Tag Archives: Just The News

What Constitution?

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Lawyers are supposed to have at least a cursory knowledge of the U.S. Constitution. Unfortunately, some of them don’t or know it and refuse to respect its limits. On Monday, Just the News posted an article about a blatant example of ignoring Constitution limits on searches and seizures or attorney-client privilege.

The article reports:

Unsealed court records reveal at least two Obama-appointed judges — often openly critical of President Trump — signed off on monitoring communications for top Trump aide Susie Wiles. Smith never disclosed to the judges that he was planning on spying on lawyers. The results tracked calls made to and from lawmakers, other lawyers and journalists.

The documents made public Monday by the White House Government Transparency Task Force include two applications by the former special counsel to use a pen register and a tap and trace device to monitor the incoming and outgoing calls of current White House chief of staff Susie Wiles’s phone while she led Trump’s fundraising operation at the SAVE America PAC.

Pen register and tap and trace devices are used to gather private data on telephone calls, including when and where the calls were made, from whom to whom, and the length of the calls. While they do not include the actual contents of the calls, they often provide investigators with valuable information. 

Both applications came in winter and spring 2023 after Trump announced he was running for president and as Smith investigated allegations that the former president had mishandled classified documents after the conclusion of his first term. The filings are redacted, but an administration official told Just the News that Wiles was the subject of Smith’s requests. 

The article quotes Harvard University law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz:

Smith has testified he believes he did nothing wrong and would investigate and prosecute Trump the same way today, insisting no politics were involved in his decision-making.

Nonetheless, Dershowitz said the record of Smith’s tactics, which included tracking the lawmakers’ and defense lawyers’ phone records and the tracking of Trump’s wife and son’s travels, was troubling.

“Here we have a clear violation of expectations of privacy. When you make a phone call and you’re a lawyer, you do not expect the fact that you made that phone call to, say, a wiretap expert or a lie detector expert, or a witness. You don’t expect that the government will get access to that, and yet the government has access to who the defense attorneys called,” Dershowitz said.

“And that would give them a tremendous advantage in any case. It could give them the names of potential witnesses, and you know ultimately that would have to come out, but it wouldn’t have to come out at the time that this investigative tactic was being used,” he added. ” So I think there’s a lot of work to be done to make sure that expectations of privacy and civil liberties beyond the Constitution are adhered to.”

Where are the orange jumpsuits?

A Failing Campaign Issue

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On Friday, Just the News posted an article about the Democrat Party’s attempt to make high gasoline prices an issue in the mid-term elections. This may actually be effective in swaying some voters who have either forgotten some recent history or never knew it.

The article reports:

Wisconsin Republican Rep. Glenn Grothman argues that Democrats in Congress cannot be trusted to enact policies that would lower gas prices, pointing to Biden-era data to support his position.

He said that voters should remember the economic conditions under former President Joe Biden as they head to the polls, arguing that Democratic energy policies have resulted in higher energy prices. Grothman criticized Democrats for opposing oil drilling in Alaska, fracking in North Dakota and the Keystone XL pipeline.

“The reason we have high gas prices is we have a shortage of supply, which always results in the higher cost,” Grothman said during an interview on the “Just the News, No Noise” TV program this week. 

…Grothman added that Democratic energy policies hampered domestic production under Biden and contributed to driving up costs at the pump. “The Democrat Party is the party that didn’t want to drill in Alaska, they didn’t want to do any fracking in North Dakota, they didn’t want to build the Keystone Pipeline,” Grothman said. “And now you expect these people to lower the price of gas?”

…Grothman cautioned that high gasoline prices could persist for years without expanded domestic energy production and additional refining capacity. “You’re going to have high gas prices not for the next two months until the [Iran] war is over. You’re going to have high gas prices for the next 15 years if we don’t start building some refineries around here,” he said.

California currently has the highest gasoline prices in the nation–about $6.40 a gallon. The national average is currently $4.37 a gallon. California is a state almost totally controlled by the Democrat Party. Are those the people you are counting on to lower your gasoline prices?

Sharia Law In America

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On Friday, Just the News posted an article about the views of young voters on Sharia Law.

The article reports:

Nearly half of likely young voters, 43%, view Islamic Sharia law positively, according to a new poll.

The demographic of likely voters between the ages of 18 and 24 hold a different view than the majority of voters polled of all ages, 57%, who hold a negative view.

The poll was conducted by Rasmussen Reports and a nonprofit organization, Our Republic, on Sept. 20. The results were released just a few weeks ahead of the November 3 election.

In response to the findings, outgoing U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said, “Sharia law is incompatible with our Constitution and has no place in America. But it’s on the rise.” That’s why he and U.S. Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, launched the Sharia Free America Caucus, he said.

Roy has introduced several bills related to Sharia law and other Islamic-related issues, which have gone nowhere in Congress, The Center Square reported Roy, an outspoken opponent of Sharia law, lost his primary in March.

These are some of the tenets of Sharia Law:

  • Theft is punishable by amputation of the hands (see above and Quran 5:38).
    • Criticizing or denying any part of the Quran is punishable by death.
    • Criticizing Muhammad or denying that he is a prophet is punishable by death.
    • Criticizing or denying Allah is punishable by death (see Allah moon god).
    • A Muslim who becomes a non-Muslim is punishable by death (see Compulsion).
    • A non-Muslim who leads a Muslim away from Islam is punishable by death.
    • A non-Muslim man who marries a Muslim woman is punishable by death.
    • Homosexuality is punishable by death but sodomizing boys is fine (see Islam & Sex).
    • Girls can be sodomized until and vaginally raped after 8 years of age (see Islam & Sex).
    • A woman or girl who has been raped cannot testify in court against her rapist(s).
    • Testimonies of 4 male witnesses are required to prove rape of a female (Quran 24:13).
    • A woman or girl who alleges rape without producing 4 male witnesses is guilty of adultery.
    • A woman or girl found guilty of adultery is punishable by death (see “Islamophobia“).
    • A male convicted of rape can have his conviction dismissed by marrying his victim.
    • Muslim men have sexual rights to any woman/girl not wearing the Hijab (see Taharrush).
    • A woman can have 1 husband, who can have up to 4 wives; Muhammad can have more.
    • A man can beat his wife for insubordination (see Quran 4:34 and Religion of Peace).
    • A man can unilaterally divorce his wife; a wife needs her husband’s consent to divorce.
    • A divorced wife loses custody of all children over 6 years of age or when they exceed it.
    • A woman’s testimony in court, allowed in property cases, carries ½ the weight of a man’s.
    • A female heir inherits half of what a male heir inherits (see Mathematics in Quran).
    • A woman cannot speak alone to a man who is not her husband or relative.
    • Meat to eat must come from animals that have been sacrificed to Allah – i.e., be “Halal.”
    • Muslims should engage in Taqiyya and lie to non-Muslims to advance Islam.

Would they support it if they understood what it was? Our education system is failing us. Where are the feminists? Does anyone believe that this is compatible with the U.S. Constitution?

A Deal That Makes Sense

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On Thursday, Just the News posted an article about a steel mill to be built in southeast Iowa. The article explains that “Iron ore from the company’s newly opened mine near Nashwauk, Minnesota — described by the administration as the first new U.S. iron ore mine in 50 years — would move downriver and be turned into finished steel in Iowa.” America controls the manufacturing plant and the mine that supplies the material–brilliant!

That article reports:

Trump, standing in the Oval Office with Essar executives and Iowa Republicans, cast the deal as proof that raising the cost of imported metal is pulling plants onto American soil, an important message for lower and middle income Americans who have lower consumer confidence due in part to perceived high gas prices. The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index fell by 6.7 points to 81.9 (1985=100) in September, down from 88.6 in August. 

References to prices, the high cost of goods and services, and oil and gas prices in particular, rose to new heights, reflecting September’s surge in fuel costs.

The article notes:

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick did not treat the mill as a coincidence. He tied it directly to the administration’s Section 232 steel duties, which Trump raised to a staggering 50% last year. Under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, Lutnick initiated investigations to determine the effects of imports on national security. 

“These are your 232 tariffs, the steel tariffs at work. Without those tariffs, this mine and steel plant doesn’t get built,” Lutnick said, arguing the United States has leaned too long on imported pellets, including from Brazil. “Now we are unleashing the Iron Range in Minnesota. You go right down the Mississippi to Iowa, where they get to build a $15 billion integrated steel plant.”

Trump made the same case in plainer language, saying the domestic industry is “roaring back to life” because companies “don’t want to pay tariffs.” The administration’s theory is straightforward: if imported steel is more expensive, the math for building a mine-to-mill chain inside the United States starts to work. Lutnick said that is “exactly your plan, because you’re driving steel to America.”

The tariffs are bringing manufacturing back to America. They are also putting large amounts of money into the Treasury. The courts need to be quiet–they are standing in the way of making America fiscally secure.

The Unemployment Numbers

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Although somehow the media is neglecting to report it, the Trump economy is doing very well.

On Thursday, Just the News posted an article about the unemployment numbers for the week ending September 26.

The article reports:

The number of people applying for unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level since mid-July, according to the latest data from the Labor Department. 

For the week ending Sept. 26, the seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims fell to 197,000, a drop of 1,000 from the previous week. 

The four-week moving average was 200,000, which was a decrease of 2,500 from the previous week’s revised average, the Labor Department said. 

Unemployment claims are a proxy indicator for layoffs, and they signal to economists where the job market is headed. So far this year, claims have remained below 220,000, which is a historic low. 

According to AI, “in 2024, the GDP of the United States is projected to grow at an annual rate of approximately 2.4 percent, reflecting a robust economic performance despite global challenges.” The predicted Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth for the third quarter of 2026 is 2.8 percent. Why did 2.4 percent reflect a robust economic performance while the media is suspiciously quiet about 2.8 percent growth?

Much of the media is reporting that consumer confidence is down in September. Might that be the result of the fact that the mainstream media is not reporting the successes of the Trump economy? The media plays a major role in how people perceive the economy. If the media reporting is favorable, people believe the country is doing well. If the media reporting is favorable and someone gets laid off, they assume that their situation is unique. If the reporting is negative and a person has a good job, they assume that they are the exception rather than the rule. It’s time Americans stopped listening to the mainstream media reports of the economy–the mainstream media is manipulating–not reporting.

I Guess Fox News Is Now Part Of The Mainstream Media

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On Tuesday, Just the News posted an article about a recent hire at Fox News.

The article reports:

Fox News has hired a former aide of Andrew Cuomo who admitted to covering up deaths at nursing homes in New York state during the COVID pandemic. 

Melissa DeRosa will be a contributor and co-host of a new podcast, “The Girls,” set to air beginning Oct. 1., according to a Fox News Media press release. 

DeRosa worked for Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration. She admitted on a conference call with Democratic lawmakers that the Cuomo administration hid the number of deaths at nursing homes, fearing it would be politicized by Cuomo’s political opponents, including President Donald Trump, the Daily Caller reported. 

This was not just some casual cover-up–this was a cover-up that had to do with the life and death of the people involved. For whatever reason, Governor Cuomo has never been held responsible for the deaths that resulted in moving people supposedly recovered from Covid into nursing homes. We also remember that Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Rachel Levine faced scrutiny when she moved her mother out of a personal care facility shortly after she implemented a policy directing Pennsylvania’s nursing homes and certain care facilities to admit recovered COVID-19 patients who were treated at nearby hospitals. It seems that the people in power were aware of the danger. There was very little information concerning the point where a person who had had Covid was no longer contagious, and extreme caution would have been appropriate.

I question the wisdom of hiring someone to co-host a podcast who has a history of hiding important information from the media.

Changing The Rules To Protect America

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On Wednesday, Just the News posted an article about some changes the U.S. State Department is making to deal with birth tourism. The idea that a mother from China can come to America, have her child, take that child back to China with her, raise him there for eighteen years, and then he can come back to America as a legal voter is frightening to me.

The article reports:

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Wednesday a new visa restriction policy that targets migrants who engage in or profit illegally from the birth tourism industry.

The secretary claimed foreign commercial birth tourism networks have exploited the American immigration system to sell U.S. citizenship for profit by coaching people seeking American citizenship on how to lie on their visa applications.

Rubio said he is creating a new policy under the Immigration and Nationality Act that targets “individuals who knowingly engage in, have engaged in, or facilitate birth tourism to the United States.”

The policy targets owners, operators, and managers of commercial birth tourism networks, visa “fixers” who coach applicants to commit fraud, foreign medical providers and other individuals who support, abet, and enable birth tourism.

The article concludes:

The move comes after President Donald Trump signed an order last month that directs the State Department to issue rules and guidance to stop birth tourism, even as U.S. law already bans tourists from obtaining visas “for the primary purpose of obtaining U.S. citizenship for a child by giving birth in the United States.”

The idea that anyone born in America, including people whose parents are here illegally, is automatically a citizen is ridiculous. The Fourteenth Amendment was put in the U.S. Constitution to insure that the children of former slaves would be legal American citizens. Unfortunately the Amendment has been abused in order to set up an eventual time bomb in American elections.

Holding People Accountable For Election Fraud

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I don’t know how rampant election fraud is in America. I have a feeling it is more common in some places than in others. I also think that we have to consider that electronic fraud is possible and deal with that also.

On Monday (updated Tuesday), Just the News posted an article about a Department of Justice crackdown on election fraud and noncitizen voting.

The article reports:

Since the Trump Justice Department warned state and local election officials that they could be charged with allowing fraudulent voting activities, more than 200 arrests and indictments have been secured in a crackdown on election fraud and noncitizen voting, and that number could double soon, a top official revealed to Just the News.

…Dhillon (Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon) also hinted at further developments in the coming weeks, suggesting her department has developed evidence calling into question New Jersey’s claim that a computer glitch allowed thousands of foreigners to register to vote in that state and about 400 to actually cast ballots in violation of law.

“I’m not sure we have the correct numbers from New Jersey. They’re not really cooperating with us, and so we will get to the bottom of what happened there. And you know, New Jersey tried to blame a vendor for a mistake or a glitch, quote unquote. But you know, I think there’ll be another side to that story,” she said.

…Dhillon further stated that in the past several weeks, her office has indicted or convicted 67 individuals for election-related crimes, while the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has made more than 160 arrests.

“What we care about is that noncitizens who voted in a federal election canceled out the votes of American citizens. It does happen. It happens a lot more than anybody says. It wasn’t being prosecuted under the Biden DOJ. In the four years of the Biden DOJ, they prosecuted a total of 13 people for election-related crimes, and we’ve done more than that in the last week here at DOJ,” she said.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. We need to secure our elections. Every vote by someone who cannot legally vote cancels out the legal vote of an America.

Is It Too Late To Solve The Problem?

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On Friday, Just the News posted an article about the problems in Europe due to the large numbers of Muslim immigrants who do not share the values and culture of Europe.

The article reports:

After the Islamic extremist terrorist attack on America on Sept. 11, 2001, there were fears of anti-Muslim backlash. But 25 years later, the script has been flipped.

Ten million or more Muslims have immigrated to the west.

Today, Muslim figures are mayors of New York and London. But there’s also conflict. Europe is gripped by tensions caused by the rapid demographic change.

A fatal stabbing in Southampton, south of London, last December provided one example of the cultural and political pressure point.

Bodycam video showed police buying into the killer’s false claim that he’d been racially attacked. Vickrum Digwa – a Sikh and son of an Indian citizen– pretended to be the victim, while officers handcuffed the real victim: college student Henry Nowak, as he bled to death.

There’s been a surge in protests across Europe. And two-thirds of Britons now say the total number of immigrants is too high. Both major parties – Conservatives and Labour – have faced public anger and disappointment over years of broken promises.

Iain Duncan Smith is a Conservative member of Parliament and former party leader.

“We’ve overcooked migration,” he told Full Measure during an interview at a London park. “We’ve been far too lax and too easy. 

“So we have to crack down on that. And the only way to have cracked down on it was what I supported, from the word ‘go’m, was to say to those who arrive illegally, ‘You’re going on the next aircraft back to somewhere further away than you came from, OK?’ 

“Once they realize the risk at sea and the cost is no longer outweighed by the opportunities, they won’t come anymore. That’s the way to deal with it, but we have to be hard about it and the government’s very weak at the moment and not able to do it.”

The article mentions that over the summer the European Parliament overwhelmingly approved the strictest immigration and deportation law in EU history. Let’s see if they are able to follow through with enforcement of that law. The future of Europe depends on it.

The Unjustice Department

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The Justice Department during the Biden administration was a disgrace. It had been politicized under President Obama, but with the help of holdovers from the Obama administration, President Biden took the politicization to a whole new level. Some recent facts about the case against General Flynn are genuinely disturbing.

On September 10th, Just the News posted an article about the case against General Flynn.

The article reports:

Retired General Michael Flynn, whose life was turned upside down by the Russia collusion investigation, told Just the News he would never have accepted his 2018 plea deal with Special Counsel Robert Mueller had he known the full FBI evidence in his case.

“Had I seen that evidence that you have broken, no way in the world,” Flynn told the Just the News, No Noise television show on Wednesday night hours after President Donald Trump’s administration declassified the fully unredacted versions of the FBI’s 2017 handwritten and typed notes of his interview with agents during which prosecutors alleged the former three-star general lied about his contacts with a Russian diplomat.

Those documents showed there were conflicts and discrepancies between what the agents wrote in their handwritten notes and what they put in their typed interview about his recollections the day he spoke with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. 

Flynn said Wednesday he believed the discrepancies were enough to undercut the charge that he lied to the agents.

The case against General Flynn is a prime example of political lawfare. It really would not have mattered if he had been found guilty or not guilty–the legal expenses and the damage to his reputation were used to serve as a warning to anyone who supported President Trump and was willing to work in the Trump administration. General Flynn was forced to sell his home to pay his legal expenses.

Congress and the Supreme Court shut down the idea of President Trump using the money he won in his lawsuit against the IRS to start a fund for the victims of political lawfare. That is unfortunate because the Flynn case would have been a very appropriate place to use that fund.

Those responsible for hiding evidence from the General need to go to jail.

A Preemptive Strike

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On Tuesday, Just the News posted an article about a House of Representatives vote on a  Constitutional Amendment to cap the U.S. Supreme Court at nine justices.

The article reports:

House Speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday announced that the House would vote on a constitutional amendment to cap the number of justices on the Supreme Court at nine.

Speaking to reporters, Johnson criticized the Democratic Socialists of America over their calls to pack the Supreme Court and insisted the chamber would force Democrats to go on the record on the issue.

“So we’re going to put that bill on the floor tomorrow on suspension because it requires a 2/3 vote of both chambers of Congress to amend the Constitution,” he said. “And we will have them put their money where their mouth is.”

If the amendment is passed with a 2/3 vote, it will prevent the Democrats from adding four liberal justices to the Supreme Court, something they have said they will do if they gain control of Congress. They have also stated that they want to give Puerto Rico, Guam, and Washington, D.C., statehood (which would probably give them a permanent majority in Congress).

The Democrats have morphed into a political party that wants to be the only political party in America and hold power forever. This is not healthy for the country. The Democrats were depending on illegal alien voters to put them in power and keep them there, but the deportations and tightening of voter registration laws have made that less likely. Now they are threatening to add states to the union and justices to the Supreme Court.

If you value the America you have known, you will not vote for a Democrat this election. There may be local Democrats who love the country and will do a good job if elected, but on a national level, the Democrat has become something Democrats from the 1960’s or 1970’s would not recognize. The party that once represented the working man now only represents its own quest for more power.

It’s Good To Have A Businessman In The White House

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On Friday, Just the News posted an article about an oil deal with Venezuela that impacts the global energy market in a major way. I have no illusions that Venezuela has become a thriving democracy, but I do believe that the Trump administration has enough leverage over the current leadership of the country to move the country slowly toward freedom.

The article reports:

President Donald Trump’s historic deal to secure rights to 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan oil not only doubles America’s energy reserves but also puts pressure on OPEC and Canada in the race for energy supremacy.

Trump announced the deal Friday night, saying it would not cost American taxpayers any money, and experts immediately predicted the move substantially realigns global energy in the favor of the United States.

“What I think you’re seeing is really, truly a long-term vision for how our country, the United States of America, wants to be the leader in the oil markets — American energy dominance. And this means getting out of this OPEC cartel. It means trying to free the world from the the craziness in the Middle East,” said Sam Romain, the chairman of Americans for Energy Dominance.

Romain said Trump’s announcement also exposed the silliness of a recent threat by Canada to stop sending crude oil to the United States over a trade dispute.

The article concludes:

Trump said the deal, which will be overseen by War Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, secures majority U.S. control of more than 65 billion barrels of oil reserves in Venezuela.

“This Historic Transaction more than doubles American Oil Reserves, greatly increases our Oil Supply, and will substantially lower Gas Prices for all Americans, long into the future, while helping to continue to set Venezuela on a course toward Tremendous Success and Great Prosperity,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

“This Transaction will greatly strengthen the already growing relationship between Venezuela and the United States,” he continued. “Thank you for your attention to this groundbreaking matter.”

American Oil Reserves were depleted during the Biden administration in an effort to keep gasoline prices down before the election. There has been some question as to the condition of the storage facilities and our ability to refill them. I am looking forward to getting back to lower gasoline prices at the pump!

Where Did The Money Go?

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On Sunday, Just The News posted an article about some of the abuses that are being uncovered in the spending of taxpayer money in previous administrations. As the national debt continues to grow, how much of that is actually fraud?

The article reports:

A half billion dollar fraud and bribery scheme conducted by a USAID contract officer and three conspirators that went undetected for a decade. American-bought equipment stolen by a terror group. Millions of dollars in food that spoiled in warehouses. These are but a few of the wasteful — if not corrupt ways — millions of USAID dollars have been lost.

While President Donald Trump has sharply cut foreign aid from the auspices of USAID and shifted what remains to the State Department, the massive abuse of America’s generosity to foreign countries over a decade of Obama-Biden governance is coming into clearer focus. 

A Just the News review of audits and investigations of the USAID and State Department inspectors general over the last year chronicles billions of dollars lost, stolen, defrauded, or wasted because of mismanagement or years of neglect.

The article lists some of the instances where taxpayer money was given to terrorists or their organizations:

For instance, the USAID inspector general recently revealed that the federal government kept funding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) despite evidence that 101 of its employees or associates had ties to terror groups like Hamas, including: 

    •  A deputy school principal serving as an al-Qassam deputy company commander in the Ain Gallout/5th infantry battalion.
    • A deputy school principal serving as squad leader for the Khan Younis Brigade/2nd infantry battalion. 
    • A teacher serving as squad leader in Hamas’ military security department/intelligence unit who tracked assignment of explosive devices.
    • A teacher serving as a platoon commander of the Central Brigade/Al Quds 2nd Battalion.
    • A math & computer teacher with ties to an al-Qassam intelligence squad.
    • A teacher with expertise as a sniper for Hamas.
    • A teacher and Hamas soldier with orders to bring two anti-tank missiles to a prescribed location during the October 7 terror attacks
    • A school principal who served as an operative of the Hamas East Jabaliya Battalion, and coordinated communications with other suspected Hamas members during the October 7, 2023 atrocities committed against Israel 

The article concludes:

In the scheme that dates to the Obama-era of foreign aid, a federal contracting officer and three businessmen pleaded guilty to bribes involving cash, NBA tickets, and a country club wedding to secure lucrative contracts that totaled about $550 million.

The defendants were about to score again in November 2023 under President Joe Biden’s open border policies, with one of their companies being awarded a contract worth up to $800 million to among other things address “a variety of issues affecting the root causes of irregular migration from Central America to the United States.”

USAID’s watchdog, however, prompted the cancellation of the contract based on “evidence of conduct of a lack of business honesty or integrity.”

We could balance the budget if we got rid of the fraud.

This May Turn Out To Be A Very Mixed Blessing

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On Tuesday, Just The News posted an article about the significant drop in what Americans are paying for prescription drugs.

The article reports:

President Donald Trump’s Most Favored Nation policies and TrumpRx platform have produced the largest annual drop in U.S. prescription drug prices in over 60 years, the steepest since 1963, according to the administration. The update follows years of price increases across much of the sector which had Americans footing the bill for other nations’ usage.

“Without even twisting an arm, without trying to pass a new bill, he [Trump] brought all these players together with TrumpRX to lower the cost of prescription drugs, and he continues to do that because this guy understands leverage. He understands the bully pulpit,” Rep. Jimmy Patronis, R-Fla., told Just The News.

TrumpRx has already generated $700 million in patient savings. GLP-1 drugs that previously exceeded $1,000 monthly now start at $149; many other high-cost medications (insulin, inhalers, fertility drugs, cholesterol treatments) have fallen 50–90%. Prescription prices are down 3.9% since Trump took office and have declined every month of 2026.

Nonprescription drugs fell 2.4% and medical-care commodities 2.7% over the past year. 

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) also locked in more than $10 billion in pharmaceutical savings this fiscal year, with hundreds of billions projected long-term. The administration states this is the first time a president has actually lowered prescription drug prices.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

…Americans have long paid substantially higher prices for brand-name prescription drugs than patients in other developed countries—often three to four times as much, according to RAND analyses of 2022 data comparing the U.S. to 33 OECD nations. 

The high prices that Americans pay finance the extensive medical research that takes place in America. The government being involved in any aspect of medicine should be troublesome for Americans. The free market works best. The cost of medical coverage was lower and the choices of medical insurance coverage was better before the government got involved. I am not opposed to Americans paying less for prescription drugs, but I want to make sure that we still leave room to pay for the research to develop new and better drugs.

One Result Of The Big Beautiful Bill

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On Saturday, Just the News posted an article about the impact of the One Big Beautiful Bill on Americans’ tax refunds.

The article reports:

The Internal Revenue Service issued $296 billion in refunds during the 2026 filing season, a 17% increase from the previous year, as millions of Americans benefited from President Donald Trump’s signature tax law, according to a new Government Accountability Office report.

The increase represented $43 billion more in refunds than the IRS had issued during the 2025 filing season for tax year 2024. The average refund also increased by $333, or 11%, compared with the previous year, according to the full report.

The GAO attributed the larger refunds, in part, to millions of taxpayers claiming new deductions created by recent tax law changes in Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB), including provisions allowing deductions for qualified tips and overtime.

The IRS also issued more refunds overall, sending out more than 8 million additional refunds compared with 2025.

The increase in refunds came as the agency faced delays affecting taxpayers who received their money by paper check.

The article notes the advantage of filing electronically and receiving your return electronically:

Still, taxpayers who had filed paper returns or relied on paper refund checks had faced significant delays.

“Most paper check refunds were delayed by weeks,” the GAO reported, as the IRS had moved toward issuing refunds primarily through direct deposit.

The IRS sent approximately 4.2 million notices to taxpayers by early May asking them to provide bank account information to allow for electronic delivery of their refunds.

Taxpayers who had not responded were told they would receive a paper check after six weeks.

As a result, the number of paper-check refunds issued by early April had plunged more than 80%, from about 2.8 million in 2025 to roughly 493,000 in 2026. Those who had received paper checks waited an average of 36 days, compared with 13 days the previous year.

The GAO found that the IRS had therefore taken about three times longer to issue paper-check refunds than it had in 2025.

Taxpayers using direct deposit generally avoided the worst of the delays.

According to the report, nine out of 10 refunds issued through direct deposit had arrived within 21 days.

According to Artificial Intelligence, this is who pays taxes in America:

In the U.S., the top 1% of earners, who make over $663,164, paid approximately 40.4% of federal income taxes in 2022, while the top 50% of earners contributed about 97% of total federal income taxes.

Federal Tax Contributions by Income Group

Understanding the distribution of federal tax payments reveals significant disparities.

    • Top 1% — They earned 22.2% of total Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) and paid 42.3% of federal income taxes.
    • Top 50% — This group accounted for 97% of all federal individual income taxes.
    • Bottom 50% — They contributed only 3% of federal income taxes.
    • Top 5% — In 2023, they paid over $1.27 trillion in income taxes, about 60% of the total.
    • Progressive Tax System — High-income earners pay higher average tax rates, emphasizing the system’s progressive nature.

Whenever someone tells you that the rich don’t pay their fair share, show them these numbers.

Putting The Money Where It Is Needed

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On Friday, updated Saturday, Just the News posted an article about a $5.3 billion in investments to improve national rail safety and upgrade Amtrak trains.

The article reports:

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced Friday $5.3 billion in investments to improve national rail safety and upgrade Amtrak trains, diverting nearly half the money from California’s disastrously overpriced and stalled high-speed rail project championed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

About $2 billion of the new Federal Railroad Administration investment will come from savings from Duffy’s decision to end federal support for the California project, which exploded to become seven times over budget and years delayed.

“I would love to see America have high-speed rail. I’m an advocate of it and for it,” Duffy told the Just the News, No Noise television show. “But when California has an initial cost estimate of $33 billion, but over the course of more than a decade, they don’t lay one track. And by the way, the cost projection now for that rail is $231 billion.

“Listen, we’re not going to invest in projects that don’t deliver for the American people. We’re going to invest in the projects that actually show that the hard work of an American taxpayer there’s a deliverable for the money that they give us, and so that’s one example,” he said.

Duffy told Just the News that the new funding will:

    • Close over 30 train crossings and upgrade over a thousand with new infrastructure and technology
    • Purchase 43 Made-in-America train sets to replace Amtrak’s aging fleet
    • Overhaul 41 locomotives currently serving Amtrak’s Midwest and Pacific routes.

Our railway system is not up to date. This is a much needed upgrade. Plowing money into a high-speed rail project for ten years without any track laid is inexcusable.

Hiding The Evidence

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On August 12, Just The News posted an article about how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) handled whistleblowers’ reports on the Biden family corruption.

The article reports:

The FBI and U.S. spy agencies received derogatory evidence about Joe Biden from 14 different informants but embarked on a secret operation to tamp down a Ukrainian corruption scandal engulfing his family during the 2020 election by formally designating Attorney General Bill Barr, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, key members of Congress and journalists as Russian disinformation “conduits,” according to explosive intelligence community documents declassified by the White House.

A spreadsheet that was recovered from U.S. intelligence agency files and made public Wednesday by the White House Government Transparency Task Force shows that spy agencies and the FBI created a list of more than six dozen prominent organizations, Americans or foreigners who became figures in the Biden family Ukraine scandal and the 2019 impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump. 

…In some ways, the Round River operation is a mirror opposite of the Russia collusion probe known as Crossfire Hurricane in which the FBI pursued unsubstantiated allegations spread by Democrats that Trump and his allies conspired with Vladimir Putin to hijack the 2016 election. In Round River, FBI analysts sought to dismiss significant evidence in the bureau’s possession, including Hunter Biden’s own laptop, pointing to possible corruption by the Bidens. 

…Remarkably, the effort to portray the Biden scandal as Russian disinformation came even though confidential human sources working for the FBI and other agencies began reporting a steady stream of concerns starting in 2015 that Ukraine was possibly targeting the future first family for influence, the memos show. The FBI has identified at least 14 informants who were providing derogatory information on the Bidens, according to an FBI letter made public Wednesday.

Tucker Carlson recently interviewed Hunter Biden. In that interview, they both blamed the laptop scandal on Israel. Despite evidence to the contrary, Hunter Biden claimed he never dropped his computer off for repair. Hunter Biden is currently on the podcast interview circuit trying to clean up his image. It may well  be that either Hunter Biden or Tucker Carlson (or both) have future political plans.

It Just Gets Uglier

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I remember how hopeful I was when Jeff Sessions was chosen to be President Trump’s Attorney General. I also remember how disappointed I was when he recused himself from the Russian collusion probes. Well, we now might have the answer as to why that happened.

On Monday, Just The News reported:

The FBI opened a probe into sitting Attorney General Jeff Sessions in May 2017 for potentially making false statements to Congress about Russian contacts even though he had already updated the disputed testimony, newly declassified documents show.

The evidence to support the probe — codenamed MARCH TOLL and opened one day after FBI Director James Comey was fired by President Donald Trump — was a weeks-old letter from Democrats and an article from a liberal news site, the memos show.

The bureau’s investigative files into the Sessions matter were declassified by President Donald Trump and made public Monday by the White House Government Transparency Task Force.

The investigation was predicated on evidence contained in a March 20, 2017, letter to Comey from two Democrat senators on the Judiciary Committee, Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Al Franken of Minnesota. 

The senators argued that Sessions made false statements in his confirmation hearing earlier that year when he testified about communications with members of the Russian government.  

A Trump administration official told reporters the timing of the investigation raises concerns because it was opened right after Comey’s firing and more than a month and a half after the Democratic senators wrote to the FBI.

The article notes:

Sessions sent a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 6 to supplement his prior testimony, confirming that he did, in fact, meet with the Russian ambassador twice during the campaign season, but that his answer, “I didn’t have–did not have communications with the Russians […]” was truthful because Franken asked about a “continuing exchange of information during the campaign” between agents of the campaign and the Russian government. 

“I did not mention communications I had had with the Russian Ambassador over the years because the question did not ask about them,” Sessions wrote in the letter. 

…However, the FBI did not act on the letter until the day after President Trump fired FBI Director Comey, citing a Justice Department belief that Comey mishandled the Hillary Clinton email investigation. The department’s own independent Inspector General would later conclude that Comey “violated long-standing department practice and protocol” with his conduct in the Clinton case. 

The FBI’s opening memo shows that the investigation into Sessions was first opened at the FBI’s Washington Field Office at the direction of headquarters solely predicated on the March 20 letter from Sens. Leahy and Franken. The file also noted that Comey notified then-Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein on April 28 that the case would be opened. 

Please follow the link to read the entire article. I believe this explains a lot about the behavior of Jeff Sessions. It also may explain how the Democrats have turned so many of the Republicans in Congress into spineless weenies. If someone threatens you with being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), you tend to do what they request.

This Is Sad

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On Monday, Just the News posted an article about the recently released tapes of former President Biden’s conversations with the ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer, who ghostwrote the former president’s memoir, “Promise Me, Dad.”

The article reports:

The 117-page transcript was covered in redactions, signifying classified information, some of which the former president admitted that he knew was classified.

Some of the classified information related to meetings that Biden had with members of former President Barack Obama’s National Security Council, many of whom would later join his own administration, including former Secretary of State Antony Blinken and former Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. Information about those meetings were blacked out by the Department of Defense.

Biden also admitted in the interview that he wrote a 40-page handwritten memorandum for Obama that argued against deploying troops to Afghanistan in 2009, because deploying the troops “wouldn’t matter.”

“The day we left would be like the day before we arrived,” Biden told Zwonitzer.

Pages of one of the interviews were also blacked out that was between Zwonitzer and an “unidentified male speaker,” and other portions were blacked out because of the National Security Act. Other information was blacked out by the CIA.

The article notes:

The audio recordings also highlighted the former president’s memory lapses, where he failed to recall the names of some of his associates and got days confused, showing that Biden’s memory issues were prevalent before he even became president.

One example occurred in April 2017, where Biden could not remember the name of one of his economic advisors, Alan Krueger.

“I’ll think of his name,” Biden said. “I should write the names down because I keep forgetting them.”

The article concludes:

Former Special Counsel Robert Hur conducted an investigation into Biden’s sharing of classified information with Zwonitzer, in which he concluded that the former president did violate the law by sharing classified information, but did not recommend criminal charges because he believed that a jury would not convict him.

Audio recordings of the 2023 interview with Hur also revealed Biden’s memory lapses, emphasizing his inability to remember key details and dates, including the year he left office as vice president. The recording also showed Biden occasionally slurring his words and muttering, and long pauses in the former president’s speech that are not revealed in a transcript of the interview. 

The Biden administration and other Democrats slammed the report at the time, claiming it was “politically motivated,” even though it did not recommend criminal charges.

The 2020 election and the Biden presidency are a sad chapter in America’s history. Joe Biden should have been allowed to spend his declining years at home in peace. Instead he was used by the people close to him to pervert America’s election process and unlawfully become President.

When You Don’t Follow The Recommendations

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On Friday, Just the News posted an article about the fraud in the federal government and the reluctance of the federal government to follow the recommendations of the Government Accountability Office.

The article reports:

The federal government continues to lose an estimated $233 billion to $521 billion each year to fraud, while most agencies overseeing the nation’s largest federally funded programs have yet to implement one of the Government Accountability Office’s top recommendations for preventing those losses, according to a new GAO report.

The report, Managing Risks in Federally Funded, State-Administered Programs, reviewed the 20 largest federally funded, state-administered programs, which accounted for approximately $1.1 trillion in federal obligations in fiscal year 2025.

The GAO found in the report released Thursday that most agencies have not completed documented fraud risk assessments. The assessments are instrumental in identifying where fraud is most likely to occur and how to prevent it.

“Federal and state agencies can better manage fraud risks and prevent fraud by applying GAO frameworks for managing fraud risks and improper payments, as well as other leading practices; leveraging available federal analytic resources, such as Do Not Pay, to verify recipient identity and eligibility before issuing federal funds; and implementing recommendations from GAO and other oversight entities that would address existing program vulnerabilities,” the report read.

The watchdog said there are currently 22 open recommendations that are focused on enhancing fraud prevention practices across the programs covered in the report.

The watchdog urged federal agencies to implement them to better safeguard taxpayer funds, particularly in state-administered programs.

The article concludes:

Among the examples cited were a consultant convicted of submitting falsified permits tied to a $4.3 million airport improvement project, landlords receiving housing-assistance payments for vacant units while tenants underreported income, and an alleged student financial aid fraud scheme involving more than 1,200 applicants at over 100 schools across 24 states.

GAO said that the consequences of fraud extend beyond financial losses.

“Every dollar or resource diverted to fraudsters hinders the federal government’s ability to achieve its goals and provide needed services,” the report said.

Fraud in federal spending impacts all Americans. We pay a price in higher taxes and less services. Government agencies who do not follow effective anti-fraud guidelines need to be penalized.

Sometimes The Double Standard Is Amazing

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Last week, President Trump made a speech about Chinese interference in the 2020 election and provided links to the evidence. Two networks refused to air the speech and one network only aired the criticism. It was as if it was no big deal to have another country interfere in our elections. The mainstream media worked hard to play down the importance of the interference. Just for the record, it wasn’t always this way.

On Monday, Just the News reported:

When the Biden Justice Department announced that Chinese hackers had gotten their hands on Great Britain’s publicly available voter files in 2024, American news media clamored with stories claiming it was a “dangerous” breach. The same, too, when U.S. officials announced Russia and Iran had hacked small numbers of U.S. voter files in 2020 and 2021.

The reason was simple: U.S. intelligence agencies believe the targeting and acquisition of voter registration files is an act of election interference. “Election interference is a subset of election influence targeted at the technical aspects of the election, including voter registration, casting and counting of ballots and reporting of results,” an October 2020 National intelligence Council report on election interference explains.

In other words, the compromising of election voter registration data, is, by the definition of intelligence agencies, an act of election interference.

When President Donald Trump presented confirmed evidence last Thursday night that China had compromised and obtained 220 million American voter registration files, the news media swung 180 degrees in the opposite direction. They argued it was old news (it was not) and not a big deal because you can buy limited data in America related to voter registration commercially. According to security experts, that limited data accessibility is not the same thing.

…In 2021, the Biden Justice Department indicted two Iranian hackers for accessing just 100,000 voter files from a single state where it is also commercially available. They were charged with criminally interfering in the 2020 election even though voter files are commercially available in limited form.

Hopefully the people who actually see the double standard outnumber the people who still either have their eyes closed or suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome.

Border Crossings Are Down, Drug Seizures Are Up

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On Sunday, Just the News posted an article citing the results of the Trump administration’s border policies. The numbers are definitely moving in the right direction.

The article reports:

Illegal border crossings remained historically low in June, continuing a trend under the Trump administration.

Last month, 31,626 illegal border-crossers were apprehended nationwide, according to the latest U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. The number is up by 6,500 from last June and down by more than 173,000 from June 2024, according to the data.

The total excludes “gotaways” – those who illegally enter between ports of entry to evade capture. Similar to the Biden administration, the Trump administration is not publicly releasing gotaway data. It remains unclear how many are still illegally entering the country.

Apprehensions at the southwest border states of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas totaled 12,901 last month, according to the data.

Between ports of entry, Border Patrol apprehended 9,848 last month, another record low. That’s 94% less than the monthly average during the Biden administration and 96% less than during the peak reported at the southwest border in December 2023.

The article notes the increase in drug seizures:

While apprehensions remained low, drug seizures increased last month.

CBP seizures of cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, fentanyl and marijuana (combined by weight) increased by 49% from June 2024, according to CBP data.

By fiscal year, drug seizures increased by 57% from fiscal 2024. The fiscal year goes from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30.

Cocaine seizures increased the most last month – by 71% from May. CBP officers seized 6,242 pounds of cocaine nationwide. Heroin and fentanyl seizures also increased by 49% and 42%, respectively, over the same time period. CBP agents seized 68 pounds of heroin and 1,072 pounds of fentanyl last month.

The article also cites the number of illegals released into the country:

The Department of Homeland Security again announced June was the 14th consecutive month “of zero releases at the border.”

CBP data contradicts this claim. Every month, unaccompanied alien children (UACs) are released into the country. Fiscal year to date, at least 1,000 UACs were reported illegally entering the country, according to CBP data.

According to federal data, 1,796 UACs were in federal care in June, down from 2,460 in January. More than 1,200 have been released to sponsors this fiscal year through the beginning of June, with the majority sent to California and Texas, according to the latest data.

In fiscal 2025, more than 24,200 UACs were sent to sponsors in the U.S. instead of being returned to their family in their home country. 

That total is down from more than 99,000 UACs sent to live with sponsors in the U.S. in fiscal 2024 and more than 113,000 in fiscal 2023.

The program allowing UACs to enter this country needs to end. There is too much danger of child exploitation in the program.

Is It Treason?

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Is it treason to hold back national security information in the President’s daily briefing? I don’t know, but I would love to see a court of law sort that out.

On Friday, Just The News reported:

President Donald Trump on Thursday released a trove of declassified intelligence documents that his administration says expose long-suspected vulnerabilities in U.S. election infrastructure, in addition to alarming intelligence pointing to prior administrations’ and officials’ knowledge of such issues that were kept from the president, Congress and the American people. 

“The intelligence community withheld information from his president’s daily brief. That’s a big deal. That’s where the intelligence community gives him the absolute most classified data, what he needs to know for that day, and frankly, during his first term, they withheld it. That is a black mark on the intelligence community,” Rep. Keith Self, R-Tex., told Just The News.

Self continued, “They should be charged because they hold positions of great responsibility, and they have violated our trust. They have violated the actual agreements that they sign when they get that level of classified data, so this is very, very easily charged and indicted.”

The materials, posted on the White House website following a prime-time address, include assessments indicating that intelligence officials were aware of risks such as outdated software and potential compromises by adversaries like China — which the documents claim acquired data on millions of American voters — but did not fully disclose them to the president, Congress or the public. 

What would be the consequences in the private sector of not sharing vital information you were tasked with gathering with the head of the company?

The article concludes:

“We all can agree that bureaucrats who manipulate or conceal intelligence from the people’s elected leaders to push their preferred policies or end states cannot keep their jobs in the American people’s Intelligence Community,” he wrote on X. “Those involved, and any who knew and remained silent, must be immediately removed from their positions of trust. 

Mike Davis, founder and president of the Article III Project and a former Senate lawyer, told Just The News he believes prosecutions are warranted. 

Intelligence analysts “obstructed and they conspired to provide doctored evidence to the President of the United States about a foreign invasion of our elections, and they must be held accountable. They must be arrested. They must be charged. They must be held accountable,” he said.

There should be firings and jail time!

Will The Facts Matter?

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Last night President Trump gave a speech about the problem of election fraud in America. Many of us who follow the non-mainstream media were familiar with most of the examples he cited about election fraud.

This is the chart of which networks carried the speech:

Somehow I don’t trust CBS’s fact-checking.

On Thursday, Just the News posted an article about the dangers of China hacking into our voter data base.

The article notes:

President Donald Trump announced in a speech on Thursday that China has compromised more than 200 million voter registration entries affecting 18 states, citing newly declassified U.S. Intelligence Community records compiled by the Government Transparency Task Force created in May. 

The findings triggered a review by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) of voter registration systems. In that review, the agencies outlined exactly how this exposed data could be exploited. 

The report warned that foreign countries, specifically China and Russia, have consistently targeted these state voter registration databases over the last decade.

“The impact of the breaches is not limited to ‘undermining confidence’ or ‘spreading false claims’ but the data itself could be used months or years after the breach to alter voter registration information,” the agencies wrote. “​​The real threat is what can be done with the stolen data.”

On Thursday, Townhall also posted an article detailing some of the information in the newly declassified documents. I strongly suggest following the link to read the documents.

The most disturbing thing to me is that the information about the data breach and possible fraudulent activities by China was left out of the daily Presidential briefing by people who decided their decisions on national security issues were more important than those of a duly-elected President.

People who dislike the President will ignore this information. The only way that exposing this fraud will be useful is if the people responsible for the fraud and the people responsible for keeping the information from the President go to jail.

Turning Our Back On A Long-Time Ally

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On Wednesday, Just the News posted an article about a recent vote in the House of Representatives on an amendment to the State Department’s spending bill which would have eliminated funds for Israel.

The article reports:

Nearly half of Democrats in the House of Representatives on Wednesday rebuked Israel by voting to end aid to the United States ally, even though the measure to cut off aid still failed because of massive Republican support. 

The measure, which was an amendment to the State Department’s spending bill, would have eliminated $3.3 billion in funding for Israel but failed in a 314-104 split, according to Politico. Ten lawmakers voted “present.” 

The vote still marked a significant change in support for Israel among Democrats, who have had to deal with blowback from liberal voters regarding Israel’s handling of the conflict against Hamas. In 2024, just 37 Democrats voted to pull U.S. funding from Israel. 

Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton stated:

“We simply cannot continue to condone [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s actions that are against our moral conscience and our own national security interests by perpetuating the status quo,” he said in a statement.

Where was your moral conscience on October 7th? Where was your moral conscience when Hamas was shooting people who showed up to collect food from the United Nations trucks? Were was your moral compass when kindergarten children in Gaza were being trained as martyrs? I think your moral compass is very selective.

Meanwhile, on Thursday, Fox News reported:

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., has “no plans” to leave the Democratic Party but if it officially became the “anti-Israel party,” count him out.

“My long-term concern has been with the Democratic Party, as I am a member of that, is that our party is going to back away and turn their back to Israel,” he said Wednesday at the Hill Nation Summit in Washington, D.C.

“If our party ever becomes, and just makes it official, the anti-Israel party, that’s when I would leave because that’s been a moral clarity for me.”

Sorry, Senator, I think your party is already there. As the Democrat party moves left and drifts into the coalition between Marxism and Islam, there will be more opposition to supporting Israel. That is unfortunate, but it is the way things are going.

We need to remember:

“I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” – Genesis 12:3