in Manhattan, June 25. (Photo: Erik McGregor, LightRocket/Getty Images)

A Louisiana state senator says he is undeterred despite receiving a death threat after he voted to override a governor’s veto on a bill protecting children from experimental “transgender” medical interventions.

“No type of threat would ever stop me from trying to save children and keep them from being mutilated or from facing any other harm,” Sen. Michael “Big Mike” Fesi, a Republican representing southern Louisiana, told The Daily Signal in a phone interview Tuesday.

Fesi voted to override Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards’ June veto of House Bill 648, the “Stop Harming Our Kids Act.” The state House voted 76-23 on July 18 to override the veto, and the Senate voted 28-11 to override the veto the following day. After the vote, Fesi received a voicemail message expressing joy at the prospect of putting him “in the ground.”

“I can’t wait to read your name in the f—ing obituary,” a man, whom police later identified as Louisiana State University graduate student Marcus Venable, said in the message. “I will make a g–d–n martini made from the tears of butthurt conservatives when we put your f—ing a– in the ground.”

In the audio, which political commentator Greg Price posted to Twitter, Venable claimed that Fesi did not produce “any g–d–n evidence to support the claims you made about people being harmed by transgender care,” and he cited what he described as “tons of empirical evidence” about an “increased suicide risk” in the absence of such interventions.

UNHINGED: This is a voicemail that was sent to Louisiana State Senator @Sen_BigMikeFesi after he voted to override Gov. John Bel Edwards' veto on the bill to ban child sex changes in which @LSU Professor Marcus Venable calls him a "fat fucking piece of shit" and says "I can't… pic.twitter.com/IEKisCF6mg
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) July 20, 2023

Fesi told The Daily Signal that he called the police to report the threat. “When they talk about ‘put you in the ground,’ you absolutely call the police,” he said.

The senator has not received any apology from Venable. He said the police told him they directed the graduate student to refrain from contacting him.

Michael Fesi in a blue suit with a red tie and an American flag — Sen. Michael “Big Mike” Fesi, the Louisiana state senator who received a death threat for voting to protect children from so-called transgender procedures.

Louisiana State University condemned Venable’s actions and will bar him from teaching, local TV station KCBY reported.

“As a university, we foster open and respectful dialogue,” LSU spokeswoman Abbi Rocha Laymoun said. “Like everyone, graduate students with teaching assignments have the right to express their opinions, but this profanity-filled, threatening call crossed the line.”

“This does not exhibit the character we expect of someone given the privilege of teaching as part of their graduate assistantship,” she added. “The student will be allowed to continue their studies but will not be extended the opportunity to teach in the future.”

LSU did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment by publication time.

House Bill 648, which will take effect on Jan. 1, 2024, forbids health care professionals from engaging in specific acts “that attempt to alter a minor’s appearance in an attempt to validate a minor’s perception of the minor’s sex, if the minor’s perception is inconsistent with the minor’s sex.”

It bans various experimental medical interventions that transgender advocates euphemistically refer to as “gender-affirming care,” such as the off-label use of drugs like Lupron to forestall puberty, cross-sex hormones, sterilizing surgery, surgeries to construct facsimiles of organs belonging to the opposite sex, the removal of “any healthy or non-diseased body part or tissue,” and other procedures to alter secondary sex characteristics.

When the Louisiana Legislature overrode Edwards’ veto, the governor predicted that the courts would “throw out this unconstitutional bill,” which he said “needlessly harms a very small population of vulnerable children, their families, and their health care professionals.”

Fesi disputed Venable’s claim that the senator did not present any evidence to support his position.

“If you have to continue these drugs, you become a lifetime patient,” he said, warning that “the suicide rate after doing this thing really goes up.”

“You need to at least wait until you’re of age to make that decision,” Fesi said. “Children, they can’t drink alcohol until 21, they can’t drive until they’re 16.”

The state senator also urged people to focus on being “a good person.”

“As far as the threats and stuff go, you need to agree to disagree,” he said. “No one needs to cause hardship on anyone else just because of a disagreement. We need to learn to love one another no matter what.”

He pledged to continue to support legislation aimed at protecting children.

Fesi noted Senate Bill 64, “Ezekiel’s Law,” which unanimously passed the state Legislature and which Edwards signed on June 1. The law requires closer communication between law enforcement and child protection agencies after the death of 2-year-old Ezekiel J’sai Harry, whose body was found in a trash can.

“Two-year-old Ezekiel was [allegedly] beat to death by his mother’s boyfriend,” Fesi recalled. “He was supposed to be moved to his dad’s possession prior to his death.” Closer communication between law enforcement and child agencies will prevent such tragedies in the future, the senator said.

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T0day’s Politically INCORRECT Cartoon by A.F. Branco

A.F. Branco Cartoon – A Father’s Love

A.F. BRANCO | on July 26, 2023 | https://comicallyincorrect.com/a-f-branco-cartoon-a-fatherss-love/

The Democrat media continues to play defense for President Biden’s bribery scandal with his son Hunter as the bagman.

Biden Loves His Son — A.F. Branco Cartoon ©2023.

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Video: Pro-life activists physically attacked outside yet another Planned Parenthood

By: DAVE URBANSKI | July 24, 2023

In May, TheBlaze reported on a vicious attack outside a Baltimore Planned Parenthood that resulted in an elderly pro-life advocate being severely beaten.

🚨Two proaborts decided to assault me and another pro-life defender outside Planned Parenthood in Washington DC this morning simply for standing on the sidewalk offering resources to families in crisis

The police refused to press charges @PAAUNOW pic.twitter.com/CEUzH4az5Y
— Terrisa Bukovinac (@Terrisalin) July 22, 2023

Over the weekend, yet another physical attack against pro-life activists outside a Planned Parenthood took place — this time in Washington, D.C. It was caught on video.

According to the Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, two D.C.-area pro-life activists — Terrisa Bukovinac, founder and executive director of PAAU, and Michael Gribbin — were assaulted Saturday morning outside the D.C. Planned Parenthood. Bukovinac said the incident began when a woman approached her and threw coffee in her face and hair, adding that when Gribbin tried to grab the woman’s coffee cup, the woman’s male partner assaulted him.

Video shows the man throwing Gribbin to the street surface and repeatedly punching him as well as the woman slapping Bukovinac in the face.

Image source: Twitter video screenshot via @Terrisalin

Image source: Twitter video screenshot via @Terrisalin

Here’s the clip. Content warning: Language:

🚨Two proaborts decided to assault me and another pro-life defender outside Planned Parenthood in Washington DC this morning simply for standing on the sidewalk offering resources to families in crisis

The police refused to press charges @PAAUNOW pic.twitter.com/CEUzH4az5Y
— Terrisa Bukovinac (@Terrisalin) July 22, 2023

The PAAU said that despite video of the assault, D.C. police have refused to press charges.

“Even as a progressive anti-abortion atheist, I understand that the abortion industrial complex is responsible for a mass genocide which will require immense bravery to dismantle,” Bukovinac said. “Pro-lifers must be committed to total non-violence to effectively challenge the institution of legal child killing around the globe.”

The PAAU said Michael New — a Catholic University of America professor who helps coordinate pro-life efforts outside the D.C. Planned Parenthood — issued a statement that said, in part: “It is sad but unsurprising that the D.C. police have refused to press charges on two individuals who assaulted two pro-life sidewalk counselors outside the DC Planned Parenthood. Pro-lifers have First Amendment rights, and no one should have to fear for their safety while sidewalk counseling. … If Terrisa and Michael wish to file civil charges against their assailants, they would have my enthusiastic support.”

The Daily Caller News Foundation, as part of its report, said D.C. police didn’t immediately respond to its request for comment on the matter.

In regard to the Baltimore attack, police have released surveillance images of a man believed to be in his twenties still wanted for brutally punching and kicking the face of the elderly pro-lifer outside that city’s Planned Parenthood.

Police released surveillance photos of a man wanted for attacking a pair of pro-life protesters outside a North Baltimore Planned Parenthood.

A $2000 reward is being offered for information leading to his arrest. https://t.co/aBZERNOhPK
— WMAR-2 News (@WMAR2News) June 8, 2023

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Senator Rand Paul, M.D., Op-ed: Congress Must Stop The Executive Branch’s Heinous Attempts To Censor Americans

BY: RAND PAUL | JULY 25, 2023

RAND PAUL

The First Amendment’s mandate that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech” is a guarantee that, no matter how inconvenient to those temporarily holding high office, the people have an absolute right to express their thoughts and opinions. Despite this constitutional requirement, over 200 years ago, President John Adams and the Federalists in Congress used the threat of war with France as a pretext to enact into law the Sedition Act of 1798, which made it a crime for Americans to “print, utter, or publish . . . any false, scandalous, and malicious writing” about the government.

The debate surrounding the Sedition Act was about the nature of freedom of speech. One supporter of the law, Alexander Addison, believed that some opinions were so dangerous that it was in the public interest to suppress them, stating, “Truth has but one side: and listening to error and falsehood is indeed a strange way to discover truth.”

An opponent, Thomas Cooper, presciently argued that the purpose of the Sedition Act was to empower one party to “suppress the opinions of those who differ from them.” Unsurprisingly, all the defendants prosecuted under the Sedition Act would be Republicans.

Sound familiar?

On Independence Day this year, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction restricting the Biden Administration from collaborating with social media companies to censor and suppress constitutionally protected speech. In his opinion, Judge Terry Doughty stated that the Biden Administration’s efforts to suppress opinions it opposes “arguably involves the most massive attack against free speech in the United States’ history.” It is difficult to disagree with Judge Doughty’s description.

For years, the Biden Administration demanded social media suppress and censor conservatives who dared question the origins of Covid, the effectiveness of masks and lockdowns, and election integrity, among other issues. The Biden Administration was so zealous in its enforcement of censorship, even parody content did not escape its anti-free speech campaign.

And the Biden administration didn’t ask nicely. When then-White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki publicly called on social media companies to censor speech relating to Covid, she mentioned Biden’s support for a “robust anti-trust program,” all but threatening to break up tech giants if they failed to adopt the administration’s censorship policies. Later, the White House announced that it was reviewing policies relating to whether social media should be held legally liable for spreading so-called misinformation. In other words, the Biden administration effectively told social media “Do our bidding, or else.”

The White House was so aggressive that a Twitter representative stated the site was “bombarded” with censorship requests from the executive branch. But that bombardment was not really directed at Twitter — it was a monstrous attack on the free speech rights guaranteed to every American by the First Amendment.

In addition to countless numbers of Americans, I was targeted by the censorship regime. When I posted a video on YouTube to educate the public on the potentially harmful consequences of relying on ineffective cloth masks to prevent transmission of Covid, YouTube took my video down and suspended me for a week.

Americans are a free people and we do not take infringements upon our liberties lightly. The time has come for resistance and to reclaim our God-given right to free expression. Permit me, as a member of the resistance, to present a solution that that restores and protects the First Amendment.

I introduced legislation called the Free Speech Protection Act, which will prohibit federal employees and contractors from using their positions to censor and otherwise attack speech protected by the First Amendment. My legislation will impose penalties for those that violate this rule, as well as empower private citizens to sue the government and executive branch officials for violating their First Amendment rights. Additionally, the bill will mandate frequent publicly accessible reports detailing the communications between an executive branch agency and media organizations, ensure that federal grant money is not used to label media organizations as sources of misinformation or disinformation, and terminates authorities that threaten free speech.

Under my Free Speech Protection Act, the government will no longer be able to cloak itself in secrecy to undermine the First Amendment rights of conservatives, libertarians, liberals, socialists, and all others who wish to exercise their right to free speech and engage in public discourse.

My legislation will make it difficult to hide efforts to censor constitutionally protected speech. Those officials who censor Americans are on notice: if you infringe upon First Amendment rights, under my bill, you will face severe penalties, such as potential debarment from employment by the United States, a civil penalty of no less than $10,000, and revocation of a security clearance. Any administration employee who prizes his livelihood would not dare threaten free speech after my bill becomes law.

Looking back upon his defeat of John Adams for the presidency, Thomas Jefferson wrote, the “revolution of 1800 . . . was a real revolution in the principles of our government as that of [17]76.” Jefferson’s victory was a vindication of the First Amendment as he allowed the Sedition Act to expire and pardoned those convicted for expressing their views.

Once again, the American people are called upon to defend the founding principles over which our forebears fought a revolution. To protect free speech, Congress must prohibit the government’s collusion with Big Tech and other media organizations. Congress must pass the Free Speech Protection Act.

Rand Paul, MD, is a U.S. senator from Kentucky.

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Mounting Evidence Doesn’t Matter, Corporate Media Will Never Cover the Biden Corruption Scandal

BY: JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON | JULY 25, 2023

Author John Daniel Davidson profile

JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON

VISIT ON TWITTER@JOHNDDAVIDSON

As evidence mounts that President Joe Biden took millions in bribe money from Ukrainian oligarchs when he was vice president as part of an elaborate influence-peddling scheme headed up by his son, Hunter Biden, let’s check in on how the corporate press is handling what looks like the biggest political scandal in American history.

Nothing to see here, apparently. The New York Times has carried no coverage of the shocking allegations contained in an unclassified FBI document Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released last week. The document, called an FD-1023, details the reporting of a highly credible FBI informant who says the top executive of Ukrainian oil and gas firm Burisma told him he paid Joe and Hunter Biden $5 million each to protect the company from a corruption investigation (that’s in addition to the millions it paid Hunter to sit on its board).

Instead, the “paper of record” ran an article attacking a group called Empower Oversight for helping a pair of IRS whistleblowers at the heart of the Hunter Biden tax fraud investigation who say the FBI and Justice Department hid the informant’s reporting from them, as well as relevant material on Hunter’s laptop. The Times wasn’t interested in the substance of what these whistleblowers had to say, but rather focused on the fact that Empower Oversight helped them follow the proper procedures and whistleblower statutes for bringing their claims to Congress.

Over at The Washington Post, there was likewise zero coverage of the FBI informant’s reporting, even after portions of it were corroborated this week as reported by Margot Cleveland in these pages. Nor was there any mention of Tuesday’s news that Hunter’s former business partner and fellow Burisma board member, Devon Archer, will testify before Congress that Hunter would regularly call his father and put him on speakerphone with overseas business associates when Joe Biden was vice president.

None of that seems to interest the editors at the Post. The only mention of any of this comes from media columnist Philip Bump, who devoted an entire column Monday to a tortured explanation of why we should ignore it all. Just because a trusted FBI informant is credible, writes Bump, doesn’t mean that what the informant was told is true: “I trust my wife, but if she tells me that our 6-year-old claims to have seen a dragon on the roof, I don’t suddenly believe that there was a dragon on the roof.”

Indeed not. But what Bump seems to be suggesting is that if his wife ran up to him terrified that there’s a dragon on the roof because his 6-year-old claims to have seen one, he would just shrug it off until further evidence emerged. And maybe he actually would. After all, this is the same guy who once seemed terribly confused about where babies come from.

But of course Bump, like the rest of the corporate press, is faking it. A normal person, confronted by his hysterical wife claiming the boy saw a dragon on the roof, would take a second to step outside and look at the roof. Bump and his colleagues refuse to do even this, insisting rather that this is all just political theater, the GOP desperately grasping at straws to damage Biden.

In a healthy society with a functioning free press, the Biden corruption scandal — and the rank obstruction of the DOJ and FBI on Biden’s behalf — would dominate the headlines. Instead of merely reporting that the Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy yesterday floated the prospect of impeachment proceedings against Biden, the press would be reporting on the mounting evidence underlying the drive for impeachment.

But no. Instead, the corporate media are twisting themselves into pretzels to explain away every new development in this story. As David Marcus noted on Twitter, “We are precipitously close to, ‘Maybe Joe Biden did take money from Burisma, but here’s why that’s actually a good thing.’”

Or as one Twitter account put it:

Where’s the proof that Biden is actually corrupt?

Emails, text messages, and bank statements that explicitly detail the scam the Bidens were running.

No I want real proof.

Video of Biden himself extorting.

No I want real proof.

Whistleblowers and business partners that have…
— MAZE (@mazemoore) July 25, 2023

We can see the goalposts shifting in real time. Asked Monday about the corruption allegations and the claims that Hunter put his father on speakerphone with foreign business associates when Biden was vice president, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden “was never in business with his son.”

That’s a far cry from Biden’s past statements that he has “never spoken” to Hunter about his overseas business dealings. (Never mind the hundreds of meetings Biden has reportedly had with Hunter’s business partners.) But at this rate the laughable White House line will become the media’s fallback position: Biden wasn’t in business with his son! He was just collecting “dividends,” not bribe money!

The upshot of all this is simple: no matter what evidence emerges, no matter how damning, the corporate media will not cover it. To the extent they mention the story at all, it will be in the context of bashing Republican lawmakers for trying to “dig up dirt” on Biden. If the GOP-controlled House opens an impeachment proceeding, which is the only way we’re ever going to get to the bottom of the Biden corruption scheme, the coverage will be about how Republican lawmakers are conducting a “witch hunt” to get back at Democrats for impeaching Trump.

Everywhere, we’ll hear the same line that CBS’s “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan tossed to Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie recently, in reference to the outrageous plea deal offered to Hunter Biden for a couple of tax charges: “I wonder after this plea happens if you would advise your party to move on?”

Of course, the whole point of the plea deal was to give the corporate media this line in hopes that the American people would “move on” and forget about the scandal. But no one, it seems, is “moving on” except Democrats and their courtesans in the press. The rest of us are going to take a second to step outside and see if there’s really a dragon on the roof. We’ll make sure to let Philip Bump know.

John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.

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Dennis Prager Op-ed: Pew Research: Democrats Value Free Speech Far Less Than Republicans

Dennis Prager / @DennisPrager / July 25, 2023

Lorie Smith, a Christian graphic artist and website designer in Colorado, center in pink, speaks to supporters outside the Supreme Court on Dec. 5, 2022, in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

COMMENTARY BY Dennis Prager @DennisPrager

Dennis Prager is a columnist for The Daily Signal, nationally syndicated radio host, and creator of PragerU.

In case you were in doubt—and if you were in doubt, that means you aren’t following what is happening in America to the most important freedom of all—Pew Research has confirmed that Democrats value free speech far less than Republicans do.

Read the following statistics and conclusions and weep for our country:

“The share of U.S. adults who say the federal government should restrict false information has risen from 39% in 2018 to 55% in 2023.”
“Just over half of Americans (55%) support the U.S. government taking steps to restrict false information online, even if it limits people from freely publishing or accessing information.”
“Support for government intervention has steadily risen since the first time we asked this question in 2018. In fact, the balance of opinion has tilted: Five years ago, Americans were more inclined to prioritize freedom of information over restricting false information (58% vs. 39%).”
“The partisan gap in support for restricting false information has grown substantially since 2018.”
“Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents are much more likely than Republicans and Republican leaners to support the U.S. government taking steps to restrict false information online (70% vs. 39%). There was virtually no difference between the parties in 2018, but the share of Democrats who support government intervention has grown from 40% in 2018 to 70% in 2023.”
“A large majority of Democrats and Democratic leaners (81%) support technology companies taking such steps, while about half of Republicans (48%) say the same.”

But, no one is asking, “Who is the main arbiter of what is, or is NOT, misinformation? There’s the rub.

Here are 10 conclusions:

No. 1: The most important human freedom is freedom of speech. Free speech is what

makes the pursuit of truth possible. It is what makes the advancement of science possible. It constitutes the very definition of a free society. And free speech is what makes human dignity possible. People who cannot say what they believe are dehumanized. They ultimately become robotic beings exemplified by North Koreans.

No. 2: America has been the freest country in the world for all of its history. That is why the French gave America the Statue of Liberty. It is rapidly relinquishing that title.

No. 3: Free speech is seriously threatened for the first time in American history.

No. 4: The threat to free speech comes entirely from the Left.

No. 5: There is no example in history of the Left attaining power and allowing free speech. From the French Revolution to the Russian Revolution to the Maoist takeover of China to almost any university in America today, wherever the Left comes to power, it suppresses speech.

No. 6: The Left must suppress speech in order to retain power. If it were to allow dissent, it would lose its hold on power.

No. 7: That is why conservative speakers are rarely allowed to speak on college campuses. Left-wing professors, deans, and administrators know—consciously or subconsciously—that an effective conservative speaker can undo years of left-wing indoctrination in just 90 minutes.

No. 8: Given that “Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents are much more likely than Republicans and Republican leaners to support the U.S. government taking steps to restrict false information online (70% vs. 39%),” the often-stated claim that “there is little difference between the two parties” is false.

No. 9: All tyrannies label dissent “misinformation.” That is what Vladimir Putin’s government labels all dissent in Russia today.

The communist regime in the Soviet Union named its official newspaper “Pravda”—the Russian word for “truth”—because in a left-wing tyranny, the left-wing regime determines truth. Anything else is “misinformation” or “disinformation.”

That Western societies are moving toward Soviet-like suppression of speech is obvious in America and was made particularly clear in 2020, when the then-prime minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern, told her country: “We will continue to be your single source of truth” and “If you do not hear it from the government, it is not true.”

Fittingly, Ardern was awarded with two teaching fellowships at Harvard University—one of them at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, based at Harvard Law School, where she “will study ways to improve content standards and platform accountability for extremist content online.”

No. 10: Liberals are abandoning liberal values—in particular, their storied commitment to free speech. There are far more liberals than leftists, but over the past few years the liberals’ unswerving commitment to the Democratic Party, unswerving commitment to The New York Times, The Washington Post, or virtually any other mainstream news source, and their unswerving opposition to conservatives and the Republican Party has led them to embrace and unswervingly vote for left-wing values.

As for the future, this is what Pew reported regarding young Americans: “The shares of younger adults who say they support tech companies and the government restricting false information online have increased substantially since 2018 (by 14 and 19 percentage points, respectively).”

But there is a better reaction than to weep.

Fight.

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Pastor ‘Exiles’ Family to Kenya to Escape Canadian Persecution of Christians

BY: JOY PULLMANN | JULY 24, 2023

Author Joy Pullmann profile

JOY PULLMANN

VISIT ON TWITTER@JOYPULLMANN

A Canadian pastor has “exiled” his family to Kenya after his government invoked emergency war measures to punish citizens who attended a protest where he prayed and sang the national anthem. Harold Ristau, a decorated veteran and seminary professor, participated in the “trucker convoy” against lockdowns last February, when The Federalist interviewed him last. He is now party to a lawsuit arguing the government’s response to Covid that included treating dissent as terrorism violated Canadians’ fundamental rights.

“The fight is far from over,” said Marty Moore, a lawyer for the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF), which is litigating Ristau’s case. More than 14 months after the protest, police arrested another convoy leader this May. Lockdown litigation will likely continue for several more years, Moore said. The same is true across the West.

For peaceably assembling to petition his government for one day last year, Ristau says, he was threatened with the removal of his security clearance and government confiscation of his retirement nest egg, kids’ college funds, and other life savings. Ristau says he’s also experienced serious damage to his reputation, career, and friendships after the government used anti-terrorism measures against peaceful protesters.

“There’s no protection, if a pandemic started tomorrow, from future mandates. So that’s why I was really open to coming here,” his wife, Elise Ristau, said, sitting beside her husband in a recent video interview from Kenya.

Besides dealing with overbearing health restrictions, their children were mocked at school for their family’s religious and political views, Elise Ristau told The Federalist. After enduring more than two years of severe social and government repression, the Ristaus moved outside Nairobi with their five children last August.

“I don’t know that I can go back and be a Christian in Canada. So that’s why we’re here in Kenya,” Harold Ristau said. There, the former chaplain with a Ph.D. in philosophy trains Kenyan pastors at the Lutheran School of Theology.

Confiscating Dissenters’ Life Savings

Government use of “debanking” to punish dissent is growing in the West. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government used it on essentially every convoy participant authorities could identify, said Moore.

“As soon as they knew your name if you were on the ground [protesting] in Ottawa, they froze your bank account,” Moore told The Federalist. “…The federal government met with the banks, they gave the [protesters’] names to the banks, and the banks were then pushed to freeze the bank accounts of anyone with that name in their banks. It was a fascist collaboration.”

Right-leaning British politicians including Brexit leader Nigel Farage recently told the public banks have closed their accounts over their political views.

In May, American whistleblowers disclosed the FBI obtained, without any warrants, “a huge list” of citizens’ private banking data in its Jan. 6, 2021 capitol riot investigation. Investigators targeted any American who legally bought a firearm using a Bank of America account all the way back to the 1990s, the whistleblower testified.

Treating a Veteran Like a Terrorist

After the Canadian government announced it would freeze the bank accounts of convoy protesters and their mostly small-dollar donors without legal due process, rumors of bank runs spread. Multiple large Canadian banks appeared to shut down online operations soon after the announcement. Elise withdrew their family’s savings that Friday, too, she and Harold said. Like thousands of Canadians, they had donated to the convoy. Yet Ristau was the only one of the four plaintiffs in his lawsuit whose accounts were not frozen. He thinks it’s because of his military record.

“Some of the measures that were at least attempted to be invoked are the kind of measures you find to freeze terrorist financing,” Moore noted. “So peaceful protesters were the equivalent of terrorists and the government leaned on banks in the guise of a national emergency to freeze their bank accounts.”

Leftist activists also filed a class-action lawsuit against every Canadian who donated to the convoy. It seeks $300 million in damages. When before the convoy Canada experienced multiple race protests that included violence against stores and police, no class action was filed.

Christians Assisting Government Persecution

Canadian lockdowns kept gyms, restaurants, and liquor stores open but closed churches. Leftist protesters were allowed to yell and sing without masks, and the prime minister kneeled to them, all while provinces banned Christians from singing and chanting in church for years.

Rev. Johannes Nieminen wasn’t allowed to cross provincial borders to perform his pastoral duties, while other Canadians could do so for work, he told The Federalist. After he was denied border entry several times, he said, police finally let him through — but told him he wasn’t allowed to meet with parishioners or hold church services.

“If I’m going to go to the grocery store for physical food, I’m going to the church for spiritual food. If I’m going to the doctor’s office for physical medicine, I’m going to church for the medicine of immortality,” Nieminen said. His denomination believes Jesus Christ’s body and blood are physically present in the wine and bread of communion, and that Christians are commanded to physically eat these — impossible without gathering in person.

Until moving to pastor in New Mexico this summer, Nieminen was clergy in the same denomination as Ristau, the Lutheran Church Canada. He said lockdowns sharply divided many churches, and even though most Covid measures are now lifted, church leaders have largely failed to seek reconciliation and repentance, as commanded in the Bible.

“We need to repent. There’s been crazy division here, and we need to actually talk about it,” he said.

State-Run Western Churches

Nieminen said pastors who obeyed the government to treat churches worse than liquor stores and gyms taught lay people church is non-essential or can be conducted online. The Bible commands keeping a day of worship, meeting in person, singing hymns and psalms, and physically receiving the bread and wine of communion. Christians have done all these every week since the time of Christ.

Communion is a “sacrament,” an action God commands that produces faith and eternal salvation. Only pastors can deliver it, a tradition going back to Christ’s commissioning of His apostles. In all the great pandemics of history, priests and pastors knowingly braved death to bring the sacrament to the dying desperate for the peace and unity with God it promises.

Nieminen said he saw Canadian Christians publicly plead for the sacrament amid lockdowns that nearly lasted three years. They received no response from their pastors, who told Nieminen the pleading parishioners didn’t use the “proper channels.”

“There’s that lack of trust in pastors and a church that they see as giving up on them and basically persecuting them,” Nieminen said. “…They’re being coerced by tyrants to do something against their conscience, and then they go to church and then they’re hearing the same thing from the church.”

Within days of him praying at the protest, says Harold Ristau’s sworn affidavit, fellow clergy began refusing to let him preach and to take communion with him. Some checked with superiors on whether to commune him. Refusing communion to a church member is tantamount to excommunication.

Praying at the protest “demonstrated I was this political insurrectionist” to some clergy whose beliefs about Covid were shaped by state-funded, anti-Christian media, Harold Ristau said: “Prior to Covid, everyone recognized the media were a bunch of liars who hated Christians, but with Covid suddenly we trust them entirely.”

A Political Decision, Not a Health Decision

So far, “none of the [legal] challenges to worship restrictions on church services have succeeded” in Canada, said John Sikkema, a lawyer at the nonprofit firm ARPA Canada.

“Culturally, people find going to the gym very important and less so going to church,” Sikkema noted. “Especially when some churches don’t seem to care and don’t think it’s necessary.”

To secular authorities, keeping the economy going easily trumps the church’s work of caring for human souls, Sikkema noted. That’s why they opened restaurants while restricting churches despite similar health risks: “That’s not really a health decision, it’s a political decision about what’s important to the health of your society.”

Police regularly showed up at churches on Sunday mornings and fined pastors whose parking lots had too many cars, he said. ARPA Canada and JCCF litigated a number of those cases and were often able to get pastors’ fines negotiated down to charitable donations.

Most churches that capitulated to government discrimination against Christians were already declining before lockdowns, and disproportionate percentages of their members didn’t go back to church afterward. Churches that kept to historic orthodoxy, on the other hand, tend to have recovered better from post-lockdown membership losses and many have even grown, Nieminen and Sikkema noted.

Religious Freedom Better in Africa

The difficulty of raising their children in rapidly apostatizing Western culture also affected the Ristaus’ decision to move across the globe.

“Things are normal here, people have traditional values,” Elise Ristau said of Kenya. “It’s inconceivable to think of transgender mutilation. As a mother and father, we do our very best to keep our kids Christian.”

In Canada, Christians are often required to lie or betray their faith to access government grants and licensing credentials, and avoid punishment in many professions, Sikkema said. Many Canadian doctors, lawyers, and teachers, for example, are required to endorse abortion and LGBT sexual acts. Canadian doctors and many other health care workers must help patients obtain an abortion or doctor-assisted suicide.

In 2018, Canada’s Supreme Court banned a Christian law school from opening over Christian sexual standards. The Canadian military is also working to eject chaplains over Christian sexual ethics. Just about every Canadian business sports a government-provided pride flag, Nieminen said. Churches that object to transgender mutilation of children have faced naked protesters as families arrive to worship, Sikkema said.

“Canadians are very aware that we don’t have freedom of religion, we don’t have freedom of speech, we don’t have the right to assemble if that’s in disagreement with the regime,” Nieminen said. “Pastors and teachers cannot speak about the morality of human sexuality. That is a reality Canadians live in, and I think that’s partly why they’re afraid to speak out.”

Christians Welcome in Kenya

The Ristaus had been invited to their current post before lockdowns, but Elise hadn’t wanted to uproot after moving the family so many times for Harold’s military career. They had bought land in Canada for their dream home and planted more than 1,000 trees on it.

“I had dreamed of this perfect life for myself in Canada,” Elise said. But then “there was a kind of turning point where I said, ‘We can go. Nothing is holding us here.’ It was a ‘shake the dust off our boots’ moment.”

From Toronto to Nairobi is approximately 7,500 miles. Flying commercially between the two takes 16 hours or more.

“In Kenya, I know it’s poor, and there’s corruption, but we’re not getting arrested for praying silently outside abortion clinics,” Elise said. “For a Christian in Canada, it’s pretty bleak.”

Joy Pullmann is executive editor of The Federalist, a happy wife, and the mother of six children. Her latest ebook is “101 Strategies For Living Well Amid Inflation.” Her bestselling ebook is “Classic Books for Young Children.” An 18-year education and politics reporter, Joy has testified before nearly two dozen legislatures on education policy and appeared on major media from Fox News to Ben Shapiro to Dennis Prager. Joy is a grateful graduate of the Hillsdale College honors and journalism programs who identifies as native American and gender natural. Her several books include “The Education Invasion: How Common Core Fights Parents for Control of American Kids,” from Encounter Books.

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Political, Religion, Spiritual

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FBI Told Delaware U.S. Attorney It Had Already Partially Corroborated Biden Bribery Claims, Source Says

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 24, 2023

MARGOT CLEVELAND

VISIT ON TWITTER@PROFMJCLEVELAND

When the Pittsburgh FBI office briefed the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office on evidence implicating Hunter and Joe Biden in a bribery scheme, the agents also told the Delaware team they had already corroborated several aspects of the confidential human source’s claims, an individual familiar with the briefing told The Federalist.

On Thursday, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released the FD-1023 summary of a confidential human source’s reporting that the Ukrainian oil and gas company Burisma paid Hunter and Joe Biden each $5 million in bribes so the then-Vice President would “protect” Burisma “from all kinds of problems.” Those bribes were in addition to the more than $4 million in total paid to Hunter Biden and his business partner Devon Archer for sitting on Burisma’s board of directors.

The Federalist has now learned that the Pittsburgh FBI office had corroborated several details contained in the FD-1023 as part of the intake process that former Attorney General William Barr established before the election under the leadership of the Western District of Pennsylvania’s then-U.S. Attorney Scott Brady. Significantly, in briefing the Delaware U.S. attorney on the results of their office’s screening of evidence related to Ukraine, the Pittsburgh FBI agents told the Delaware office they had corroborated multiple facts included in the FD-1023, an individual with knowledge of the briefing told The Federalist.

Following the late June 2020 interview with the CHS, the Pittsburgh FBI office obtained travel records for the CHS, and those records confirmed the CHS had traveled to the locales detailed in the FD-1023 during the relevant time period. The trips included a late 2015 or early 2016 visit to Kiev, Ukraine; a trip a couple of months later to Vienna, Austria; and travel to London in 2019.

As The Federalist previously reported, during their briefing of the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office, the Pittsburgh FBI agents said the FD-1023 bore indicia of credibility and that it merited further investigation. The person familiar with that briefing now confirms the agents also informed the Delaware office that the Pittsburgh FBI had corroborated the CHS’s presence in the various cities at the times claimed.

The Federalist has also learned that the CHS’s handler corroborated the CHS’s claim that he had met with Oleksandr Ostapenko. According to the source with knowledge of the matter, the CHS’s handler told Pittsburgh’s FBI agents that the CHS told his handler he had an upcoming meeting with Ostapenko. The CHS’s contemporaneous claim of the planned rendezvous with Ostapenko tracked the timing of one of the visits the CHS claimed in the FD-1023 to have had with Ostapenko. Significantly, the Pittsburgh office briefed the Delaware office on that piece of corroborating evidence that came from the CHS’s handler.

Open-source reporting of Burisma’s purchase of an interest in a North American oil and gas company likewise lined up with the discussions the CHS relayed to the FBI, as summarized in the FD-1023, the individual familiar with the briefing told The Federalist. That the Pittsburgh FBI office not only provided the Delaware office with a summary of the damning FD-1023 and its conclusion that it bore indicia of credibility but also identified several pieces of corroborating evidence is huge because, to date, it appears the Delaware office did nothing to investigate the allegations contained in the FD-1023.

As Barr previously made clear, the role of the Pittsburgh office was limited to providing a “clearing-house function” for information related to Ukraine to weed out “any potential disinformation.” The purpose of the intake process, Barr stressed, was to “check[] out the source and credibility of evidence before assigning it to one of the ongoing investigations already pending in the Department,” such as the Delaware investigation into Hunter Biden. As such, the Pittsburgh office lacked the authority to subpoena witnesses or records or to use grand jury proceedings to further corroborate the FD-1023. That responsibility fell with the Delaware office.

But not only did the Delaware office apparently ignore the allegations contained in the FD-1023, as well as the corroborating evidence already allegedly accumulated by the Pittsburgh FBI office, but U.S. Attorney David Weiss’s office allegedly secreted the very existence of the FD-1023 from the whistleblowers. Both IRS whistleblowers testified last week that they did not even learn of the existence of the FD-1023 until Barr publicly confirmed he had sent the information to Delaware for further investigation.

Delaware Assistant U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf also excluded the IRS agents working the Hunter Biden investigation from the meeting at which the Pittsburgh FBI agents briefed the office on the FD-1023 and the corroborating evidence they had already uncovered. The IRS whistleblowers further testified that portions of Hunter Biden’s laptop were withheld from them and they were explicitly prohibited from taking any investigative steps connected to Joe Biden — or questioning anyone by using Joe Biden’s name, “Dad,” or “the Big Guy.”

Under these circumstances, even if the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office comes forward now to say it did investigate the FD-1023, its belated claim would be meaningless because the individuals with the knowledge and skill necessary to investigate a complex, international money laundering, bribery, and tax fraud scheme were cut out of the process and barred from interviewing the necessary witnesses.

The Delaware office remains mum, however, not even pretending to have investigated the FD-1023’s allegations. That failure is even more scandalous now that we know Pittsburgh had already corroborated several aspects of the CHS’s reporting and briefed Weiss’s office on the corroborating evidence.

Yet the Biden White House continues to falsely claim the FD-1023 charges “have been debunked for years.” On the contrary, the only thing debunked to date has been the lies of Biden’s Democrat apologists, such as Ranking Member of the House Oversight Committee Jamie Raskin, who doubled down on his claim that Barr had found the FD-1023 not credible and not meriting further investigation.

Americans now know not only that Raskin and his Democrat colleagues lied, but that President Joe Biden lied — both when he said he knew nothing of his son’s business ventures and in claiming now that the FD-1023 has been debunked.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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TIMELINE OF BIDEN ADVISER’S COMMUNICATIONS WITH HUNTER, MEETINGS WITH VP ABOUT BURISMA RAISES QUESTIONS

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Hunter Biden’s friend to tell Congress then-VP Joe joined dozens of son’s business meetings via phone: report

By Lawrence Richard | Fox News | Published July 24, 2023 12:45pm EDT

Devon Archer, a former best friend and business associate of Hunter Biden in Ukraine, is expected to testify under oath to Congress this week that President Biden met with dozens of Hunter’s business associates while he was serving as vice president between 2009 and 2017.

Fox News Digital has confirmed that Archer has been subpoenaed by the House Oversight Committee and could testify as early as Thursday, July 27. The expected testimony could cast further doubt on President Biden’s repeated claims that he had no knowledge of his son’s foreign business dealings or of having any influence on them.

Miranda Devine, a New York Post columnist and Fox News contributor, reported Monday that Archer, 48, is expected to tell the House Oversight Committee about meetings he witnessed attended by both Bidens — Hunter and Joe — either in person or via telephone. During the meetings, Hunter would specifically introduce his father to foreign business partners or prospective investors, Archer is expected to testify.

The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed Archer to speak as House Republicans continue to investigate whether the Bidens used the influence then-Vice President Biden had in the White House to elicit these deals and other alleged Biden family corruption. The committee told Fox News it believes the president communicated in some form with Hunter Biden’s business associates.

Hunter Biden gets off plane with president — President Biden has snapped at reporters who have asked him about alleged corruption involving him and his son, Hunter Biden. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

“We are looking forward very much to hearing from Devon Archer about all the times he has witnessed Joe Biden meeting with Hunter Biden’s overseas business partners when he was vice president, including on speakerphone,” the committee said in a statement.

The committee invited Archer to testify as he was sentenced last year to one year in prison for his role in a $60 million bond fraud involving various clients. At least three previously planned dispositions were canceled by Archer for personal reasons.

“Joe Biden lied to the American people when he said he knew nothing about his son’s business dealings,” committee chairman Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., said in a statement on Monday. “Evidence continues to be revealed that Joe Biden was very much involved in his family’s corrupt influence peddling schemes and he likely benefited financially. This includes deals with a corrupt Ukrainian oligarch and a CCP-linked energy company that generated millions for the Bidens and undermined American interests.”

Comer added, “It certainly appears that Joe Biden and his family put themselves first and Americans last, but corporate media and the Justice Department continue to cover up for the Bidens. The Oversight Committee will continue to follow the facts to provide the transparency and accountability that the American people demand and deserve. We look forward to speaking soon with Devon Archer about Joe Biden’s involvement in his family’s business affairs.”

Devine, also the author of “Laptop from Hell,” reported Archer is expected to testify on specific examples of the elder Biden getting involved in his son’s business deals, including an evening meeting in Dubai on Friday, Dec. 4, 2015, which ultimately saw Hunter Biden meeting with Ukrainian energy company Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky and calling his dad during their conversation. At the time, Burisma was paying Hunter $83,000 a month to serve as a director, Devine reported.

GOP RIPS HUNTER’S ‘SWEETHEART’ PLEA DEAL ON TAX AND GUN CRIMES, ZERO IN ON JOE BIDEN

According to Devine, Archer, who was also a director, is expected to testify that the call between Joe, Hunter and Hunter’s business partners came after he and Hunter had dinner with the Burisma board at the Burj Al Arab Hotel. Archer and Hunter reportedly left the meeting and traveled to the Four Seasons Resort Dubai at Jumeirah Beach when Vadym Pozharskyi, a senior Burisma executive, called them and said Zlochevsky needed to urgently speak with Hunter. The two Ukrainians then reportedly joined Hunter and Archer at the Four Seasons, where Pozharskyi specifically asked Hunter, “Can you ring your dad?”

According to Devine, Archer is expected to testify that Hunter called his father, who was in Washington, D.C., at the time, and introduced the Ukrainians by their first names. Then the younger Biden emphasized that the Burisma executives “need our support.” Then-Vice President Biden acknowledged the Ukrainians, as he did in other calls with Hunter’s business partners, but kept the conversation brief, Archer is expected to testify.

Devine reported that committee members are likely to ask Archer about the context surrounding that meeting as three days after that conversation, on Dec. 9, 2015, then-Vice President Biden, who was former President Obama’s point man for Ukrainian issues, flew to Kyiv to address the Ukrainian parliament. At the time, Zlochevsky was being investigated by Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin for corruption and, just two months later, Shokin seized four of Zlochevsky’s houses in Kyiv, two plots of land and a Rolls-Royce, Devine reported.

A month after the seizure, then-Vice President Biden threatened to withhold $1 billion in U.S. aid to Ukraine unless Shokin was fired. Then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko promptly fired Shokin.

OBAMA-ERA EMAILS REVEAL HUNTER’S EXTENSIVE TIES TO NEARLY A DOZEN SENIOR-LEVEL BIDEN ADMIN AIDES

Biden later bragged to the Council on Foreign Relations during an event in January 2018, saying, “I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, he got fired.”

Members of the House Oversight Committee are expected to ask Archer about the timing of the firing as Shokin was also investigating Burisma at the time.

The New York Post previously reported an email sent on Nov. 2, 2015 that shows Pozharskyi was ratcheting up pressure on Hunter and Archer to use their influence to “close down” Shokin’s investigation into Burisma.

President Biden has repeatedly defended the firing as pointing back to Poroshenko, who said Shokin was corrupt and was slow walking efforts to clear corruption in the prosecutor’s office. Biden and the U.S. were also not the only entities advocating for Shokin to be removed. According to a Congressional Research Service report published in Jan. 2017, International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde threatened to withhold $40 billion unless Ukraine undertook “a substantial new effort” to clear corruption in the government. The CRS report said Shokin submitted his resignation in February 2016 and was subsequently removed.

Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin was investigating Burisma before he resigned in Feb. 2016. (GENYA SAVILOV/AFP via Getty Images)

However, Just last week, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released an FBI document describing an allegation that Zlochevsky told an FBI informant he paid a $10 million bribe to Joe and Hunter Biden in 2016 “to ensure Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin was fired.” The FBI document, known as an FD-1023, shows Zlochevsky calling Joe Biden “the big guy.” Archer is expected to testify the “big guy” was a title other people in Biden’s circle used to refer to the elder Biden.

According to Devine, Hunter Biden’s former business partner in Los Angeles, Tony Bobulinski, also met with Hunter and Joe. In an email sent to Hunter, Bobulinski refers to then-Vice President Biden as “the big guy.”

Archer also is expected to tell the committee about other instances — as many as two dozen times in Archer’s presence — where Hunter called his father and put him on speaker to impress prospective investors, Devine reported.

REPUBLICAN CALLS TO IMPEACH BIDEN GROW FOLLOWING RELEASE OF FBI DOCUMENT DETAILING BRIBERY ALLEGATIONS

His testimony is expected to include information about dinners Hunter organized, so his father could meet his foreign business partners, Devine wrote. A Fox News Digital review found that Biden personally met with several of Hunter’s business associates from the U.S., Mexico, Ukraine, China and Kazakhstan over the course of his vice presidency. Joe Biden met with two of Hunter’s since-dissolved investment fund partners, former Colombia President Andrés Pastrana Arango and Eric Schwerin, at the Naval Observatory — the official residence of the vice president — on March 2, 2012, the New York Post reported.

Biden, Poroshenko — Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, right, hosted then-Vice President Joe Biden for official talks in Kyiv, Ukraine, Jan. 16, 2017. (Vitaliy Holovin/Corbis via Getty images)

According to emails reviewed by Fox News Digital, the elder Biden also met with two of Hunter’s Mexican business associates, Miguel Aleman Velasco and Miguel Aleman Magnani, when they visited the West Wing on Feb. 26, 2014. Joe and Hunter Biden also gave Velasco and Magnani a tour of the White House Brady Press Briefing room.

Emails reviewed by Fox News Digital, also showed Hunter arranged a video conference with his father and Carlos Slim, a Mexican billionaire with whom Hunter was seeking to do business with at the time, on Oct. 30, 2015.

Joe, Hunter, and Hunter’s business partner Jeff Cooper hosted another meeting at the Naval Observatory, located at Number One Observatory Circle in Washington D.C., for Slim, Velasco and Magnani on Nov. 19, 2015. At the time, Hunter and Cooper were interested in investing in a Mexican energy company with the business executives, the Daily Mail reported.

SEAN HANNITY: THIS IS THE SINGLE BIGGEST ABUSE OF POWER SCANDAL IN MODERN AMERICAN HISTORY

In February 2016, Hunter and Cooper flew on Air Force 2 to Mexico City, where Hunter wrote an email to Magnani that he would be personally attending a meeting between Joe and then-Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. In the same email, Hunter said Magnani had not spoken to him “for months” despite Hunter delivering “on every single thing you’ve ever asked,” which included bringing guests to meet his father.

“I have brought every single person you have ever asked me to bring to the F’ing White House and the Vice President’s house and the inauguration and then you go completely silent,” Hunter wrote in the email. “I don’t know what it is that I did but I’d like to know why I’ve delivered on every single thing you’ve ever asked – and you make me feel like I’ve done something to offend you.”

Hunter, Joe Biden — Hunter Biden’s business associates thanked him for introducing them to his father Vice President Joe Biden in emails found on the younger Biden’s laptop. (Kris Connor/WireImage)

Joe Biden also attended a dinner with Hunter’s business associates from Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Russia at the Georgetown restaurant Café Milano in Washington, D.C., on April 16, 2015, emails from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop show. One such email from Hunter to Archer shared a guest list for the dinner, which included Burisma’s Pozharskyi, late Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov and his wife, Russian billionaire Yelena Baturina, who was in business with Hunter’s Rosemont firm. It is not clear if these individuals ultimately attended the dinner.

The day after the 2015 meeting, Pozharskyi emailed Hunter thanking him for introducing him to his father.

Devine reported that Archer is expected to answer questions from the committee about these Café Milano meetings.

A close associate of Archer’s said he believes it is his “civic duty” to testify before the committee, Devine reported.

According to Devine, the associate said Archer has “nothing to hide, no revenge to enact nor anyone to protect other than his family and he feels he has been handcuffed by the absurdly bogus [fraud] case into remaining silent. In a forum where he has immunity he can at least start to speak truth.”

Fox News’ Gillian Turner, Chad Pergram and Jessica Chasmar contributed to this report.

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Crime, Law, Political

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Texas Gov. Abbott to Biden: ‘See You in Court’

By Nicole Wells | Monday, 24 July 2023 02:12 PM EDT

Defying a request from the Department of Justice, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott told President Joe Biden on Monday that he will not be ordering the removal of floating barriers from the Rio Grande River.

“To end the risk that migrants will be harmed crossing the border illegally, you must fully enforce the laws of the United States that prohibit illegal immigration between ports of entry,” Abbott wrote in a letter to Biden after the Justice Department requested last week that he remove the barriers. “In the meantime, Texas will fully utilize its constitutional authority to deal with the crisis you have caused.”

“Texas will see you in court, Mr. President,” he added.

On Thursday, the DOJ said it plans to file a lawsuit against Texas for the placement of the floating barriers in the Rio Grande, according to a letter obtained by CNN and sources familiar with the matter who spoke to the outlet. According to the letter sent to Abbott, the Justice Department set a deadline of 2 p.m. ET on Monday for Texas to commit to removing the floating barriers before legal action would be taken.

Addressing Biden, the Republican governor said he had “asserted Texas’ sovereign interest” in protecting the state’s borders with the marine barriers in his “role as the commander-in-chief of our State’s militia under Article IV, § 7 of the Texas Constitution.”

In response, the White House decried Abbott’s actions as “dangerous and unlawful.”

“Gov. Abbott’s dangerous and unlawful actions are undermining that effective plan and making it hard for the men and women of Border Patrol to do their jobs of securing the border,” White House spokesman Abdullah Hasan told CNN. “The governor’s actions are cruel and putting both migrants and border agents in danger.‘

“If Gov. Abbott truly wanted to drive toward real solutions, he’d be asking his Republican colleagues in Congress, including Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, why they voted against President Biden’s request for record funding for the Department of Homeland Security and why they’re blocking comprehensive immigration reform and border security measures to finally fix our broken immigration system,” he said.

The DOJ’s threat of legal action is based on a clause in the Rivers and Harbors Act that “prohibits the creation of any obstruction to the navigable capacity of waters of the United States, and further prohibits building any structure in such waters without authorization from the United States Army Corps of Engineers.”

Texas is already facing a lawsuit brought by the owner of a Texas canoe and kayaking company. That suit was filed the same day that Texas began deploying buoys for the floating barrier. It lists the state of Texas and Abbott, as well as the Texas National Guard and Texas Department of Public Safety, according to CNN.

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Loper-Bright-AAF Download

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‘NEVER WHAT FOUNDERS INTENDED’: Supreme Court Should Strike Down Chevron Deference, Conservatives Say

By: Tyler O’Neil / @Tyler2ONeil / July 24, 2023

A bearded man holds a lobster on a fishing vessel — Eleven conservative groups filed an amicus brief supporting fishermen who are challenging Chevron deference in a Supreme Court case. Pictured: Joe Dean, an Iraq war combat veteran, works on his family’s lobster boat on Aug. 7, 2021, outside the fishing village of Stonington, Conn. (Photo: Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty Images)

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—A conservative nonprofit launched by former Vice President Mike Pence is representing 11 conservative groups in supporting fishermen challenging the extensive power of the federal bureaucracy.

Advancing American Freedom, which plays no role in Pence’s 2024 presidential campaign, filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court case Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which the court will revisit the longstanding precedent of Chevron deference. The group exclusively gave The Daily Signal a copy of the brief.

In Chevron v. National Resources Defense Council (1984), the Supreme Court held that whenever a law is ambiguous, a federal agency has the authority to interpret the scope and content of that ambiguity to achieve its ends, so long as the interpretation is “reasonable.” This precedent granted executive agencies tremendous power to effectively rewrite the law, critics like Advancing American Freedom claim.

“The Left has used Chevron Deference to grow the administrative state and circumvent the approval of Congress to push their own agenda,” J. Marc Wheat, Advancing American Freedom’s general counsel, told The Daily Signal. “This is never what the Founders intended; unelected bureaucrats at various agencies do not have the power to legislate and we hope that the Supreme Court checks the Chevron Deference once and for all.”

In Loper Bright, fishermen are challenging the National Marine Fisheries Service—represented by Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. Federal law forces fishermen to carry inspectors aboard their vessels. A new Fisheries Service rule forces the fishermen to pay the salaries of these federal inspectors. The federal law requiring the inspections does not stipulate that fishermen must pay inspectors’ salaries, but the Fisheries Service insists that it has the power to demand payment under Chevron.

A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit sided with the Fisheries Service in August 2022, noting that the statute leaves “room for agency discretion.” Yet Judge Justin Walker dissented.

“Did Congress authorize the National Marine Fisheries Service to make herring fishermen in the Atlantic pay the wages of federal monitors who inspect them at sea?” he asks in his dissent. “Congress unambiguously did not.”

“Fishing is a hard way to earn a living,” he notes. While “Congress can make profitable fishing even harder by forcing fishermen to spend a fifth of their revenue on the wages of federal monitors embedded by regulation onto their ships,” it has not done so. “Until Congress does that, the Fisheries Service cannot.”

Advancing American Freedom filed the amicus brief on Monday, representing itself and ten other conservative organizations. Eagle Forum, the National Center for Public Policy Research, Project 21 Black Leadership Network, Students for Life of America, and Young America’s Foundation joined the brief. The brief begins by quoting the Declaration of Independence, noting that the Founders faulted King George III for erecting “New Offices… to harass” them “and eat out their substance.”

“Here, a New England fishing business is threatened with insolvency because a Federal agency seeks to swarm the industry with bureaucrats to consume the proceeds of some 20% of the daily catch,” the petitioners write. “Bureaucracies that have grown smug and fat through Chevron deference should reacquaint themselves with their country’s history.”

“This case presents the question of Chevron deference dead on without any need to tack, offering an excellent opportunity to abandon this sinking ship and to offer lower courts a more seaworthy vessel for judicial review,” the petitioners write.

Conservative Supreme Court justices have criticized Chevron deference in recent years. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in his concurrence in Michigan v. EPA (2015) that Chevron “wrests from Courts the ultimate interpretative authority ‘to say what the law is,’ and hands it over to” the executive branch. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote last fall that the court should acknowledge “that Chevron did not undo, and could not have undone, the judicial duty to provide an independent judgment of the law’s meaning.”

Federal agencies have used Chevron deference to justify many controversial policies.

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year, President Joe Biden directed his administration to “protect and expand access to abortion care.” Following the prompting of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued guidance claiming to find an abortion mandate in a law that had never been interpreted as mandating abortion.

The federal agency interpreted the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, which requires health care providers to provide “stabilizing treatment” in certain circumstances, as mandating abortion. If a health care provider determines that abortion is necessary to protect the mother’s life, he or she must either perform the abortion or refer the woman to a medical facility that would perform it, regardless of the relevant state law.

Advancing American Freedom, representing 25 other conservative and pro-life groups, filed an amicus brief challenging this interpretation of the law. The brief argues that this interpretation “would expand the meaning of the 1986 statute to include abortions as a form of treatment and would illegally overwrite legitimate state laws designed to protect women and the unborn.”

As in Loper Bright, Advancing American Freedom urges the Supreme Court to overturn Chevron.

Tyler O’Neil @Tyler2ONeil

Tyler O’Neil is managing editor of The Daily Signal and the author of “Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center.”

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SUMMING UP THE WEEK OF JULY 21, 2023

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Top Democrat Jeffries Refuses to Defend Right of Congress to Pass Laws After Environmental Activists Take Other Side

BY: MOLLIE HEMINGWAY | JULY 21, 2023

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MOLLIE HEMINGWAY

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That’s why the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group voted on an amicus brief backing Congress’ own legislation and the right of Congress to pass legislation.

“The jobs at stake are the exact type of jobs – blue collar jobs for skilled workers that provide good wages, health coverage, retirement security, and funding for training of current workers and new entrants to the industry – that are so badly needed in today’s economy,” the union wrote in its brief.

When Clark whipped for the bill she now refuses to defend, she praised Biden for “standing with our veterans, seniors, and working families” during the negotiations.

Neither Jeffries nor Clark responded to The Federalist’s request for comment.

Tristan Justice contributed to this reporting.

Mollie Ziegler Hemingway is the Editor-in-Chief of The Federalist. She is Senior Journalism Fellow at Hillsdale College and a Fox News contributor. She is the co-author of Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court. She is the author of “Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections.” Reach her at mzhemingway@thefederalist.com

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MEXICO’S AMLO INTENSIFIES ANTI-GOP MEDDLING WITH NEW ATTACK ON TEXAS GOV ABBOTT

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DOJ to sue Texas over floating border barrier; Abbott says ‘see you in court’

Construction of the barrier in the Rio Grande began this month

By Adam Shaw | Fox News | Published July 21, 2023 2:53pm EDT

The Department of Justice says it intends to sue Texas Gov. Greg Abbott over the use of a floating buoy border barrier to stop illegal immigration into the state — a move that immediately drew a fiery response from the Republican governor.

“The State of Texas’s actions violate federal law, raise humanitarian concerns, present serious risks to public safety and the environment, and may interfere with the federal government’s ability to carry out its official duties,” the DOJ said in a letter to Abbott, first reported by the Houston Chronicle.

Abbott announced the barrier, consisting of orange buoys and intended to discourage migrants from crossing the Rio Grande, in June and began installing it this month. It is part of Operation Lone Star, a multifaceted operation to tackle the border crisis amid what Republicans say is a vacuum of leadership from the federal government.

But the move had angered Mexico and the U.S. federal government, as well as immigration activists, who had said the move to defend Texas’ sovereignty was illegal and inhumane.

Texas officials had said that the latest plan will discourage people from attempting to cross the treacherous river. It is expected to take about two weeks to set up the buoys.

“Anytime they get in that water, it’s a risk to the migrants. This is the deterrent from even coming in the water,” Texas Department of Public Safety director Steve McCraw said last month.

But the DOJ also cited humanitarian concerns in opposing it, as well as other risks.

Texas floating border barrier — Migrants approach the site where workers are assembling large buoys used as a border barrier along the banks of the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass, Texas. (AP/Eric Gay)

“This floating barrier poses a risk to navigation, as well as public safety, in the Rio Grande River, and it presents humanitarian concerns,” the DOJ letter said, according to the Chronicle. “Thus, we intend to seek appropriate legal remedies, which may include seeking injunctive relief requiring the removal of obstructions or other structures in the Rio Grande River.”

The letter sets a July 24 deadline for a response from Abbott.

ABBOTT MOVES AHEAD WITH FLOATING BORDER BARRIERS ON RIO GRANDE DESPITE LIBERAL OUTRAGE

Abbott responded on Twitter to the letter, saying that Texas “has the sovereign authority to defend our border, under the U.S. Constitution and the Texas Constitution. We have sent the Biden Administration numerous letters detailing our authority, including the one I hand-delivered to President Biden earlier this year.”

Abbott has feuded with the Biden administration repeatedly about the border, with the administration accusing him of inhumane actions and with Abbott accusing the administration of exacerbating the migrant crisis.

Texas is stepping up to address this crisis.

We will continue to deploy every strategy to protect Texans and Americans — and the migrants risking their lives.

We will see you in court, Mr. President.
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) July 21, 2023

“The tragic humanitarian crisis on the border was created because of Biden’s refusal to secure the border. His open border policies encourage migrants to risk their lives crossing illegally through the Rio Grande, instead of safely and legally over a bridge,” Abbott said Friday.

OVERWHELMING MAJORITY OF AMERICANS SAY BORDER IS IN CRISIS OR ‘MAJOR PROBLEM’: POLL

“Texas is stepping up to address this crisis. We will continue to deploy every strategy to protect Texans and Americans — and the migrants risking their lives,” he said. “We will see you in court, Mr. President.”

The administration has slammed Abbott’s unilateral efforts to tackle the border crisis now into its third year. Abbott has restarted border wall construction, set up razor wire and has bussed migrants to “sanctuary” cities like Washington, D.C., and New York City.

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An administration official told Fox on Friday that Abbott is endangering the lives of migrants and agents with his actions — pointing to reports of drownings and broken limbs, as well as injuries from razor wire.

“The Governor’s actions are preventing Border Patrol agents from accessing the river, patrolling the area, and arresting individuals who attempt to enter the country unlawfully,” the official said. “They are forcing agents to cut through multiple layers of concertina wire when responding to medical emergencies.”

The official also pointed to June’s border numbers, which show a sharp drop in encounters at the border overall to numbers not seen since February 2021.

“Gov. Abbott is undermining the President’s effective border enforcement plan, which has brought unlawful border crossings down to the lowest levels in over two years,” the official said.

Meanwhile, the border barrier also brought rebuke from Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Mexico has issued a complaint over the barrier, and Lopez Obrador used the barriers to meddle in U.S. elections and tell Hispanics not to vote for Abbott or Republicans who support stronger border measures.

“We don’t have to do much, just tell our compatriots not to vote for the governor of Texas or for lawmakers of the Republican Party who support these measures,” he said.

Tell Compatriots not to vote for Republicans??????? They’re not suppose to vote AT ALL! So, let me get this straight. The President of Mexico is instructing his own people to not only enter our country illegally, but also to VOTE? What’s wrong with this picture?

Adam Shaw is a politics reporter for Fox News Digital, primarily covering immigration and border security. He can be reached at adam.shaw2@fox.com or on Twitter .

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Law, Political

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Andrew McCarthy Op-ed: IRS whistleblowers reveal who’s really to blame for shocking Biden corruption

Biden corruption case relies on veteran IRS agents whose testimony holds up against Hill Democrats

Andrew McCarthy | Fox News | Published July 21, 2023 4:00am EDT

In Wednesday’s marathon House hearing, Oversight Committee Democrats ran into a buzzsaw: two IRS whistleblower agents — Gary Shapley, the supervisor on the investigation who went public a few weeks ago, and Joseph Ziegler, the lead investigator on the case, who was publicly identified for the first time at the hearing.

In gory detail, the agents outlined how President Biden’s Justice Department quashed the Biden corruption investigation from within while publicly pretending that it was being conducted with independence and integrity.

When committee Democrats tried to poke holes in the testimony, they ended up on the receiving end of what they hadn’t bargained for: fusillades of fact — damning data about the millions raked in by the president’s son and family members from apparatchiks of corrupt and anti-American regimes.

WHITE HOUSE MOCKS HUNTER BIDEN HEARINGS AS ‘WASTE OF TIME,’ SPARS WITH HOUSE GOP ON TWITTER

The agents’ stellar performance did not surprise anyone who has ever participated in a criminal tax investigation. In nearly 20 years as a prosecutor, I was — as the lawyer on my cases — better versed in the criminal law applicable to, say, racketeering, international terrorism, money-laundering, admissibility of evidence, and standards of proof, than the agents from the FBI and other agencies with whom I worked, a sizable majority of whom were non-lawyers. Tax enforcement was an exception.

IRS whistleblowers Congress — Supervisory IRS Special Agent Gary Shapley, left, and IRS Criminal Investigator Joseph Ziegler are sworn in as they testify during a House Oversight Committee hearing related to the Justice Department’s investigation of Hunter Biden on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

The tax code is an esoteric area of the law. Experienced investigators know a lot more about it than most prosecutors — I learned a lot more from my IRS agents than they learned from me. In fact, tax enforcement is sufficiently abstruse that prosecutors from around the country need approval from the Justice Department’s Tax Division in Washington to file charges. In almost all other cases, they may indict without main Justice’s supervision.

In this very specialized area, it turns out that the very best tax-enforcement agents were assigned to the Biden case. Shapley and Ziegler have combined decades of education and experience in tax law and financial bookkeeping practices. They have been involved in some of the most significant tax investigations, including international schemes, ever conducted in the U.S. They held critical positions and were trusted to run big cases because they knew their stuff. And because they’ve been investigators for such a long time, they know how to testify — how not to get intimidated (especially when you know much more than the people asking the questions do) and how not to accept the premise of questions loaded with inaccuracies and misimpressions.

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It showed. The ranking Democrat on the panel, and thus the first in the minority to ask questions was Jamie Raskin, of Maryland, a tireless progressive partisan and former law professor who never tires of posing as a legal titan. But his questions were rife with disinformation and the witnesses called him on it.

He began, for example, trying to make the point that prosecutors and agents often disagree on whether felony charges ought to be brought. Rather than simply accept that proposition, which is true, Shapley explained why it is irrelevant — in this instance, the case agents and line prosecutors agreed that felony charges were appropriate; it was higher-ups in the Justice Department who slammed the brakes on the case.

On this point, it is vital that committee Republicans keep their eye on the ball.

Ohio Republican Jim Jordan, who besides being on yesterday’s panel is chairman of the Judiciary Committee with oversight over DOJ, took pains at the hearing to point out that, while the whistleblowers have been completely consistent, Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss has repeatedly changed his story.

Joe Ziegler, Internal Revenue Service Whistleblower X, testifies before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability on Capitol Hill on Wednesday. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

The agents stress that they were being ordered by prosecutors not to follow leads that could have garnered evidence against Joe Biden. Despite all the obstacles, they managed to make a strong case against Hunter Biden, but they couldn’t get it charged because Weiss told them he was not the ultimate decisionmaker — he was being stymied by the Biden Justice Department. But Attorney General Merrick Garland has publicly claimed that Weiss was in charge and was assured that he would have all the authority he needed to bring any charges in any jurisdiction — all he needed to do was ask.

Initially, Weiss backed that story. But then, when Shapley became the first of the whistleblowers to go public, Weiss changed his tune, struggling to back Garland while not contradicting Shapley, whose account is richly corroborated.

First Weiss said he had the authority. Then he conceded that he lacked authority to file charges outside his district of Delaware (i.e., in districts where Hunter had allegedy committed tax crimes), but vaporously added that he had consulted with the Justice Department about that problem. Then he claimed that he had not asked to be designated a special counsel, which would have given him authority to file charges anywhere.

Meantime, Shapley’s account was never shaken: Weiss had told a room full of agents that the Justice Department had refused to grant him special counsel authority, and that he was being blocked from filing felony tax charges against Hunter by Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys in Washington, D.C., and California.

Jordan is right that Weiss is a weasel. But Weiss is the wrong target here. He is just the fall-guy for Garland. Contrary to what the attorney general would have the country to believe, it was not Weiss’s job to ask for special counsel authority. It was Garland’s duty to appoint a special counsel the moment he realized there was a conflict of interest that prevented DOJ from investigating in the normal course. There could be no more profound conflict than the Biden Justice Department’s being in the position of investigating President Biden’s son and other family members in an international corruption probe in which the president himself is deeply implicated.

Biden’s attorney general did not appoint a special counsel because he made protecting his boss, the president, his highest priority. That is why the case the whistleblowers so compellingly described at the hearing was sabotaged. The culprit here is not Weiss. It’s Garland.

Andrew C. McCarthy is a senior fellow at the National Review Institute and a contributing editor of National Review. Follow him on Twitter @andrewcmccarthy

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Victor Davis Hanson Op-ed: The Biden Family Caricatures

Victor Davis Hanson / @VDHanson / July 21, 2023

From “nibbling” on a young girl in Helsinki, Finland, to this awkward hug exchange June 15 with actress and film director Eva Longoria on the South Lawn of the White House, President Joe Biden has earned a bad reputation for his behavior with girls and women. (Photo: Alex Wong/ Getty Images)

The Biden first family seems determined to confirm every stereotype of their antisocial behavior — to the point of dysfunctionality. During the 2020 campaign, at least eight women alleged that then-presidential candidate Joe Biden in the past had serially and improperly touched, kissed or grabbed them.

One, Tara Reade, alleged she was sexually assaulted by Biden, who denied the charge. Yet Biden himself finally was forced to apologize for some of his behavior. Or as he said at the time, “I get it.” He claimed that he would no longer improperly invade the “private space” of women and had meant no harm. But Biden’s obnoxious conduct extended well beyond the eight accusers.

Women as diverse as former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and Biden’s own daughter-in-law Kathleen Buhle have both alleged in their memoirs that Biden made them feel uncomfortable through his intrusive touching and embraces. On several occasions, Biden developed a strange tic of becoming too physical with young girls. He habitually attempted to hug them while blowing in their hair.

His daughter Ashley wrote in her diary that she feared her past adolescent showers with her father had been inappropriate. Even as president, Biden has weirdly called out young girls in his audiences to note their attractiveness. On one occasion, the president interrupted his speech to address a female acquaintance — enlightening the crowd that, “We go back a long way. She was 12 and I was 30, but anyway … .”

As a result, Biden has likely been warned repeatedly to forgo intimate references to young women.

He has no doubt also been advised by his handlers to stop all close, supposedly innocent contact with young girls and children — if for no other reason than to prevent his political opponents from charging that Joe is “creepy,” “perverse,” or “sick.” And yet like some addict, Biden cannot stop — regardless of the eerie image he projects around the world.

Last week, the president jumped the proverbial shark by embracing a young child in a crowd while on the tarmac of the Helsinki, Finland, airport. In his strangest act yet, Biden kept moving his mouth near the face of the young girl. He was apparently trying to nibble the youngster, almost in turkey-gobbling fashion.

She recoiled.

No matter. Biden continued at her shoulder.

Again, she flinched.

Biden then reverted to form, and sought with a second try to smell her hair and nestle closer.

Had any other major politician in the age of #MeToo committed such an unnerving stunt, he would likely have been ostracized by colleagues and mercilessly hammered by the media. Not in Biden’s case. The apparent media subtext was that it was either just “Old Joe” trying to be too friendly, or a symptom of his cognitive decline and thus not attributable to any sinister urge.

Senescence now provides paradoxical cover for Biden’s creepiness — a newfound exemption for his old boorish behavior.

Also, during the president’s latest antics, cocaine was found in the West Wing of the White House. All the White House spokespeople had to do was to reassure the public that the drugs most certainly did not belong to first son Hunter Biden — despite his being a frequent guest resident of the White House and a former crack-cocaine addict. Instead, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre dismissed reporters for requesting such clarification.

Then the official narrative went through several contortions as to where and how the bag of cocaine was found. The disinformation only added suspicion that the White House either would not or could not be transparent about the discovery of illicit drugs abandoned at the very nexus of American governance. Requests for clarity were understandable, not just because Hunter has had a long history of drug addiction. He also has a troubling habit of leaving a public trail of evidence of his drug use. Hunter forgot his crack pipe in a rental car. He abandoned his laptop that contained evidence of his own felonious behavior. And his unlawfully registered handgun turned up in a dumpster near a school.

In sum, the president and his son both have quite disturbing and all-too-public bad habits. Americans in response assume both would be careful not to offer the tiniest shred of evidence that their pathologies continue.

White House handlers should keep the president from even getting near small children and young women. And they should be just as unambiguous that Hunter Biden has never, and would never, even get too close to illicit drugs while inside the White House. Sadly they can do neither.

These suspicions are force multipliers of the mounting evidence of Biden family corruption. They feed narratives of heartlessness about disowning a granddaughter born out of wedlock. And they add to worries of presidential senility.

The result is the caricature of a first family, one that is utterly dysfunctional — and increasingly detrimental to the country at large.

The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.

COMMENTARY BY Victor Davis Hanson @VDHanson

Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and author of the book “The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won.” You can reach him by e-mailing authorvdh@gmail.com.

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Family, Opinion, Political

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6 Ridiculous Narratives Democrats Tried In Response To IRS Whistleblowers’ Damning Biden Testimony

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 20, 2023

Author Margot Cleveland profile

MARGOT CLEVELAND

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IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler’s testimony Wednesday before the House Oversight Committee about the political interference in the Biden investigation proved so unimpeachable that Democrats resorted to a shotgun attack on everything except the facts. Here are the top six themes the left hammered during the hearing.

1. Orange Man — and His Family And Associates — Bad

Wednesday’s hearing began promptly at 1:00 with opening statements by Republican Chair James Comer and Democrat Ranking Member Jamie Raskin. From the get-go Raskin set one theme Democrats would continue to peddle over the course of the next six hours: Donald Trump is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad man.

Trump was impeached and is under indictment. His daughter was under investigation, and her husband sold out to the Saudis. Trump’s cronies — Manafort, Stone, Flynn, and Cohen — committed crimes, and Trump pardoned them. On and on they went, pointing to Trump to turn the focus from the whistleblowers’ testimony: that the evidence indicates Hunter Biden committed felonies and now-President Joe Biden may have been complicit in the illegality. Democrats likewise used this misdirection to avoid confronting the overwhelming evidence that the DOJ and FBI interfered in the investigation and protected the Biden family.

2. How Dare Republicans Say ‘Two-Tier Justice System’

A second prevalent tactic on display during Wednesday’s hearing was Democrats feigning outrage over Republicans’ complaints of a “two-tier justice system.”

According to Democrats on the committee, that phrase belongs to the civil rights movement and may only be invoked to condemn systemic racism. Some representatives ran so hard with this theme that they spent their allocated time highlighting decades-old hate crimes rather than asking the IRS whistleblowers questions concerning their testimony.

One representative even quizzed Shapley on his knowledge of the racial disparity seen in the prosecution of tax cases. Shapley said he was unaware of the statistic. The Democrat lawmaker then cited the relative percentages for the IRS agent, while remaining oblivious to the fact that Shapley was complaining of favoritism bestowed on the white, privileged Hunter Biden.

3. Never Mind the Whistleblowers, Let’s Talk About Rudy and the Arms Dealer

Democrats also sought to distract from the whistleblowers’ testimony by framing the evidence detailed by the two experienced and well-credentialed IRS agents as flowing from Rudy Giuliani. But as Ziegler testified, he launched the investigation into Hunter Biden after evidence implicating him was discovered pursuant to a separate criminal investigation. None of the evidence Ziegler and Shapley developed came from Giuliani.

Nor did the allegations that Joe and Hunter Biden each received $5 million in bribes from Burisma, as reported by an FBI confidential human source and summarized in the FD-1023, come from Giuliani. The IRS agents never saw the FD-1023 in any event.

House Democrats likewise attempted to minimize the whistleblowers’ testimony by pretending that, beside Giuliani, the only evidence of misconduct came from a witness charged with being an arms dealer, namely Gal Luft. Whether Luft has credible evidence of Biden-family corruption, however, has nothing to do with Ziegler and Shapley’s claims.

4. Merely a Misunderstanding

In their less hysterical moments, the Democrats offered a gentler spin, framing the House’s hearing as much ado about a misunderstanding. It also came down to the whistleblowers not grasping the difference between a special counsel and a special attorney, several Biden apologists suggested.

But as Shapley made clear, he had documented U.S. Attorney David Weiss’s statement — that the DOJ had denied Weiss special counsel authority — soon after Weiss made that representation, and thus while Shapley’s memory was clear. In any event, according to Shapley, Weiss had also said during that meeting on Oct. 7, 2022, that he was not the final decision maker on whether to bring charges against Hunter Biden. That fact makes the distinction between a special counsel and a special attorney irrelevant.

Raskin also suggested Shapley was confused about Weiss’s authority, claiming the Delaware U.S. Attorney made clear in his letters to Congress he had ultimate authority to charge Hunter Biden.

Both whistleblowers decimated that line of argument by highlighting what Weiss actually said, which was that he lacked charging authority outside of Delaware. In fact, if anything, Raskin hurt his cause by highlighting the contradictions between Weiss and Attorney General Merrick Garland’s statements, establishing the necessity for both DOJ bigwigs to testify before Congress to resolve the inconsistencies.

5. Just a Difference of Opinion

A related theme Democrats peddled during Wednesday’s hearing centered on prosecutorial discretion. The left side of the aisle painted the whistleblowers’ testimony as merely a professional disagreement between the IRS agents and Weiss.

But there was no disagreement in opinion, Shapley and Ziegler stressed: Both the IRS and Weiss agreed that Hunter Biden should be charged with multiple felony counts. Weiss, however, lacked the ability to bring charges in D.C., and it was the Biden-appointed U.S. attorney there, as well as in California, that kept the Delaware U.S. attorney from filing criminal felony charges against the president’s son.

Further, that the D.C. and California U.S. attorneys thwarted efforts to bring felony charges against Hunter Biden proved especially rich given the Democrats continued references throughout the hearing to Weiss being Trump’s “hand-picked U.S. attorney.” Beyond the obvious point that being a Trump appointee establishes nothing, under the Democrats’ standard, the involvement of the Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys removes this case from the “difference of opinion” scenario.

6. There’s No Evidence, I Tell You, No Evidence

A sixth narrative Democrats pushed during the Oversight hearing was that there’s no evidence of misconduct or favoritism. But to paraphrase Shapley’s line, just repeating the same lie multiple times doesn’t make it true. And to say there’s no evidence of misconduct or favoritism is a whopper of a lie.

The evidence of misconduct by the Bidens exists in the form of texts, emails, chat messages, bank records, suspicious activity reports, the FD-1023 report, and statements made by former business partners such as Tony Bobulinski. The public record is also replete with evidence of DOJ and FBI favoritism, including the extensive testimony of these two whistleblowers, parts of which a third whistleblower has already corroborated.

The Democrats may not like the evidence or want to talk about it, but to say none exists is about as believable as the Secret Service’s claim that they cannot determine whose cocaine was recovered in the White House.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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FBI Told Twitter Hunter Biden Laptop Was Real When New York Post Story Broke, Then Hid Behind Big Tech Censors’ ‘Disinfo’ Smear

BY: JORDAN BOYD | JULY 20, 2023

Author Jordan Boyd profile

JORDAN BOYD

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The FBI, which had known Hunter Biden’s laptop was authentic since 2019, admitted to Twitter that it was real on the day the New York Post published its reporting on the laptop — but then switched its narrative to “no further comment” and refused to acknowledge the laptop’s veracity to any other Big Tech companies ahead of the 2020 election, according to July 17 testimony from Laura Dehmlow, the section chief of the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force (FITF).

In a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray obtained by The Federalist, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Jim Jordan outlined how “Dehmlow revealed that the same FBI personnel who were warning social media companies about a potential Russian ‘hack and leak’ operation in the run-up to the 2020 election knew that the laptop belonging to Hunter Biden was not Russian disinformation.” Dehmlow also testified that previous FITF Section Chief Bradley Benavides and his subordinates who were tasked with sniffing out Russian influence “knew that Hunter Biden’s laptop was real.”

And when directly asked by Twitter employees about the laptop’s legitimacy in a meeting on the day the New York Post’s bombshell story was published, an FBI analyst confirmed the laptop’s legitimacy — before an FBI lawyer interrupted to declare the agency had “no further comment.”

“Somebody from Twitter essentially asked whether the laptop was real. And one of the FBI folks who was on the call did confirm that, ‘yes, it was,’ before another participant jumped in and said, ‘no further comment,’” Dehmlow recalled in her testimony.

Later that same day, the FBI told Facebook in a meeting that it had “no comment” on the laptop.

Even though it received quick confirmation about the laptop’s legitimacy, Twitter joined Facebook in launching a censorship campaign that affected how a substantial number of Americans voted in the 2020 election. Anyone on Twitter who tried to share the link was barred from doing so. The New York Post was punished with a suspended account that stayed locked for weeks. Facebook, similarly, reduced the story’s reach.

Despite participating in more than two dozen intricate information-sharing meetings and, as Missouri v. Biden later revealed, in censorship collusion with Silicon Valley giants in the months leading up to the 2020 election, the FBI “made the institutional decision to refuse to answer direct questions from social media companies about the laptop’s authenticity” after shutting down the analyst who initially admitted to Twitter that it was real.

Meanwhile, around the time the Post story dropped, the FBI was one of the key agencies — aided by corporate media and the Biden campaign — that primed Big Tech to believe that news detailing Biden family corruption based on data obtained from Hunter’s laptop was Russian disinformation designed to manipulate the election.

“In one meeting on October 7, 2020 — just one week before the New York Post article on the Hunter Biden laptop was published — the agenda explicitly listed “Hack/Leak Concerns” as an item of discussion,” Jordan wrote.

E-mail from Facebook employee to Matthew Masterson and Brian Scully, on file with Judiciary Committee.

The Federalist reported in August 2021 that the FBI was in possession of Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop as early as December 2019. In his testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee, IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley further confirmed that the FBI verified the authenticity of the laptop as early as November 2019 “by matching the device number against Hunter Biden’s Apple iCloud ID.”

FBI individuals quibbled about “what information” they should “reveal to social media companies when asked in upcoming meetings” to explain the laptop, Jordan said. Ultimately, the agency decided to stick to the “no comment” narrative until well after the 2020 election was over.

“Put simply, after the FBI conditioned social media companies to believe that the laptop was the product of a hack-and-dump operation, the Bureau stopped its information sharing, allowing social media companies to conclude that the New York Post story was Russian disinformation,” Jordan explained.

Jordan noted that a federal judge’s recent memorandum ruling in Missouri v. Biden proved this censorship directly inhibited “millions of Americans from having a clear understanding about a salient issue in the 2020 presidential election.”

If Hunter’s laptop was truly the product of a Russian disinformation campaign as so many suggested, the FBI’s FITF had the authority to “share the specific details” of that propaganda war, Dehmlow said.

“Instead, the refusal of FBI officials — the very officials who knew the laptop was real — to verify the authenticity of the laptop allowed widespread censorship about an otherwise accurate news story,” Jordan concluded.

Jordan demanded on behalf of his committee that Wray name those in the FBI’s FITF who knew of the laptop’s authenticity but still advocated for the agency to stay quiet until after the election. He also asked for all documents, records, and communications related to the FBI’s meetings with Silicon Valley censors beginning in 2017 to be handed over by Aug. 3. Lastly, Jordan requested that all the FBI employees involved in this issue be available for transcribed interviews with the committee.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

BIDEN FAMILY CORRUPTION, BIG TECH, CENSORSHIP, COLLUSION, FACEBOOK, FBI, HUNTER BIDEN, HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP, JIM JORDAN, MISSOURI V. BIDEN, NEW YORK POST, TWITTER,

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Explosive FD-1023 Exposes More Biden Bribery Dirt — And Teases Damning Evidence to Come

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 20, 2023

Author Margot Cleveland profile

MARGOT CLEVELAND

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Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, just released a minimally redacted copy of the FBI’s FD-1023 detailing a confidential human source’s reporting of a criminal scheme involving then-Vice President Joe Biden and the Ukrainian business Burisma. According to the FD-1023 summary, Burisma’s owner specifically referenced the firing of Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin — the same man Biden bragged about Ukraine firing after his threat to withhold aid from the country while he was vice president.

After months of pushing the Justice Department and FBI to explain what investigative procedures they had undertaken in response to evidence implicating then-Vice President Biden in a criminal bribery scheme, Grassley released the unclassified copy of the FD-1023, which documented claims made by the “highly credible” confidential human source (CHS). Grassley had acquired the FD-1023 via legally protected disclosures by Justice Department whistleblowers.

While some of the information included in the FD-1023 has already been revealed by members of the House who previously reviewed the summary of the CHS’s reporting, the public release provides new explosive details related to the firing of Ukrainian prosecutor Shokin.

Among the CHS’s conversations with Burisma’s owner Mykola Zlochevsky, one took place shortly after Joe Biden made his first public statement about Shokin “being corrupt.” At the time, according to the CHS, Shokin was investigating Burisma, and Zlochevsky told the CHS that “Hunter will take care of all of those issues through his dad.”

Then, following Trump’s election in 2016, the CHS spoke again with Zlochevsky, who expressed dissatisfaction with Trump’s victory but noted that “Shokin had already been fired, and no investigation was currently going on…” Zlochevsky’s statement proves significant because Joe Biden had long claimed he pushed for Shokin’s firing because Shokin was not investigating Burisma — which is the exact opposite of the details summarized in the FD-1023.

Beyond putting the already known details in black-and-white for the public to read, such as Zlochevsky’s representation that he had 17 recordings of the Bidens and had never paid the “Big Guy” directly, the release of the FD-1023 is significant for another reason: The American public now knows the many details the FBI could have and should have investigated.

For instance, did Burisma or any other related entity purchase a Texas-based oil and gas company for approximately $20-$30 million during the relevant time period? Were the CHS and his business partner in Kiev in the 2015 and 2016 time period? Did the CHS’s U.S. business partner confirm the details of the meeting? Was the CHS in London during the relevant time in 2019? And did the FBI ever ask the CHS to record his conversations with Zlochevsky or attempt to turn Zlochevsky into an asset?

According to the FD-1023 report, in 2019, the CHS had offered to assist Zlochevsky if he wanted to speak to the U.S. government about the Bidens and what Zlochevsky claimed was their coercion of Burisma to pay the bribes. Did anyone ever ask the CHS to contact Zlochevsky? If not, why not?

The public release of the FD-1023 is significant now for a third reason: It comes on the heels of the IRS whistleblowers’ testimony Wednesday before the House Oversight Committee that suggested the CHS’s reporting corroborates other evidence.

During Wednesday’s hours-long hearing, IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler both told lawmakers they had never seen the FD-1023. Significantly, Ziegler then stated: “There’s things that are contained on that document that could further corroborate other information that we might be having an issue corroborating because it could be regarding a foreign official. So, if we have information regarding that in a document or a witness, we can further corroborate later evidence.”

But because federal law prohibits the discussion of confidential taxpayers’ information, other than through specific procedures, Ziegler did not detail what, if any, information they may have discovered during their investigation into Hunter Biden. Instead, Ziegler said, “if that’s something that we have, we can turn that over to the House Ways and Means Committee.”

This testimony suggests that the IRS’s investigation likely uncovered evidence the FD-1023 corroborated. With that form now public, both Ziegler and Shapley can study it and assess what documentary material, such as wire transfer reports, they uncovered that is now corroborated. However, that evidence will have to go to the House Ways and Means Committee before it is made public.

So much for Democrats’ claim that there is no evidence of Joe Biden’s complicity and corruption.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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EXCLUSIVE: JOE BIDEN ALLEGEDLY PAID $5M BY BURISMA EXECUTIVE AS PART OF A BRIBERY SCHEME, ACCORDING TO FBI DOCUMENT

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Democrats Try to Censor RFK Jr. During Hearing on Censorship

By: Fred Lucas / @FredLucasWH / July 20, 2023

Robert Kennedy Jr., a 2024 presidential hopeful, is sworn in before testifying at the Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing in Washington, D.C., on July 20. (Photo: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images)

House Democrats attempted to prevent President Joe Biden’s Democrat primary rival Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from giving public testimony during a hearing investigating government censorship. Kennedy was among witnesses who testified Thursday to the House Judiciary Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government about collusion between the federal government and Big Tech companies to block speech.

Early on, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., cited House Rule 11, Clause 2, “which Mr. Kennedy is violative of,” she said.

“I move that we move into executive session because Mr. Kennedy has repeatedly made despicable antisemitic and anti-Asian comments as recently as last week,” said Wasserman, whose run as former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee came to a controversial end after Wikileaks emails appeared to by appeaed to show DNC staffers tried to tip the scales against the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and in favor of eventual nominee Hillary Clinton.

House Rule 11, Clause 2 requires any House witness with testimony that would “defame, degrade or incriminate any person,” to be given in closed session, out of public view.

During his testimony, Kennedy insisted his remarks were mischaracterized.

“In my entire life, I have never uttered a phrase that was either racist or antisemitic,” Kennedy told the House panel.

Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., asked to table the Wasserman Schultz motion, and she responded by asking for a roll call vote. All Republicans on the select subcommittee backed Massie, in voting against going into closed session for Kennedy’s testimony. All Democrats voted in favor of Wasserman Schultz.

Wasserman Schultz said it was voting against “allowing a witness to degrade others and to violate the rules and not have his testimony and degradation amplified rather than given in executive session.”

Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., said he was voting, “No to hate speech.”

Last week, Kennedy suggested that COVID-19 could have been a deliberate bioweapon from the Chinese, and said: “COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”

Kennedy, the son of former attorney general and New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, and the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, is challenging Biden for the Democrat presidential nomination

“I was censored, not just by a Democratic administration, I was censored by the Trump administration,” Kennedy said during the House hearing. “I was the first person, as the chairman [Jim Jordan, R-Ohio] pointed out, I was the first person censored by the Biden administration two days after he came into office.”

Massie noted “irony and cognitive dissonance from the other side of the aisle is deafening.”

“This is a hearing on censorship that began with an effort with a formal motion from the other side of the aisle to censor Mr. Kennedy,” Massie said. “They do not want him to speak. Yet that is the topic of this hearing. They have kept him from speaking, the collusion between government and private organizations.”

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Bidens allegedly ‘coerced’ Burisma CEO to pay them millions to help get Ukraine prosecutor fired: FBI form

The FD-1023 form was released Thursday by Sen. Chuck Grassley

By Brooke Singman | Fox News | Published July 20, 2023 12:30pm EDT

Joe Biden and Hunter Biden allegedly “coerced” Burisma CEO Mykola Zlochevsky to pay them millions of dollars in exchange for their help in getting the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the company fired, according to allegations contained in an unclassified FBI document released Thursday by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. Grassley said he released the document, which describes an alleged criminal bribery scheme involving then-Vice President Biden and a Ukrainian business executive, so that the American people can “read this document for themselves without the filter of politicians or bureaucrats.”

President Biden has snapped at reporters who have asked him about alleged corruption involving him and his son, Hunter Biden. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

The document in question is an FBI-generated FD-1023 form, which Grassley acquired via legally protected disclosures by Justice Department whistleblowers, according to the senator’s office.

That FD-1023 — a confidential human source (CHS) reporting document — reflects the FBI’s interview with a “highly credible” confidential source who detailed multiple meetings and conversations he or she had with a top executive of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings over the course of several years starting in 2015. Hunter Biden, at the time, sat on the board of Burisma.

Sen. Chuck Grassley speaks into mircrophone during hearing

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, wants Americans to “read this document for themselves without the filter of politicians or bureaucrats.” (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Fox News Digital has reviewed the document, which includes new information, including the identity of the business executive — Burisma CEO Zlochevsky — and the allegations that he was “coerced” into paying Joe Biden and Hunter Biden millions of dollars to get a Ukrainian prosecutor investigating his firm fired.

In the form, Zlochevsky tells the source he has “many text messages and ‘recordings’ that show he was coerced to make such payments” to the Bidens.

https://static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2023/07/FD-1023_Senator-Grassley_FINAL.pdf

Biden has acknowledged that when he was vice president, he successfully pressured Ukraine to fire prosecutor Viktor Shokin. At the time, Shokin was investigating Burisma Holdings, and at the time, Hunter had a highly lucrative role on the board receiving thousands of dollars per month. The then-vice president threatened to withhold $1 billion of critical U.S. aid if Shokin was not fired.

Biden allies maintain the then-vice president pushed for Shokin’s firing due to concerns the Ukrainian prosecutor went easy on corruption, and say that his firing, at the time, was the policy position of the U.S. and international community.

The unclassified document is dated June 30, 2020, and says the contact with the source was “telephonic.”

The source reported to the FBI that “in late 2015 or 2016, during the Obama/Biden Administration, CHS was first introduced to officials at Ukraine natural gas business Burisma Holdings through [redacted] Oleksandr Ostapenko.” The form reflects that there is an additional FD-1023 detailing information brought by the source dated Jan. 2, 2018.

HOUSE GOP DEMAND TRANSCRIBED INTERVIEWS FROM HUNTER BIDEN PROSECUTOR, DOJ, IRS, SECRET SERVICE OFFICIALS

“CHS and Ostapenko traveled to Ukraine and went to Burisma’s office…the purpose of the meeting was to discuss Burisma’s interest in purchasing a US-based oil and gas business, for purposes of merging it with Burisma for purposes of conducting an IPO in the US,” the form states. “Burisma was willing to purchase a US-based entity for $20-$30 million.”

The form states that the CHS attended that meeting, as well as Burisma’s CFO Vadim Pojarski and Karina Zlochevsky, the daughter of CEO and founder Mykola Zlochevsky.

Hunter Biden, left, and Mykola Zlochevsky (Getty Images)

Fox News Digital has previously reported that Hunter Biden and his business associates had much contact with Pojarskii [Pozharsky] about his role on the board of the company.

“During the meeting Pojarskii asked CHS whether CHS was aware of Burisma’s Board of Directors. CHS replied ‘no,’ and Pojarski advised the board members included: 1) the former president or prime minister of Poland; and 2) Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden.

“Pojarskii said Burisma hired the former president or prime minister of Poland to leverage his contacts in Europe for prospective oil and gas deals,” the form states.

Burisma said they “hired Hunter Biden ‘to protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems.’”

The source asked why Burisma needed his assistance regarding the merger of the U.S.-based company when Biden was on their board, to which Pojarskii replied: “Hunter Biden was not smart, and they wanted to get additional counsel.”

EXCLUSIVE: PERSON ALLEGING BIDEN CRIMINAL BRIBERY SCHEME IS ‘HIGHLY CREDIBLE’ FBI SOURCE USED SINCE OBAMA ADMIN: SOURCE

The form jumps to a meeting the source detailed that took place two months later. The source met with Mykola Zlochevsky in Vienna, Austria, outside a coffee shop, along with Ostapenko.

“CHS recalled this meeting took place around the time Joe Biden made a public statement about (former) Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin being corrupt, and that he should be fired/removed from office,” the form states. “CHS told Zlochevsky that due to Shokin’s investigation into Burisma, which was made public at this time, it would have a substantial negative impact on Burisma’s prospective IPO in the United States.”

“Zlochevsky replied something to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry Hunter will take care of those issues through his dad,” the form states, adding that the source “did not ask any further questions about what that specifically meant.”

Hunter Biden arrives at Fort Lesley J. McNair in Washington, D.C., on July 4, 2023. (Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Zlochevsky went on to say, “Hunter Biden advised Burisma it could raise much more capital if Burisma purchased a larger US-based business that already had a history in the US oil and gas sector.” The source said Zlochevsky mentioned a business in Texas.

“CHS advised Zlochevsky it would be problematic to raise capital in the US given Shokin’s investigation into Burisma as nobody in the US would invest in a company that was the subject of a criminal investigation,” the form states.

DOJ KNEW HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP WAS ‘NOT MANIPULATED,’ CONTAINED ‘RELIABLE EVIDENCE’ IN 2019: WHISTLEBLOWER

“CHS suggested it would be best if Burisma simply litigate the matter in Ukraine, and pay some attorney $50,000,” the form states, but Zlochevsky said Burisma “would likely lose the trial because he could not show that Burisma was innocent.”

“Zlochevsky also laughed at CHS’s number of $50,000 (not because of the small amounts but because the number contained a ‘5’) and said that ‘it costs 5 (million) to pay one Biden, and 5 (million) to another Biden.”

“CHS noted that at this time, it was unclear to CHS whether these alleged payments were already made,” the form states.

Joe Biden's son Hunter's laptop was authenticated by NBC News on May 19

World Food Program USA Board Chairman Hunter Biden and Vice President Joe Biden. (Paul Morigi/Getty Images for World Food Program USA)

But the form states that the source told Zlochevsky that “any such payments to the Bidens would complicate matters, and Burisma should hire ‘some normal US oil and gas advisors’ because the Bidens have no experience with the business sector.”

“Zlochevsky made some comment that although Hunter Biden ‘was stupid, and his [Zlochevsky’s] dog was smarter,’ Zlochevsky needed to keep Hunter Biden [on the board] ‘so everything will be okay,’” the form states.

The source went on to ask “whether Hunter Biden or Joe Biden told Zlochevsky he should retain Hunter.”

“Zlochevsky replied: ‘They both did.’”

The source retired that this was a “mistake,” and that Zlochevsky “should fire Hunter Biden and deal with Shokin’s investigation directly so that the matter” stayed an issue in Ukraine and so that it did not “turn into some international matter,” to which Zlochevsky stressed not to worry and “this thing will go away anyway.”

“CHS replied that, notwithstanding Shokin’s investigation, it was still a bad decision for Burisma to spend $20-30 million to buy a US business, and that CHS didn’t want to be involved with the Biden matter,” the form states.

President Biden and his son Hunter Biden. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images)

“Zlochevsky responded that he appreciated CHS’s advice, but that ‘it’s too late to change his decision.’”

“CHS understood this to mean that Zlochevsky had already paid the Bidens, presumably to ‘deal with Shokin,’” the form states.

“It is remarkable that congressional Republicans, in their eagerness to go after President Biden regardless of the truth, continue to push claims that have been debunked for years and that they themselves have cautioned to take ‘with a grain of salt’ because they could be ‘made up,’” said White House spokesman Ian Sams. “These claims have reportedly been scrutinized by the Trump Justice Department, a Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney, and a full impeachment trial of the former President that centered on these very issues, and over and over again, they have been found to lack credibility. It’s clear that congressional Republicans are dead-set on playing shameless, dishonest politics and refuse to let truth get in the way. It is well past time for news organizations to hold them to basic levels of factual accountability for their repeated and increasingly desperate efforts to mislead both the public and the press.”

The FBI said in a statement that the release of the 1023 risked the safety of a confidential source:

“Throughout the FBI’s engagements with Congress, we have been guided by our obligation to protect the physical safety of confidential human sources and the integrity of sensitive investigations. We have repeatedly explained to Congress, in correspondence and in briefings, how critical it is to keep this source information confidential. In the face of these significant concerns, the FBI negotiated a resolution with Chairman Comer to provide the information requested in a manner that protects the safety of confidential sources and integrity of investigations.”

Meanwhile, the form jumps to a “2016/2017 telephone call” the source had with Zlochevsky after the 2016 presidential election. Zlochevsky said he was “not happy Trump won the election.”

“CHS asked Zlochevsky whether he was concerned about Burisma’s involvement with the Bidens,” the form states. “Zlochevsky stated he didn’t want to pay the Bidens and he was ‘pushed to pay’ them.”

The source explained to the FBI agent taking notes of his conversation that the Russian term Zlochevsky used to explain the payments was “poluchili.” The form states that “literally translates to; ‘got it’ or ‘received it’ but is also used in “Russian criminal slang for being ‘forced or coerced to pay.’”

HUNTER DEMANDED $10M FROM CHINESE ENERGY FIRM BECAUSE ‘BIDENS ARE THE BEST,’ HAVE ‘CONNECTIONS’

At this point, Shokin had already been fired. Zlochevsky said “nobody would find out about his financial dealings with the Bidens.”

“CHS then stated, ‘I hope you have some back-up (proof) for your words (namely, that Zlochevsky was ‘forced’ to pay the Bidens).”

“Zlochevsky replied he has many text messages and ‘recordings’ that show that he was coerced to make such payments,” the form states. “CHS told Zlochevsky he should make certain that he should retain those recordings.”

The form then jumps to a 2019 telephone call between the source and Ostapenko, in which they discussed “various business matters” unrelated to Burisma.

“During the call, Zlochevsky asked CHS and/or Ostapenko if they read the recent news reports about the investigations into the Bidens and Burisma, and Zlochevsky jokingly asked if the CHS was an ‘oracle’ (due to CHS’s prior advice that Zlochevsky should not pay the Bidens and instead to hire an attorney to litigate the allegations concerning Shokin’s investigation),” the form states.

“CHS mentioned Zlochevsky might have difficulty explaining suspicious wire transfers that may evidence any (illicit) payments to the Bidens,” the form states. “Zlochevsky responded he did not send any funds directly to the ‘Big Guy’ (which CHS understood was a reference to Joe Biden).”

President Biden and Hunter Biden. (Getty Images)

The form says CHS asked Zlochevsky how many companies and bank accounts he controlled, to which he responded it would “take them (investigators) 10 years to find the records (i.e. illicit payments to Joe Biden).”

While the source detailed the conversations with Zlochevsky, he also told the FBI that “it is very common for business men in post-Soviet countries to brag or show-off” and said it is “extremely common for businesses in Russia and Ukraine to make ‘bribe’ payments to various government officials.”

As for recordings and text messages of conversations with the Bidens, the source said that Zlochevsky said he had “a total of 17 recordings” involving the Bidens; “two of the recordings included Joe Biden, and the remaining 15 recordings only included Hunter Biden.”

The source said those recordings “evidence Zlochevsky was somehow coerced into paying the Bidens to ensure” Shokin was fired.

The source said Zlochevsky also had “two documents (which CHS understood to be wire transfer statements, bank records, etc.), that evidence some payment(s) to the Bidens were made, presumably in exchange for Shokin’s firing.”

“For the better part of a year, I’ve been pushing the Justice Department and FBI to provide details on its handling of very significant allegations from a trusted FBI informant implicating then-Vice President Biden in a criminal bribery scheme,” Grassley said. “While the FBI sought to obfuscate and redact, the American people can now read this document for themselves, without the filter of politicians or bureaucrats, thanks to brave and heroic whistleblowers. What did the Justice Department and FBI do with the detailed information in the document? And why have they tried to conceal it from Congress and the American people for so long?”

Grassley added: “The Justice Department and FBI have failed to come clean, but Chairman Comer and I intend to find out.”

Comer subpoenaed the FBI to turn over the unredacted document to Congress. The FBI did not comply, but instead, made accommodations to allow lawmakers to review the document in a secure setting last month.

“The FBI’s Biden Bribery Record tracks closely with the evidence uncovered by the Oversight Committee’s Biden family influence peddling investigation,” House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer said. “In the FBI’s record, the Burisma executive claims that he didn’t pay the ‘big guy’ directly but that he used several bank accounts to conceal the money. That sounds an awful lot like how the Bidens conduct business: using multiple bank accounts to hide the source and total amount of the money.”

Comer in front of billboard of New York Post Hunter Biden frontpage

Rep. James Comer, chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, speaks during a hearing in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 8, 2023. (Anna Rose Layden/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Comer added: “At our hearing with IRS whistleblowers, they testified that they had never seen or heard of this record during the Biden criminal investigation, despite having potentially corroborating evidence. Given the misconduct and politicization at the Department of Justice, the American people must be able to read this record for themselves. I thank Senator Grassley for providing much needed transparency to the American people.”

Brooke Singman is a Fox News Digital politics reporter. You can reach her at Brooke.Singman@Fox.com or @BrookeSingman on Twitter.

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Top 3 Things Tucker Carlson Says the Regime Doesn’t Want You Talking About

BY: EVITA DUFFY-ALFONSO | JULY 19, 2023

Author Evita Duffy-Alfonso profile

EVITA DUFFY-ALFONSO

VISIT ON TWITTER@EVITADUFFY_1

“If you want to know what really, really matters, to [the regime], and to you, and to the future of the country, consider the things that you are not allowed to say,” Tucker Carlson told his audience of young people during a Turning Point USA speech on the heels of his interviews with Republican primary candidates in Iowa.

These unsayable things, Carlson said, are easy to pinpoint because wrong-think seems to be the only “crime” that’s consistently and seriously penalized in contemporary America. Rapists and murderers go unprosecuted in American blue cities. “[B]urning down buildings, impoverishing people, starting totally counterproductive wars we can’t win that kill a lot of our citizens, [and] leaving the border open so 7 million people can walk across” are “never punished.”

So what are the three topics Carlson says have been deemed forbidden speech by the media, White House, and virtually every member of the American gentry class? “One of them’s the war in Ukraine, another’s Covid, and, of course, the third is Jan. 6.”

War in Ukraine

Every uniparty politician, corporate media outlet, and mega-corporation insists that if you don’t “hate” Russia and support America funneling billions of dollars to defend a nation ruled by a corrupt, oligarchical government, you must love Vladimir Putin and oppose “democracy.”

“It’s not a criminal act not to hate somebody,” Carlson said. He pointed out that the number of Americans murdered by Russians is in the “range” of “zero.” Meanwhile, more than 100,000 Americans die every year at the hands of Mexican cartels and the drugs they smuggle into our country. Yet the media and our government want us to be more preoccupied with a foreign war than the deaths of American citizens here at home.

Carlson explained that so far, America has utterly failed to be a leader in the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, encouraging the war instead of facilitating peace. “If you’re the leader, the last thing you do is sow more chaos,” Carlson said. Yet the White House “with the full participation of the Republican Party” has fueled and prolonged a bloody war — and you had better not question it.

“Foreign policy is the one big thing” that’s not subject to “voter control,” Carlson said. Americans have a right to weigh in on things like the war in Ukraine and tell the federal government: “This is my country and you’re doing this in my name, with my money, and potentially my children.”

Washington, however, doesn’t believe in “the public [signing] off on wars … and that’s exactly why they like it,” Carlson added. If you try to question Washington’s lucrative wars, you’re told to “shut up.” And you, “an American citizen who loves your country [and] whose ancestors fought to defend it,” are accused of disloyalty by people who don’t care about America at all.

Covid

During and following the years of Covid tyranny, Big Tech companies (often at the behest of the federal government) censored anyone, including doctors and sitting members of Congress, who discussed the numerous civil liberties violations, the highly plausible lab-leak theory, the devastation of lockdowns, failed vaccines, the inefficacy of cloth masks, and vaccine injuries.

“Every organization in American life … from your government, to the entire media, [and] in some cases, your church,” told Americans that if you want to be a “good person” you’ll follow the Covid rules, Carlson said. In the case of the Covid shots, you had to pipe down and take it — without really knowing what was in it or what the long-term outlook would be.

Now we know the staggering number of people who appear to be vaccine injured, as Carlson pointed out. Yet the powers that be continue to gaslight the public anytime someone tries to discuss adverse reactions to any of the Covid shots.

“This [was] a moral test, and if you want[ed] to pass, you obey[ed],” said Carlson, adding that those who stood against Covid authoritarianism were persecuted and labeled societal “outlaws.”

Jan. 6

Carlson recalled how shortly after Jan. 6, 2021 people began claiming the demonstration was a “racist insurrection.” At the time, Carlson pointed out it neither had anything to do with race nor involved “armed people try[ing] to overthrow the government,” but he was told, yet again, to “shut up.” He even found himself labeled a “racist insurrectionist.”

The people who protested on Jan. 6, were, in Carlson’s words, “grandmas with diabetes and a lot of debt.” Why were these everyday Americans so angry? Well, the American gentry class refused to allow the country to talk honestly about why a massive swath of the populace was so enraged that they took a “bus from Tennessee to go jump up and down in front of the Capitol.”

We were never allowed to consider how “Biden won by 81 million votes — 15 million more than Barack Obama, which seems like a lot considering [Biden] didn’t campaign and he can’t talk.” We also weren’t allowed to consider whether electronic voting machines or unmonitored ballot drop boxes were compromised, Carlson added. Those who tried to raise concerns about the 2020 election, which sparked Jan. 6, were “deplatformed,” “debanked,” “bankrupted,” “fired,” and essentially “hounded out of public life in America.”

Thought Criminals Are Our ‘North Star’

Carlson warned of distractions in the news cycle. While we must push back against things like radical transgender theory, stories related to that and other hot-topic issues can also be used by the left to manipulate our priorities, he said. “I don’t think there’s a single Democratic member of Congress who cares at all about trans rights,” Carlson explained, theorizing that many of these daily news stories are “designed to take people like me and send us off into a screaming fit.”

Instead, “look around and ask … what are the topics that no one’s even pushing back on?” If you are really interested in truth-seeking and you want to locate “the North Star” in confusing, disordered, post-industrial America, then you need to look for the “thought criminals.”

Evita Duffy-Alfonso is a staff writer to The Federalist and the co-founder of the Chicago Thinker. She loves the Midwest, lumberjack sports, writing, and her family. Follow her on Twitter at @evitaduffy_1 or contact her at evita@thefederalist.com.

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As Michigan Charges Trump Electors With Felonies, Recall How Leftists Everywhere Urged 2016 Electors to Defect to Hillary

BY: JORDAN BOYD | JULY 19, 2023

Author Jordan Boyd profile

JORDAN BOYD

VISIT ON TWITTER@JORDANBOYDTX

If the last two election cycles have proven anything, it’s that Democrats hold an undeniable double standard when it comes to objecting to elections.

The radically different treatment Republicans receive when contesting poorly administered elections intensified this week when Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel charged 16 Republican electors in her state for participating in what she deemed a “false electors scheme.” Defendants, all 55 years or older, each face eight various conspiracy and forgery felony counts that carry a sentence of five to 14 years in prison each.

“The evidence will demonstrate there was no legal authority for the false electors to purport to act as ‘duly elected presidential electors’ and execute the false electoral documents,” Nessel, an avid anti-“election denier” activist, said in a statement. “Every serious challenge to the election had been denied, dismissed, or otherwise rejected by the time the false electors convened.”

The corporate media hailed Nessel’s allegations as a “righteous prosecution” and “compelling.” History, however, shows the charges are nothing more than a political ploy to advance the left’s war on anyone who questions election results or seeks solutions to preserve election integrity. In fact, attacks on the Trump electors in Michigan, a state where election fraud was reported in both 2020 and 2022, come from the same party and its institutional allies that formally objected to every GOP presidential certification this century and shamelessly attempted to turn electors against their political enemy Trump in 2016.

Sanctimonious Scrambling

As soon as it was clear that Donald Trump, despite the deep state’s best efforts to hoax him out of the running, would become the 45th president of the United States, Democrats and their allies scrambled to influence electors to reject Americans’ wishes. Corporate media quickly rose to the top as the loudest voice calling for electoral disobedience. Articles demanding state electors “prevent an irresponsible demagogue from taking office” and overrule Americans to install Hillary Clinton as president popped up in the pages of The Atlantic, The Washington Post, the Daily Beast, Vox, and Time.

The New York Times even published an article from a Texas-based Republican elector explaining “Why I Will Not Cast My Electoral Vote for Donald Trump.”

“The Electoral College is essentially an undemocratic system that’s been jury-rigged to make it somewhat more democratic,” another Vox article asserted to reassure any skeptics.

These last-ditch attempts to keep Trump out of the White House were eagerly amplified by people like MSNBC’s Joy Reid and NYT’s Jonathan Weisman, in tweets collated by journalist Michael Tracey.

Propaganda press puppets such as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, WaPo’s EJ Dionne, and NYT’s Paul Krugman added their two cents about why electors should act on their open disdain for a Trump presidency on Twitter and on TV.

Chris Hayes and Michael Moore pushed for electors to block President-elect Donald Trump from becoming the president on MSNBC.

"They think electors should be persuaded to part with their pledges and vote against Donald Trump."

"Yes, they absolutely should do that." pic.twitter.com/iINfV5hYE3
— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) July 19, 2023

Jennifer Palmieri, the communications director for the Hillary Clinton 2016 presidential campaign who later bragged about her role in meddling with the 2016 election by spreading the Russia collusion hoax, also joined in on the dogpile.

Clinton’s top political adviser John Podesta urged a foreign intervention intelligence briefing for electors prior to their vote, hoping that news about Russia would fuel the campaign’s efforts to question the legitimacy of Trump’s victory.

Petitions calling on electors to “Make Hillary Clinton President” made their rounds on the internet. These were promoted by celebrities such as singer Pink and their sentiments echoed by movie star Mark Ruffalo.

Video ads of celebrities pleading and pressuring electors to “prevent an unfit candidate from becoming president” by voting against Trump also circulated.

“You have position, the authority, and the opportunity to go down in the books as an American hero who changed the course of history,” the activists claimed in one “Unite For America” campaign video.

When leftists’ partisan ploy to swindle electors didn’t work, they turned to congressional Democrats to object to Trump’s presidential certification. Multiple Democrats attempted to verbally object to the electoral votes from multiple states until then-Vice President Joe Biden was forced to quiet his colleagues’ ramblings about voting machines and Russia collusion to proceed with formally handing Trump the presidency. Even after that, prominent Democrats such as former President Jimmy Carter and failed Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton supported the theory that Trump was illegitimately elected. Polls showed 42 percent of Americans thought the same.

No Such Thing As ‘False Electors’

In her charges, Nessel repeatedly painted the Michigan defendants as “false elector” co-conspirators who participated in a “desperate effort” to “interfere with and overturn our free and fair election process, and along with it, the will of millions of Michigan voters.” Legally, however, there’s no such thing as “false electors.”

“There were contingent Republican electors named consistent with legal precedent to preserve the still ongoing legal challenges to the validity of Georgia’s certified vote,” my colleague Margot Cleveland explained in May when corporate media tried to smear Republican electors in the Peach State.

A similar elector swap to those in Michigan and Georgia happened in Hawaii in 1960. As Cleveland pointed out, it received praise instead of scrutiny because Democrats and their preferred candidate came out on top.

After Richard Nixon was initially declared the victor in Hawaii in 1960, both Nixon’s and John F. Kennedy’s electors decided to meet and “cast their votes for President and Vice President, and certified their own meeting and votes.” The three Hawaii electors, all Democrats, cast their votes for Kennedy.

When state circuit court Judge Ronald Jamieson eventually ruled Kennedy the winner of the presidency, Cleveland said he “stressed the importance of the Democrat electors having met on Dec. 19, as prescribed by the Electoral Count Act, to cast their ballots in favor of Kennedy.”

“That step allowed the Hawaii governor to then certify Kennedy as the winner of Hawaii’s three electoral votes and, in turn, Congress to count Hawaii’s electoral votes in favor of Kennedy,” she continued.

The stark difference between how Democrats and Republicans are treated on the elector issue merely confirms Americans’ worst fears about the nation’s two-tiered system of justice. More Democrats denied that former President Donald Trump won the 2016 election than the people who claimed President Joe Biden wasn’t legitimately elected in 2020 — but it’s Republicans who face jail time for expressing concern.

If you’re a loyal leftist partisan harping on voting machines and Russian “hacking,” objecting to every GOP victory, and demanding electors vote against the will of the people, you’re a hero and protector of democracy. If you do the same to the benefit of a Republican candidate, you’ve fomented a “coup attempt” and betrayed the soul of the nation.

At a time when the justice system is weaponized against Trump and his followers, that’s a damning double standard that not even the most corrupt, partisan actors can ignore.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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COUNTRY SINGER JASON ALDEAN ANGERS LIBERAL ACTIVISTS WITH ANTI-CRIME, PRO-GUN SONG ABOUT 2020 RIOTS

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Jason Aldean’s controversial ‘Small Town’ video cut by CMT, song skyrockets to Number 1 amid backlash

By Caroline Thayer , Tracy Wright | Fox News | Published July 19, 2023 1:32pm EDT

Jason Aldean has lost the support of Country Music Television (CMT), with the network confirming to Fox News Digital it has pulled the musician’s “Try That in a Small Town” music video from circulation.

A representative for the network did not provide more context for the decision, but Aldean has received immense backlash from the public, with some suggesting it is a “pro-lynching song” — a narrative Aldean adamantly denies. In the video, Aldean’s lyrics are sung while news coverage from the 2020 riots illustrates his message. “Cuss out a cop spit in his face / stomp on the flag and light it up,” Aldean sings, along with footage of the described instances.

Aldean’s tune has skyrocketed to success given all the controversy, sitting as ITunes’ No. 1 song at the time of publication.

Jason Aldean music video — Jason Aldean’s music video for “Try That in a Small Town” has been pulled by CMT. No reason was immediately given. (BBR Music Group/Jason Aldean/YouTube)

A representative for Aldean’s record label, BBR Music Group, did not immediately return Fox News Digital’s request for comment, nor did representatives for the singer. TackleBox, the production company which produced Aldean’s music video, shared in a statement to Fox News Digital that the location is a “popular filming location outside of Nashville,” which Aldean did not select himself.

Jason Aldean looks off int he distance wearing a black cowboy hat — Jason Aldean was ridiculed online for his song “Try That in a Small Town,” prompting the country star to speak out and defend himself. (Rich Polk/Getty Images for iHeartRadio)

Several movies and music videos have been filmed at the location. “Any alternative narrative suggesting the music video’s location decision is false,” it added.

Throughout the video, Aldean can be seen singing in front of the Maury County Courthouse, which has an American flag hanging from it. The government building can be found in Columbia, Tennessee. It was previously the site of a horrific lynching of Black man Henry Choate, in 1927.

Jason Aldean smiles in black on the carpet — Jason Aldean reminded his followers that he was present at the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas where a mass shooter killed 61 individuals. (Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic)

“Any alternative narrative suggesting the music video’s location decision is false.”— TackleBox on the location of Jason Aldean’s music video

On Tuesday, Aldean addressed the controversial response to his song.

“In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests. These references are not only meritless, but dangerous,” he told his social media followers.

“There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it – and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage – and while I can try and respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music – this one goes too far.”

Here are the lyrics of the song the radical Left think is so aweful. You decides:

Try That In A Small Town Lyrics

[Verse 1]
Sucker punch somebody on a sidewalk
Carjack an old lady at a red light
Pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store
Ya think it’s cool, well, act a fool if ya like
Cuss out a cop, spit in his face
Stomp on the flag and light it up
Yeah, ya think you’re tough

[Chorus]
Well, try that in a small town
See how far ya make it down the road
‘Round here, we take care of our own
You cross that line, it won’t take long
For you to find out, I recommend you don’t
Try that in a small town

[Verse 2]
Got a gun that my granddad gave me
They say one day they’re gonna round up
Well, that shit might fly in the city, good luck

[Chorus]
Try that in a small town
See how far ya make it down the road
‘Round here, we take care of our own
You cross that line, it won’t take long
For you to find out, I recommend you don’t
Try that in a small town

Caroline Thayer is an entertainment writer for Fox News Digital. Follow Caroline Thayer on Twitter at @carolinejthayer. Story tips can be sent to caroline.thayer@fox.com.

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Dick Morris to Newsmax: DOJ Double Standard ‘Unbelievable’

By Solange Reyner | Wednesday, 19 July 2023 03:07 PM EDT

The double standard in the Department of Justice’s handling of cases against former President Donald Trump and Hunter Biden is “unbelievable,” political consultant Dick Morris said on Newsmax.

“They blocked the IRS agents from interviewing Hunter, they leaked the time and the place of the search … so they could make sure everything was nice and neat for them and it’s just outrageous what’s going on,” Morris said Wednesday during an appearance on “John Bachman Now” ahead of IRS whistleblower testimony before the House Oversight Committee about alleged meddling in the DOJ probe of Biden.

“But there’s a larger point that I want to focus on with you,” Morris added. “This new indictment of Trump, if it comes through, is totally different from the others because it accuses him essentially of waging an insurrection against the government and it characterizes Trump’s objections to the 2020 election as acts of sedition and that’s clearly an attempt to invoke the 14th amendment that says that if anybody was in sedition or rebellion of the U.S. government they can’t hold public office and that’s clearly what they’re trying to do.

“And if he’s found guilty of this by a D.C. grand jury, which would be of course all Democrats, he literally could be barred from appearing on the ballot and you may find Democratic secretaries of state around the country who refuse to put them on the ballot.

“So, this is a direct assault on our right to choose the next president and I believe what we need to do is that Congress needs to say they will not vote any more money, the house, for the government, they will close it down if they have to rather than let the Justice Department proceed.

“I think they should demand that the administration and the DOJ announce they will not go against any person who is a candidate for president during the campaign. He can do it afterwards but during the campaign, it’s clear election interference.”

Trump on Tuesday said he received a letter informing that he is the target of the DOJ’s probe into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, an indication he could soon be charged by U.S. prosecutors.

New federal charges, on top of existing state and federal counts in New York and Florida and a separate election-interference investigation nearing conclusion in Georgia, would add to the list of legal problems for Trump as he pursues the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.

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IRS Whistleblower X Is Joe Ziegler, a Gay Democrat

By Eric Mack | Wednesday, 19 July 2023 02:03 PM EDT

The previously unnamed Internal Revenue Service “Whistleblower X” revealed himself during public testimony before three GOP-led House committees Wednesday, saying he is a “gay Democrat married to a man” and wrongfully slandered as a partisan operative or a “traitor” to his party.

“In coming forward, I am risking my career, my reputation, and my casework outside of this investigation,” Joe Ziegler, with the IRS for 13 years, said in his opening statement.

Ziegler testified with a 10-minute statement alongside his supervisor Gary Shapley, the second whistleblower, who previously came forward publicly.

“I’m no more credible than this man sitting next to me due to my sexual orientation or my political beliefs,” Ziegler continued. “I was raised and have always strived to do what is right.

“I have heard from some that I am a traitor to the Democratic Party and that I am causing more division in our society. I implore you, that if you were put in my position with the facts as I have stated them, that you would be doing the exact same thing.”

Ziegler and Shapley, career IRS criminal investigators, allege the Justice Department obstructed with their yearslong investigation into Hunter Biden.

“In early August 2022, federal prosecutors from the Department of Justice Tax Division drafted a 99-page memorandum,” Ziegler continued in his opening statement. “In so [doing,] they were recommending for approval felony and misdemeanor charges for the 2017, ’18, and ’19 tax years.

“That did not happen here, and I am not sure why.

“And, as the special agent on this case, I thought the felony charges were well supported.”

Leaders of the House Judiciary, Oversight and Accountability, and Ways and Means committees led the hearing, the first public testimony from the two IRS agents assigned to the federal case into President Joe Biden’s youngest son, Hunter, which was focused on tax and gun charges.

“The decision to bring felony counts against Hunter Biden was agreed to by both prosecutors and investigators in the fall of 2021,” Ziegler added. “I met with prosecutors assigned to the case, and we all agreed and decided which charges we are going to recommend to in the prosecution report, which included felony counts related to 2014, and ’18.

“In March of 2022, the prosecutors requested Discovery from the investigative team and presented the case to the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office and in later meetings, in early August of 2022, all four attorneys agreed to recommend felony and misdemeanor charges for the 2017, ’18, and ’19 tax years, insofar as the Department of Justice Tax Division attorney sent an email about the process of bringing charges to include felony and misdemeanor tax charges in two separate districts, Delaware and Los Angeles.”

The congressional inquiry into the Justice Department’s case against Hunter Biden was launched last month, days after it was announced that the younger Biden will plead guilty to the misdemeanor tax offenses as part of an agreement with federal prosecutors.

The House Ways and Means Committee voted to publicly disclose hundreds of pages of testimony from the IRS employees in which they described several roadblocks agents on the case faced when trying to interview individuals relevant to the case or issue search warrants.

One of Shapley’s most explosive claims was U.S. Attorney David Weiss in Delaware, the federal prosecutor who led the investigation, asked to be provided special counsel status in order to bring the tax cases against Hunter Biden in jurisdictions outside Delaware, including Washington, D.C., and California, but was denied.

Both Weiss and the Justice Department have vehemently denied such claims, saying he had “full authority” of the case and never sought to bring charges in other states.

Ziegler described his persistent frustrations with the way the case was handled, dating back to the Trump administration under Attorney General William Barr. He said he started the investigation into Hunter Biden in 2015 and began to delve deeply into his life and finances. Republicans have also sought testimony from other agents involved in the case but have been mostly unsuccessful thus far.

Republicans, including the three chairmen — Reps. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, James Comer, R-Ky., and Jason Smith, R-Mo. — have sought to paint the Justice Department’s case as rife with political interference and bias.

“Bank records so far show the Biden family, their business associates, and their companies received over $10 million from foreign nationals and their related companies,” Comer said in his opening statement.

“A lot of this money poured in while Joe Biden was Vice President.

“Despite creating many companies after Vice President Biden took office, the Biden family used business associates’ companies to receive millions of dollars from foreign companies in China, Ukraine, and Romania.

“After foreign companies sent money to business associates’ companies, the Bidens then received incremental payments over time to different bank accounts.

“These complicated financial transactions were used deliberately to conceal the source of the funds and total amounts. No normal business operates like this.

“What were the Bidens’ selling? Nothing but influence and access to the Biden network. This is an influence-peddling scheme to enrich the Bidens. We need to know whether Joe Biden is compromised by these schemes and if our national security is threatened.”

They have also called the plea agreement Hunter Biden made with prosecutors to likely avoid jail time a “sweetheart deal.”

High-ranking officials at the Justice Department have countered these claims by pointing to the extraordinary set of circumstances surrounding a criminal case into a subject who at the time was the son of a leading presidential candidate.

Testimony from Justice Department officials could come after Hunter Biden appears for his plea hearing next week.

Material from The Associated Press was used to compile this report.

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This piece originally appeared in The Washington Stand.

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Louisiana Overrides Dem Governor to Ban ‘Transgender’ Surgeries, Puberty Blockers for Minors

Commentary by Ben Johnson / @TheRightsWriter / July 19, 2023

Louisiana State Capitol building — The Louisiana Legislature overrode Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards’ veto of a bill that will protect minors from so-called transgender procedures, including surgeries and puberty-blocking chemicals. Pictured: Louisiana State Capitol in downtown Baton Rouge. (Photo: zrfphoto, iStock/Getty Images)

Louisiana has become the 20th state to protect minors from irreversible “transgender” procedures, including surgeries and cross-sex hormone injections, over the veto of its Democratic governor.

Members of the state Legislature assembled in a special veto override session in Baton Rouge Tuesday to pass the Stop Harming Our Kids Act (HB 648), which prevents surgical or chemical conversion therapy to create an underage person’s “gender identity” that is “inconsistent with the minor’s sex.” The bill forbids the “removal of any healthy or non-diseased body part or tissue”—such as mastectomies, hysterectomies, and sterilizations—and the construction of artificial breasts or genitalia. The bill also forbids placing children on puberty blockers or administering cross-sex hormone injections.

Gov. John Bel Edwards vetoed the bill on June 29, asserting it “needlessly harms a very small population of vulnerable children, their families, and their health care professionals.”

The Legislature’s Republican supermajority then called a special veto override session where the child protections passed the state House of Representatives by a 76-23 vote—a larger margin than their initial passage on May 3. The bill then cleared the state Senate, 28-11. It takes effect on Jan. 1.

Public health and child protection advocates cheered the outcome. “Detransitioner” Chloe Cole, who has lamented losing organs as a result of her teenage “transition,” noted the tremendous progress the state had made in one year. Before Tuesday’s vote, Louisiana stood as “the last state in the South that was sterilizing and cutting up children,” she noted.

“Last year, Louisiana tried to ban talk therapy for kids with [gender dysphoria]. As of today, Louisiana has done a full 180 and has now placed age restrictions that prevent what happened to me from happening to any child in the South,” she said. “To the Louisiana Legislature, thank you so much for listening to my cautionary tale” and handing the Pelican State’s children a “major win!!”

Family Research Council also played a role in lobbying legislators to enact these child protections. Jennifer Bauwens, director of the Center for Family Studies at the Family Research Council, testified that lawmakers should ban “scientifically unsupported, highly invasive, and potentially irreversible interventions” for children whose brains have not yet fully developed—a process that ends in the early to mid-20s.

In a letter to Louisiana state Senate President Page Cortez, a Republican, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins (himself a former Louisiana legislator) urged the senator to heed “valid medical evidence,” “tragic personal stories of regret by people who tried to medically ‘transition’ from their biological sex,” and “heartbroken parents” victimized by counselors and school personnel who “encouraged their children to ‘identify’ as something they can never be.”

The leaders of both chambers of the state Legislature met with dozens of pastors for a time of prayer and to hear their concerns as the veto override session came into session, Gene Mills of the Louisiana Family Forum told “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” on Monday.

“We had robust participation from the public today here at the Capitol, and I appreciate how involved average citizens have been in our important discussions this year,” said Speaker of the House Clay Schexnayder.

In the end, six House Democrats joined all of that chamber’s Republicans on Tuesday’s veto override: state Reps. Roy Daryl Adams of Jackson, Robby Carter of Amite, Chad Brown of Plaquemines, Mack Cormier of Belle Chasse, C. Travis Johnson of Vidalia, and Dustin Miller of Opelousas. Two Democratic state senators also crossed the aisle: Katrina Jackson of Monroe and Greg Tarver of Shreveport. Two Democratic state legislators, Reps. Francis Thompson and Jeremy LaCombe, switched parties to the GOP due, in part, to the governor’s position on the Stop Harming Our Kids Act.

U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., offered his “congrats to my former colleagues in the Louisiana legislature who stood up for children today” and assured “children will not be mutilated in the South.”

The State Freedom Caucus Network called the override “a major victory to protect children.”

The bill makes an exception for children who enter puberty too early, for those born intersex, or who require such actions to treat a separate physical injury.

Edwards, who tried to kill the bill in a procedural move during the legislative session, said on Tuesday, “I expect the courts to throw out this unconstitutional bill.” Yet U.S. District Judge David Hale, an Obama appointee, allowed a Kentucky bill protecting children from transgender procedures to take effect last Friday.

The veto override session is the state’s third since 1974—all in Edwards’ second term as governor. The override puts Edwards in the history books as the only modern Louisiana governor to have lawmakers override more than one veto. Lawmakers previously had a showdown with Edwards over the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, which prohibits men from competing against women in most sports activities. Edwards allowed the law to take effect without his signature after a strong bipartisan coalition of legislators, led by sponsor state Sen. Beth Mizell, a Republican, passed the bill with enough votes to override his veto. The governor called that bill “very distressing” and “mean-spirited.”

Nearly two-thirds of Americans (61%) say males should not be allowed to compete in women’s K-12 and collegiate sports. In addition to the 20 states that have signed such bills, similar bills have passed three additional states.

The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.

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Citing Unpursued Evidence, IRS Whistleblower Calls for Special Counsel to Probe Biden Case

By: Fred Lucas / @FredLucasWH / July 19, 2023

Joseph Ziegler, right, coming forward as an iRS whistleblower, is sworn in with colleague Gary Shapley on Wednesday before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee. (Photo: Brendan Smialowksi/AFP/ Getty Images)

A previously unidentified IRS whistleblower publicly told Congress on Wednesday that federal prosecutors investigating presidential son Hunter Biden were “hamstrung” by political pressure and called for appointment of a special counsel in the case.

Former IRS special agent Joseph Ziegler—a Democrat who identifies himself as a gay married man—previously gave anonymous testimony to the House Ways and Mean Committee. In new testimony Wednesday, Ziegler made his identity known to the House Oversight and Accountability Committee during a hearing on why a five-year investigation recently produced a lenient Justice Department plea agreement with Hunter Biden, despite evidence that the president’s son made millions in overseas business deals in China, Ukraine, and other places by using his father’s name.

“People are saying that I must be more credible because I’m a Democrat who happens to be married to a man. I’m no more credible than this man sitting next to me, due to my sexual orientation or my political beliefs,” Ziegler told the committee in opening remarks, referring to IRS colleague and supervisor Gary Shapley, the panel’s other witness.

“The truth is, my credibility comes today from my job experience with the IRS and my intimate knowledge of the agency’s standard and procedures,” he said.

Earlier this month, U.S. Attorney for Delaware David Weiss reached a plea deal with Hunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden, to charge him on two misdemeanor tax charges and a suspended sentence for lying on a gun purchase form. No prison time likely would result.

This development came after IRS investigators and federal prosecutors had previously determined that the younger Biden should face felony charges, Ziegler said.

“As I read the public documents of the Department of Justice action against Hunter Biden, there is nothing [saying] that Hunter Biden will be required to amend his false tax return for 2018—a false tax return that includes improper deductions for prostitutes, sex clubs, and his adult children’s tuition,” Ziegler said.

The two IRS whistleblowers said in previous testimony that Weiss–appointed by then-President Donald Trump and kept on board by the Biden administration for this probe—sought special counsel status.

This development came after federal prosecutors appointed by Biden in Washington, D.C., and California refused requests from Weiss to bring charges against Hunter Biden in those jurisdictions. Although Weiss said in a letter to House members that he had independence in the probe, he said in a follow-up letter that he didn’t have prosecutorial power outside his jurisdiction.

“While the impression has been conveyed by the U.S. attorney in Delaware that he has similar powers to that of a special counsel on this case, free rein to do as needed, that was not the case,” Ziegler told lawmakers. “It appeared to me, based on what I experienced, that the U.S. attorney in Delaware in our investigation was constantly hamstrung, limited, and marginalized by DOJ officials, as well as other U.S. attorneys. I still think that a special counsel is necessary for this investigation.”

Ziegler also talked about his personal experience.

“I was raised, and have always strived, to do what is right. Although I do have my supporters, others have said that I am a traitor to the Democratic Party and that I am causing more division in our society,” he told the committee. “I implore you to consider that if you were in my position with the facts as I have stated them, ask yourself if you would be doing the exact same thing. I hope that I am an example to other LGBTQ people out there who are questioning doing the right thing at the potential cost to themselves and others.”

Ziegler added that he is “risking my career, my reputation, and my casework outside the investigation we are here to discuss.”

“I ultimately made the decision to come forward after what I believe were multiple attempts at blowing the whistle at the Internal Revenue Service,” he said. “No one should be above the law, regardless of your political affiliation.”

Shapley, Ziegler’s colleague, already had spoken in public interviews with media and in testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee. Shapley said he had to come forward after he saw the Justice Department cross a “red line,” explaining:

The Justice Department allowed the president’s political appointees to weigh in on whether to charge the president’s son. After the United States attorney for D.C., Matthew Graves, appointed by President Biden, refused to bring charges in March 2022, I watched United States Attorney Weiss tell a room full of senior FBI and IRS senior leaders on Oct. 7, 2022, that he was not the deciding person on whether charges were filed. That was my red line.

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[READ: Whistleblower: FBI Tipped Off ‘People Very Close’ To Joe And Hunter Before IRS Investigative Team’s ‘Day Of Action’]

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Ex-Agent Corroborates Whistleblower Claim That FBI Interfered with IRS Investigation of Hunter Biden, Comer Reveals

BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | JULY 18, 2023

Republican House Oversight Chairman James Comer of Kentucky revealed that a former FBI agent who was on the Hunter Biden case corroborated key details from accusations made by whistleblowers from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

In a Monday press release, Comer said the committee interviewed a former FBI supervisory special agent from the FBI’s Wilmington, Deleware office who confirmed federal investigators tipped off the Biden team about an interview the IRS and FBI were planning to conduct with Hunter Biden.

“The night before the interview of Hunter Biden, both Secret Service headquarters and the Biden transition team were tipped off about the planned interview,” Comer said. “On the day of the Hunter Biden interview, federal agents were told to stand by and could not approach Hunter Biden — they had to wait for his call.”

“As a result of the change in plans,” Comer added, “IRS and FBI criminal investigators never got to interview Hunter Biden as part of the investigation.”

In June, House Republicans released transcripts of interviews with two IRS whistleblowers who alleged that Department of Justice (DOJ) officials repeatedly interfered with their criminal tax investigation of the younger Biden. The explosive allegations came just days after it was revealed federal prosecutors had brokered a sweetheart plea deal that watered down the charges against Hunter Biden to two misdemeanor tax crimes and one count of felony firearm possession, with an agreement that he will not be prosecuted for the gun crime if he never owns a gun again and maintains sobriety for 24 months. (Notably, such amnesty would have been threatened if officials linked the mysterious bag of cocaine found at the White House to the president’s son, who wrote a book about being a drug addict.)

Gary Shapley, one of the two IRS whistleblowers to come forward, told Fox News “the most substantive felony charges were left off the table.” Shapley told House Republicans the DOJ even denied tax authorities a search warrant while compromising the investigation by tipping off the Biden team about the probe’s proceedings.

IRS whistleblowers also revealed that federal tax investigators were left completely in the dark about the unclassified FD-1023 form housed by the FBI suggesting a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme between the president and a Ukrainian energy executive.

“The Justice Department’s efforts to cover up for the Bidens reveals a two-tiered system of justice that sickens the American people,” Comer said Monday. A poll out from the Trafalgar Group with Convention of States Action last year found nearly 4 in 5 Americans believe they live under a two-tiered justice system.

“The Oversight Committee, along with the Judiciary Committee and Ways and Means Committee, will continue to seek the answers, transparency, and accountability that the American people demand and deserve,” Comer added.

FBI Director Christopher Wray defended his agency’s misconduct before the House Judiciary Committee last week.

“Are you protecting the Bidens?” asked GOP Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz.

“Absolutely not,” Wray claimed.

Matt Gaetz sparked a contentious exchange with FBI Director Christopher Wray in today's House Judiciary Committee hearing by questioning if Wray was "protecting the Bidens?"

“Absolutely not," Wray responded. "The FBI has no interest in protecting anyone politically.” pic.twitter.com/QsFr5klFmW
— POLITICO (@politico) July 12, 2023

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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7 Things the House Oversight Committee Should Ask IRS Whistleblowers

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 18, 2023

one of the IRS whistleblowers, Gary Shapley

Author Margot Cleveland profile

MARGOT CLEVELAND

VISIT ON TWITTER@PROFMJCLEVELAND

The IRS whistleblowers who exposed the Department of Justice and FBI’s interference in the investigation into Biden family corruption will publicly testify on Wednesday before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee.

The duo, Gary Shapley and a man known now only as Whistleblower X, had previously sat for transcribed interviews with the House Ways and Means Committee. And while some details from that closed-door testimony should be reiterated during the on-camera congressional hearing, Oversight Committee Chair James Comer should corral Republicans before Wednesday to coordinate the questioning of the whistleblowers so the country learns the depth of the scandal.

Here’s what they should ask Shapley and the soon-to-be-named second whistleblower and how they should do it.

1. Let the Whistleblowers Do the Talking

Because the legacy press will be poised to present Wednesday’s hearing as a Republican witch hunt and their supposed continued hounding of Hunter Biden, the representatives on the right side of the aisle should save the grandstanding for another time and let the agents speak for themselves.

As experienced agents, both Shapley and Whistleblower X know how to testify in a clear and understandable way. They also know how to respond to a hostile cross-examination, which unfortunately will be what they face from Democrats. Republicans should ask the agents open-ended questions that call for narrative responses and allow the whistleblowers’ words to convey to America the protect-Biden scandal they witnessed.

2. Start with Preliminaries, Not the Most Salacious Details

While it is understandable that the House Oversight Committee will want to strike hard and fast with the most devastating testimony, Republicans must remember the media blackout over this scandal means most Americans remain ignorant of many of the basics of the Hunter Biden investigation and how it connects to now-President Biden. Many Americans likely also know little about the two witnesses and may even believe the Democrats’ defamatory branding of the whistleblowers as “bought and paid for” by extreme MAGA Republicans.

For these reasons, before delving into the details, Republicans should ensure the country learns of the whistleblowers’ extensive and impressive professional background. Comer should also ensure the whistleblowers come clean about any political leanings they have, which appears to be none or, if any, leaning more to the left than the right. The whistleblowers’ opening statements will likely cover these preliminaries to some extent, but providing another minute for each witness to briefly remind Americans of your experience with the criminal investigation division of the IRS and explain to the country where you stand politically would be wise.

3. Begin Big-Picture Before Hitting the Details

The committee should then move to the origins of the investigation and the big picture of the scandal. More detailed questions will follow, but could you first broadly explain why and when the investigation began? Can you summarize the staffing of the investigative team and how the FBI field offices, FBI headquarters, the IRS criminal division, and the U.S. attorneys’ offices interacted at the beginning of the investigation, and then later throughout the investigation?

Again, let the whistleblowers tell their story, using follow-up questions to draw out more details, if necessary, but from a big-picture perspective. And once the whistleblowers explain how the investigation proceeded, broadly speaking, ask: Was that staffing and interaction, especially with the DOJ and FBI, the norm?

4. Evidence and Interference

With the above backdrop established, the committee should focus next on two main lines of questioning: the evidence uncovered of potential criminal conduct and the interference the agents faced when investigating the case.

The most effective and efficient way to present this testimony will be by requesting the whistleblowers walk the committee through the chronology of the investigation, identifying at each stage what evidence was uncovered and how, and whether there was any interference in the investigation.

Follow-up questions for each leg in the investigative journey should inquire of any witnesses or evidence they know of to corroborate their testimony and what steps they normally would have taken absent the interference.

Because the committee has the transcript of the whistleblowers’ previous closed-door testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee, the staffers should be able to easily sequence the questioning to ensure it is accessible to ordinary Americans.

5. Weiss’s Weasel Words and Garland’s False Ones

While the whistleblowers’ prior testimony revealed scores of ways in which the DOJ and FBI interfered in the investigation, equally concerning is U.S. Attorney David Weiss and Attorney General Merrick Garland’s attempts to cover up that interference.

For instance, Shapley testified about the D.C. and California U.S. attorneys’ refusal to file charges against Hunter Biden, and Weiss’s inability to indict the president’s son in those venues without permission from the Department of Justice — permission Weiss allegedly claims had been denied him. According to Shapley, Weiss made that statement during an Oct. 7, 2022, meeting and said he was “not the deciding person on whether charges are filed.”

Neither Weiss nor Garland has expressly denied Shapley’s claims, but both made statements that cannot be reconciled with Shapley’s testimony. Garland, for his part, testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Weiss “has full authority” to bring cases in another jurisdiction if he deemed it necessary. Weiss similarly claimed in a letter to Congress that “he had been granted the ultimate authority” over the Biden investigation, but the Delaware U.S. attorney quickly clarified in a second letter that he didn’t have that authority yet but had been assured he would be granted it if necessary.

On Wednesday, the House Oversight Committee should ask Shapley to retell the events of the Oct. 7 meeting because the IRS agents’ testimony implicates Weiss and Garland in a cover-up. Republicans should also ask Shapley whether it is possible Weiss said during that meeting that he had been denied a request to be appointed a special attorney as opposed to a special counsel, as some Democrats are suggesting Shapley misunderstood Weiss. A quick follow-up here, however, will also make clear that no matter which “special” appointment Weiss said he was denied, the U.S. attorney clearly said he wasn’t the decisionmaker.

6. Evidence Seen or Not Seen

The DOJ and FBI also interfered in the investigation by withholding evidence from Shapley and his investigative team. For instance, both Shapley and Whistleblower X stated they were not aware of the FD-1023 form that summarized a confidential human source’s claims that Joe and Hunter Biden each received $5 million in bribes from Burisma. Shapley also testified that he was prevented from seeing all the evidence on the Hunter Biden laptop, even after the FBI had removed documents potentially protected by attorney-client privilege. The committee should elicit testimony from Shapley and Whistleblower X concerning this withheld evidence.

Republicans should then attempt to learn what other evidence may have been secreted from the investigative team. The committee should read off a litany of the evidence it has and ask the whistleblowers if they were familiar with that evidence. Similarly, the committee should provide a list of witnesses with likely knowledge of the pay-to-play scandal and ask whether the whistleblowers knew of those individuals’ potential involvement and whether they were questioned.

This line of questioning may reveal new areas of inquiry — something the whistleblowers may not have known of previously. But in that case, the whistleblowers may not be able to respond to the questions because only the House Ways and Means Committee has the authority to receive protected tax information. The right questions, though, will give the whistleblowers the opportunity to convey that they have not seen the particular evidence referenced and therefore cannot respond to the query in this setting, but would be happy to provide the Ways and Means Committee a supplemental affidavit.

7. Anything More That Could Be Done

The whistleblowers have already made clear the statute of limitations ran out on potential felony tax charges against Hunter Biden because the Delaware U.S. attorney lacked the authority to indict the president’s son in another state. But what about the allegations contained in the FD-1023 or the other banking records recovered by the various House committees? Does that evidence indicate additional crimes have been committed for which the statute of limitations has not yet expired?

The whistleblowers should be asked: What potential crimes? What investigative techniques would you recommend? Given the international scope of these potential crimes, does the Baltimore FBI field office have the expertise to investigate adequately? Do you and your team have the ability to investigate this evidence and determine if there is a there, there?

Ending the hearing thusly will send a message that Weiss may have called off the investigation, but that doesn’t mean the case of corruption against the Biden family is dead.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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