FBI agents arrested Massachusetts Air National Guardsman Jack Douglas Teixeira at a home inย North Dighton, Massachusetts, on Thursday in connection with a trove of classified documents that have been leaked online in recent months.ย Attorney General Merrick Garland said that Teixeira, 21, is being investigated for the “alleged unauthorized removal, retention, and transmission of classified national defense information.” ย
Teixeira, who joined the Air National Guard in September 2019, held the highest-level security clearance granted by the federal government for top secret information, according to an internal Department of Defense email reviewed by Fox News.ย His security clearance and access to classified government systems have since been revoked, according to another internal government document.
Jack Teixeira, a 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman seen here in a photo posted on social media, was arrested Thursday in connection with an investigation into the leak of classified documents.ย ย (Facebook)
Teixeira was most recently stationed at Otis Air National Guard Base as a member of the of 102nd Intelligence Wing. He was promoted to Airman 1st Class last July, according to the unit.ย The National Guard saidย in a statement it is aware of the “alleged role a Massachusetts Air National Guardsman may have played in the recent leak of highly-classified documents” from the Pentagon.ย
“The National Guard takes this issue very seriously and will support investigators,” the National Guard said in a statement. “National security is our foremost priority and any attempt to undermine it compromises our values and degrades trust among our members, the public, allies and partners.”
Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder called the leaks a “a deliberate criminal act,” saying that distribution lists for classified information are being reviewed.
“We entrust our members with a lot of responsibility at a very early age,” Ryder said at a press conference on Thursday.
“You’ve received training and you will receive an understanding of the rules and requirements that come along with those responsibilities, and you’re expected to abide by those rules, regulations and responsibility. It’s called military discipline. And in certain cases, especially when it comes to sensitive information, it also is about the law.”
nextImage 1 of 3Aerial photo of the arrest of Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira by FBI agents for allegedly leaking classified materials. (Fox News)
The New York Times originally identified Teixeira as the suspected leaker on Wednesday evening, reporting that he was the leader of a Discord group called “Thug Shaker Central” that consisted of roughly 20 to 30 young men. Teixeira allegedly starting sharing classified documents with the private group in recent months, but the leaks gained wider attention after another member shared them in a public forum, according to the report.ย
Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks warned Pentagon employees against sharing classified information in a memo on Tuesday.ย ย (Fox Newsย )
Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks sent a memo to Pentagon officials on Tuesday, warning employees against leaking classified information or downloading classified documents from unclassified sources.ย
“Do not access or download documents with classified markings from unclassified websites โ either from home or work โ as the data ma y be classified, it may be associated with hostile foreign elements, or it may contain malicious code or embedded capability that could introduce cyber threats into our information system,” Hicks wrote in the memo, which was obtained by Fox News.
President Biden said earlier Thursday that the U.S. was “getting close” to finding the person responsible for leaking Pentagon documents that the Department of Defense has described as containing “sensitive and highly-classified material.”
“I canโt right now [give an update]. There is a full-blown investigation going on with the intelligence community and Justice Department and they are getting close,” Biden told reporters during his trip to Ireland. “I donโt have an answer for you.”
The president also said, “Iโm concerned that it happened, but there is nothing contemporaneous that Iโm aware of that is of great consequence.”
US President Joe Biden addresses the Houses of the Oireachtas at Leinster House in Dublin, Ireland, on April 13, 2023.ย ย (KENNY HOLSTON/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
The leaked documents mainly concern Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but also include intelligence on China, the Middle East, Israel’s spy agency Mossad, and world leaders.ย U.S. defense officials previously told Fox News that this leak could be “bigger than Snowden” in terms of damage to intelligence and allied relationships.ย
Teixeira is expected to make his first court appearance some time on Friday between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m., a source with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts said.
Fox News’ Sarah Tobianski and Lorraine Taylor contributed to this report.
The vote to expel two Democrats from the Tennessee House of Representatives last week reminds us of one of the immutable laws of politics: Whenever Democrats accuse anyone of racism, demand to see the videotape.
Hey โ remember the 2016 racist bus attack on three black coeds at the University at Albany that caught Hillary Clintonโs attention? They claimed a group of white men shouting racial epithets started hitting them, but no one on the bus cared! Foolishly, in retrospect, they didnโt check to see if the bus had cameras. It did. Rallies, hysteria, a Hillary tweet โฆ and then it turned out theywere the ones beating up a white girl.
Or how about the Princeton professor who claimed sheโd been the victim of a vicious racist policeman in 2016? โMany women who look like me,โ she wrote on Twitter, โhave a much more frightening end to such arrests.โ After a hue and cry, the police released the officerโs dashcam footage. The officer had been almost comically polite to her, despite her going 20 mph over the speed limit, as well as driving on a suspended license.
In 2015 in Connecticut, another BIPOC lady professor decided that, instead of simply paying a small traffic fine, sheโd wreck a copโs life. In a blizzard of letters to government officials, she accused the policeman of racism and demanded that โaction be taken against the officer.โ The police released a recorded transcript of the entire interaction โ and guess what? The officer never said any of the racist things sheโd alleged. He, too, was a model of professionalism.
The list goes on and on and on. And on and on. And on and on โฆ (Though itโs important we avoid reflexive cynicism. Only the most callous among us would doubt Jussie Smollett.)
In any case, the moral of the story: Democrats say RACIST!!, you say โShow me the video.โ
Which brings us to the allegedly racist Tennessee Republicans who expelled two of their colleagues this week just because they were black! (Didnโt Republicans notice these guys were black before now?)
MEDIA: The expelled lawmakers did nothing that others didnโt do!
MEDIA: Trust us, these lawmakers were the picture of decorum.
Normal people: Show us the video.
MEDIA: We must have left it in the car. Weโll try to remember to bring it tomorrow.
Thereโs a reason Tennessee Democrats frantically tried to prevent the playing of the video.
What it shows is two black Democrats, Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, on the Tennessee House floor carrying on for more than an hour, shouting into a bullhorn, waving protest signs, banging on the podium like a drum, and leading chants with protesters in the gallery:
Power to the people! Power to the people!
No justice, no peace! No action, no peace!
Whose house? Our house! Whose house? Our house!
Gun control now! Gun control now!
Please explain how the Jan 6 QAnon Shaman showed more contempt for the democratic process than Jones and Pearson did. How about compared to a representative sending naughty texts to female colleagues outside of business hours โ the casus belli of the last expulsion in 2016.
But according to MSNBC, the only reason Jones and Pearson were expelled was because the โpredominantly white, predominantly maleโ lawmakers refuse to โcoexist with representatives who are female or young or blackโ โ as Nicole Wallace put it. (Nicole: Relax. Youโve got the job.)
In bafflement, Wallace asked, โWhy did they have to be expelled? Why did this come to this?โ
Idea: Show the video, Nicole!
Rep. Gloria Johnson, the body-positive white representative, begged not to be expelled, pointing out with some justice that, unlike Jones and Pearson, she broke no House rules โ never shouted, pounded the podium, displayed a protest sign or used a bullhorn.
But as soon as her argument succeeded and she wasnโt expelled, Johnson rushed to MSNBC to say racism was the only reason she wasnโt. The sole deciding factor, she said, was โthe color of our skin.โ
If so, then why did she flap her gums about not breaking any House rules? Why not just say, Hey, guys! Iโm white! (Amazon is now accepting pre-orders for her forthcoming memoir, โProfiles in Craven.โ)
Some conservatives say the Republicans should have expelled the white lady just to avoid (false) charges of racism. Yes, and innocent whites and Asians should be sent to prison so no one can say our criminal justice system is racist.
Iโm sorry if black people break rules out of proportion to their numbers in the population, but we donโt punish the innocent to achieve some childish idea of โequity.โ
Rep. Johnson is a liar, but she didnโt break any House rules. Jones and Pearson did.
Johnson defended the assault on democracy by her black colleagues, saying, โThe younger generation has a different way of speaking. They have a different way of addressing things.โ So get used to bullhorns during legislative sessions, America! Itโs just black style.
Apparently, weโve returned to the Treating-Black-People-Like-Children phase of โDiversity.โ I just wish liberals would state their racism plainly: We simply canโt expect black people to abide by white norms of dignity and decorum.
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
Why do brands like Bud Light make marketing decisions โ like promoting transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney โ that will lose customers and money?
While it may seem like a mystery, Steve Deace has some answers.
He says people โstill believe thereโs this neutral mechanism in our culture called โthe marketplaceโ where eventually these things get sifted and filtered, right? And the people decide if they want this or they want that or they donโt want that and they do want this, right?โ
He continues, โI donโt think thatโs true anymore.โ
As worship of God wanes, a new religion has begun to take its place. Deace believes that this is why brands like Bud Light are completely ignoring the desires of their target demographics.
He says, โThe idea that it will just be a religionless society โ oh no, it will not. There will be another religion. Another religion will emerge to take the place of the one that vacated said space. Nature abhors a vacuum. Something will emerge to take that place.โ
And according to Deace, the leftโs new religion of wokeness is a tight-knit one.
โThey have built a fellowship. May I say a church? They have each otherโs backs. They go to the end. This is where the real religious commitment and conviction exists in America.โ
โAmerica is not devoid of real religious commitment and conviction. It is replete with the wrong religious commitment and conviction.โ
Want more from Steve Deace?
To enjoy more of Steve’s take on national politics, Christian worldview and principled conservatism with a snarky twist, subscribe to BlazeTV โ the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.
Men everywhere seem to experience tension between what they themselves define as good men and the way the surrounding culture pressures them to be real men.
The report of a mass shooting in a bar in Thousand Oaks, California, in 2018 was more than a news account of a crime. It was also a story about two young men.
The killer was 28-year-old Ian David Long, a college dropout, divorced former Marine who was unemployed and living with his mother.
He knew the Borderline Bar and Grill held a weekly college night when it would be crowded with young people. He entered the bar dressed in black, a hood pulled over his head. Tossing smoke grenades into the crowd to create confusion, he drew out a pistol with a laser sight and started shooting. A sergeant from the sheriffโs office rushed over to help, but the shooter was waiting for him. After killing the sergeant and 12 other people, Long shot himself.
In the crowd that night was another young man, 20-year-old Matt Wennerstrom, who emerged as the hero of the hour. Sporting a backward baseball cap and a scruffy beard, Matt looked like a typical college student. But what he did was not at all typical.
As soon as shots began booming through the bar, he and about seven other young men grabbed as many people as they could and pushed them under a pool table for cover. Then they piled their own bodies over them to protect them from the hail of gunfire.
One woman, who was celebrating her 21st birthday at the bar that night, told reporters afterward, โThere were multiple men who got on their knees and pretty much blocked all of us with their back toward the shooter, ready to take a bullet for any single one of us.โ
When the shooter paused to reload, Matt and his friends threw bar stools through a back window and began shepherding people outside. Repeatedly, the young men rushed back into the bar to steer more people to safety.
How did Matt have the presence of mind to respond so quickly to danger?
When a reporter at the scene of the crime asked that question, the young man replied, โMy life is taken care of. I know where Iโm going if I die, so I was not worried to sacrifice.โ
Two young men. One used his masculine strength to take lives. The other used his masculine strength to save lives.
โToxic Masculinityโ
When the American Psychological Association (APA) issued its first-ever guidelines for counseling men and boys in 2018, it denounced โtraditional masculinity ideologyโ as โpsychologically harmful.โ Groups like the APA have injected the phrase โtoxic masculinityโ into the bloodstream of Americaโs public discourse. The phrase has become a catchall explanation for male sexism, dominance, aggression, and violence.
Few people are claiming all masculinity is toxic. Yet the message men often hear is that there is something inherently defective in the male character. Many men today feel discouraged, devalued, and demoralized.
When I told my class at Houston Baptist University that I was writing a book on masculinity, a male student shot back, โWhat masculinity? Itโs been beaten out of us.โ When masculinity itself is portrayed as a problem, the implication is that the solution is emasculation.
โAre men being held hostage by culture war labels and stereotypes that blame them rather than help them?โ asks the Christian Science Monitor. In a culture that increasingly blames men, itโs time to find ways to help them instead.
Because of testosterone, men are typically larger, stronger, and faster than women. In general, they are also more physical, more competitive, and more risk-taking. We need to affirm these God-given traits as good when used to honor and serve others.
The APA guidelines make a point of noting that most mass shooters are male, but they overlook the controlled power and aggression used by the heroic men who have stopped mass shooters.
Masculine traits are not intrinsically toxic; they are good when directed to virtuous ends. In a fallen world, the lawful application of coercive force is sometimes necessary to defend the innocent.
Yet we all know that the male strength that makes a man a protector can be distorted and turn him into a predator. The drive to achieve can become egoism and self-seeking. The leadership impulse can be twisted into an impulse for domination and control.
In โPlay the Man,โ Washington, D.C., pastor Mark Batterson says, โThe image of God is our original software, sin is the virus.โ The challenge is to sort out which definitions of manhood are part of the original software and which are the virus. Which belong to Godโs original design and which are products of sin?
Masculinity: Godโs Software or a Sinful Virus?
We might say there are two competing scripts for what it means to be a man. Sociologist Michael Kimmel highlighted the contrast with an ingenious experiment. He started by asking cadets at West Point what it means to be a good man. If someone delivers a eulogy and says, โHe was a good man,โ what does that mean?
The cadets had no trouble answering: โHonor, duty, integrity, sacrifice, do the right thing, stand up for the little guy, be a provider, be a protector.โ Be responsible, be generous, and give to others.
โWhere did you learn that?โ Kimmel asked. The cadets answered, โItโs everywhere. Itโs our culture โฆ itโs the Judeo-Christian heritage. Itโs the air we breathe.โ Men seem to be innately aware of the software God has coded into the male character.
Kimmel then asked a follow-up question: โWhat does it mean if I tell you, โMan the f-ck up! Be a real man.โโ
The cadets shouted, โOh no, thatโs completely different.โ To be a real man means to be โtough, strong, never show weakness, win at all costs, suck it up, play through pain, be competitive, get rich, get laid.โ
Kimmel has posed the same two questions to thousands of boys and young men in countries across the globe โ from single-sex schools in Australia to a police academy in Sweden to former soccer stars at FIFA โ and he virtually always gets the same answer.
Men everywhere seem to experience tension between what they themselves define as the goodman and the way the surrounding culture pressures them to be real men. They sense the contradiction between the software and the virus.
The Good Man vs. the โRealโ Man
Borrowing from Kimmelโs experiment, letโs give them labels: the Good Man versus the โRealโ Man.
Itโs not that every trait listed as the โRealโ Man is necessarily bad. In a crisis, for example, we need men (and women) who can stand tough and not collapse in tears. But that is meant to be a short-term strategy, not a way of life.
The problem with the stereotype of the โRealโ Man is that it is one-sided. When separated from a moral vision of the GoodMan, it can easily degenerate into sexism, dominance, entitlement, and contempt for those perceived as weak โ traits we can all agree are toxic.
Of course, men do not respond well to being accused of being toxic โ who would? A better course is to ask, โHow can we support men in aspiring to live out the ideal of the Good Man?โ
Because men are made in Godโs image, even those who are not Christian seem to understand that their unique masculine strengths are not intended to enable them to get whatever they want but to protect those they love โ to provide, sacrifice, and, if necessary, fight for them.
As a result, when Christians promote a biblical moral vision โ the Good Man โ they are not imposing an alien standard on men. They are encouraging them to follow their own conscience, to be uncompromising in doing what they instinctively know is right.
As Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, people everywhere โshow that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending themโ (Romans 2:15).
Our goal should be to support men in living out their innate sense of the biblical software โ Godโs original design for manhood.
In โThe War Against Boys,โfeminist philosopher Christina Hoff Sommers writes, โHistory teaches us that masculinity without morality is lethal. But masculinity constrained by morality is powerful and constructive, and a gift to women.โ
But how did there come to be two competing scripts in the first place? Over the course of Western history, society has grown more secular, and so has its concept of masculinity. As a result, men increasingly feel pressure to live by the secular script of the โRealโ Man. The most important conversation is not the one between men and women but the one carried out within menโs own heads between these two competing versions of manhood. Ideally, the Good Man should also bethe โRealโ Man. But in todayโs secular culture, the two have become decoupled.
My goal is to ask how the two scripts were split apart. We will be effective in countering the secular script for men only if we understand where it came from and how it developed. By recognizing that there are two competing scripts, we can cut through many of todayโs contentious debates over masculinity. The word โmasculinityโ has become a trigger word that sets people off in all directions, making it difficult even to discuss the topic objectively.
But a Christian worldview gives us the means to think critically about cultural trends. It provides a perspective that is โin the world but not of itโ (John 17:14โ19).
A transcendent perspective empowers us to rise above the polarization โ to push back against both extremes and consider a dispassionate account of the issues facing men today.
Nancy Pearcey is a professor and scholar in residence at Houston Christian University. She has written several bestselling books, which have been translated into 19 languages. The story of Brandon is adapted from her book “Love Thy Body: Answering Hard Questions about Live and Sexuality.”
According to the contemporary left, itโs โauthoritarianโ for local elected officials to curate school library collections but fine for a powerful centralized federal government to issue an edict compelling a major industry to produce a product and then force hundreds of millions of people to buy it.
President Biden is set to โtransformโ and โremakeโ the entire auto industry โ โfirst with carrots, now with sticksโโ notes the Washington Post, as if dictating the output of a major industry is within the governing purview of the executive branch. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing draconian emissions limits for vehicles, ensuring that 67 percent of all new passenger cars and trucks produced within nine years will be electric. This is state coercion. It is undemocratic. We are not governed; we are managed.
In fascist economies, a powerful centralized state โ often led by a demagogue who plays on the nationalistic impulses of people โ controls both manufacturing and commerce and dictates prices and wages for the โcommon good.โ Any unpatriotic excessive profits are captured by the state. All economic activity must meet state approval. And crony, rent-seeking companies are willing participants. Now, Iโm not saying we already live in a fascist economic state. Iโm just saying the Democratic Party economic platform sounds like it wishes we were.
The coverage of Bidenโs edict has gone exactly as one might expect. โBiden makes huge push for electric vehicles. Is America ready?โ asks Politico, for instance. The conceit of so much modern media coverage rests on the assumption that the leftโs ideas are part of an inevitable societal evolution toward enlightenment. The only question remaining is when will the slaw-jawed yokels in Indiana and Texas finally catch on.
Iโm sorry, EVs are not a technological advancement โ or much of an environmental one โ over vehicles with internal combustion engines. Most of the comforts EV makers like to brag about have been a regular feature of gas-powered cars for decades. At best, EVs are a lateral technology. And, as far as practicality, cost, and comfort go, theyโre a regression. If EVs are more efficient and save us money, as administration officials claim, manufacturers would not have to be compelled and bribed into producing them.
The problem for Democrats is that consumers already have perfectly useful and affordable gas-powered cars that, until recently, could be cheaply fueled and driven long distances without stopping for long periods of time. Fossil fuels โ also the predominant energy source used to power electric cars โ are the most efficient, affordable, portable, and useful form of energy. We have a vast supply of it. In recent years, weโve become the worldโs largest oil producer. There are tens of billions of easily accessible barrels of fossil fuels here at home and vast amounts around the world. By the time we run out, if ever, we will have invented far better ways to move vehicles than plugging an EV battery โ which is made by emitting twice as many gases into the air as a traditional car engine โ into an antiquated windmill.
โI want to let everybody know that this EPA is committed to protecting the health and well-being of every single person on this planet,โ the EPAโs Michael Reganย explainedย when announcing the edicts. No one is safer in an EV than a gas-powered vehicle. The authoritarianโs justification for economic control is almost always โsafety.โ But the entire โsafetyโ claim is tethered to the perpetually disproven theory that our society canโt safely โ and relatively cheaply โ adapt to slight changes in climate. If the state can regulate โgreenhouse gasesโ as an existential threat, it has the unfettered power to regulate virtually the entire economy. This is why politicians treat every hurricane, tornado, and flood as an apocalyptic event. But in almost every quantifiable way, theย climate is less dangerousย to mankind now than it has ever been. And the more they try to scare us, the less people care.
So let the Chinese communists worry about keeping their population โsafe.โ Letโs keep this one innovative, open, and free.
David Harsanyi is a senior editor at The Federalist, a nationally syndicated columnist, a Happy Warrior columnist at National Review, and author of five booksโthe most recent, Eurotrash: Why America Must Reject the Failed Ideas of a Dying Continent. He has appeared on Fox News, C-SPAN, CNN, MSNBC, NPR, ABC World News Tonight, NBC Nightly News and radio talk shows across the country. Follow him on Twitter, @davidharsanyi.
A New York City law firm with โstrong tiesโ to Democrats and the Biden administration, and a big-time fundraiser for both, lent the Manhattan district attorney three lawyers to help him take down Donald Trump. This cohort included former Special Assistant District Attorney Mark F. Pomerantz, whose leaked resignation letter appears responsible for the Manhattan prosecutorโs decision to indict Trump.
Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg became the first prosecutor to bring criminal charges against a former president when he moved forward last week with the arraignment of Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records. The pathetic, barebones indictment was quickly denounced by pundits on both sides of the political aisle. Then on Friday, the House Judiciary Committee raised additional concerns about the role Matthew Colangelo, the former No. 3 man in the Biden administrationโs Department of Justice, played in the targeting of Trump.
While Braggโs hiring of Colangelo to reportedly โjump-startโ the investigation into Trump further indicates the indictment was politically motivated, the Manhattan D.A. officeโs unprecedented use of outside, Democrat-connected lawyers to investigate Trump pre-dates Colangeloโs arrival by nearly a year.
A Pattern
In early to mid-February of 2021, Braggโs predecessor, District Attorney Cyrus Vance, arranged for private criminal defense attorney and former federal prosecutor Mark Pomerantz to be a special assistant district attorney for the Manhattan D.A.โs office. Pomerantz, whom The New York Times noted was to work โsolely on the Trump investigation,โ took a temporary leave of absence from his law firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, where he had defended former Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., against alleged campaign finance violations. But even before being sworn in as a special assistant to the Manhattan D.A., Pomerantz had reportedly โbeen helping with the case informally for monthsโฆโ
According to the Times, โthe hiring of an outsider is a highly unusual move for a prosecutorโs office.โ One must wonder, then, how much more unusual it is for the Manhattan D.A.โs office to receive the โinformalโ assistance of a private criminal defense attorney. The legacy news outlet, however, justified the hiring of Pomerantz based on the โusual complexityโ of โthe two-and-a-half-year investigation of the former president and his family business.โ
A few months later, the D.A.โs office welcomed two more outsiders, Elyssa Abuhoff and Caroline Williamson, who also both took leaves of absence from the New York powerhouse Paul, Weiss to work on the Trump investigation as special assistant district attorneys.
For a law firm to lend not one but three lawyers to the Manhattan D.A.โs office seems rather magnanimous, until you consider Paul, Weissโs previous generosity to Joe Biden. During Bidenโs White House run, the law firm hosted a $2,800-per-plate fundraiser for about 100 guests.
The chair of the Paul, Weiss law firm, Brad Karp, alsoย toppedย the list of Biden fundraisers, bundling at least $100,000 for the then-candidate. โAs someone who cares passionately about preserving the rule of law, safeguarding our democracy and protecting fundamental liberties, Iโve been delighted to do everything I possibly can to support the Joe Biden/Kamala Harris ticket,โ Karpย wroteย in an email.
Karpโs support of the Democrat presidential ticket isnโt surprising given that his fellow Paul, Weiss partner Robert Schumer is Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumerโs brother.
Bidenโs connection to the firm, however, dates much further back, with the former secretary of homeland security in the Obama-Biden administration, Jeh Johnson, also heralding from Paul, Weiss. Once elected president, Biden nominated Jonathan Kanter, a former partner of Paul, Weiss, to serve as the top antitrust enforcement official at the Justice Department. In fact, according to Bloomberg, Paul, Weiss has โemerge[d] as Biden-Era N.Y. Power Center.โ
A Resignation
The three Paul, Weiss alumni sent to the Manhattan D.A.โs office to bolster the Trump investigations would all make news, but for different reasons. Pomerantz first garnered headlines when he resigned as a special assistant district attorney in early 2022, after Bragg became Manhattanโs D.A.
In his resignation letter, leaked to The New York Times, Pomerantz said that in late 2021, Braggโs predecessor, Vance, had โconcluded that the facts warranted prosecution, and he directed the team to present evidence to a grand jury and to seek an indictment of Mr. Trump and other defendants as soon as reasonably possible.โ But after replacing Vance as D.A., Bragg decided โnot to go forward with the grand jury presentation and not to seek criminal charges at the present time,โ Pomerantz wrote, adding, โThe investigation has been suspended indefinitely.โ
What Pomerantzโs letter did not say, however, was that in late 2021, โat least three career prosecutors asked to move off the investigation,โ reportedly โconcerned that the investigation was moving too quickly, without clear evidence to support possible charges.โ Instead, in his resignation, Pomerantz declared he believes โDonald Trump is guilty of numerous felony violations,โ that โthe public interest warrants the criminal prosecution of Mr. Trump,โ and that โsuch a prosecution should be brought without any further delay.โ
Pomerantz later rejoined Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and authored a book about the Trump investigation.
Pomerantzโs letter and his claims that Bragg had suspended the Trump probe triggered a political firestorm, which the Manhattan D.A. sought to quell by telling the public the investigation was ongoing.
Criminal Charges
Meanwhile, the Manhattan D.A.โs office pushed forward in its criminal case against the Trump Corporation. A grand jury had indicted the Trump Corporation in late June of 2021 on charges it engaged in a scheme to avoid paying taxes on the salaries of high-level executives by instead funneling compensation through perks, such as luxury apartments and cars. A second Trump corporation would later be added to the criminal case that went to trial in late 2022.
The trial team that prosecuted the case included the other two Paul, Weiss attorneys on loan to the Manhattan D.A.โs office: Abuhoff and Williamson. Bragg borrowed a third outside attorney, Gary T. Fishman, from New Yorkโs Democrat Attorney General Letitia James. Along with three regular members of the Manhattan D.A.โs office, the three โspecial assistant district attorneysโ helped convict the Trump-related business entities in early December 2022.
After securing convictions of the two Trump corporations, Abuhoff and Williamson ended their โspecial assistant district attorneyโ relationship with Braggโs office in December 2022 and went back to Paul, Weiss โ a return that would be short-lived. Abuhoff rejoined the Manhattan D.A.โs office in February 2023, and Williamson returned the next month, but now both as regular members of the staff.
So short was their time back at Paul, Weiss, in fact, that one must wonder if the firm paid them bonuses following their departure from the Manhattan D.A.โs office. The Federalist posed this question to Paul, Weiss, but the inquiry went unanswered. Paul, Weiss also did not respond to questions concerning whether the lawyers received any compensation or Paul, Weiss benefits while on leave to the D.A.โs office.
Abuhoff and Williamsonโs return to the D.A.โs office followed the news that in early December, Bragg had hired Matthew Colangelo from the Biden DOJ to โjump-startโ the officeโs investigation into Trump. Upon his inauguration, Biden had appointed Colangelo to serve in the No. 3 slot at the DOJ, showing the trust Biden has in the lawyer now charged with taking down his opponent Trump.
Colangelo had also previously worked in the Obama-Biden administration and as chief counsel and executive deputy attorney general in A.G. Jamesโ office, where he and Fishman reportedly investigated Trump. As noted above, James would later lend Fishman to the Manhattan D.A.โs office, keeping with her campaign promise to โbe a real pain in the -ssโ to Trump. Itโs no wonder House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan is concerned about Colangeloโs role in the unprecedented indictment.
Connecting the Dots
But the issue goes much beyond Colangelo, for it seems likely Bragg never would have hired Colangelo had Pomerantzโs resignation letter never been leaked to The New York Times. Itโs outrageous that Pomerantz was reportedly โinformallyโ advising the former Manhattan D.A. while working for the โBiden-Era N.Y. Power Centerโ law firm with extensive connections to Democrats. Equally outrageous is the fact that the same law firm lent the D.A.โs office three lawyers to bolster the Trump investigation.
It seems Bragg was swayed by New York politics to alter the communist boast of Joseph Stalinโs secret police chief, Lavrentiy Beria: โShow me the man and Iโll show you the crime.โ The Manhattan D.A. had the man but couldnโt find the crime.
โLend me your top attorneys to show me a crime,โ is the new motto of the political machine New York Democrats built to purge the country, communist style, of Trump. That should horrify every American.
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 Prizeโthe law schoolโs 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.
EXCLUSIVE: Two dozen Republican lawmakers are demanding answers from the Pentagon after Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRNMMC) sent a “cease and desist” letter to Catholic priests to stop providing care during Holy Week, slamming the move as a violation of the First Amendment.
Twenty-four Republican members of Congress penned a letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. In the letter, obtained exclusively by Fox News Digital, the lawmakers blast the Biden administrationโs “attack on the Christian faith.”
“Last week, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center sent a โcease and desistโ letter to Holy Name College Friary, a group of Catholic priests, ordering them to stop providing pastoral care at their facility,” the letter reads. “The same group of priests have served at Walter Reed for almost 20 years, and this order came days before Easter.”
“Forcing priests to stop providing care during Holy Week is not only morally wrong, but also a violation of the First Amendment,” the members of Congress wrote.
The entrance of Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C., is seen on Nov. 19, 2021.ย (OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)
The lawmakers praised the Catholic priests who have “stood alongside our service members through the darkest days of our history.”ย “They joined American service members on the battlefield and provided care to all in need,” the letter says.
The lawmakers are demanding answers from Austin on why the Biden administration sent the “cease and desist” letter and why the administration chose to “terminate the contact” with the Holy Name College Friary.
The lawmakers also claim that the Archdiocese of the Military informed them that the contract for providing pastoral care was “awarded to a for-profit, secular company that does not provide pastoral care.”
“awarded to a for-profit, secular company that does not provide pastoral care.” A “SECULAR” company??????? What kind of BIBLICAL care are they going to get? Sounds like an attack on Christianity to me.
“Who was awarded the contract and why?” they asked, requesting further contract terms, applications, review comments, the award letter and all internal emails and documents related to the contract.
“This attack on the Christian faith by the Biden administration during Holy Week is unconscionable,” the lawmakers wrote, demanding answers by April 21.
The Defense Health Agency told Fox News Digital that there “was no cancelation of Catholic services at Walter Reed, especially during Holy Week.”
“Palm Sunday mass was conducted by the Catholic priest assigned to the hospital and there were services on Holy Thursday and Good Friday. On Easter Sunday, confessions were offered as well as mass celebrated by a Catholic priest,” the Defense Health Agency spokesperson said.
The Defense Health Agency also told Fox News Digital in an email that “a contract was NOT terminated.”
“As with most contracts they have a beginning and an end. This contract originally ended on December 31st and was extended until March 31st.ย The contractor was aware of the contract end date,” the spokesperson said. “A new contract was awarded to a different company effective April 1st.”ย
“When the previous contractor continued to provide services after April 1st, a cease and desist letter was sent stating the former contractor could not perform services since they were not under contract,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson added: “The current contract is under review to ensure the right services are being provided. But there was absolutely no loss of Catholic Services to the community.”
Rep. Mary Miller, R-Ill., gives remarks after receiving an endorsement during a Save America Rally with former President Donald Trump at the Adams County Fairgrounds in Mendon, Illinois, on June 25, 2022.ย (Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images)
The letter to Austin was sent by Reps. Mary E. Miller, R-Ill.; Jim Banks, R-Ind.; Paul Gosar, R-Ariz.; Byron Donalds, R-Fla.; Tom Tiffany, R-Wis.; Scott Perry, R-Pa.; Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga.; Andy Biggs, R-Ariz.; Warren Davidson, R-Ohio; Matt Rosendale, R-Mont.; Lauren Boebert, R-Colo.; Ralph Norman, R-S.C.; Bob Good, R-Va.; Keith Self, R-Texas; Debbie Lesko, R-Ariz.; Andrew Clyde, R-Ga.; Josh Brecheen, R-Okla.; Brian Babin, R-Texas; Ben Cline, RpVa.; Andy Harris, R-Md.; Diana Harshbarger, R-Tenn.; Michael Cloud, R-Texas; Eli Crane, R-Ariz.; Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla.; and Alex X. Mooney, R-W.Va.
“Priests and pastors guided our troops through the darkest days of our toughest battles. The Biden administration chose Easter weekend to kick Catholic priests out of Walter Reed, violating their First Amendment right to free exercise of religion,” Miller told Fox News Digital. “I am proud to lead this letter to Biden’s Defense Secretary to demand answers on this unconscionable attack on Christian service members and the First Amendment.”
The Pentagon, though, said there was an active duty Army priest providing Catholic coverage for Holy Week and Easter at Walter Reed after the cease and desist letter.
But two senior U.S. defense officials told Fox News that the decision surrounding the renewal of the contract for Catholic Pastoral Care was not handled by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and did not involve the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The officials said the decision was not made by the Pentagon.
The Pentagon is seen from Air Force One as it flies over Washington, D.C., on March 2, 2022.ย (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)
Instead, an official said the contract was handled by the Defense Health Agency.ย
The letter from the lawmakers came after the Catholic archdiocese said in a statement that Walter Reed issued the cease and desist order against Holy Name College Friary, a Franciscan community of priests and brothers that has served at the center for nearly 20 years.
Walter Reed said the contract for Catholic Pastoral Care was terminated at the end of March, just asย Holy Weekย was about to begin. Walter Reed replaced the contract with a secular defense contracting firm that the Catholic archdiocese argues will not be able to provide adequate care.
Walter Reed, though, defended the move over the weekend, saying that Catholic Easter Services were provided to those who “wish to attend,” and included a celebration of Mass and the administration of Confession by an ordained Catholic priest.
“For many years, a Catholic ordained priest has been on staff at WRNMMC providing religious sacraments to service members, veterans and their loved ones,” Walter Reed said in a statement. “There has also been a pastoral care contract in place to supplement those services provided.”
“Currently… the pastoral care contract is under review to ensure it adequately supports the religious needs of our patients and beneficiaries,” the Walter Reed statement said. “Although at this time the Franciscan Diocese will not be hosting services on Sunday parishioners of the Diocese while patients at our facilities may still seek their services.”
The AMS was created by St. Pope John Paul II to provide the Churchโs services to veterans and service members in the U.S. and overseas. The archdiocese, which does not have geographical boundaries, is responsible for the care of 1.8 million Catholics across the globe.
“Squad” memberย Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., was blasted as a “total fraud” online after her infamous “accent” video re-emerged. Ocasio-Cortez caught flak in 2019 for appearing to use an “accent” at the Rev. Al Sharptonโs National Action Network convention that year. The Democratic socialist congresswoman was responding to critics who pointed to her past employment as a bartender that she called attempts at delegitimizing her as a lawmaker.
Ocasio-Cortez caught flak in 2019 when she used an “accent” at the Rev. Al Sharptonโs National Action Network convention that year.ย (RepAOC/Youtubeย )
The footage of her speech made its way around the internet again on Tuesday when the Twitter account End Wokeness reposted the video cut with a recent video she made aboutย former President Donald Trumpย where she was not using the accent.
End Wokeness blasted Ocasio-Cortez as a “total fraud” and pointed out her “accent before and after.”
“When Donald Trump tapped into this idea of Make America Great Again, there was times of economic opportunity,” Ocasio-Cortez said in the recent video. “Wages rose until the 1970s.”
“I’m proud to be a bartender. Ain’t nothing wrong with that,” Ocasio-Cortez said in 2019. “There’s nothing wrong with working retail, folding clothes for other people to buy. There is nothing wrong with preparing the food that your neighbors will eat. There is nothing wrong with driving the buses that take your family to work. There is nothing wrong with being a working person in the United States of America and there is everything dignified about it.”
She added that she feels “encouraged” when people remind her of her past because it shows that if she can “work in a restaurant and become a member of the United States Congress, so can you.”
Other users defended the congresswoman, with NK News editor Oliver Jia tweeting that he is “no AOC fan but this is petty nonsense to be making a case about.”
“Politicians from both parties change the cadence of their voice all the time depending on the audience,” Jia wrote. “It’s also common for people from certain backgrounds to code switch depending on who they’re with.”
I'm no AOC fan but this is petty nonsense to be making a case about. Politicians from both parties change the cadence of their voice all the time depending on the audience.
It's also common for people from certain backgrounds to code switch depending on who they're with. https://t.co/kAowSRMFzd
— Oliver Jia (ใชใชใใผใปใธใข) (@OliverJia1014) April 11, 2023
Fox News Digital reached out to Ocasio-Cortezโs office for comment on the video but received no response.
Ocasio-Cortezโs speech was not well-received in 2019, with the congresswoman being compared to failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, whose dialect appeared to change for different audiences on the campaign trail.
Amid the negative reaction to her speech, Ocasio-Cortez took to Twitter to respond to the criticism, pointing to her upbringing in the Bronx and explaining that she talks differently when sheโs “fired up.”
“As much as the right wants to distort & deflect, I am from the Bronx. I act & talk like it, *especially* when Iโm fired up and especially when Iโm home,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. “It is so hurtful to see how every aspect of my life is weaponized against me, yet somehow asserted as false at the same time.”
Fox News Digital’s Joseph Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
When it comes to transgender ideology, Dr. Andrรฉ Van Mol says simply being a board-certified family physician in todayโs political climate could be considered controversial.
Speaking at The Christian Post’s Generation Indoctrination conference last month, Van Mol, who is also the co-chair of the American College of Pediatrician’s Committee on Adolescent Sexuality, said if he was to give testimony in a court of law, attorneys for the other side would work to get his testimony thrown out, claiming he is not an expert. But if he worked for a gender clinic, he would be considered an “expert.”
โIf I were a family physician working for the gender clinic, now Iโm an expert,โ he noted, pointing to what he described as the โideological capture of medical organizations, legislators, media as a whole, [and] the academic worldโ by gender politics.
Van Mol called the trans movement โideology masquerading as science, reinforced with emotional blackmail โ โYou have to support them or theyโre going to kill themselves’ โ which is also not true.โ
That dynamic, he added, is perhaps best encapsulated by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), which Van Mol calls an advocacy group.
โAll roads lead back to WPATH,โ he explained, using the acronym for the organization formerly known as the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association.
Under WPATH Standards of Care (SOC)ย for the Health of Transsexual, Transgender and Gender Nonconforming People, said Van Mol, all age restrictions for puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery have been removed.ย The latest version of WPATHโs SOC now includes โeunuchโ as a gender identity, which it describes as โindividuals [who are] assigned male at birth and wish to eliminate masculine physical features, masculine genitals or genital functioning.โ
Van Molโs response to the change was brief but to the point.
โThis cannot be science,โ he said.
โThere’s always a more honest answer to gender dysphoria or confusion in a minor than chemical sterilization and surgical mutilation in what is otherwise a very healthy young body,โ he said. โWhat they need is to address those underlying issues.โ
Oftentimes, said Van Mol, much of the controversy stems from a toxic mix of mainstream media headlines and low-quality scientific research. He pointed to the familiar trend of media outlets chasing headlines rather than following the science.
โYouโll notice that whenever thereโs a new study singing the praises of transition, magically, immediately, itโs covered in the media from coast to coast, with pretty much the same talking points, and that canโt be coincidental,โ he said.
Van Mol also said studies that support sex-change procedures โuniformly show that those studies are of low to very low quality.โ
โBy definition that means they fail to show what they claim they are showing,โ he added.
He also pointed to the closure of the Tavistock Clinic, Britainโs Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS), the worldโs largest pediatric gender clinic, set for later this year following six comprehensive literature reviews out of the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland and Florida.
โWhat we see now is โฆ four nations that were leading the world in โgender-affirming transition medical interventionsโ have done a complete turnaround, a complete 180, again, they were leading in it, and now theyโre like, โNo, this is not supported by good data,โโ he said.
According to recent data, the number of minors in America receiving a diagnosis of gender dysphoria tripled from 2017 to 2021, with more than 42,000 receiving the diagnosis in 2021. On the social media platform TikTok, which is especially popular among younger people, the hashtag โtransโ has logged 50.2 billion views, nearly doubling within the space of a year.
More European nations, he added, are turning away from this โjunk scienceโ and instead telling minors who are experiencing gender dysphoria to undergo comprehensive psychological evaluation and therapy โ both for the patient and the family.
โThere’s decades of literature showing overwhelming probability in a gender dysphoric minor of underlying health problems of adverse childhood experiences, bad family dynamics and a way over-representation of autism spectrum dysphoria, and that these all predate the gender dysphoria,โ Van Mol explained.
This approach, said Van Mol, is a more holistic method of addressing what tends to be a deeply complex condition.
โAnd thereโs absolutely no way that happens in a 40-minute visit to Planned Parenthood that gives you hormones,โ he added.
One of the biggest challenges presented by China as compared to the USSR is the depth of the Chinese penetration of Americaโs economy, politics, culture, and society.
โIt is time to acknowledge reality: The United States is in a New Cold War with the PRC [Peopleโs Republic of China],โ Heritage President Kevin Roberts wrote, expressing a sentiment espoused throughout the report.
For decades, America has followed a bipartisan and naรฏve policy of unfettered engagement with China, which has allowed the Chinese Communist Party to entrench and enrich itself within the international system while facing no consequences for its aggression abroad or totalitarianism at home. China now uses its wealth and technology to supercharge a policy of civil-military fusion, linking economics and military strategy.
One of the biggest challenges presented by China as compared to the USSR is the depth of the Chinese penetration of Americaโs economy, politics, culture, and society. The Heritage plan leaves no stone unturned when discussing these malign activities, advocating a โwhole-of-government and whole-of-society effortโ to counter them.
1. Ban Dangerous Chinese Apps
TikTok and other CCP-linked apps are incredibly popular, especially among American youth. These apps threaten personal privacy and national security. Heritage recommends an outright ban of TikTok and a more aggressive, risk-oriented approach to assessing foreign-owned information technologies in the U.S.
This would take very little in terms of new law, and the federal government has processes in place to monitor or ban these apps. Congress is already debating this issue, so the prognosis looks good.
2. Ban the Import and Sale of Chinese Drones
Although a lesser-known issue, CCP-linked drone manufacturers, specifically Da-Jiang Innovations (DJI), dominate the commercial and recreational markets. As with TikTok, all information collected by those drones is stored on CCP-accessible servers.
Local, state, and federal agencies have used DJI drones โ some given as free โgiftsโ during the pandemic โ to โmonitor every aspect of life in these cities,โ including โthe precise location of critical infrastructure and other sensitive information.โ
Bans on these drones can be included in the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) or implemented via executive order. Educating non-federal officials about the drones could reduce the threat at the state and local levels.
3. Risk-Manage Inbound Investment
Chinaโs direct investment in American firms peaked in 2015, but its national security implications remain. Often funneled through middlemen who camouflage Chinese involvement, CCP-linked investment still reaches into the billions annually.
The federal government has the tools to properly manage and review this. The 2018 Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act (FIRRMA) enabled the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to scrutinize these investments more.
Expanding definitions in FIRRMA can empower CFIUS to address all forms of Chinese investment, even through intermediaries, while direct legislative language can force reviews when agencies decline to use the power granted by law.
4. Reject Damaging ESG Policies
So-called environmental, social, and governance policies have been a debacle for investors and a sop to Chinese-linked firms, which control the supply chains for ESG-mandated renewable energy. ESG weakens the U.S. while strengthening its greatest foe.
Congress can end this damaging strategy through legislation, which it indeed did before President Biden vetoed it. Congress should continue pushing to end ESG through law and work to advance the understanding of ESGโs danger in the corporate sector.
5. Increase Munition Production and Arm Taiwan
This issue is paramount to countering China, particularly as the CCP has advanced its aggression toward Taiwan. The Heritage report acknowledges the trade-offs inherent in the decisions about arms sales and transfers and proposes an augmentation of our defense-industrial base to overcome these scarcity issues going forward.
Today, we can prioritize Taiwan by sending critical munitions, ensuring that capabilities sent elsewhere do not overly affect the defense of Taiwan, drawing down our own stocks in accordance with the law, and facilitating arms purchases from other nations.
6. Foster Innovation in the U.S. Maritime and Shipping Sectors
Americaโs โuncompetitive and outdated shipbuilding and shipping sector diminishes U.S. competitiveness, undermines the resilience of the economy, constrains the nationโs ability to mobilize and sustain a wartime economy, and meet the U.S. Navyโs global responsibilities,โ according to the report.
The major stumbling block to reform is the restrictive Jones Act, which should be repealed and replaced with a law focused on promoting innovation in the maritime sector. The Jones Act, or the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, mandates that U.S.-made and U.S.-owned vessels transport goods between American ports, and that U.S. citizens operate the vessels.
Free-market solutions will allow the creativity of American industry to excel, developing novel methods of transportation, growing our shipbuilding and shipping capacities, and backstopping American naval power.
7. Expand Export Controls
The U.S. policy of engagement with China had allowed the chronic export of technologies used to advance Chinaโs military aims. Legislation has since limited certain โfoundational technologyโ exports, but the federal bureaucracy has failed to implement controls by refusing to label these technologies.
Congress must exercise its oversight power and force executive branch agencies to make these determinations in line with the law, so as to cease the transfer of critical security technology to the CCP.
8. Hold China Accountable for Covid-19
Regardless of the pandemicโs specific origin, a great deal of evidence has shown the CCP deliberately covered up the virus, allowing it to spread unchecked. Since then, the CCP has stonewalled investigations into its behavior, using its leverage at the World Health Organization to avoid accountability.
The U.S. government should cease funding the WHO until it conducts a thorough investigation of Chinaโs involvement in the pandemic, end all financing of Chinese biomedical research, and propose unbiased international standards by which pandemics can be detected and limited without interfering with national sovereignty.
9. Prioritize the Pacific Islands
The Pacific Islands are often overlooked in the geopolitical competition with China. Many small island nations comprise the region, but it is strategically important to maintain a U.S. presence in the Pacific, especially through its links to Asia and Australia.
China has focused on this region, seeking to cut off the U.S. from its Indo-Pacific allies.
โWinning the New Cold Warโ suggests the U.S. compete on the same turf by renewing existing diplomatic and security agreements, exploring the expansion of those accords to other nations, and engaging diplomatically through high-level visits and summits.
10. Establish a Quad Select Initiative
The Quad โ the U.S., Australia, India, and Japan โ is one of Americaโs most important initiatives to counter China. It links the key players in the Indo-Pacific and builds bridges for future cooperation.
Expanding this multilateral format by selectively inviting other nations to join for military, economic, or planning purposes would allow the U.S. to enhance regional alliances and foster broader anti-CCP cooperation.
This would not require any legislation but merely a change in the executive posture. Creating a more open architecture for the Quad would serve as a significant counter to Chinese regional aggression.
These 10 points are the planโs low-hanging fruit, and the federal government could adopt these policies tomorrow if it had the will. Heritageโs โWinning the New Cold Warโ aims to bolster that resolve. Time will tell if it succeeds, but the plan is an excellent start.
Mike Cotรฉ is a writer and podcaster focusing on history, Great Power rivalry, and geopolitics. He has also written for National Review and The National Interest, blogs at rationalpolicy.com, and can be found on Twitter @ratlpolicy.
The federal government peddled technology to Big Tech companies to assist them in censoring Americansโ speech on social media in the run-up to the 2020 election, according to emails Missouri and Louisiana uncovered in their First Amendment lawsuit against the Biden administration. Specifically, the State Department marketed this censorship technology through its Global Engagement Center. In other words, our tax dollars not only funded the development of tools to silence speech that dissented from the regimeโs narrative. They also paid for government employees to act as sales reps pitching the censorship products to Big Tech.
Iโve been โtasked with building relationships with technology companies,โ Samaruddin Stewart, then a senior adviser for the State Departmentโs Global Engagement Center or โGEC,โย wroteย in an early-February 2020 introductory email to LinkedIn, allegedly requesting a meeting. According to the lawsuit, his email also suggested he would be reaching out to other social media companies interested in โcountering disinformation.โย
On March 9, 2020, Stewart again contacted LinkedIn, referencing an earlier verbal discussion and writing:
Iโll send information [to LinkedIn representatives] about gaining access to Disinfo Cloud โ which is a GEC funded platform that offers stakeholders an opportunity to discover companies, technology, and tools that can assist with identifying, understanding, and addressing disinformation.
These two emails are explosive. Yet because they were revealed in two passing paragraphs of the 164-page complaint filed by Missouri, Louisiana, and a handful of other plaintiffs against the Biden administration, they โ and their enormous significance โ have been overlooked.
โCold-Callingโ Big Tech
The Stewart emails establish that in 2020, federal government actors contacted social media giants to promoteย GECโsย Disinfo Cloud. GEC represented that this government platform provided โcompanies, technology, and toolsโ to โassist with identifying, understanding, and addressing disinformation.โ Then it gave private tech companies access to Disinfo Cloud.ย
Almost identical to how GEC described Disinfo Cloud in congressionalย testimony, the State Departmentโsย webpageย marketed it as a โone-stop shopโ to โidentify and then test tools that counter propaganda and disinformation.โ โFact checkingโ and โmedia authenticationโ are just a couple of the types of technologies available through the dashboard.
GEC didnโt just promote Disinfo Cloud or give Big Tech access to what GECย calledย โthe U.S. governmentโs online repository.โ Government employees at GEC also offered to help private companiesย identifyย tools to suit their specific needs. Just โwriteโ to the GECโs Technology Engagement Division about โwhat your office needs to counter propaganda and disinformation,โ the State Department instructed on its webpage, and the government will โassistโ in finding โa technological solution.โย
โTestbedโ
Access to Disinfo Cloud, according to the State Departmentโs webpage, also provides โa gatewayโ to the GECโs Technology Engagement Divisionโs โTestbed,โ allowing users to review and test the technology against their unique needs.
While Stewartโs emails donโt expressly mention the โTestbedโ feature, the State Department boasts that the โprivate sectorโ uses both Disinfo Cloud and Testbed. The GECโs webpage also invites Disinfo Cloud users to ask โfor assistance in identifying a technological solution or draft a test proposal for a tool.โ If Disinfo Cloud users canโt find a tool that works for them, the GEC Technology Engagement team stresses it โis open to insights and is here to help implement ideas to move the counter propaganda and disinformation mission forward.โ
Infomercials
Deposition testimony by FBI Agent Elvis Chan suggests GECโs marketing of the censorship tools went beyond making cold calls (or emails) to LinkedIn and other Big Tech companies. It also seemingly went further than providing product advice and samples on Disinfo Cloud: The GECโs Technology Engagement Division apparently hosted infomercials to help the private vendors market their censorship software.
Chan, the assistant special agent in charge of the cyber branch at the FBIโs San Francisco field office, was โone of the primary peopleโ communicating with social media companies about supposed โdisinformation,โ and thus is one of the named defendants in Missouri v. Biden. As part of that litigation, the plaintiffs deposed Chan. During questioning, Chan testified that ahead of the 2020 election, he periodically spoke with Stewart, who would meet with the social media companies separately from Chan.
According to Chan, Stewart met with policy individuals with the various social media companies about โdifferent initiatives.โ Those initiatives included various kinds of vendor-made software โthat they would pilot to see if they could detect malign foreign influence on social media platforms.โย
Chan further testified that Stewart and GEC โwould provide webinarsโ from these vendors. As Chan explained, โ[T]he State Department was just providing a venue where different vendors could show off their products.โ The presentations were open to the general public, said Chan, but the GEC โwould invite all sorts of audiences, to include researchers, employees from State Department counterparts, so typically Ministry of Foreign Affairs.โ The intended audience, according to Chan, was โState Department-equivalent personnel, social media companies, and researchers.โ
Chan said he attended only a couple of the webinars because the companies took only a โsurface-levelโ look at the content, and thus he didnโt consider the technology useful to the FBI. But apparently, it was fine for the State Department to market the same tools to social media companies.
From Chanโs deposition testimony, it appears Stewart, the GECโs then-senior adviser, made the equivalent of sales calls and hosted infomercials, all for the purpose of pushing various censorship services to social media companies.
It is unclear whether these webinars were in addition to the GECโs โTech Demo Seriesโ โ at which private vendors showcased their knack for fighting so-called disinformation for โU.S. government counterparts and foreign partnersโ โ or whether, after the GEC sent a full-time representative to Silicon Valley in December of 2019 (presumably Stewart), the Tech Demo Series was opened to the public. However, given that the official Disinfo Cloud Twitter account promoted the Tech Demo Series, it seems likely that GEC expanded its target audience for the series to include the private sector and other Disinfo Cloud users.
Either way, Chanโs deposition testimony reveals our government marketed censorship technology to social media companies through โwebinars.โ And while Chan claimed he didnโt think GEC endorsed the products, the government expressly represented the Disinfo Cloud technology as tools to โassistโ with attacking so-called disinformation.
The Tools
So what exactly were those tools?
From open-source material, it is difficult, if not impossible, to identify the entire dataset of tech companies featured on Disinfo Cloud or participating in the Tech Demo Series. Thatโs because Disinfo Cloud has โbeen retired as [a] GEC-sponsored effort,โ according to the State Department. The DisinfoCloud.com webpage has also been shuttered.
But because GEC ran various โtech challenges,โ giving winners State Department โsponsorshipโ on the governmentโs Disinfo Cloud Testbed โ advertised as worth $25,000 โ among other things, several censorship companies involved can be identified, including NewsGuard, PeakMetrics, and Omelas.
NewsGuardโs censorship technology includes โitsย unreliableย reliability ratings database of thousands of news and information websites and a second database of purported hoaxes,โ as Iย detailedย in March. NewsGuardโsย winningย tech-challenge entry built upon those databases andย usedย โAI and social listening tools to identify the initial source of the hoax,โ and to find instances of the hoax being โrepeated or amplifiedโ online.
The second winner, PeakMetrics, offered a dashboard for tracking mentions of a topic across multiple media channels with social listening technology. The third winner, Omelas, developed tools to visually map online information.
The government gave these winners the ability to pilot their technology on Disinfo Cloudโs Testbed. Then it promoted Disinfo Cloud to social media giants as offering โaccess to companies, technology, and tools that can assist with identifying, understanding, and addressing disinformation.โย
So were NewsGuard, PeakMetrics, and Omelas among the companies GEC marketed to Big Tech? Did they participate in the government-run Tech Demos and present infomercials to the private sector? Did GEC help these vendors test their products for private companies on the Testbed?
In Practice
Consider the implications, using NewsGuard to illustrate.
NewsGuard rates various media outlets on a 100-point scale and provides a red โunreliableโ rating if its โexpertsโ score the news source below 60. The companyย ratesย The Federalist โredโ and claims it is one of the top-10 โmost influential misinformers.โ Conversely, some of the outlets thatย botchedย the biggest political stories of the century maintain a 100 percent reliability score.
The government awarded NewsGuard a $25,000 prize to develop new technology on Disinfo Cloud, using, in part, that ratings system as a backbone. NewsGuard would later receive an additional $750,000 from the government to advance the development of its censorship technology. PeakMetrics and Omelas also both scored additional government funding of $1.5 and $1 million respectively.
But think about the governmentโs other behind-the-scenes censorship entanglements. The government, via your tax dollars, funded both Disinfo Cloud, which provided the technology necessary to pilot the program, and the outside contractor, Park Advisors, that managed it.
The State Departmentโs GEC promoted the companies and technology featured on Disinfo Cloud, and a government liaison working for GEC personally contacted social media companies to encourage them to use the platform. The government also hosted Tech Demo Series for the vendors to market their products to the private sector.
Disinfo Cloud regularly promoted private censorship technology on its official Twitter account and retweeted NewsGuardโs announcement of its partnership with Mediabrands to โbring NewsGaurdโs rating work to TV news programming.
Then beyond promoting the censorship tools, government employees working with GEC helped social media and private-sector businesses identify, test, and tweak the most โappropriateโ technology for their โneeds.โ
And what are those โneeds?โ Censoring the speech of you and your fellow Americans.
A Scandal Like No Other
This scandal far surpasses the one that formerly ensnared GEC, when it was revealed the State Department awarded the Global Disinformation Index (GDI) โ another โratingsโ company that blacklists conservative outlets โ $100,000 as part of the U.S.-Paris Tech Challenge. GDI also reportedly received money from other government-funded organizations. Those taxpayer funds helped finance GDIโs blacklist of conservative media outlets, which advertisers relied upon to defund dissenters.
But what Stewartโs emails now reveal is that the government is not merely funding censorship research. It is acting as a sales rep to market censorship technology to private companies.
The State Department isnโt skirting the First Amendment. It is driving a stake through its heart.
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 Prizeโthe law schoolโs 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.
Walmart has announced Tuesdayย that it is closing four of its Chicago stores because they are part of a group of locations that “lose tens of millions of dollars a year.”ย Theย retail giantย says the Chatham Supercenter, the Walmart Health center, and the Walmart Academy at 8431 S. Stewart Ave., the Kenwood Neighborhood Market at 4720 S. Cottage Grove Ave., the Lakeview Neighborhood Market at 2844 N. Broadway St. and the Little Village Neighborhood Market at 2551 W. Cermak Road will shutter this upcoming Sunday.ย
“The simplest explanation is that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago — these stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, and their annual losses nearly doubled in just the last five years,” Walmart said in a statement.
“The remaining four Chicago stores continue to face the same business difficulties, but we think this decision gives us the best chance to help keep them open and serving the community,” it added.
The Walmart Supercenter in Chicago that will close on Sunday, April 16, the company says.ย (Google Maps)
Walmart said that “over the years, we have tried many different strategies to improve the business performance of these locations, including building smaller stores, localizing product assortment and offering services beyond traditional retail. ย
“We have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the city, including $70 million in the last couple years to upgrade our stores and build two new Walmart Health facilities and a Walmart Academy training center,” the company also said.
“It was hoped that these investments would help improve our storesโ performance,” Walmart said in press release, but “Unfortunately, these efforts have not materially improved the fundamental business challenges our stores are facing.”
Walmart announced Tuesday, April 11, 2023, it is closing four Chicago stores that lose millions each year.ย (Fox News / Fox News)
Those employed by the stores that are soon set to close are now eligible to transfer to work at other Walmart locations.ย
An employee unpacks Black Friday sales merchandise in an aisle at a Walmart location in Chicago, Illinois, , on Wednesday, Nov. 25, 2015. Walmart said Tuesday its stores in the city, collectively, haven’t been profitable.ย (Daniel Acker/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)
“Hiring managers from surrounding facilities will be in each of these stores this week to help associates begin finding their next opportunity,” according to Walmart.ย
The company said it hopes to repurpose the buildings itโs leaving behind so they remain “important parts of their communities.”
Affected staff will be paid until Aug. 11, 2023, unless they transfer out to another store.ย After that date, Walmart said those eligible will receive severance benefits.ย
Walmart said it has tried different strategies to improve the business performance of its Chicago stores, but “these efforts have not materially improved the fundamental business challenges our stores are facing.”ย (Robyn Beck/AFP / Getty Images)
Republicans have an abortion problem, and there is only one Party leader who can fix it: Donald Trump.
Let me explain. Like the proverbial dog chasing the bus, the GOP spent years campaigning on the promise to appoint Supreme Court justices who would repeal Roe v. Wade but when finally successful, had no idea how to navigate the resulting political landscape. Democrats have used the reversal of Roe and Republicansโ subsequent anti-abortion initiatives to paint the party as extreme, thereby winning over women and younger voters.
The overturning of Roe handed abortion policy back to the states, where it will stay for the foreseeable future. Our country is so divided on the issue that Congress is unlikely to pass a nationwide law any time soon.
Given that power, some red states like Texas have enacted draconian laws banning all or nearly all abortions, a position that is unpopular with the majority of Americans. Other states have had long-standing restrictions on the books that were not enforceable because of Roe; now, some of those are in play.
Wisconsin, for instance, has a statute from 1849 that banned most abortions. That law is under review by the stateโs Supreme Court. Just recently, Badger State residents voted to fill a seat on that court; a Democrat who favors abortion rights won that race by a shockingly wide margin after the contest became the most expensive such match-up in Wisconsinโs history. Because of that win, liberals now hold a majority on the state court, for the first time in decades.
Remember that Donald Trump won Wisconsin in 2016, and then lost it in 2020 to Joe Biden, both by narrow margins; it is truly a “swing state”. In the 2022 midterm elections, Republicans actually gained seats in Wisconsinโs state legislature. So, the recent loss of the court seat, driven by the dispute over abortion, should be a wake-up call to Republicans.
Red states, too, have delivered warning shots to Republicans. Last year in Kansas, voters soundly defeated a proposed amendment to the stateโs constitution that would have banned abortions. Even in conservative Kansas, about 60% of voters shot down the measure. As in the Wisconsin senate race, turnout was extremely high.
Polling shows very clearly that Americans want abortion to be safe, legal and also to be restricted to the early months of pregnancy. Some 61% of Americans in a Pew survey last year said abortion should be legal in all or most cases โ about the same number that defeated the Kansas resolution.
Polling also shows strong support (70%) for the kind of referendum offered voters in Kansas. There are 14 states currently that have a total or near-ban on abortions, including some swing states like Wisconsin and Georgia โ states which could determine the outcome of future presidential elections. Other swing states, like Ohio and Arizona, have bans that are on hold pending court rulings.
How can Republicans be faithful to voters who firmly oppose abortion but also appeal to the majority, and win elections? By demanding that every state put abortion laws before voters, instead of allowing governors and state legislatures to dictate policy. In some states, that would likely result in a continuation of broad restrictions; in others, it would not. Thatโs called democracy, with all voters having their say. The GOP needs a leader to declare this the Partyโs policy. The only person able and perhaps willing to do so is Donald Trump.
First, remember that abortion was not an issue central to Trumpโs 2016 campaign. Indeed, he was barely familiar with party orthodoxy when he claimed early on that women who had abortions should be “punished,” a position he quickly reversed when admonished from the right and the left. Banning abortion ranks below Chinaโs threat, a strong military and solid economic growth for the former president, and a lot of Republicans would agree with him.
Second, Donald Trump has been blamed for post-Roe election losses in the midterms and in special elections. He would relish, instead, pinning those losses on the GOPโs abortion policies.
Third, Trump can remind voters that the Republican Party is supposed to be the party of freedom and liberty. How can the GOP claim that mantle while denying half the country one of the most personal freedoms that exists โ how to manage their own bodies and their families?
Fourth, Democrats have taken an extreme position on abortion by passing offensive laws in states they dominate. In New York, abortion is allowed up to and including at nine months, if “in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating health care provider, continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk to the pregnant patientโs life or health.” The law does not specify what the health threat might be; depression might satisfy the “health care provider” who does not even have to be a doctor. It is time the GOP turned the “extremist” weapon on Democrats.
Fifth, Republicans need to broaden their appeal if they want to win elections. In the recent Chicago mayorโs run-off race, Paul Vallas, easily the more accomplished of the two competing Democrats, was defeated partly because his opponent ran ads featuring a 2009 clip in which Vallas describes himself as “more of a Republican than a Democrat.” Imagine: the Republican brand is so tarnished that in a troubled city bleeding residents, the “R” word elects a man with virtually zero credentials.
Any Republican candidate who comes out with a balanced abortion policy, even one that channels the majority of voters, will lose support among Evangelicals and the powerful pro-life movement. On the other hand, Trump is in an extremely strong position currently, notwithstanding his many legal issues, has been a champion of religious freedom and should be uniquely able to withstand the tempest. He can remind pro-lifers that he delivered a conservative Supreme Court, without which voters would not be able to choose. And, it is worth noting that not that long ago, the GOP, including then-Governor Ronald Reagan, were leaders in liberalizing abortion policy.
By siding with the American majority, Trump could do something powerful for the GOP: make it great again.
Liz Peek is a Fox News contributor and former partner of major bracket Wall Street firm Wertheim & Company. A former columnist for the Fiscal Times, she writes for The Hill and contributes frequently to Fox News, the New York Sun and other publications. For more visit LizPeek.com. Follow her on Twitter @LizPeek.
A California mom is outraged after her daughter’s school district upheld a “parental secrecy policy” allowing school officials to offer gender counseling without informing parents.
Aurora Regino said her 11-year-old daughter’s elementary school in the Chico Unified School District helped her transition from female to male during the last school year, but a guidance counselor kept her in the dark during the entire process.
“During one of the meetings, my daughter told the counselor she wanted to tell me about her new identity. They ignored her request and did nothing to support her in letting me know what was going on at school,” she told board members at a meeting last Wednesday.
The board weighed a measure that would allow for “more parental inclusion” but ultimately voted to keep the existing so-called “parental secrecy policy” in place with a 3-2 vote.
“It was a really sad decision that they made, but unfortunately I wasn’t extremely surprised,” Regino told “Fox & Friends First” host Todd Piro on Tuesday.
“This policy that they have in place, to keep these situations a secret from the family, is incredibly damaging. It was extremely damaging in my case with my daughter. She was bullied and she didn’t have the support that she needed from her family and, also, she was outed within the school with other people within the office knowing her new gender and pronouns that she didn’t even tell them, and she had to go through those feelings of wondering how they even knew all on her own.”
California mom Aurora Regino speaks to her daughter’s school board ahead of a vote offering more transparency for parents.ย (Chico Unified School Board of Education)
Regino, who is suing the district for keeping her in the dark about her daughter’s identity and transition, lambasted the policy as “incredibly dangerous” and said the struggle to advance parental rights in the area had been hard-fought.ย
She told Piro her daughter is doing well, but she is determined to speak out on behalf of her family and others with similar experiences, so everyone knows what is taking place in public schools.
“When this originally happened to our family, nobody could’ve ever told me that this was going on, especially at the young age of elementary school,” she said.
The policy that board members voted to uphold, according to Regino, extends to children as young as pre-kindergarten who are approximately five years old and reaches through the 12th grade.
“It’s incredibly damaging that they’re upholding such a crazy policy for such young children,” she continued after a moment, arguing that such a tumultuous time in children and adolescents’ lives is when they need parental guidance the most.
Four people were shot, including one fatally, outsideย a Washington, D.C.,ย funeral home Tuesday, police said, as the unidentified gunman remains at large. Officers responded to the scene where multiple people were shot outside Stewart Funeral Home in the 4000 block of Benning Road NE, aย Metropolitan Police Departmentย (MPD) spokesperson initially confirmed.
Greeting reporters at the scene, MPD Police Chief Robert Contee said investigators believe the people were targeted but don’t yet know why. The shooting unfolded while a funeral for a homicide victim killed at the end of March was letting out. Around 12:17 p.m., an officer already in the area in his car by a bus stop called out for the sounds of gunshots.
“Our member went to the aid of several people,” Contee said. Of the four victims struck by gunfire, all were adults. One of them, a man, was deceased, while the other three were taken to area hospitals with serious but not life-threatening injuries, the chief added.
“At this point, the Metropolitan Police Department is asking for the community’s help. We’re asking for anyone who has information to please call us anonymously at 202-727-9099, or you may text us anonymously at 50411,” Contee said. “At this point, it appears that several people who were in the block were specifically targeted. We’re unsure why that is. We’re unsure why these people were targeted, more or less why they were targeted at a funeral. We don’t understand that. We’re looking for the community’s help.”
A shooting unfolded outside Stewart Funeral Home in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday.ย (Googe Maps)
“We have not identified a gunman. But it appears that the individuals who were standing in the block were targeted for some reason. And that reason we’re not sure,” the chief said.
Contee said it is not clear at this time whether the incident was a drive-by shooting.
MPD Chief Robert Contee delivers an update on the shooting near a funeral home.ย (Fox News)
“It does not appear that it was an exchange of gunfire. It appears that these four people were near the sidewalk here [and] were struck by gunfire coming from a suspect or suspects,” he said.
“Again, the funeral ended. People were milling about when this shooting happened. And we’re trying to find out who fired the shots at the end of the funeral.”
Police units block the street near Stewart Funeral Home after a mass shooting in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday.ย (Fox News)
Contee did not name the Marchย homicide victimย remembered at the funeral.
This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.
The Biden administration involved itself in the raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home despite reports that its officials were “stunned” to find out about the news on social media, according to the group America First Legal, which obtained internal government documents related to the raid through a Freedom of Information Act request.
“The evidence further suggests that Biden officials in the Executive Office of the President and the Department of Justice unlawfully abused their power and then lied about it to the American people,” said Reed D. Rubinstein, America First Legal senior counselor and director of oversight and investigations, in a post on social media Tuesday. “This government, it seems, acknowledges no limits on its power to harass, intimidate, and silence its political opponents.”
Rubinstein’s comments come after a Freedom of Information Act request by America First Legal found the FBI initially obtained access to Trump records through a “special access request” from the Biden White House.
The new information confirms Fox News reporting from August, when NARA acting head Debra Wall wrote a letter to Trump’s attorney alluding to the administration’s involvement.
Records show that John Laster, “the Archivesโ official responsible for administering all access requests for Presidential records,” was involved in the request despite the Archivesโ previously claiming it had “not been involved in the DOJ investigation.”
“On October 25, 2022, Acting Archivist Wall wrote to then-Ranking Members James Comer and Jim Jordan, claiming โNARA received the 15 boxes from President Trump on January 18, 2022, and then discovered that they contained classified national security information. Shortly after the discovery, NARA consulted with its Office of Inspector General (OIG), which operates independently of NARA. As DOJ has disclosed publicly in court filings, NARAโs OIG subsequently referred the matter to DOJ on February 9, 2022,โ” America First Legal wrote.
“If the OIG acted independently in making a referral to the FBI, then Mr. Laster would not have involved himself in the FBIโs review of the 15 boxes in his capacity as the Director of the White House Liaison Division โresponsible for all access requests for Presidential records.โ”
Former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.ย (Charles Trainor Jr./Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
According to America First Legal, the special access statute “authorizes special access requests to an incumbent president only when the records in question are needed for โthe conduct of current businessโ of the White House.”
“Providing documents to the DOJ for purposes of a criminal investigation is not the โcurrent businessโ of the White House,” the organization said.
The August letter from Wall to Trump attorney Evan Corcoran also seemingly hinted at President Biden’s involvement.
Local law enforcement officers are seen in front of the home of former President Donald Trump in Palm Beach, Florida on Aug. 9, 2022.ย (Giorgio Viera/AFP via Getty Images)
“NARA informedย the Department of Justiceย about that discovery, which prompted the Department to ask the President to request that NARA provide the FBI with access to the boxes at issue so that the FBI and others in the Intelligence Community could examine them,” Wall wrote. “The Counsel to the President has informed me that, in light of the particular circumstances presented here, President Biden defers to my determination, in consultation with the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, regarding whether or not I should uphold the former Presidentโs purported โprotective assertion of executive privilege.”
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
San Francisco State University endorsed the erasure of women this week when its top student affairs administrator released a statement reaffirming the transgender activists who attacked womenโs rights speaker Riley Gaines.
Gaines, who rose to fame after speaking up about the unfairness of men masquerading as women to gain an advantage in womenโs sports, was assaulted last week after she attempted to address a crowd at a Turning Point USA event about the necessity of female spaces, especially in athletic settings. The chaos ensued mere hours after White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre encouraged radical gender ideologues to โfight backโ against people who called for sex-specific spaces.
Footage of the attack on SFSUโs campus shows the former NCAA swimmer being chased by a crowd yelling โtrans rights are human rightsโ and calling the swimmer a โtransphobic b-itch.โ
Gaines reported that, during the chaos, she was assaulted by at least one man and trapped in a room for three hours. The mob also attempted to extort money from her in exchange for her freedom before she was finally able to escape. Gaines said neither campus police nor attending school administrators took steps to stop the violence.
โThis is proof that women need sex-protected spaces,โ Gaines tweeted.
Instead of punishing the hysterical students who โambushedโ Gaines, the school and alumni cheered on the angry mob.
Shortly after Gaines was attacked, SFSUโs Vice President for Student Affairs & Enrollment Management Jamillah Moore released an official statement encouraging the students who harassed the speaker.
โToday, San Francisco State finds itself again at the center of a national discussion regarding freedom of speech and expression. Let me begin by saying clearly: the trans community is welcome and belongs at San Francisco State University,โ she wrote.
Moore also claimed that the students that are seen on footage roughhousing Gaines chose to โprotest peacefully.โ
โThank you to our students who participated peacefully in Thursday eveningโs event. It took tremendous bravery to stand in a challenging space. I am proud of the moments when we listened and asked insightful questions. I am also proud of the moments when our students demonstrated the value of free speech and the right to protest peacefully,โ Moore said.
Gaines quickly condemned Mooreโs statement and confirmed that she plans to sue the school for failing to protect her from violence.
โIโm sorry did this just say PEACEFULโฆ.,โ Gaines replied. โI was assaulted. I was extorted and held for ran[s]om. The protestors demanded I pay them if I wanted to make it home safely. I missed my flight home because I was barricaded in a classroomโฆ We must have different definitions of peaceful.โ
Just last month, an angry mob of Stanford law students shut down a talk led by Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Kyle Duncan with profane insults and threats of violence and death. Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne and Stanford Law School Dean Jenny Martinez eventually apologized but the students and administrators who participated in the chaos were left largely unpunished.
Stanford Law Schoolโs Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Tirien Steinbach, who confronted Duncan about the โharmโ she claimed he caused to students, doubled down on their defiant challenge and refused to apologize even after she was put on administrative leave.
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.
The facade of โsafetyโ around hormonal birth control continues to crumble: Researchers at Oxford Population Healthโs Cancer Epidemiology Unit have recently shown that progestin-only hormonal contraceptives, long billed as the โsafestโ birth control option because of their lack of estrogen, definitively raises oneโs risk of breast cancer, similarly to combined hormonal contraceptives (which contain both synthetic estrogen and progestin).
Furthermore, the Oxford researchers found that breast cancer risk, while it declines after discontinuation of hormonal birth control, still remains elevated for ever-users of hormonal birth control (when compared to never-users). Of course, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) still wonโt cop to increased risks for breast cancer for ever-users of birth control โ just for current users โ and they are also currently evaluating whether to make a progestin-only pill the first-ever over-the-counter birth control pill in the United States.
Unsurprisingly, in another instance of โnothing to see here, folks,โ headlines abounded with the results of the Oxford study for a few weeks, carefully emphasizing the โslightโ or โsmallโ increase in breast cancer risk. And the experts, of course, were quick to chime in with all the benefits of hormonal contraception, insisting women shouldnโt see this as a reason to go flushing their pills.
So listen, I talk to women about this every single day. You have to talk about risk vs benefit. It is clear that hormonal contraception lowers the risk of ovarian and uterine cancer, but it increases the risk of clotting. When you put that head to head, itโs about individualizing that risk-benefit and option-risk for the woman. If you talk to any OB/GYN, they will say, we have a line, โpregnancy is much higher risk than any associated risk with birth control pills or hormonal contraception.โ So you have to have that conversation based on you and your health-care provider.
While I agree that health-care decisions should be made between a woman and her doctor, is it really true, with everything we know about the risks and side effects of birth control (and we know an awful lot), that itโs really that much โsaferโ than a nine-month pregnancy? Women, after all, tend to be on birth control for years โ perhaps even decades โ at a time. And the oft-touted benefits of hormonal birth control reducing ovarian and uterine cancers? Well, Dr. Ashton might be surprised to learn that pregnancy has those, too.
Itโs also worth mentioning that while ovarian and uterine cancers can undoubtedly be devastating diseases, the average womanโs baseline risk for breast cancer is far greater than her risk for ovarian or uterine cancer; in fact, breast cancer is now the worldโs most commonly diagnosed cancer. In other words, elevating the average womanโs risk of breast cancer even a little bit should be a serious consideration for doctors and health-care institutions indeed. In fact, one might argue they have a moral imperative to help women lower their risks for breast cancer.
Unfortunately, despite increasing, high-quality evidence of the harms of birth control (of which breast cancer is only one among a lengthy list of risks), health-care organizations such as the FDA are loath to give women true informed consent about these drugs. In 2019, the Contraceptive Study Group (CSG) submitted a Citizen Petition to the FDA requesting they add a black box warning to hormonal contraceptives given the mounting evidence for breast cancer risks for ever-users of these drugs (evidence the Oxford study has yet again corroborated).
Yet in a partial response to the CSGโs petition, published a full three years later in 2022, the FDA refused to supply women with this warning. One wonders what leg they have to stand upon now, and if theyโll continue to ignore these significant risks to women โ which can be entirely avoided through the use of highly effective, drug- and side-effect-free measures for family planning known as fertility awareness-based methods.
With the publication of the Oxford study, the FDA has once again proven itself at odds with the best scientific evidence on this matter, which even the National Cancer Institute acknowledges. Again, this is largely because of the โbenefitโ of preventing pregnancy, which evidently trumps all other considerations โ even ones that could take the lives of women.
Grace Emily Stark is a freelance writer with published work in multiple outlets, and she is the Editor of Natural Womanhood. Grace is also a current Ramsey Institute Fellow at the Center for Bioethics & Culture, and a former Novak Alumni Fund Journalism fellowship recipient. Follow her writing at GraceEmilyStark.com.
In his 67-page straight-talking opinion, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk stuck to the facts โ something Americans desperately need to hear after decades of euphemistic discussions about abortion.
โUnborn humans.โ โEugenics.โ โHead, hands, and legs, with defined fingers and toes.โ โShame, regret, anxiety, depression, drug abuse, and suicidal thoughts.โ
Federal Judge Matthew Kacsmarykโs Friday decision freezing the FDAโs approval of the abortion-pill combination, mifepristone and misoprostol, included these phrases and more. And while the left is already attacking Kacsmarykโs 67-page straight-talking opinion in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA by framing it as filled with anti-abortionrhetoric, the Trump appointee stuck to the facts โ something Americans desperately need to hear after decades of euphemistic discussions about abortion.
After a brief introduction in which Kacsmaryk highlighted the FDAโs two decades of stonewalling that delayed a legal challenge to the 2000 approval of the abortion drugs, the court opened with the basic facts. The plaintiffs โ doctors and medical associations that provide health care to pregnant and post-abortive women and girls โ sued the FDA, challenging several administrative actions related to the approval of the chemical abortion drugs.
โUnborn Humansโ
The court then explained the drugs and their functioning: โMifepristone โ also known as RU-486 or Mifeprex โ is a synthetic steroid that blocks the hormone progesterone, halts nutrition, and ultimately starves the unborn human until death.โ But โbecause mifepristone alone will not always complete the abortion,โ the court continued, โthe FDA mandates a two-step drug regimen: mifepristone to kill the unborn human, followed by misoprostol to induce cramping and contractions to expel the unborn human from the motherโs womb.โ
Calling an unborn human an โunborn humanโ immediately triggered abortion activists, but as Kacsmaryk explained in a footnote, such terminology is scientifically correct, whereas the lawyers and courts โoften use the word โfetusโ to inaccurately identify unborn humans in unscientific ways.โ
โThe word โfetus,โโ Kacsmaryk explained, โrefers to a specific gestational stage of development, as opposed to the zygote, blastocyst, or embryo stages.โ And because the FDAโs approval of the abortion drugs applies at multiple โgestational stages,โ the word โfetusโ would be inaccurate.
It is understandable that abortion activists want to hide the humanity of unborn humans, but that doesnโt make the science less real: It just means girls and women who have bought the โclump of cellsโ narrative will suffer when faced with the truth, which chemical โat home abortionsโ force.
โThe mother seeing the aborted human โappears to be a difficult aspect of the medical termination process which can be distressing, bring home the reality of the event and may influence later emotional adaptation,โโ the court wrote, based on the record evidence. โFor example, one woman was surprised and saddened to see that her aborted baby โhad a head, hands, and legsโ with โ[d]efined fingers and toes.โโย
Another woman alleged that โshe did not receive an ultrasound or any other physical examination before receiving chemical abortion drugs from Planned Parenthood.โ According to the record, โThe abortionist misdated the babyโs gestational age as six weeks, resulting in the at-home delivery of a โlifeless, fully formed baby in the toilet,โ later determined to be around 30-36 weeks old.โ
Harm to Women
Beyond exposing the reality that abortion kills an unborn human, Kacsmarykโs opinion also refuted the โpopular belief and talking pointsโ that using the abortion pill is โas easy as taking Advil.โ Here, the federal judge detailed the factual evidence. Among other things, โbleeding from a chemical abortion, unlike surgical abortion, can last up to several weeks,โ and by being done at home, โwithout physician oversight,โ it can lead โto undetected ectopic pregnancies, failure of rH factor incompatibility detection, and misdiagnosis of gestational age โ all leading to severe or even fatal consequences.โย
The opinion also countered the claim that side effects are rare by highlighting evidence that โover sixty percent of women and girlsโ emergency room visits after chemical abortions are miscoded as โmiscarriagesโ rather than adverse effects to mifepristone.โย
The evidence also shows emotional and psychological injury, Kacsmaryk stressed, with 77 percent of women who underwent a chemical abortion reporting โa negative changeโ after the at-home abortion, and 38 percent of women reporting issues โwith anxiety, depression, drug abuse, and suicidal thoughts because of the chemical abortion.โ
While the abortion industry prefers to cite its own evidence, as Kacsmaryk noted, those studies are flawed both because of the miscoding of chemical abortions as miscarriages and because the FDA stopped requiring the reporting of non-fatal adverse reactions.
Eugenic Roots
The left also didnโt like Kacsmaryk exposing the eugenic beliefs of the Population Council, which had sought FDA approval for the abortion drugs. John D. Rockefeller founded the Population Council in 1952, โafter he convened a conference with โpopulation activistsโ such as Planned Parenthoodโs director and several well-known eugenicists,โ the court wrote. Attendees of that conference discussed โthe problem of โquality,โโ and concluded that โ[m]odern civilization had reduced the operation of natural selection by saving more โweakโ lives and enabling them to reproduce,โ thereby resulting in โa downward trend in โฆ genetic quality.โ
โ[m]odern civilization had reduced the operation of natural selection by saving more โweakโ lives and enabling them to reproduce,โ thereby resulting in โa downward trend in โฆ genetic quality.โ …….. “Natural Selection”????? Can you say, “disciples of Margarete Sanger”?
Many Americans remain oblivious to the historical backdrop eugenics played to the abortion movement, and activist groups prefer they remain in the dark. The sunlight Kacsmaryk shined upon that truth infuriates them.
Political Pressure
Judge Kacsmaryk also exposed the political pressure placed on the FDA to approve the abortion drug โ something Americans are likely to appreciate more today in the aftermath of the FDAโs hasty approval of the Covid mRNA shots.
In the case of the abortion pill, the FDA took the unprecedented step of arranging a meeting between the French pharmaceutical company that owned the patent rights and the eventual drug sponsor, the Population Council. โThe purpose of the FDA-organized meeting was โto facilitate an agreement between those parties to work together to test [mifepristone] and file a new drug application.โโย
Evidence further shows the Department of Health and Human Services โinitiatedโ another meeting to determine how the Clinton administration โmight facilitate successful completion of the negotiationsโ between the French firm and the Population Council to ensure the group secure patent rights and eventual FDA approval.โ In fact, Clintonโs HHS secretary โbelieved American pressure on the French firm was necessary.โ
Then after the Population Council submitted a new drug application, the FDA proposed detailed restrictions to address safety concerns, including that the drug be administered by doctors โtrained and authorized by lawโ to perform surgical abortions; trained in administering mifepristone and treating adverse events; and able to provide treatment at a medical facility that had the equipment necessary to perform surgical abortions, resuscitation procedures, and blood transfusion, within one hourโs drive. The FDAโs restrictions were leaked to the press, prompting a political firestorm.
So Much for Safety
The FDA later abandoned the above safety mandates and approved the drug for use to kill unborn humans aged seven-weeks gestation or younger. The FDA further required three โin-person office visits: the first to administer mifepristone, the second to administer misoprostol, and the third to assess any complications and ensure there were no fetal remains in the womb.โ All adverse events were also required to be reported.ย
In 2002, the FDA removed even more of the safety restrictions, increasing the maximum gestational age from seven-weeks gestation to 10-weeks gestation, reducing the number of office visits from three to one, increasing the drug dosage, allowing non-doctors to prescribe and administer chemical abortions, and eliminating the requirement for non-fatal adverse reactions to be reported. Then in 2019, the FDA approved a generic version of the abortion pills, and on April 12, 2021, the FDA announced it would allow abortion pills to be dispensed through the mail.ย
โWhether FDA abandoned its proposed restrictions because of political pressure or not,โ the court wrote, โone thing is clear: the lack of restrictions resulted in many deaths and many more severe or threatening adverse reactions.โ But โdue to FDAโs lax reporting requirements, the exact number is not ascertainable,โ Kacsmaryk stressed.
Straight Facts
But it was not on politics that Kacsmaryk based his decision to freeze the FDAโs approval of the abortion pill. Rather, in his methodical opinion, the federal judge explained that the FDA lacked the authority to accelerate approval of the drug under what is called โSubpart Hโ of the FDA. That subpart only allows for accelerated approval of drugs that treat โserious or life-threatening illnessesโ โ something pregnancy is not.ย
Kacsmaryk also concluded the evidence the FDA supposedly relied upon to approve the abortion drugs failed to support the conclusion that they were โsafe and effective under particular conditions of use.โ And finally, Kacsmaryk held the FDAโs approval of mail distribution violated the 1873 Comstock Act, which makes it illegal to use the mail to deliver any โarticle or thing designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion.โ
The Biden administration has already filed a notice of appeal with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and in issuing his opinion in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA, Kacsmaryk entered a temporary stay, which he or the court of appeals will likely make permanent pending resolution of the case. Thus, abortion pills will remain available for now.
How the Fifth Circuit and eventually the Supreme Court will rule remains to be seen, but what is clear now is the abortion-loving left is desperate to keep the truth about abortion from the public and is furious that Kacsmaryk dared to expose the reality: Abortion kills unborn humans.
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 Prizeโthe law schoolโs 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.
A progressive media host is doubling down after she enraged liberals by insisting women should not be referred to as “birthing persons”ย or “persons with uteruses.”ย “The Young Turks” co-host Ana Kasparianย laughed at the backlash she received after calling transgender “inclusive” language “degrading” to women last month. Progressive journalists and transgender activists accused her of being “right-wing.”
“[Laughing out loud]! The meltdowns over wanting be referred to as a woman rather than a โbirthing personโ is pretty wild,” she responded on Twitter on Monday.
The far-left host insisted she’d never apologize for taking this stance.
“Iโll never apologize for that, especially as biological woman who has had a f—ing lifetime of being told Iโm less than,” she added.
“The Young Turks” co-host Ana Kasparianย (The Young Turks)
“Iโm a woman. No apologies,” Kasparian fired back.
Many of the same progressives who criticized her original tweet also took offense at this unapologetic statement. Several on the left pleaded for Kasparian to stop tweeting about the issue or accused her of bigotry.ย
“You’ll be on J.K. Rowling’s level of TERFyness within 2 years at this rate,” Mississippi Free Press news editor Ashton Pittman tweeted.
You'll be on J.K. Rowling's level of TERFyness within 2 years at this rate.
The founder of “Race 2 Dinner,” an organization that invites White women to be lectured about their privilege and racism, mocked Kasparian. “You win the Oscar, Emmy and Grammy for Most Toxic White of the Weekend. Bravo for you,” Saira Rao said.
You win the Oscar, Emmy and Grammy for Most Toxic White of the Weekend.
Transgender activists insisted no one was referring to a woman as a “birthing person.”
“Thatโs not whatโs happening,” Charlotte Clymer, an activist formerly with the Human Rights Campaign, retorted. “When referring to the whole community of people who are capable of pregnancy in the context of pregnancy, repro advocates use โbirthing personโ to include trans men + nonbinary people. No one is arbitrarily calling individual women ‘birthing person,'” Clymer tweeted.
A transgender drag queen running for Congress in 2024 told Kasparian she was wrong and warned transgenders were under attack.
“I really donโt understand why youโre still tweeting about this. How many times a day are you being referred to as “birthing person” in real life? Knowing the intense scrutiny & hate trans people are facing rn, along w/the hundreds of anti-trans bills, couldnโt you just not?” the candidate tweeted.
I really donโt understand why youโre still tweeting about this. How many times a day are you being referred to as โbirthing personโ in real life?
Knowing the intense scrutiny & hate trans people are facing rn, along w/the hundreds of anti-trans bills, couldnโt you just not?
— Maebe for Congress (she/they) ๐ณ๏ธโโง๏ธ (@Maebe_A_Girl) April 10, 2023
Transgender attorney and activist Alejandro Carabello warned Kasparian that not using inclusive language could lead to “dire” results, linking to a 2019 report where a transgender man, a biological woman, was not given proper medical care and delivered a stillborn baby.
“No one is using that term to describe you personally, it’s in reference to the population. When language isn’t inclusive in medicine, the consequences can be dire. These are the real issues instead of making yourself the victim,” Carabello wrote.
Fox News reported last year how the Biden administration, congressional Democrats and liberal groups across the country had repeatedly dropped words like “mother” and “woman” from their language in order to appease the transgender community.
More recently, major companies like Nike have turned off customers by paying transgender activists like Dylan Mulvaney to model women’s clothing.
Fox News’ Jessica Chasmar contributed to this report.
Theย Virginia momย of a 6-year-old charged with shooting his first-grade teacher earlier this year has been indicted by a grand jury in connection with the shooting, the Newport News Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office announced Monday. Deja Nicole Taylor, 25, is charged withย felony child neglect, and a misdemeanor count of recklessly leaving a firearm so as to endanger a child.ย
FILE: Students return to Richneck Elementary in Newport News, Va., Jan. 30, 2023.ย (Billy Schuerman/The Virginian-Pilot via AP)
The charges were brought about after an investigation by the Newport News Police Department and the Commonwealth Attorney’s Office.ย
“Every criminal case is unique in its facts, and these facts support these charges, but our investigation into the shooting continues,” Commonwealth’s Attorney Howard Gwynn said in a statement.
The Commonwealth’s Attorney has also asked a Circuit Court judge to impanel a “Special Grand Jury” to continue investigating security issues that may have enabled the January shooting. The probe could potentially lead to more people being criminally charged in connection with the shooting.
Abby Zwerner, a 25-year-old first-grade teacher at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Virginia, was shot in the hand and chest Jan. 6, as she sat at a reading table in her classroom. She spent nearly two weeks in the hospital and required four surgeries.
Richneck Elementary School teacher Abigail Zwerner sat down with NBC for an interview a couple months after being shot by her 6-year-old student in the classroom.ย (Screenshot/NBC)
Monday’s indictment announcement comes a week after Zwerner filed a lawsuit seeking $40 million in damages from school officials, accusing them of gross negligence and ignoring multiple warnings the day of the shooting the boy was armed and in a “violent mood.”ย
The lawsuit names as defendants the Newport News School Board, former Superintendent George Parker III, former Richneck Principal Briana Foster-Newton and former Richneck Assistant Principal Ebony Parker.
In the lawsuit, Zwerner’s attorneys say all the defendants knew the boy “had a history of random violence” at school and at home, including an episode the year before when he “strangled and choked” his kindergarten teacher.
Messages of support for teacher Abby Zwerner, who was shot by a 6-year-old student, grace the front door of Richneck Elementary School Newport News, Va., Jan. 6, 2023.ย ย (Family of Abigail Zwerner via AP, File/ AP Photo/John C. Clark, File)
Last month, Newport News prosecutor Howard Gwynn said his office would not criminally charge the boy because he is too young to understand the legal system. Gwynn has yet to decide if any other adults will be charged.
The boy used his mother’s gun, which police said was purchased legally. James Ellenson, the attorney for the boy’s family, has said previously that the firearm was secured on a high closet shelf with a lock.
Fox News Digital has reached out to Ellenson for further comment.
The FBI recently sought to develop sources inside Christian churchesย and Catholic diocesesย as part of an effort to combat domestic terrorism, according to internal documents released by House Judiciary Committee on Monday. The internal documents โ obtained last month by House Judiciary Committee Chairmanย Jim Jordan, R-Ohio,ย and Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., who are also members of the so-called Weaponization Subcommittee โ showed the FBI planned to use churches as “new avenues for tripwire and source development.” The federal law enforcement agency also aimed to specifically target “mainline Catholic parishes” as part of its efforts.
In addition, according to Jordan, the FBI expressed interest in “leverag[ing] existing sources and/or initiat[ing] Type 5 Assessments to develop new sources with the placement and access.” And, in another example, the agency cited a desire to to sensitize religious congregations “to the warning signs of radicalization and enlist their assistance to serve as suspicious activity tripwires.”
Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, conducts a Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing on March 9. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)ย (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
“Based on the limited information produced by the FBI to the Committee, we now know that the FBI relied on at least one undercover agent to produce its analysis, and that the FBI proposed that its agents engage in outreach to Catholic parishes to develop sources among the clergy and church leadership to inform on Americans practicing their faith,” Jordan wrote in a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Monday.
Jordan also issued a subpoena for a series of related documents the committee previously requested from the FBI, but which the FBI has failed to provide.
“This information is outrageous and only reinforces the Committeeโs need for all FBI material responsive to our request,” Jordan wrote to Wray. “The documents produced to date show how the FBI sought to enlist Catholic houses of worship as potential sources to monitor and report on their parishioners.”
“Americans attend church to worship and congregate for their spiritual and personal betterment,” the letter continued. “They must be free to exercise their fundamental First Amendment rights without worrying that the FBI may have planted so-called “tripwire” sources or other informants in their houses of worship.”
FBI Director Christopher Wray listens during a news conference at the Department of Justice on Jan. 27.ย ย (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
Jordan and Johnson firstย requested related documentsย from the FBI on Feb. 16, days after former FBI agent and whistleblower Kyle Seraphin published an internal document originating from the FBI’s Richmond Field Office that appeared to outline a plan to “mitigate the threat of Radical-Traditionalist Catholics.”
The leaked document generated widespread condemnationย from Republican lawmakersย who said the FBI’s efforts may violate the Constitution.ย However, the original letter from Jordan and Johnson went unanswered prompting a follow-up request on March 20. Three days later, the FBI produced the 18-page document Jordan announced on Monday.
“The FBI received the subpoena,” the FBI told Fox News Digital in a statement. “The FBI recognizes the importance of congressional oversight and remains fully committed to cooperating with Congressโs oversight requests consistent with its constitutional and statutory responsibilities. The FBI is actively working to respond to congressional requests for information โincluding voluntary production of documents.”
The agency also referred Fox News Digital to recent comments Wray made during congressional testimony in which he said he was “aghast” when he saw reports about the FBI targeting Catholics.
“We took steps immediately to withdraw it and remove it from FBI systems. It does not reflect FBI standards,” Wray added. “We do not conduct investigations based on religious affiliation or practices, full stop. We have also now ordered our inspection division to take a look at how this happened and try to figure out how we can make sure something like this doesn’t happen again.” ย
Louisville police have identified Connor Sturgeon asย the man who opened fireย at the Old National Bank on East Main Street Monday morning. The 23-year-old worked at the bank, Louisville Interim Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel said at a 3 p.m. news briefing. He was livestreaming during the attack, she added.
The first reports of shots fired came in at 8:38 a.m., she said. Sturgeon shot at responding officers.
“We then returned fire and stopped that threat,” she said. “The suspect is deceased. This is the only time that I will mention the suspect name in this case: Connor Sturgeon, white male, 23 years of age, who was employed at Old National Bank.”
“It is clear from the officers’ response that they absolutely saved people’s lives,” Deputy Chief Paul Humphrey said at an earlier press conference.
Louisville police have identified 23-year-old Connor Sturgeon as the gunman in Monday morning’s attack on an Old National Bank in the city’s downtown neighborhood.ย ย (Connor Sturgeon/LinkedIn)
According to his LinkedIn profile, Sturgeon worked at the bank for about two years as a “syndications associate and portfolio banker” and had three prior summer internships there.
Police deploy at the scene of a mass shooting near Slugger Field baseball stadium in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, U.S. April, 10, 2023. ย ย (ย Michael Clevenger/USA Today Network via REUTERS)
Sturgeon’s dad was a college and high school basketball coach in Indiana who led his most recent team to two sectional titles with a record of 142-45 before retiring last year, the Louisville-based WLKY-TV reported in April 2022. The school in Floyd Knobs, Indiana, is just 10 miles away from downtown Louisville.
Before coaching there, he had left his job as the successful head coach at the University of Indianapolis in 2007 to spend more time with his family, according to a report on the website of his alma mater, DePauw University. His two sons were 9 and 6 at the time.
LMPD officers search for evidence after five people were killed and six injured, including a LMPD officer, in a deadly Monday morning shooting at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville. April 9, 2023ย (Matt Stone/Louisville Courier Journal – USA Today Network)
At least one officer was critically injured in the attack Monday, police said, Nickolas Wilt, who was recently sworn in. A second responding officer suffered minor injuries. In all, four people were killed, not including the gunman, and nine injured, authorities said.
Gov. Andy Beshear, speaking at a news briefing alongside city leaders, said Monday that he had a personal connection to the attack.
Andy Beshear, Governor of Kentucky, speaks during a news conference after a gunman opened fire at the Old National Bank building on April 10, 2023 in Louisville, Kentucky. According to reports, there are multiple fatalities and injuries but the shooter died at the scene.ย ย (Luke Sharrett/Getty Images)
“This is awful,” he said. “I have a very close friend that didnโt make it today. And I have another close friend who didnโt either. And one whoโs at the hospital that I hope is going to make it through.”
Law enforcement officers respond to an active shooter at the Old National Bank building on April 10, 2023 in Louisville, Kentucky. According to reports, there are multiple fatalities and casualties. The shooter died at the scene.ย ย (ย Luke Sharrett/Getty Images)
Police are askingย anyone with information on the attack to call their tip line at 502-574-LMPD.
Fox News’ Haley Chi-Sing contributed to this report.
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
It is clear that state-sponsored SEL violates the U.S. Constitution in its attempt to infuse the religious science of โright human relationsโ into education while cloaking it in secular language.ย
Social-emotional learning will soon become spiritual-ethical learning, and the public school systems will decide whose spiritual and ethical beliefs to teach.
For families that care about raising their children with the moral and religious values of their own faith tradition, questions about which spiritual and ethical teachings should be taught prompt even more speculation about whether so-called social-emotional learning (SEL) should be taught in public education at all.
As the theory adopts spiritual and ethical dimensions, it will amount to state-sanctioned religion.
What Is SEL, and How Has It Changed?
Social-emotional learning (SEL) is a mental-health framework that has woven itself into the very fabric of our education system.ย ย Standards, assessments, curricula, and even college and career readiness standards have been altered to teach, measure, and track studentsโ adoption of SELโsย five core competenciesย โ put forth by its standard-bearer, the Collaborative for Academic Social Emotional Learning (CASEL).ย ย
Since its birth in 1994 at the Fetzer Institute and up until 2020, CASELโs definition of social-emotional learning and its competencies have relatively stayed the same. Itย described SELย as โthe process through which children acquire the skills to recognize and manage emotions, develop caring and concern for others, make responsible decisions, establish positive relationships, and handle challenging situations effectively.โย
In 2020, amid the chaos of the global pandemic and racial riots, CASEL quietly updated that definition and its five core competencies. Its new definition of Transformative SEL and adjusted competencies reflect the view that so-called social and emotional learning needs to be taught through a racial and โequityโ lens.
SEL lessons and the subjects addressed through them act as both a springboard and smokescreen for activist teachers to have discussions about race, sex, and class that aim to create a critical consciousness in children.ย ย Once they are led to believe the systems of society have been set up to oppress specific groups of people, students can be coached to become social-justice activists who show their empathy and compassion by tearing down the systems of society in order to build ones that are more โequitable.โย ย
In this vision, โequitableโ meansย equal outcomesย through the redistribution of resources, not equal opportunity under the law.ย ย The whole purpose of social-emotional learning has therefore been changed toย explicitlyย โaddress issues such as power, privilege, prejudice, discrimination, social justice, empowerment, and self-determinationโ with the goal of developing โjustice-oriented, global citizens.โ
Spirituality Through SEL
As if this departure from its original purpose were not destructive enough, social-emotional learning is undergoing another revision โ one that will seek to address the spiritual needs of students as a part of the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model.ย Created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), WSCC claims to create a comprehensive school health approach by fostering collaboration among the public health and education sectors through the integration and alignment of their services, far beyond hearing and vision screenings.ย ย
These public-private partnerships will take other medical and mental health services that are generally rendered out of school and facilitated by parents and caregivers and instead allow them to be offered as aid provided by the school so the needs of the โwhole childโ can be met. Spirituality will soon be seen as one of those needs.
๐งตThe CDC expands into education via the WSCC model of Community/Healthy Schools. They want children accessing psycho-social-emotional, medical, sexual, reproductive, dental, and eye services at school. They are collecting data, expanding Medicaid, and removing parental consent. pic.twitter.com/mDaXv5Nd4U
Recently, there has been an influx of SEL programs in the market that incorporate spirituality into their lessons. The Fetzer Institute, along with Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and Dr. Lisa Miller from Columbiaโs Teachers College, launched the Collaborative for Spirituality in Education. Fetzerโs support of research on the spiritual aspects of childhood development led to the social-emotional learning program, โWhat Makes Me: Core Capacities for Living and Learning.โ
Released in collaboration with UNICEF and the Learning for Well-being Foundation โ a โWhole Child Partnerโ committed to advancing the WSCC model worldwide โ it addresses nine core capacities that are believed to protect and improve the lives of children based on the U.N.โs Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).
Both childrenโs โevolving capacitiesโ and โchildrenโs spiritual well-beingโ are key parts of achieving multiple childrenโs rights, as outlined in the UNCRC. The evolving capacities of the child are mentioned in both Article 5 and Article 14.1 in regard to children being able to exercise their own rights (Article 5), and their freedom of thought, conscience and religion (Article 14.1). Moreover, Articles 17, 23.3, 27 and 32 โฆ recognize spiritual well-being as a goal of these rights alongside physical, mental and moral well-being, among others.ย
โWhat Makes Meโ seeks to teach spirituality through SEL as โa more active and engaged process in which some persons choose to shape and create a way of knowing and living that may or may not draw on religionโ and as something that involves the conscious choice to explore lifeโs โbig questions.โ
The UNCRC also states thatย children have sexual rights from birthย and should be able to learn about sexual behaviors as young as age 5 throughย Comprehensive Sexuality Education, including the idea that sex is not binary or immutable.ย ย One must wonder if the โspiritualityโ they intend to impart to children as a fundamental โrightโ is a wide acceptance of sexual variance and the offering of an alternative belief system that differs from their familial, cultural, and religious beliefs.ย
โWhat Makes Meโ is not the only SEL program incorporating spirituality that Fetzer invests in. Itย recently pledged $1 millionย to theย QUESTion Project, started by mentalist and owner of The Open Future Institute,ย Gerard Senehi. It asks students questions such as: โWho am I?โ โWhat is my purpose?โ โWhat does a good life look like?โย ย If administered in a public school using taxpayer money, these questions violate the separation of church and state and cross the line into the government using education to institute an unconstitutional state-sanctioned religion.ย ย SEL programs such as these meet the federal governmentโsย definition of a religion, which is a โcomprehensive belief system that addresses the fundamental questions of human existence, such as the meaning of life and death, manโs role in the universe, and the nature of good and evil, and that gives rise to duties of conscience.โย
The First Amendment commands that the government can โmake no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.โย ย
Considering the esoteric and mystical religious roots of social-emotional learning and CASEL through the Fetzer Institute, and its broadening into explicitly teaching โspirituality,โ it is clear that state-sponsored SEL violates the U.S. Constitution in its attempt to infuse the religious science of โright human relationsโ into education while cloaking it in secular language.
The role and responsibility of molding and shaping a childโs moral character does not belong in public classrooms backed by organizations with political or societal agendas.
It should remain in the loving arms of the family, where it has been since the dawn of time.
Lisa Logan is the host of the YouTube Channel Parents of Patriots and author of the Substack Education Manifesto. As a wife, mother and patriot, she has made it her mission to expose the sinister agenda behind social-emotional learning programs to save our children and the future of our country.
The Biden administration was heavily criticized Thursday after it made a series of announcements on various hot-button topics ahead of the holiday weekend.
On Thursday afternoon, the White House released a long-awaited after-action report on the botched Afghanistan withdrawal overseen by President Biden in August 2021. Then, hours later, the Department of Education rolled out new Title IX rules expanding the definition of sexual discrimination in an effort to prevent schools from banning transgender athletes.
Also on Thursday, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) published a 150-page plan on how it would deploy new resources from the Inflation Reduction Act. Buried in the document, which the Treasury Department originally said would come no later than Feb. 17, the IRS acknowledged that it would spend a staggering $45.6 billion on increased enforcement and tax audits.
“I think I speak on behalf of my colleagues in this room when we want the record to reflect that this was sent to us about 10 minutes before the briefing began with little notice, and itโs the very definition of a modern major holiday news dump,” CBS News reporter Ed O’Keefe said to White House spokesperson John Kirby on Thursday in a question about the Afghanistan report.
White House spokesperson John Kirby defended the timing of the Biden administration’s Afghanistan report on Thursday.ย (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
“Youโre releasing this at the beginning of the High Holidays [sic] and after months of requests from Republicans and the broader public,” O’Keefe continued.
Kirby responded that the White House believed the report, which is a summary of classified reports assembled by individual defense agencies, was timed in a “responsible” fashion, adding that it was the “culmination of an awful lot of work.”
The White House was later criticized for the contents of the report, which largely cast the blame of the 2021 withdrawal on the Trump administration. During the operation, 13 American service members were killed in a suicide bombing while manning the perimeter of the airport where evacuations were taking place.
“John Kirbyโs comments during todayโs White House press briefing were disgraceful and insulting. President Biden made the decision to withdraw and even picked the exact date; he is responsible for the massive failures in planning and execution,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said in a statement.
The Department of Education moved to review federal funding for schools that implement “sex-related criteria that would limit or deny a studentโs eligibility to participate on a male or female athletic team consistent with their gender identity.”ย (Andrea Ronchini/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The administration was also blasted for its subsequent Title IX revisions opening the door to force schools and colleges that receive federal funds to allowย transgender students to playย on sports teams.
Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem threatened to sue the administration over the rule, saying “only girls will play girlsโ sports.”
“What an Easter weekend news dump by the Biden Administration,” Noem’s spokesperson Ian Fury tweeted. “One wonders why they wanted to hide this? Probably because they know that public sentiment is not on their side.”
And the IRS was similarly criticized for announcing its massive $45.6 billion tax and audit enforcement funding. The Inflation Reduction Act bolstered the IRS’ budget by $80 billion, allowing the agency to hire tens of thousands of new agents. The House passed legislation in early January to rescind $70 billion of that funding.
“New IRS spending plan allocates $45.6 billion on ramping up audits, more than 14x the spending for improving taxpayer services,” tweeted Mike Palicz, the federal affairs manager at Americans for Tax Reform. “Nice Easter news dump.”
A White House official noted that the White House took more than 90 minutes of questions, including some about the Afghanistan report, from reporters Thursday. The press briefing also occurred after the IRS announcement.
Thomas Catenacci is a politics writer for Fox News Digital.
Marion County Sheriff Billy Woods on Friday slammed “society,” “school districts” and gun law rhetoric after announcing the arrests of two juveniles โ one of which is just 12 years old โ in connection with the recent killings of three teenagers in Florida.
A third juvenile suspect remains at large, and the attorney general’s office is weighing whether to charge all three suspects as adults, Woods said during a press conference.
“The fact is: society fails them. We do not hold our juveniles accountable. We minimize their actions,” Woods said Friday.
The suspects are accused of fatally shooting 16-year-old Layla Silvernail, 16-year-old Camille Quarles, and an unnamed 17-year-old male on or around March 30 in rural Marion County.
Marion County Sheriff Billy Woods blames society and school district failures for three juvenile suspects accused of killing three teenagers around March 30.ย (Fox News)
Woods told reporters he had to “look into the eyes” of the suspects’ mothers and inform them of their son’s crimes.
“Really, [the suspects’ parents] don’t have a whole lot to say. If you’re a parent, put yourself in their shoes. Holy hell. Panic. I’m scared to death as a parent. Embarrassed. Ashamed. What do you think they’re gonna say?” the sheriff said.
“I am a father, and I cannot fathom what they were going through. These mothers and the mothers across this nation need all of your help because here’s what infuriates me,” he added.
“I am a father, and I cannot fathom what they were going through. These mothers and the mothers across this nation need all of your help because here’s what infuriates me,” Marion County Sheriff Billy Woods said.ย (Marion County Sheriff’s Office/Facebook)
The sheriff also criticized media and others who put the blame on guns after a shooting.
“There are individuals out there viewing โฆ who want to blame the one thing that has no ability or the capacity to commit the crime itself, and that’s the gun,” Woods said. “These individuals committed the crime.”
He added that he does not know what the solution is, but “[t]he bad guy’s going to get a gun no matter what laws you put in place.” Woods went on to blame society and schools for not holding juveniles accountable for their crimes.
Layla Silvernail, left, and Camille Quarles, along with an unidentified 17-year-old male, were shot and left for dead in Marion County, Florida, between March 30 and April 1.ย (Facebook/Layla Silvernail/Camille Quarles)
“I am a father,” he said. “But hereโs the one thing my boys know: growing up, the freaking barber had my permission to whip their a–es.”
The suspects in the triple homicide were involved in a burglary and robbery ring and stole their firearms from cars, Woods said.
“A simple burglary, as some people would say โ but I don’t consider anything โsimpleโ when it comes to a burglary โ if the law allows me, I’ll plaster their face up โฆ on my page, on media, I will hand it out if the law allows me because parents have the right to know who their kids are hanging out with and preventing this,” Woods said.
He continued, “Our school districts, not just here, across this state and across this nation need to stop minimizing the actions of their students. Hold them accountable. That’s where the failure is.”
Police first found Silvernail with a gunshot wound, lying on the side of the road in the area of Forest Lakes Park on SE 183rd Avenue Road. Authorities transported the teenager to a hospital in critical condition, and she lost brain function until she was pronounced dead.
Three teenage shooting victims were found left for dead miles apart in Marion County, Florida, between March 30 and April 1.ย (America’s Newsroom)
A day after finding Silvernail, Marion County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) deputies responded to SE 94th Street and SE 188th Court and located a deceased 17-year-old male with a gunshot wound.
The next morning, on April 1, the MCSO Major Crimes Unit, Forensic Unit and Underwater Recovery Team responded to a tip and searched the area of Malauka Loop and Malauka Loop Trace and found Silvernailโs vehicle partially submerged in a body of water. The car was about 9 miles from where Silvernail was found.
The suspects were in Silvernail’s vehicle with the victims prior to their deaths, according to the sheriff. Authorities believe all three victims were shot at the same time.
“She was there of her own free will,” Woods said of Silvernail.
Layla Silvernail’s family is planning to donate the 16-year-old’s organs, according to a GoFundMe.ย (Facebook/Layla Silvernail)
After obtaining a search warrant and searching her vehicle, authorities found 16-year-old Quarles dead from a gunshot wound in Silvernail’s car. The arrested suspects confessed to shooting Quarles in the vehicle, Woods said.
Woods previously told Fox News Digital that he believed the suspects were part of a “wannabe” or “neighborhood” gang, and the victims likely knew them for a short time.
Police have not released the name of the male victim who was killed.
Audrey Conklin is a digital reporter for Fox News Digital and FOX Business. Email tips to audrey.conklin@fox.com or on Twitter at @audpants.
The House Oversight Committee issued subpoenas to banks asking for the Biden family’s financial records.
Fox News has confirmed that the Oversight Committee subpoenaed Bank of America, Cathay Bank, JPMorgan Chase, HSBC USA N.A., as well as former Hunter Biden business associate Mervyn Yan asking for financial records.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, complained that Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., was trying to hide information regarding the investigation from Democrats on the committee.
House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., leads an organizational meeting for the 118th Congress, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2023.ย (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
In a statement to Fox News, Comer said “Ranking Member Raskin has again disclosed Committeeโs subpoenas in a cheap attempt to thwart cooperation from other witnesses. Given his antics with the first bank subpoena, the American people and media should be asking what information Ranking Member Raskin is trying to hide this time. No one should be fooled by Ranking Member Raskinโs games. We have the bank records, and the facts are not good for theย Biden family.“
President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, step off Air Force One, Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023, at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base in Syracuse, N.Y.ย ย (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
The Oversight Committee Democratic staff sent a memo to members on Thursday which accuses Republicans of conducting their investigation behind a “veil of secrecy.”
“Despite this massive investment of time and resources, Republican efforts on this and other congressional committees have failed to yield any evidence of misconduct by President Biden. Nevertheless, Chairman Comer has issued six document subpoenas for financial records as part of this renewed investigation, several of which have been based on information Committee Republicans know to be false,” the memo states.
The Democratic memo alleges that Republicans haven’t been publicizing their subpoenas or notifying Democrats, which has purportedly resulted in some targets of subpoenas being unaware that the committee is seeking their records.
President Biden speaks during the annual House Democrats Issues Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Baltimore on March 1, 2023.ย (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
“On February 27, 2023, Chairman Comer secretly issued the Committeeโs first document subpoena as part of Committee Republicansโ ongoing investigation into the Biden family to Bank of America. This subpoena sought, among other information, “all financial records” from January 20, 2009, to the present โ a staggering 14-year period โ for John R. Walker, a private U.S. citizen…ย Yet, because of Chairman Comerโs use of a secret subpoena, Mr. Walker was never notified that the Committee had subpoenaed his financial records from Bank of America, he was never notified that Bank of America turned over his records to the Committee, and he was never notified that the Committee was publicly releasing information from these records,” the memo states.
Chad Pergram currently serves as a senior congressional correspondent for FOX News Channel (FNC). He joined the network in September 2007 and is based out of Washington, D.C.
Law enforcement officials arrested a transgender person they believed was plotting a mass murder attack on schools and churches in Colorado Springs.
The 18th Judicial District Attorneyโs Office said on Thursday that a family member of a teenager named William Whitworth, who identified as โLily,โ contacted law enforcement because of a threat Whitworth made “to shoot up a school.โ
Police went to Whitworth’s address and found the suspect sleeping in a bedroom.
Investigators described what they saw in the charging documents.
โOnce entering the home there was trash piled up all around the house to where it made it hard to walk inside,โ they wrote. โThere were numerous containers filled with half eaten food with mold growing inside and numerous alcoholic beverage containers laying around the house.โ
Police spoke to Whitworth, who reportedly said, “I’m a little drunk by the way,” during the questioning.
โWhile waiting for the fire department to show up, Lily was asked how long she had been planning the school shooting and Lily stated sheโs about a third of the way from doing it,โ police said.
Whitworth allegedly told police that Timberview Middle School was a target, as well as some churches.
The charging document also says that Whitworth allegedly admitted to writing a manifesto and going through “active firearm planning” in addition to mapping out the school.
Whitworth was charged with two counts of criminal attempt to commit murder in the first degree, criminal mischief, menacing and interference with staff, faculty, or students of educational institutions.
The teenager had a bond set at $75,000 and is scheduled for a court hearing on May 5.
The arrest was compared by many to the horrific mass shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, during which a transgender person mercilessly slaughtered three 9-year-old students and three adult staff members. The murderer in that incident also prepared a manifesto, but police have not released details from it to date.
Here’s more about the Nashville mass shooting:
Glennโs POWERFUL Nashville Tragedy Message: THIS Is the Way Out www.youtube.com
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Former NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines has been subject to verbal and written abuse in recent weeks after she took a stand against the inclusion of men in women’s sports. On Thursday night, however, her attackers turned to physical violence.
A man in a dress reportedly struck Gaines at least twice Thursday night after the 23-year-old swim star gave a speech about keeping women’s spaces female-only. Her attacker was part of a hysterical mob of transsexual extremists and LGBT activists that descended on the Turning Point USA and Leadership Institute event at San Francisco State University.
Gaines posted a video to Twitter documenting some of the chaos that reached a fever pitch as audience members were being let out of the classroom, noting, “The prisoners are running the asylum at SFSU…I was ambushed and physically hit twice by a man. This is proof that women need sex-protected spaces.”
The 12-time All-American swimmer underscored that the vicious attack “only further assures me I’m doing something right. When they want you silent, speak louder.”
The prisoners are running the asylum at SFSU…I was ambushed and physically hit twice by a man. This is proof that women need sex-protected spaces.
Still only further assures me I'm doing something right. When they want you silent, speak louder. ๐ฃ๏ธ pic.twitter.com/uJW3x9RERf
Kim Shasby Jones, co-founder of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports, tweeted, “These people are UNHINGED and dangerous. It is 2023 and a young women is physically assaulted simply for speaking up for her rights!”
The Independent Women’s Forum, for which Gaines is a spokeswoman, issued a statement strongly condemning the violence, adding, “Riley was violently accosted, ambushed, and physically assaulted during a speech on sex discrimination women face in their own single-sex sports category.”
The IWF noted that “Riley is courageous in speaking up for truth, science and common sense. She has experienced firsthand the injustice female athletes face across America in their own sport.”
“The effort to silence, threaten & harm women for standing up for #WomensRights is absolutely ludicrous. The Biden administration @POTUS & governing bodies of sport @ncaa @iocmedia pushing for biological males in womenโs sport for the sake of inclusion are responsible for this,” continued the statement.
Gaines had dared to tell her story to SFSU students about competing in the womenโs NCAA swimming championships against male athlete Lia Thomas, whom she claimed in a February interview had exposed his male genitalia in a women’s locker room after a meet.
Her agent, Eli Bremer, told Fox News Digital, “Her goal in speaking at universities has been to educate her peers about her experience and what the impact of the growing number of biological males in womenโs sports will do to the integrity of Title IX. She has been questioned in civil and somewhat uncivil manners about her views many times, and she thoroughly encourages diverse viewpoints and debate on this issue.”
Concerning Gaines’ attack by a transsexual extremist, Bremer said, “This will not stop Riley from boldly educating people of the dangers of biological males in womenโs sports. She will continue to speak the truth against the radical left that no longer understands the difference between men and women.”
Footage taken by the student-run news outfit Golden Gate Xpress shows police escorting Gaines down a hallway and away from the angry mob. When the officers reach the end of one corridor, they appear to find the door to a safe room locked, at which point Gaines turns to calmly face the extremists, who held signs that read, “Go the f*** home,” “trans lives matter,” and “trans women are women.”
One LGBT activist can be heard screaming, “transphobic b****.”
Riley Gaines has been escorted out of the event into a side hallway in the HSS Building. Students were following through โtrans women are womenโ 8:31 p.m pic.twitter.com/rGaTvrje17
Gaines was ultimately barricaded in a room with police protection for roughly three hours, during which time some transsexual activists attempted to extort her, saying they would disperse if paid off.
The All-American athlete did not leave campus until 11:38 p.m., 20 minutes after police announced that those who stuck around to protest would be arrested.
Upon learning that Gaines had been attacked, her husband, Louis Barker, said, “I was shaking. It made me that mad. It makes me sick to feel so helpless about it. … She was under police protection and was still hit by a man wearing a dress.”
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
In a surreal moment at the Country Music Awards last week, co-host Kelsea Ballerini joined with several drag performers to belt out a campy version of her single, โIf You Go Down (Iโm Goinโ Down Too),โ an anthem taking aim at Tennessee laws denying wrongly named โgender-affirming careโ for children.
The performance was steeped in queerness, both in the pretend โoppressionโ of performers literally center stage at a nationally-broadcast awards show and in the academic sense, where drag serves as a kind of postmodern harlequin dance. Choreographed to confront its audience, the unspoken subtext of the number was that itโs time for you to pick a side, and you had better be careful which side you pick.
This was a brazen show of strength. Think โshock and awe,โ only with lots of bedazzling.
A Vicious Activist Cult
The left picked their side. And the side they picked was the side of a school shooter who became for them an emblem of their cultural movement: Cast as a victim of โhatefulโ traditional religious values, a tragic figure broken by her desire to โbe seen,โ the shooter was sainted, her death a kind of religious redemption play. The narrative coalesced around her supposed suffering because the left was never going to surrender its stranglehold on politicized victimhood. Thatโs where all the power is.
At the tip of the cultural Marxist spear today is the trans cult. Just a year ago, it was the racialist cult of Black Lives Matter. Their presence is smothering in cultural spaces by design. In fact, their defiance of norms is predictable. After all, over the last seven years or so weโve seen veneers of civil comradery peeled back, or else worn so thin as to become transparent.
A public pause to mouth the platitudes of togetherness is no longer required in a society so clearly divided along ideological lines. Indeed, such niceties areย ridiculedย as a sign of weakness or inauthenticity. โWhere was your Christian god that day?โ the left sneered. โGuess your church canโt protect you, after all.โ
In glib taunts that displayed their misunderstanding of Godโs earthly role in traditional religions, they laid their ideology raw before the bodies of three 9-year-olds were even cold. And that ideology, like the martyr it created when it embraced the killing of Christians as a blasรฉ bump on the road to their utopia, now wants to be seen. The devil wants his due.ย There can be no other explanation for the leftist urge to celebrate the โvisibilityโ of aย viciousย activist cult, or toย claimย โtransgender Americans shape our Nationโs soul,โ especially in the immediate wake of the slaughter of Christians by a trans person. Their ostentatious obeisance to these damaged people was a liturgy performed with rapturous audacity on the American stage. It, too, was meant to โbe seen.โ
Whether itโs a country music drag act, a trans-identified light beer, a trans-allied wizard, or a march by college students demanding the surrender of natural rights to the state, the memetics of cultural Marxism is performative, phony Maoist struggle sessions delivered in swarms to project strength and to dispirit opponents by displaying the inevitability of the mob and its power. Itโs a cultural troll. Itโs their way of telling you that they are in charge and that you are helpless. You will conform. You must. What else is there?
It was in response to this attempted coup against Western liberal culture and the Enlightenment itself that Iโve written what I believe to be a clarion call for the individualist; but it, too, was something of a performance: It proclaimed, but it didnโt explain.
Cultural Marxism Demands Cultural Hegemony
Briefly, we must reject the premises of the cultural Marxist because cultural Marxism itself cannot live peaceably with federal republicanism or individual autonomy. In fact, it demands the opposite: All things are constrained by the state and its desires. Rule must be universal. Governing individuals is like herding cats, whereas ruling over a collective molded by both state pressures (law, force) and social forces (shame, shunning) is a more gratifying task, especially because the molding, if done well, creates a populace that reflects back the will of the state to itself. The state is now God, and its citizens, made in the stateโs image, are its supplicants.
The whole of the cultural Marxist project is to create and maintain cultural hegemony. Itโs that sameness we saw in the uniformed Maoists with identical haircuts, and the sameness we see in our own social justice Red Guard with their ubiquitous cotton-candy hair and tribal piercings. There can be no deviation from the new standards, built atop the rubble of old traditions the Marxists seek to destroy. To create the New Man, you must kill off the Olds. To arrive at Year Zero, you must erase all those years that came before it. To save the culture, you must first destroy it completely.
Cultural Marxism is dystopia peddling utopia through grievance narratives and rank emotionalism. It grants the self-styled dispossessed enormous power over those it casts as oppressors, which is itself determined by an intersectional calculus among victim groups.
Yet this power is temporary. Because what its authors seek, ultimately, is authoritarian. The useful idiots will soon be replaced by a ministerial elite, who will guide the filthies during The Great Reset. With policed conformity. Asceticism. Sameness. Every thought you think, every word you utter, and every move you make, must be approved by the state. And youโll beg them for that privilege.
Blinded By โBeing Seenโ
The useful idiots enjoy wielding power, but they never seem to recognize that once theyโve ground down all opposition and extirpated all difference, once theyโve rooted out every intolerance they can conjure, there are no more battles to fight, no more ideas to be born, no more purpose left to live. To speak in a language they understand, their project reduces us to the means of production, slaves to the most successful oligarchs, earthly deities who delight in our serfdom, providing us safety and sustenance in exchange for conformity, and a surrender of self to a greater good they determine. Enlightened feudalism, in short. And weโre tilling their fields.
But thatโs the endgame, and those whoโve embraced the cultural Marxist paradigm canโt see it coming. Their identity politics and the power their โoppressionโ yields appeal to their egos. They are blinded by the narcissism of โbeing seen,โ and by the thrill of cultural control, however temporary. They revel in bullying.
All of our major institutions have taken up the trans cause for the same reasons they took up the cause of BLM: to gather power, destroy norms, attack traditions, and create the conditions of tribalism that must exist before the collective comes together out of the ruins of universal cancellation. The last man standing is the New Man, the perfect servant to a benevolent master.
Where we once were conceived of statist authoritarianism as an iron boot forever pressing on our necks, today itโs a Christian Louboutin red-bottomed pump, worn by a dude in a lace dress and zebra thong, stomping on our faces forever. Only weโre compelled to dig the kink.
The revolution will be accessorized, and youโll learn to like it, or else.
Jeff Goldstein is a lapsed academic and writer living in Colorado. He likes tacos, โ79 Cabernets, and his favorite color is magenta.
On Wednesday, Speaker McCarthy and a bipartisan group of lawmakers met with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen at the Ronald Reagan Library in California. The meeting made McCarthy the most senior U.S. official to meet with the leader of Taiwan on U.S. soil in decades, according to Newsweek.
During the historic summit, McCarthy reaffirmed Congressโs commitment to strengthening relations with the island nation and support for Taiwanโs aim to remain democratic in the wake of increasing Chinese aggression.
โI felt our meeting today provided a greater peace and stability for the world. Americaโs support for the people of Taiwan will remain resolute, unwavering and bipartisan,โ McCarthy said. Tsai echoed similar sentiments, saying, โTo preserve peace, we must be strongโ and โwe are stronger when we are together.โ
โI am the Speaker of the House. There is no place that Chinaโs going to tell me where to go and who I can speak to โ Iโm not the general manager of @HoustonRockets.โ
— Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (@committeeonccp) April 6, 2023
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) โ which claims Taiwan is Chinese territory โ issued remarks on Thursday threatening to โtake resolute measuresโ in response to Tsai and McCarthyโs alleged promotion of Taiwanese independence. Taiwan News reported the islandโs national defense ministry tracked a Peopleโs Liberation Army helicopter and two naval vessels in the waters surrounding Taiwan on Wednesday and Thursday.
Most egregiously, however, is the CCPโs attempt to โinspectโ ships traveling through the Taiwan Strait. According to Reuters, โChinaโs Fujian maritime safety administration launched a three-day special joint patrol and inspection operation in the central and northern parts of the Taiwan Straitโ on Wednesday that includes โmoves to board ships.โ Fujian is a southeastern Chinese province bordering the Taiwan Strait.
โThe maritime safety authority in the southeastern Chinese province said โฆ the operation included โon-site inspectionsโ on direct cargo ships and construction vessels on both sides of the Taiwan Strait โto ensure the safety of vessel navigation and ensure the safe and orderly operation of key projects on water,โโ the report reads. Taiwan indicated it would not cooperate with the inspections.
Biden Helps China by Undercutting America
In the background of McCarthyโs bid to reaffirm U.S. support for Taiwanese sovereignty is the flailing presidency of Joe Biden, whose administrationโs seemingly intentional bid to cripple Americaโs national security and economic stability is giving China leeway to expand its influence across the globe.
On Monday, NBC News reported the infamous Chinese spy balloon the Biden administration let drift across the continental United States earlier this year โwas able to gather intelligence from several sensitive American military sites.โ Among the intelligence transmitted back to the CCP was โmostly from electronic signals, which can be picked up from weapons systems or include communications from base personnel.โ
On the economic front, Bidenโs monetary policy โ which includes spending trillions of taxpayer dollars on useless Democrat pet projects โ has resulted in decades-high inflation, causing everyday Americans to struggle to afford basic necessities such as gas and groceries. The administrationโs ongoing war against the U.S. fossil fuel industry has only exacerbated the countryโs economic pains.
Under Biden, the hegemony of the U.S. dollar is also in jeopardy. Countries such asย Brazilย andย Malaysiaย have announced within the past week plans to work with China to reduce dependence on the U.S. dollar when conducting trade with Beijing. Most recently, the Chinese yuan surpassed the U.S. dollar as the most traded currency in Russia, signifying growing ties between Beijing and Moscow.
As noted byย The Daily Caller, โ[i]f foreigners no longer want [U.S. dollars] for trade, central bank reserves, private wealth funds, and the official currency of about a dozen countries, all those dollars have nowhere to go but back to us in a flood like our country has never seen.โ Such a scenario would likely lead to hyperinflation and further suffering among the American people.
The U.S. is haunted by self-inflicted domestic problems, so the CCP likely sees an opportunity not just to take control of Taiwan but to recalibrate the politics of the Indo-Pacific in its favor. The longer Biden cripples the U.S., the closer China gets to creating a new world order devoid of U.S. influence.
Shawn Fleetwood is a Staff Writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
Protesters at The State University of New York at Albany (SUNY Albany) worked to shut down conservative pundit Ian Haworth at an event Tuesday in defiance of the Turning Point USA speaker’s discussion on free speech on college campuses.
The conservative pundit labeled a snippet of the campus catastrophe “the most socialist thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Trans rights are human rights!” the group shouted at one point.
Protesters at SUNY at Albany voiced their dissent against TPUSA guest speaker Ian Haworth on April 4, 2023.ย (Twitter @ighaworth/TPUSA Upstate)
The Turning Point USA-sponsored talk titled “Free Speech on Campus” was sent into a tailspin as students hit Haworth with insults and expressions of “queer rage” filled the room.
“F— Ian!” protesters shouted in one video he posted to Twitter. “F— you, fascists!” rang out in another. Haworth laughed it off as “irony.”
“Last night, I was at the University of Albany to speak with @TPUSA. My argument: free speech is being destroyed on college campuses. And like clockwork, some deranged protesters showed up and used the heckler’s veto to try and shut down the even,” he tweeted Wednesday.
“When the chapter tried to settle the protesters down so we could start the event, they responded with ‘f— you @TPUSA’ The tolerant left, ladies and gentlemen,” he continued in the thread.
Haworth made several posts in the thread, pointing out the protesters who stormed the room who were eating the free pizza provided by the organization they were protesting.
A view of the Delaware & Hudson Building and administrative center of the State University of New York (SUNY) on April 22, 2020, in Albany, New York.ย (Photo by Roy Rochlin/Getty Images)
“The most socialist thing Iโve ever seen is a bunch of deranged students screaming ‘no cops, no KKK, no @TPUSA’ at a Jewish immigrant while also happily shoveling free pizza down their throats paid for by…@TPUSA!,” he wrote.
Jokingly, he added, “Sure, theyโre Nazis, but who doesnโt love a free slice?”
One demonstrator, according to another tweet in the thread, even went as far as destroying an event attendee’s Bible for “no reason whatsoever.”
And, as Haworth noted, things got even weirder when protesters decided to form a conga line in the room, flipping off the camera as they passed by.
“Not one person seemed concerned that this is a traditional Cuban carnival dance, and is therefore an act of cultural appropriation,” Haworth wrote on a video tweet.
Other students kicked off their Crocs and danced and screamed, before eventually taking over the room.
Haworth’s event was eventually moved to another location, complete with a police escort and police presence surrounding the new venue.
“College is now where free speech goes to die, and we need to push back against this bulls— with everything we have. Donโt let the angry minority bully people into silence,” Haworth said.
Fox News Digital reached out to both Haworth and SUNY at Albany for comment, with SUNY at Albany providing the following statement:
“Consistent with the mission of an institution of higher learning, we expect members of our community to be able to voice their views in a manner that promotes constructive dialogue and honors UAlbanyโs commitment to freedom of expression,” the school said. “This is especially important when it involves speech that members of our community find offensive or objectionable.”
“Our constitutional obligation to protect speech, even when that speech fundamentally conflicts with our core values, is a pillar of our democratic system. We are equally committed to fostering an environment in which all students feel safe and included โ and that the right to protest is also protected,” it added.
SUNY at Albany pledged to help its community members understand their “rights and responsibilities under the First Amendment” and said all student organizations are entitled to reserve space and invite guest speakers “without interference.”
The institution further detailed that university staff and the university police department worked with the hosting organization to relocate the event to ensure it could continue but to also provide protesters a space to voice their concerns, adding that two students were ticketed for trying to gain access to a restricted area reserved for the event.
Haworth responded with the following statement:
“The protesters who stormed the Turning Point USA event on free speech at University at Albany proved my point: college campuses are where free speech goes to die. The protesters disrupted the event, abusing and insulting the TPUSA chapter, college staff, law enforcement and their fellow students, with one goal: to shut down speech. While I fully support their right to protest (even if their accusations of me being an infamous Jewish immigrant transphobic misogynistic KKK member are laughably inaccurate), the heckler’s veto is not free speech…and neither is destroying the property of TPUSA members!โฆ
“Ultimately, this isn’t about me. I doubt these protesters even knew who I was prior to this event. In reality, it’s about any ideas that threaten the fascist ideology of leftism on campus. This unfortunate event proves the threat conservatives face every day on campus, and reinforces the truth that colleges have a duty to allow free speech and debate to flourish on campus,” he concluded.
Haworth also thanked TPUSA, university faculty and law enforcement for making sure the event could proceed at the new venue.
Taylor Penley is a production assistant with Fox News.
A survivor of the Chinese Cultural Revolution issued a chilling warning on the heels of the Trump indictment, arguing the tumultuous past of communist China is “repeating itself” in the U.S.
Xi Van Fleet, a Maoist survivor, joined “Fox & Friends First” to discuss why Tuesday, the day former President Donald Trump was arraigned in Manhattan, will be remembered as one of the “darkest” days in history.
“You are cheering for your own demise, becauseโฆ April 4th, 2023, would be remembered as one of the darkest day[s] in America when the Democrats made our country… a banana republic of communism,” Fleet told Todd Piro on Thursday.
The former president was formally charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.ย The indictment was predicated on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s years-long investigation into alleged hush money payments prior to the 2016 election.ย
He has faced rampant bipartisan criticism surrounding the strength of the charges, and some have even tabled the move as “political persecution.”
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Trump Tower in New York on Monday for his expected booking and arraignment the following day on charges arising from hush money payments during his 2016 campaign.ย (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Fleet noted that when she was growing up in China, Mao weaponized the law to target his political enemies, and that is now happening in the U.S., she warned.ย
“When the totalitarian wins, no one is safe, we will all become victim[s],” Fleet said. “After the cultural revolution, what happened is China was brought to ruins and 20 some million lives lost. American people need to learn the history of the communism and to see that it is repeating right here in America.”
Hung Cao, who is a retired Navy captain, fled Vietnam decades ago, just before the fall of Saigon. He echoed Fleet’s sentiment on Thursday, saying Americans are falling “prey” to totalitarian leadership in wake of the indictment.
“My grandfather was hauled away in the middle night. He was a magistrate and murdered in front of my mom, and so it’s just one of those things where if this can happen in the United States, that it can happen anywhere,” Cao said.
“This is why I fought for this country for so many years. I wore uniform for 30 years and fought in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, for things like this, and here we are,” he continued. “We’ve fallen prey to all of this.”
Meanwhile, some critics worry China is celebrating the unprecedented indictment, in an effort to derail the significance of American democracy on the world stage.ย This could, in turn, have an impact on heightening bilateralย tensions over Taiwanย as relations between Washington and Beijing remain icy at best.ย
The South China Morning Post, a media organization funded by the pro-China e-commerce firm Alibaba, published an op-ed saying China is “chuckling at the irony” of Trump’s arrest.
“Chinese didnโt always feel the need, nor have the ammunition, to lampoon the U.S. political system,” the article says. “However, the generation of young people who shouted โLong live President Wilsonโ at the end of World War I, and the idealistic generation who endorsed a โfight for freedom and democracyโ in Tiananmen Square in 1989, have little in common with young Chinese people today who see no upside to emulating American democracy.”
A delegation of U.S. lawmakers traveled to Taiwan to meet with the island’s leaders, despite clear warnings from Chinese officials that came on the heels of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s historic meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in Simi Valley, California, on Wednesday.
“We have to show them that we’re going to stand with them and have the Seventh Fleet standing by to support them in case something happens,” Cao said.
The Chinese military had a fleet surrounding the island during the lawmakers’ visit, according to Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas.ย Despite the “intimidation” tactics, he insisted the delegation would not succumb to the threats. ย ย
Democrats are playing Republicans like a fiddle. The leftโs sole objective is to make Trump the Republicansโ 2024 presidential nominee. Heโs already lost three election cycles for the GOP โ why not make it four?
A month ago, things were looking bad for the Democrats.
Immediately after Trump announced for president last November, he may as well have gone into the witness protection program. Even Fox News cut away from his announcement speech. He had to have dinner with a noted Hitler enthusiast to get any attention, and, when he spoke at CPAC in February, the room was half-empty.
Looming before them was the threat from Florida: Gov. Ron DeSantis. He was beating Trump in the presidential polls without even announcing. Heโd scored victory after victory against Democrats and won his reelection bid โ in a purple state! โ by 20 points, despite attacks from Trump.
Against DeSantisโ smarts and energy, the Democrats would be running President Senile Dementia and a vice president whose sole credentials are that she is black and a woman.
They had only one hope: Get Trump the nomination. Liberals: HEโS A DANGER TO THE NATION! NEVER HAVE WE FACED SUCH PERIL! Now letโs do everything we can to make sure he gets the nomination.
And thatโs why Democrats indicted Trump on absurd charges this week, with the media covering the event like it was the capture of Osama Bin Laden. Today, the party mandarins are sitting around laughing as Republicans trip over themselves to defend Trump.
This was the whole point of my book, โResistance Is Futile: How the Trump-Hating Left Lost Its Collective Mind.โ Instead of attacking Trump for the things heโd actually done, liberals would run off and make wild charges, forcing normal people to say, I donโt like the guy, but heโs not a Russian agent.
The endless stream of preposterous charges against Trump only helped him.
So why not launch another ridiculous accusation to help him get the nomination? Thatโs exactly what they did in last yearโs GOP primaries, supporting Trumpโs nut-bar candidates, knowing they would go on to lose the general election. By boosting Trumpโs candidates, Democrats managed to pull out a historic midterm victory for Biden.
And now, theyโre doing it again, trying to trick Republicans into choosing the worst possible presidential nominee. Guess what? Itโs working! New GOP motto: Unable to learn from the third kick of a mule.
In response to Trumpโs arraignment on Tuesday, all conservative media swept aside news of out-of-control crime, chaos at the border, fentanyl overdoses and the looming recession. Their No. 1 job became: SAVE TRUMP! A major conservative talk radio host even suggested DeSantis stand down and endorse Trump.
True, everyone at MSNBC is a Trump-hating zealot. But this helps obscure the real objective. Half the Democrats genuinely hate Trump, and the other half are saying, This is fantastic. Weโre going to win him the nomination.
Politico reports that Bidenโs senior advisers reacted to Trumpโs recent surge in the polls with unmitigated joy. โWe beat Trump once, they say, and will again.โ
Theyโre absolutely right. After voters reject you once, they almost never change their minds. In all of U.S. history, losing presidential candidates have run again about a dozen times. Only three of those renominations were successful โ and only one since 1892. (Nixon was the only one to do it in the past 131 years. Of course, that first election probably was stolen from him, but Nixon graciously conceded, instead of running around making a complete ass of himself.)
Everyone acts as if Trumpโs 2016 win was a gigantic, stupendous victory, when in reality he barely squeaked by. Donโt confuse โstartlingโ with โbig.โ
He was running against the most hated woman in politics.
Moreover, the country had been incessantly told that Hillary had it in the bag. On Election Day, The New York Times put her chances of winning at 85%. Princeton professor Sam Wang โ whoโd correctly predicted 49 out of 50 states in 2012! โ said Clinton was more than 99% likely to be the next president. How many Clinton voters saw those polls and thought, Iโll just say I voted for her and go get my nails done.
Yet and still, out of 139 million votes cast in 2016, Trump won with a mere 80,000 votes across three states. Flip those votes, and Hillary wins.
Trumpโs winning was a shock, but it wasnโt an amazing, spectacular victory, indicative of some sort of electoral magic.
And then, of course, Trump went on turn his presidency over to Jared and Ivanka, betray his voters (But he moved the embassy!) and lose the next three election cycles.
Republicans: No matter how angry you are at Democrats for politicizing the law, please remember: Trump. Will. Lose. To. Biden. There is absolutely no scenario in which he wins. The good news is thereโs virtually no scenario where Biden wins โ unless Trump is his opponent.
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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
For weeks now, former President Donald Trump and legal expertsย on the rightย predicted that the prosecution Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg brought against Trump wasย pathetic and partisan. Not long after Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records during his arraignment on Tuesday, some of his most outspoken political enemies also began casting doubt on Braggโs attempts to send the former president to jail.
Here are the notorious anti-Trumpers who willingly admitted that Braggโs case against the leader of the Republican Party is a weak attempt to keep him from winning the White House in 2024.
Andrew McCabe
Former Deputy Director of the FBI Andrew McCabe expressed disappointment on CNN on Tuesday after he realized that Braggโs justification for elevating Trumpโs charges to felonies โsimply isnโt there.โ
โI think everyone was hoping we would see more,โ McCabe said.
He later added that โItโs hard to imagine convincing a jury that they should get there.โ
"Disappointment," says Andrew McCabe on CNN regarding the indictment. "Everyone was hoping we would see more."
McCabe says the justification to try these misdemeanors as felonies "simply isn't there": "It's hard to imagine convincing a jury that they should get there." pic.twitter.com/PafSwiY2nZ
Jonathan Chait, a political columnist at New York Magazine, wrote in the Intelligencer that Braggโs case against Trump is littered with โlegal deficienciesโ and kicks off โthe criminalization of politics.โ
โTrump is being prosecuted charged because he paid hush money to a mistress, something itโs inconcievable he would have been charged over if he were never a candidate for office,โ Chait tweeted.
Alan Dershowitz
Attorneyย Alan Dershowitzย called Braggโs case against Trump a โpoliticization of the criminal justice systemโ andย โvery, very dangerous for America.โ
โThis is a scandalous misuse of the criminal justice system,โ Dershowitzย told Sky News Australia. โIt will create a terrible precedent in which other prosecutors will go after people of the opposing party.โ
Carrie Cordero
CNN legal analyst Carrie Cordero said she expected Braggโs charges against Trump to be connected to the payments Trumpโs former lawyer Michael Cohen made to Stormy Daniels but said the case itself is โa little underwhelming.โ
โThereโs not more to it. There are not more violations, tax violations. Thereโs not an incredible new set of facts that we didnโt know about publicly. Itโs really the facts of this case, as they have existed for basically almost seven years,โ Cordero said.
Itโs a little underwhelming – – my reaction w/ @jaketapper & team @CNN in the moment the first ever indictment against a former president was unsealed. pic.twitter.com/USCc2LFCbM
Republican Sen. Mitt Romneyโs distaste for the former president is no secret but even his strong anti-Trump bias didnโt stop him from calling out the Manhattan D.A. for having โstretched to reach felony criminal charges in order to fit a political agenda.โ
John Bolton
Trump-era National Security Adviser John Bolton says Bragg is โwrong on the applicability of the New York statuteโ that he charged Trump under.
โSpeaking as someone who very strongly does not want Donald Trump to get the Republican presidential nomination, Iโm extraordinarily distressed by this document. I think this is even weaker than I feared it would be and I think itโs easily subject to being dismissed or a quick acquittal for Trump,โ Bolton explained on a CNN panel on Tuesday.
Even John Bolton thinks the indictment is a joke. "I'm extraordinarily distressed by this document … This is even weaker than I feared it would be." He predicts a "quick acquittal" because the case suggests everything a candidate pays for can be construed as campaign-related. pic.twitter.com/KTyBa72gLo
Bolton warned that โthere is no basis in the statutory language to say that Trumpโs behavior forms either a [campaign] contribution or an expenditure under federal lawโ which effectively renders Braggโs case vulnerable to challenge.
โIf you can construe the statute to cover this behavior then I think it violates the First Amendment,โ Bolton said.
Ian Millhiser
Ian Millhiser, a senior correspondent at Vox, called Braggโs case against Trump โpainfully anticlimacticโ and said it was built on an โuncertain legal theory.โ
In the second paragraph of the Vox analysis he penned on Tuesday, Millhiser acknowledges that โthereโs a very real risk that this indictment will end in an even bigger anticlimaxโ because โit is unclear that the felony statute that Trump is accused of violating actually applies to him.โ
โBragg, in other words, has built one of the most controversial and high-profile criminal cases in American history upon the most uncertain of foundations. And that foundation could crumble into dust if the courts reject his legal arguments on a genuinely ambiguous question of law,โ Millhiser reaffirms later in the article.
Noah Feldman
Bloomberg opinion columnist and Harvard law professor Noah Feldman wrote in The Washington Post on Tuesday that indicting Trump is a โRisky Bet for New York and the Nation.โ
Feldman opens by invoking Democratsโ favorite Trump talking point โ โno one is above the lawโโ but quickly criticized Braggโs case against the former president as โpoorly timed,โ โlegally weak,โ and one that could easily result in a mistrial or acquittal.
โAnd not only may Trump potentially beat the charges, at trial or on appeal,โ Feldman wrote. โHe may be able to use those charges to create the impression among his supporters that he is a victim of politically motivated vendetta. In turn, that may make it harder for Georgia or federal prosecutors to bring and sustain much more serious charges against him.โ
Mark Joseph Stern
โThe Trump Indictment Is Not the Slam-Dunk Case Democrats Wanted,โ Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Sternโsย latest headline blared.
According to Stern, Bragg fails to disclose the specific election law that he believes Trump violated even though the โentire prosecution hinges on that question.โ
โThese charges will be difficult to prove,โ Stern warned. โThere can be no doubt that the district attorney faces an uphill climb.โ
โThey tell the story of a complex conspiracy to illicitly alter the course of the 2016 electionโpotentially, a powerful tale of corruption that persuades both the jury and the public of this prosecutionโs necessity,โ he continued. โBut Braggโs legal theory is, if not convoluted, a fairly confusing effort to patch together disparate offenses into one alleged crime, carried out over 34 illegal payments. This is not at all the slam-dunk case that so many Democratsย wanted.โ
Michael Avenatti
Even the lawyer who previously represented on-screen prostitute Stormy Daniels apparently cast doubt on Braggโs ability to bring a successful case against Trump based on testimony from his former client.
โYou canโt build a case on the testimony of Cohen and Daniels,โ Michael Avenattiย reportedly said.
Jonathan Lemireโs Democrat Sources
MSNBC host Jonathan Lemire told his fellow โMorning Joeโ panelists last week that he and other Democrats are concerned Braggโs case isnโt strong.
โDemocrats Iโve spoken to, including some senior members of the White House, who do fear that becauseย this case is weakest, that if it is brought first, that it will be potential โ allow Trump to then paint this one as illegitimate, that itโs weak, and suggest that all of the other cases against him are as well. Andย that is something theyโre worried about,โ he warned.
Sarah Isgur
Harvard law grad and senior editor of the anti-Trump publication The Dispatch Sarah Isgur admitted on Twitter shortly after Trumpโs arraignment that Braggโs charges donโt make sense.
โHeโs tying felony falsification of business records to another state crime that requires unlawful meansโฆso now we need a third crime in order for this โfelony turtles all the way downโ charge to work. The two state crimes canโt point back to each other!โ she wrote.
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.
The increasing prominence and leadership ofย Republicans on educationย has been a great development for American students and parents. This trend has really picked up speed.ย Take for example, Glenn Youngkin โ running for governor at the time in previously blue Virginia โ who recognized this unrest. He was elected in November 2021 when he earned the support of frustrated suburban parents whose children had floundered in prolonged COVID classroom lockouts.ย
Now comes Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a former governorโs daughter and a presidentโs spokesperson. Elected as Arkansasโ first female governor and with her own young children at home, it was natural for Gov. Sanders to run on an education platform. She fulfilled that promise within her first months after taking office, describing her new education reform law as “the largest overhaul of the state’s education system in Arkansas history.”
Sarah Huckabee Sanders attends an America First Policy Institute event in Washington, D.C., on July 26, 2022.ย (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
First, the bill is a huge win for teachers. Yes, you read that right. This new Republican governor scored a major win for teachers.
Arkansas teachers presently have a $36,000 minimum salary with the national average a bit less than $42,000. Gov. Sanders destroyed that low bar; raising the minimum nearly 40% to $50,000. That is huge. As a late night TV advertisement might say, “But thereโs more.” Itโs not only new teachers or those under $50,000 who will see an increase; any teacher above that amount will see a $2,000 raise and could earn a $10,000 bonus. Ask any teacher and they will tell you: This is real money.
Still more benefits include 12 weeks of paid maternity leave and a scholarship for prospective teachers valued at up to $6,000. At the same time, the new law also empowers local school districts by ending an antiquated rule that made it harder to fire bad teachers and base pay on experience alone. I expect broad swaths of new applicants will be attracted to scholarship funds, a significant raise, time off for maternity, and eliminating the union rules that protected bad teachers.
Second, the law codifies Gov. Sandersโ earlier executive order banning classroom indoctrination. Progressive critics are forever up in arms about protecting rights, but this new governorโs law ensures that all educators “are in compliance with Title IV and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.”
If you refuse to believe a Republican governor affirms the 1964 Civil Rights Act, then Section 16(c) removes all doubt, noting the law “does not prohibit the discussion of: (1) Ideas and the history of the concepts described in subsection (b) of this section; or (2) Public policy issues of the day and related ideas that individuals may find unwelcome, disagreeable, or offensive.” Put more simply, go ahead educators and teach REAL history.
Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders unveils her education bill at the Arkansas state Capitol in Little Rock on Feb. 8, 2023.ย (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Third, the lawย provides funding for parentsย to send their children to private schools under a tiered system that begins with students enrolled in an F- or D-rated public schools. Who wants to argue that kids forced to attend terrible schools have a fair chance? Or that parents who want to see their children thrive shouldnโt have an opportunity to send them elsewhere? Eventually, the law allows for all kids to have the same opportunity.ย
Fourth and finally, the new law doubles down on literacy and the proven science of reading approach, with funding for more reading coaches and grants for parents to hire tutors. It also ensures that kids donโt move through the system unprepared for their future. Now children unable to demonstrate second-grade reading skills will be retained so they get the foundation they desperately need.
Arkansas is one of the smallest states in the country, but with Gov. Huckabee Sanders upending the status quo, itโs about to become a national model. Politicians and education policy wonks, take note.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen declared the relationship between the United States and Taiwan is strong amid “unprecedented” challenges in theย Indo-Pacific region.ย McCarthy, R-Calif., and Tsaiย metย at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California on Wednesday, along with a group of bipartisan lawmakers.ย
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., second from right, welcomes Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen as she arrives at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., Wednesday, April 5, 2023.ย (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu)
“Today, Iโm honored to meet with Taiwanโs President Tsai as she transits the United States,” McCarthy said, adding that their discussion took place “fittingly” at the library, which highlights Reaganโs belief in “democracy and commitment to the ideals of peace and freedom.”
“Those values have always served as the bedrock of our friendship with the people of Taiwan and they are more important now than ever before,” McCarthy said.
“I believe our bond is stronger now than at any time or point in my lifetime,” he added, noting that Tsai is a “great champion of that bond.”
Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., conducts a news conference in the U.S. Capitols Statuary Hall on Thursday, January 12, 2023. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)ย (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
The speaker of the House said the United States “will honor our obligations and reiterate our commitment to our shared values behind which all Americans are united.”ย
McCarthy met with Tsai and a bipartisan group of lawmakers. Tsai thanked McCarthy and the Republican and Democratic lawmakers who attended the meeting.
“Their presence and unwavering support reassure the people of Taiwan that we are not isolated and we are not alone,” Tsai said.
Pointing to the regional challenges, Tsai said “it is no secret” that the “peace that we have maintained and the democracy which we have worked hard to build are facing unprecedented challenges.”
Tsai, in the meeting, reiterated Taiwanโs commitment to “defending the peaceful status quo, where the people of Taiwan may continue to thrive in a free and open society.”
“I also highlighted a belief which President Reagan championed, that to preserve peace, we must be strong,” Tsai said. “I would like to add that we are stronger when we are together.”
In this image made from video, Taiwan’s Presidential office secretary general Lin Chia-lung, left, President Tsai Ing-wen, center, and Foreign Minister Joseph Wu wave before Tsai’s departure on an overseas trip at Taoyuan International Airport in Taipei, Taiwan, Wednesday, March 29, 2023.ย ย ((AP Photo/Johnson Lai))
Tsai also thanked members of Congress for their proposed initiatives that have “helped to make Taiwan and our partnership stronger.”
“Specifically, initiatives in the realm of enhancing Taiwan’s self-defense capabilities, fostering robust trade and economic ties between us, and supporting Taiwan’s meaningful participation in the international community, and also to seek out our shared interests in peace and prosperity across the Indo-Pacific,” Tsai said.
The meeting Wednesday came after The Chinese Embassy wrote a threatening email to McCarthy and other members of Congress who planned to meet with Tsai Wednesday.
Li Xiang, the embassy’s liaison to Congress, wrote a nearly four-page email warning U.S. lawmakers that China views the meeting as a “blatant provocation.”
“I have to point out that China will not sit idly by in the face of a blatant provocation and will most likely take necessary and resolute actions in response to the unwanted situation. Let’s work together to prevent such a thing from happening,” Li wrote, according to a copy of the email obtained by PunchBowl News.
McCarthy’s meeting with Tsai came months after former House Speaker Pelosi visited Taiwan, which, according to the Chinese Embassy, “triggered a serious crisis in the China-U.S. relationship.”ย
“Lessons should be learned,” the letter read.ย
Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), center left, poses for photographs after receiving the Order of Propitious Clouds with Special Grand Cordon, Taiwanโs highest civilian honor, from Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, center right, at the president’s office.ย (Chien Chih-Hung/Office of The President via Getty Images)
China shut down communications with the United States military after Pelosi visited Taiwan last year. That visit prompted increased aggression by China in the South China Sea and led experts to predict a Chinese invasion of Taiwan by 2024.
China sent a specific warning to McCarthy on Tuesday regarding the meeting, alleging it would break the “One China” policy.
“IfโSpeakerโMcCarthyโignoresโtheโinternationalโcommunityโsโbroadโsupportโforโtheโone-Chinaโprinciple,โrefusesโtoโdrawโlessonsโfromโothersโโmistakes,โandโinsistsโonโplayingโtheโ’Taiwanโcard,’โitโwillโundoubtedlyโfurtherโdamageโChina-USโrelations,โandโevenโstrengthenโtheโstrongโdeterminationโofโtheโChineseโpeopleโtoโuniteโandโfightโforโnationalโreunification,” a spokesperson for China’s consulate in Los Angeles wrote.
The “One China” policy, adopted by the U.S. and other countries, stipulates that the government of Beijing is the sole legitimate government of China.
Officials and lawmakers have warned that it’s only a matter of time before China tries to invade Taiwan, with some arguing that the 2024 U.S. presidential election and the Taiwanese election might have influence on the timing of Chinaโs aggression toward Taiwan.
Brooke Singman is a Fox News Digital politics reporter. You can reach her at Brooke.Singman@Fox.com or @BrookeSingman on Twitter.
The presidential campaign ofย former President Donald Trump’sย 2024 bid says it has brought in over $10 million in donations since an indictment against him was announced a week ago. Trump was indicted March 30 as part of a years-long investigation by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office for hush money payments.
A source within the Trump campaign told Fox News Digital that the campaign raised $4 million in the first 24 hours following the indictment news, and an additional $6 million in the ensuing days.
In the days after the indictment, the Trump campaign sent out an abundance of fundraising emails.
Former President Donald Trump sits with his defense team in a Manhattan court on April 4, 2023, in New York City.ย (Seth Wenig-Pool/Getty Images)
“The American people know that whenever Iโm viciously and unfairly attacked, itโs really an attack on YOU,” a fundraising email from the Trump campaign on Wednesday afternoon reads.
His campaign is also selling T-shirts that show a photoshopped mugshot of Trump.
“Not guilty,” the text below the photoshopped mugshot states.
The former president’s campaign is also selling T-shirts that show a photoshopped mugshot of Trump.ย (Trump Campaign)
On Tuesday, Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree on Tuesday. Falsifying records is typically considered a misdemeanor charge, but rises to a felony when a defendant’s “intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.”
During a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg was asked why the second alleged concealed crime wasn’t specified in the indictment.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg speaks on Donald Trump arraignment April 4, 2023.ย (Fox News)
“Let me say as an initial matter that the indictment doesn’t specify it because the law does not so require. In my remarks, I mentioned a couple of laws which I will highlight again now,” Bragg said. “The first isย New York stateย election law, which makes it a crime to conspire to promote a candidacy by unlawful means. I further indicated a number of unlawful means, including additional false statements, including statements that were planned to be made to tax authorities. I also noted the federal election law cap on contribution limits.”
Bragg is also accusing Trump and his associates of using a “catch and kill” scheme to possibly bury potentially damaging information that came ahead of the election in 2016.
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Trump Tower, Monday, April 3, 2023, in New York, the day before his arraignment.ย (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
“Trump then went to great lengths to hide this conduct, causing dozens of false entries in business records toย conceal criminal activity, including attempts to violate state and federal election laws,” Bragg alleged. “In total, 34 false entries were made in New York business records to conceal the initial covert $130,000 payment.”
Fox News’ Paul Best, Danielle Wallace and Emma Colton contributed to this report.
Paul Steinhauser is a politics reporter based in New Hampshire.
New York Times reporter Michael Shear confronted White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Tuesday over the Biden administration’s unwillingness to comment on the Donald Trump indictment. At the beginning of the briefing, Jean-Pierre said the White House is not commenting on Trump’s case because “it’s an ongoing case.”
When it was Shear’s turn to question Jean-Pierre, he noted that Biden “has spoken repeatedly” about January 6. Referring to two speeches he delivered involving Jan. 6, Shear pointed out that “there were more than 500 active legal cases going on during the time that he made those speeches” and that Biden’s comments could have impacted the cases.
“What is the White House’s reticence?” Shear asked, referring to the refusal to address Trump’s case. “And what’s the difference between [Jan. 6] and [Trump’s case]?”
The press secretary responded with her usual talking points, claiming Jan. 6 “was an attack on our democracy” and that Biden “will never shy away when it comes to our democracy.” But Shear had no patience for Jean-Pierre’s spin and question-dodging.
“There were 500 cases involving Americans whose freedom was at risk!” he told Jean-Pierre.
04/04/23: Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre www.youtube.com
Jean-Pierre responded by noting that “people died” on Jan. 6, to which Shear fired back, “I don’t need a lecture on the fact that people died!”
After Jean-Pierre then accused Shear of lecturing her, he exposed yet another double standard in the White House’s position. Officials were willing to comment on Jan. 6 despite the ongoing criminal cases because of its historic nature, but Trump’s indictment is also historic, so why are they unwilling to talk about it?
“Why isn’t that, why isn’t there a similar kind of assessment about how the world is watching us now?” he asked.
The press secretary said Jan. 6 was “a different moment” and vowed the White House would be “consistent on not commenting on any criminal ongoing investigation.”
She never, however, addressed the core of Shear’s question, which highlighted the double standard about which historic criminal incidents the Biden administration publicly discusses.
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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 โThe Washington Post.โ He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh DโSouza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and Presiden
A new report reveals that gender dysphoria has the highest prevalence among youth of European descent, with discomfort with oneโs gender most common among children, especially girls with โexceptionally high intelligenceโ and a history of mental health issues. ย
A website calledย Parents of ROGD kids.com, which has formed a support group for families with gender dysphoric children, surveyed parents who believed they had children experiencing rapid onset gender dysphoria. Theย survey results, which collected responses over nearly four years, were compiled into a report by website creator Suzanna Diaz and J. Michael Bailey of Northwestern Universityโs Department of Psychology on Wednesday. The 1,774 responses to the survey were collected from Dec. 1, 2017, through Oct. 22, 2021.
Examining the demographics of youth who developed rapid onset gender dysphoria reveals that three-quarters of the children (75%) were female, while just 25% were male. Additionally, the overwhelming majority (78.9%) were of European descent, while much smaller shares were ethnically mixed (16.2%), Asian (2.8%), Indigenous (0.8%), African American (0.6%), Middle Eastern and East Indian (0.4%).
The results of the survey measured the average age when children first experience gender dysphoria as 14.8 years old. The report details how, on average, girls began to develop gender dysphoria at 14.1 years, while boys were an average of 16 years old when they first began to experience discomfort with their sex.
The survey asked parents to evaluate their childโs โsocial adjustmentโ before they began to experience gender dysphoria. A majority of both males (57.6%) and females (56.7%) had โa few good friendsโ before they developed gender dysphoria. Responses from parents showed that similar percentages of boys (33.7%) and girls (33.9%) โgot along with other kidsโ before they began to question their sex.
While one-third of parents (33.3%) of sons experiencing gender dysphoria indicated their child was bullied before becoming gender dysphoric, just 26.3% of parents with daughters experiencing gender dysphoria said the same. According to parents of girls with gender dysphoria, 27.3% said their child was โwell-liked,โ in contrast to 22.7% of parents of boys.
As nearly 10% of parents who believe their daughters have gender dysphoria reported that their child had โmany good friends,โ just 3.9% of parents whose sons have gender dysphoria said the same. Parents of boys (16.8%) were slightly more likely than their female counterparts (14.3%) to report that their child was โnot well liked by peers,โ as similar percentages of parents with daughters (17.4%) and sons (15.8%) recalled that their child had โone good friend.โ
Extremely small shares of parents with girls answered in the affirmative when asked if their daughters had others fight or instigate arguments with them (4.7%), instigated fights with others (2.3%) or bullied others (2.2%), while 5.4% of parents with boys reported that their son found themselves in fights or arguments instigated by others. Less than 1% of parents with sons maintained that their child โbullied others.โ
When asked to evaluate their childโs level of intelligence, 35.6% of parents reported their child had โexceptionally high intelligence,โ while just 15.5% characterized their childโs level of intelligence as โaverage or below average.โ
A majority of parents (57%) said their gender dysphoric children had a history of โmental health issues,โ while 42.5% insisted otherwise. Parents of girls (59.4%) were slightly more likely to report a mental health history in their children than parents of boys (51%). On average, mental health issues first began to arise 3.8 years before gender dysphoria.
The most common mental health issues experienced by females with gender dysphoria were anxiety (47.3%), depression (33.2%), difficulty socializing with peers (26.5%) and difficulty coping with stressful situations in general (23.2%). Among males, the most frequently reported mental health issues included anxiety (35.2%), difficulty socializing with peers (28.1%), depression (25.1%) and difficulty coping with stressful situations in general (19.2%).
A majority of the 390 parents (51.8%) who answered a question asking whether they felt pressure from a โgender clinic or specialistโ to transition their child socially or medically reported experiencing pressure. By contrast, just 24.6% said that they did not feel any pressure to โtransitionโ their child and an additional 23.6% responded that they were โunsureโ if they felt pressured to transition their child.
When asked if their children were friends with others who โcame out as transgender around the same time,โ 55.4% of the 917 respondents who answered the question responded in the affirmative. Among parents of girls, that figure increased to 60.9%.
Respondents reported that their children spent an average of 4 ยฝ hours a day โon the Internet and social media.โ However, it was determined that the number of hours per day on the internet and social media โwas not significantly related to the likelihood of social transition.โ
The reportโs publication takes place as the medical establishment and popular culture continue to embrace the โAffirmative Approach,โ which touts puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and body-mutilating sex-change surgeries as solutions for gender dysphoria. Parents of ROGD Kids condemn the Affirmative Approach as a โlie.โ
The release of the survey comes as states across the U.S. are working to sex-change procedures from being performed on minors. Currently, 12 states have implemented prohibitions on some or all forms of sex-change procedures in light of concerns about their long-term impacts: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah and West Virginia.
The American College of Pediatricians has identified some of the potential side effects of puberty blockers as โosteoporosis, mood disorders, seizures, cognitive impairment and, when combined with cross-sex hormones, sterility.โ Potential longterm impacts of cross-sex hormones include โan increased risk of heart attacks, stroke, diabetes, blood clots and cancers across their lifespan.โ
Sex-change surgeries include chemical and surgical castration, double mastectomies on girls, orchiectomy (removing testicles) for boys, the construction of a fake vagina (vaginoplasty) for boys, and removal of skin and tissue from girls’ forearms or thighs to create a fake, flaccid penis that doesn’t function.
Several detransitioners have come forward to discuss their trauma and regret from having these life-altering medical procedures, with 18-year-old Chloe Cole among the most prominent.
Cole, whose gender dysphoria has since subsided, has announced her intention to sue the medical professionals who treated her for gender dysphoria. As a letter announcing her intent to sue explains, although doctors advised Cole that โthe distress she experienced because of her gender dysphoria would resolve as she transitioned,โ she discovered that her โdistress always came back worseโ after a burst of โinitial reliefโ following โeach phase of transition.โ
She has also maintained that the double mastectomy she underwent at the age of 15 caused her mental health to deteriorate and led to suicidal thoughts.
In the House Oversight Committeeโs (HOC) latest update on its investigation into the corruption of President Joe Biden, Chairman James Comer announced several former Biden family associates have eagerly agreed to speak with Republicans about how they were โleft out to dryโ by the Bidens.
โIt doesnโt look good for @POTUS,โ Comer warned during a Fox News segment on Monday.
I now have access to the Biden family's suspicious activity reports from @USTreasury.
I have also subpoenaed Biden family band records.
And Biden family associates connected to the schemes are talking to @GOPoversight.
Comer said that the HOC is in discussions with four associates who have inside knowledge about the foreign dealings the Bidens made with several of Americaโs political enemies. This, combined with potential testimony from two other associates who are currently tied up in litigation concerning their roles in Biden family businesses, could give the committee proof that the White House is compromised.
โIf you look at everyone whoโs ever been in business with Biden, whether it be Hunter Biden or Joe Biden, none of them ended well, none of the businesses ended well. Most of the businesses never got started off the ground,โ Comer said. โAny money that was transferred in from China or adversaries around the world ended up in the Bidensโ back pockets.โ
Now, Comer said, the HOC also has possession of the Biden familyโs โsuspicious activityโ reports from the Treasury Department and subpoenaed the familyโs bank records which will expedite Republicansโ investigation significantly.
The HOC confirmed in March that several Biden family members, including Hunter Biden, James Biden, Hallie Biden, an unknown โBiden,โ and companies linked to the family โcollectively received $1.3 million in payments from accounts related to Rob Walker, a Biden family associate.โ Within six months of Vice President Joe Biden leaving the White House and after several bank transfers, the Bidens received the money.
Comer said the HOC still did not know who the unnamed Biden was in the China transaction because the Biden family holds so many bank accounts and LLCs.
โThat right there is a red flag,โ Comer said. โThatโs one reason they got so many bank violations. If theyโre in a legitimate business, why do you have to have so many different LLCs, and why, when China sends you a wire, do you have to send it through one, two, or even three LLCs to launder it before then hits a Biden bank account? This whole thing stinks to high heaven.โ
Despite this, Comer said that once the HOC gains access to the LLCs, it can assess the Biden familyโs bookkeeping habits.
โItโll be interesting to see how and if they paid any taxes on this revenue that was coming in from our adversaries around the world,โ Comer said. โWhat all did they write off?โ
He also expressed optimism about the speed of the HOCโs investigation thus far.
โThis investigation is moving along at a lot faster pace, I think, than most people would have predicted,โ Comer said.
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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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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