Getting The Job Done Despite The Roadblocks

On Friday, The Daily Signal posted part of an interview with President Donald Trump’s border czar Tom Homan by the Daily Signal’s Senior National Security and Legal Analyst Mehek Cooke.

Here are a few excerpts from that interview:

Mehek Cooke:…I’m watching New York Democrats today, and they are moving to limit local cooperation with [Immigration and Customs Enforcement]. They’re moving to restrict you and ban you and ICE officers from even wearing masks, as I’ve seen a massive surge in the type of violence that’s coming out against ICE officers.

Tom Homan: …A couple things. First of all, you know, good luck with the law of banning masks. Federal law always trumps state and local law. And while threats are up over 8,000%, masks is a non-starter, so good luck enforcing that.  

Second thing is, you talk about New York. You know, I met with Governor Hochul a couple months ago, and I told her about what happened in Minnesota, that, you know, we were able to draw some resources out of Minnesota because the local jails cooperated with us.

And I told her the same thing, because I knew this legislation was coming. I said, Look, you end cooperation in the jails, we’re going to have to send more agents to do the job, because now rather than one agent arresting one bad guy in the jail, which is safer for the agent, safer for the alien, safer for the community, of course, you’re going to release him. Now we got to send a whole team, six or seven agents, to go find him. So, it’s going to result more agents in the community.

Totally briefed on the whole thing, but she decided to go ahead and do it anyways. Well, I made a statement that we’re going to send more agents to New York. We have to as a response to this to go arrest those public safety threats.

Border Czar Homan also notes that when states will not let ICE use local jails to house arrested illegals, he can simply ship the illegals to a state that is willing to house them.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. The problem with illegal immigration is not organic–it has been put together by people who do not want the best for America.

Solving The Medicare Fraud Problem

On Wednesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the next steps in dealing with home health care fraud.

The article reports:JD

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is pausing new Medicare enrollment for hospices and home health agencies for six months to review alleged rampant fraud.

Vice President JD Vance’s Anti-Fraud Task Force is working with the agency to combat fraud, waste, and abuse in Medicare. So far, the task force has withheld $1.4 billion in federal funding from home health and hospice providers across the country, Fox News reported.

“We’ve seen systemic and deeply troubling fraud in the hospice and home health space, with bad actors exploiting some of our most vulnerable Medicare patients and stealing money from the American taxpayer,” CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz said.

“Today we’re shutting the door on fraud—preventing new bad actors from entering Medicare while we aggressively identify, investigate, and remove those already exploiting them. This is about protecting patients, restoring integrity, and safeguarding taxpayer dollars,” Oz said.

The announcement comes after the Daily Wire reported on alleged widespread Medicare fraud in Ohio’s home health industry. Officials with Ohio Medicaid told the Columbus Dispatch the department had been investigating fraud concerns before the recent reports surfaced.

The moratorium will not affect current Medicare enrollments. Existing providers will continue to deliver services to Medicare beneficiaries.

The article concludes:

In February, Vance announced that the administration was withholding reimbursements for $259.5 million in Medicaid funds from Minnesota pending an investigation into allegations of widespread welfare fraud there.

Vance is holding a news conference Wednesday afternoon to warn all 50 states they must fully comply with anti-fraud statutes or risk losing federal Medicaid funding, the Wall Street Journal reported.

“Under President Trump, we are unleashing the most aggressive federal anti-fraud efforts in American history,” Vance said. “We won’t rest until we root out every bit of fraud infecting our government and screwing over taxpayers.”

Getting rid of the fraud in Medicaid and Medicare could easily add years to the life of the programs. It is long past time this was done.

Paying Attention To Where The Money Was Going

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a requested Department of Justice probe into the misuse of funds by the Small Business Administration.

The article reports:

Biden administration officials may have sought to dodge public records laws and congressional oversight by classifying taxpayer-backed loans to Planned Parenthood as “Benghazi,” according to findings by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa.

Ernst, chairwoman of the Senate Small Business Committee, has been investigating Small Business Administration loans to the nation’s largest abortion provider under the Paycheck Protection Program during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a letter sent Monday to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Ernst asked for a Justice Department investigation “for potential Federal Records Act violation by concealment and/or attempted concealment” of SBA records regarding loans to Planned Parenthood and loan forgiveness.

“What does Benghazi have to do with Planned Parenthood? It appears the Biden SBA used it as a codename to hide the $90 million in taxpayer funds they gifted to the abortion provider,” Ernst told The Daily Signal in a statement.

“I’ve already exposed the Biden administration’s blatant disregard for transparency, but this potential cover-up demands answers,” Ernst continued. “I’m calling for a DOJ investigation to determine if Biden officials were illegally concealing federal records over their egregious handout to Planned Parenthood.”

The article notes:

All government emails can generally be accessed by the public through the Freedom of Information Act and the Public Records Act.

“Under 18 U.S.C. § 2071, an individual who ‘willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, or destroys, or attempts to,’ conceal any federal record can be fined and imprisoned for up to three years,” Ernst says in the letter to Blanche.

Ernst contends congressional or public-record requests seeking Planned Parenthood documents from the SBA would miss these records because they were being concealed as “Benghazi.”

“DOJ should investigate SBA officials’ record concealments related to a series of meetings and emails, including an April 30, 2021, email from Peggy Hamilton, the SBA general counsel, with ‘Benghazi (PPP/PPH) Decisions’ in the subject line,” Ernst told Blanche. “This email appears to be the originating email for what became a months-long thread about Planned Parenthood’s SBA loans and the entity’s loan-forgiveness requests.”

It seems as if there are a few people in the Biden administration who are going to have to deal with 18 U.S.C. § 2071. Remember, they are innocent until proven guilty, but if they are guilty, I hope they face the maximum penalty.

How Do You Put A Hospice In A Taco Stand?

How do you put a hospice in a taco stand or a tire store? That is the question being asked in a post by The Daily Signal on Sunday. Evidently the authorities in California were so lax in checking Medicare money handed out to supposed hospice facilities that some of them were located in very strange places.

The article reports:

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has halted payments to more than 400 hospices in Los Angeles and across California, with the estimated fraud being greater than $600 million, according to the anti-fraud task forceopens in a new tab led by Vice President JD Vance. 

Sheila Clark, CEO of the California Hospice and Palliative Care Association, is questioning how these alleged instances of fraud have slipped through the cracks.

“How do you put a hospice in a burrito stand in California? How do you put a hospice in a tire store? That all had to be vetted through licensure, certification, and accreditation,” Clark said during a House of Representatives hearing on April 21.

The article concludes:

In an interview with Fox Newsopens in a new tab, First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli called California “the kingdom of fraud.”

“Nobody is minding the shop. The money just goes out the door—no checking, no vetting. California has a responsibility to make sure the money is going to the intended recipients.”

On Tuesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reported that $6,000 was being paid out by the government for hospice patients that allegedly did not exist.

We have not gotten one call from a congressperson or a patient. Why? Because those hospices did not exist. They were signing up patients … and charging us $6,000 a month for that patient.” 

I am hoping that as we clear out the fraudulent spending by the government we can continue to decrease the tax burden on Americans.

Protecting The First Amendement

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a recent Supreme Court case involving free speech.

The article reports:

The Supreme Court held in an 8-1 ruling on Tuesday that a Colorado ban on “conversion therapy” for counselors unlawfully regulates speech and is viewpoint discrimination. 

Justice Neil Gorsuch, a President Donald Trump appointee, issued the majority opinion. Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor—both appointees of President Barack Obama—issued concurring opinions. 

Only Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson—an appointee of President Joe Biden—dissented. 

The Chiles v. Salazar case involved a challenge to a Colorado law that allows licensed counselors to address issues of sexuality and gender only from the state’s approved perspective. 

Kaley Chiles, a Christian licensed counselor in Colorado Springs, used what is called “talk therapy” with patients who voluntarily sought her help. These included minors who said they struggled with issues related to sexuality and gender, and who wanted their behavior to be in accordance with their sex and their religious faith.

In the majority opinion, Gorsuch wrote the state law “prescribes what views she [Chiles] may and may not express.”

“As applied to Ms. Chiles, Colorado’s law regulates the content of her speech and goes further to prescribe what views she may and may not express, discriminating on the basis of viewpoint,” Gorsuch wrote in the majority opinion.

The article concludes:

The opinion stated that the government cannot label speech as conduct, as in Chiles’ case it constituted treatment. The opinion added that the “First Amendment is no word game.”

“The fact that the state’s viewpoint regulation falls only on licensed health care professionals does not change the equation,” Gorsuch wrote.

This case deals with an attack on counselors who hold a Biblical worldview on sexuality. In many cases homosexuality can be related to childhood trauma or family dysfunction. If a homosexual person wants to leave that lifestyle, they should be free to find a counselor who will help them along that journey. If an adolescent is confused about their gender identify and his parents want to find a counselor who will help them walk through adolescence with the gender he was born with, the parents should be free to find that counselor. Some of the things counselors are telling our teenage children are not helpful in the long run.

Walking His Own Path

On Sunday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a recent statement by Senator John Fetterman. If someone had told me when Senator Fetterman was elected that he would be the only reasonable Democrat in the Senate, I would have thought they were crazy, but here we are.

The article reports:

Democrat Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman criticized his party Saturday over the ongoing partial government shutdown and its impacts on federal employees and operations.

Multiple agencies, including the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), are being subjected to “emergency measures” due to the shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), according to a release by DHS.

Fetterman said he spoke with TSA agents during his frequent travels about the effects of the shutdown.

“I am the only Democrat that has refused to vote in shutting down DHS, literally the only one,” Fetterman said during Saturday’s episode of “The Big Weekend Show.” “And now all agree that this would not have any impact on ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement]. They already have their funding, and it doesn’t push or force ICE to do any of those kinds of reforms that people think are necessary now, too.”

“Why would you want to punish all of these workers that are under DHS? The only thing that it can do is just make us less safe, and that also makes people have to go without getting paid,” Fetterman continued. “I’m at the airport virtually every week of the year, and I ask all those TSA agents, and I said, ‘Hey, do you like not to get paid for your work?’ I haven’t met one saying, ‘No, it’s no problem.’”

This shutdown makes no sense unless the Democrats believe that illegal votes combined with their extreme left wing are the only way they can win the midterms. Aside from the inconvenience to Americans who travel, there is a serious risk to shutting down the Department of Homeland Security during a war. I don’t believe the majority of Americans support this shutdown.

Unless the number of illegal voters in the midterm elections is enough to swing the election, the shutdown makes no sense.

Stating The Obvious

On Friday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the results of the War on Poverty. The results have not been what the stated goals were, although they may reflect a different agenda than the one stated.

The article reports:

America’s “War on Poverty,” launched by President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, has expanded into a vast array of federal social welfare programs that today exceed $1 trillion per year.

Upon signing the Economic Opportunity Act, Johnson stated: “This is not in any sense a cynical proposal to exploit the poor with a promise of a handout,” but rather a means to “help our people find their footing for a long climb toward a better way of life.”

While poverty has declined significantly over the past half-century, however, recent reports indicate that these programs simultaneously reduced the share of private income for America’s poorest, locking them into long-term dependency and limiting their ability to move up into the middle class.

A recent study by economists Kevin Corinth and Richard Burkhauser, which analyzed poverty rates before and after America embarked on the War on Poverty, concluded that, while poverty decreased substantially since 1964, this was achieved largely by welfare supplanting “market” income such as wages, investments, and profits. In addition, before the 1960s, market income had succeeded in reducing poverty at similar rates to what the War on Poverty achieved.

“Our new research shows that the United States made strong progress in reducing poverty during the quarter century before the War on Poverty began, and that this progress was entirely accounted for by increases in market income, not government transfers,” Corinth told The Daily Signal. “In other words, there was a lot of benefit and not much cost during this earlier period.”

Before the War on Poverty, poverty reduction was achieved across racial groups. Economist Thomas Sowell wrote in 2004 that the poverty rate among black families fell from 87% in 1940 to 47% in 1960, without government assistance.

The article notes:

A January report by the Congressional Budget Office found that, for the poorest 20% of Americans, government payments increased from 26% of total income in 1979 to 42% in 2022. And as welfare programs expanded, market income for America’s poorest declined as a share of total income. Whereas in 1979, welfare payments were only about half the amount of private income sources for the lowest quintile, the two income sources were roughly equal by 2022.

According to a February report in The Daily Economy by analyst Tyler Turman, based on this Congressional Budget Office data, “despite historically unprecedented economic gains for low-income Americans, more of them are dependent on government assistance than at any point in the country’s history.”

The article concludes with a statement that probably describes the actual goal of the War on Poverty:

If the goal of the War on Poverty was to boost Americans’ self-sufficiency, it appears to have fallen short. What it has achieved, rather, is a costly expansion of government, long-term dependency for the poor, and a perennial voting bloc for politicians who feed the addiction.

Following The Money

On Monday, The Daily Signal posted an article about about a policy change in the Department of Education.

The article reports:

The Department of Education will soon require universities to publicly disclose the counterparties of foreign funding, a senior Education Department official told The Daily Signal.

Section 117 of the Higher Education Act requires higher education institutions to report gifts and contracts valued at $250,000 or more to the Department of Education, to make them available for public inspection.

Universities currently report counterparties, their gifters or contractors, to the agency. However, the identities of foreign counterparties are not made public, which the senior department official said violates the law. The totals received from counterparties of concern are listed in the Section 117 Foreign Gift & Contract Reporting portal, but the gifters’ identities are not named.

…The Education Department is following the rulemaking process, providing notice to universities and allowing for public comment on the new requirement. The department plans to make the counterparty information available for public inspection by early to mid-summer.

“That’s the part the universities do not want to see happen,” the official said. “They’ve spent years trying to make it not happen.”

Previous administrations allowed universities to mark certain funding sources on their records as exempt from disclosure in public records requests.

“The department, for years, has actually provided a way for universities to not disclose this information to the public,” the official said. “We’re done with that business. We’re not doing that. The law says we have to make available these records for public inspection. We’re going to do it.”

Harvard University receives the most from counterparties of concern—$634 million—according to the agency’s portal. Almost all of the gifts and contracts came from counterparties in China.

It would be naive to believe that the money given by foreign sources does not influence what is being taught. With this information now available to the public, parents will have another criteria to evaluate when choosing a school for their child.

A Win For American Consumers And The U.S. Constitution

On Wednesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the impact of the repeal of the EPA’s Endangerment Finding.

The article reports:

In 2009, unelected bureaucrats inside the EPA (read: the Washington Swamp) made a decision that has shaped American energy policy—and increased the cost of living—ever since. Their Endangerment Finding declared that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide “endanger public health and welfare.”

It’s time we got rid of unelected bureaucrats making regulations and replaced them with Congress (which is accountable to the people because of elections) making laws.

The article notes:

The finding became the legal foundation for sweeping federal regulation of everything from power plants to automobiles, and from oil refineries to natural gas pipelines.

With that sweeping regulation came higher prices for everything from new cars and trucks to major appliances, like dishwashers, washers and dryers, ovens, and refrigerators, along with fuel and energy.

Trump called his decision to repeal the finding “the single largest deregulatory action in American history.”

He’s right. This decision marks a turning point in the fight to revive American prosperity and make American life more affordable, at the same time as it restores constitutional government.

The article concludes:

By reversing the Endangerment Finding, Trump reaffirms a basic constitutional principle: major policy decisions of vast economic and political significance must come from the people’s elected representatives, not from unelected bureaucrats. 

The Supreme Court reaffirmed this fundamental principle in West Virginia v. EPA, the 2022 case that relied on the so-called major questions doctrine, which requires specific congressional authorization for major environmental regulations. 

Agencies exist to execute the law, not to create it. Returning such consequential questions to Congress honors the separation of powers and ensures democratic accountability.

If climate policy is to be remade, it should be debated openly, voted on by lawmakers, and enacted through legislation—not imposed through regulatory interpretation by unelected officials.

Trump and Zeldin took a giant step toward making life more affordable and opened the gate for substantial economic growth at the same time as they moved toward restoring the kind of limited constitutional government the Founders envisioned.

All Americans will benefit—and all Americans should be grateful that Trump has the courage to stand up to the Washington Swamp to fight for the American people.

I hope that when voting begins in the midterms, voters will remember how good the Trump administration has been for their pocketbooks.

Trumpenomics Is Working

On Wednesday, The Daily Signal reported:

The U.S. government posted a $95 billion budget deficit in January, down $34 billion, or 26%, from a year earlier as revenue gains, including customs duties, outpaced growth in outlays, the Treasury Department said on Wednesday.

Adjusting for routine calendar shifts in benefit payments due to holidays, weekends, and other factors in both years, the Treasury said the January deficit would have been $30 billion, a decline of $52 billion, or 63%, from January 2025.

January receipts totaled $560 billion, up $47 billion, or 9%, from a year earlier, while outlays totaled $655 billion, up $13 billion, or 2%.

A $95 billion deficit is not a good thing; however, it is better than it was a year ago. If America is going to survive as a country, we need to elect people who will give us budget surpluses–not budget deficits.

The article concludes:

Helping to drive both January and year-to-date results were sharply higher net customs receipts due to President Donald Trump’s tariffs. These totaled $27.7 billion in January, about the same level as December and slightly below the $30 billion monthly pace late last year. Customs duties in January 2025, the month that Trump took office and well before his tariff announcements, totaled $7.3 billion.

Fiscal year-to-date net customs duties were $117.7 billion, up from $28.2 billion a year earlier.

Also, cutting the deficit was a rare $12 billion decline in Treasury interest outlays on the public debt to $72 billion for January. The Treasury official said this stemmed from downward adjustments to payments on inflation-linked securities that were delayed by last year’s government shutdown and publication of consumer price index data.

Year-to-date Treasury debt interest totaled $426 billion, a record for the period, up $34 billion, or 9%.

The tariff income is a wonderful thing. My fear is that as fast as it comes in, Congress will find a way to spend it.

Do We Really Need Another Government Shutdown?

The real reason for a government shutdown at this point would be to slow down the success of President Trump’s economic policies and to slow down the march of President Trump’s policies through Congress. Actually. the RINO Republicans are doing a good job of slowing down the Trump agenda in Congress.

On Sunday, The Daily Signal reported:

CNN’s Dana Bash pointed out to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday that a partial government shutdown over Democrats’ demands for restrictions on enforcement by federal agents would primarily affect agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Transportation Security Administration, and the Federal Aviation Administration.

Despite Democrats’ new list of demands for Republicans to avoid a shutdown, President Donald Trump’s One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act already provided substantial funding to the Department of Homeland Security.

During their “State of the Union” interview, Bash asked Jeffries how a shutdown would advance Democrats’ goal to “rein” in immigration agencies under DHS if it would disrupt others whose missions were not focused on immigration enforcement operations.

“Well, our plan is to get there on behalf of the American people. That’s why we need to press forward aggressively and ensure that there are legislative changes enacted as part of any DHS spending bill, because that’s the way that you change behavior,” Jeffries said. “And these are commonsense changes, things like mandatory body cameras. Judicial warrants should absolutely be required before ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] agents can storm private property and rip everyday Americans out of their homes in such a violent fashion.”

Just for the record, everyday Americans are not being ripped out of their homes in violent fashion.

In January 2026, Politifact reported:

  • As of Jan. 7, there were 68,990 immigrants in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention. About 52% had either criminal convictions or pending criminal charges.
  • From Jan. 20, 2025, the first day of President Donald Trump’s second term, to Oct. 15, 64% of all immigrants detained by ICE had either criminal convictions or pending criminal charges.
  • One think tank’s analysis found about 5% of people in ICE detention had been convicted of violent offenses.

The question becomes, “What is the acceptable number of illegal alien criminals to allow to live in America?” Are you willing to have them live in your neighborhood?

Student Loans For Dead People

If the government continues to give away millions of dollars to dead people, some of us are going to start declaring ourselves dead!

On Monday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the number of student loans being given to dead people.

The article reports:

The Trump administration is fixing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid program after uncovering around $1 billion in fraud, according to Education Secretary Linda McMahon.

“We have identified and saved about a billion dollars for FAFSA loans that would’ve been fraudulent,” McMahon told The Daily Signal in an exclusive interview.

The Biden administration only required identity verification for less than 1% of students applying for student loans, McMahon claimed.

“There were dead people who were applying for loans and receiving them, bots who were receiving, and we identified in Minnesota several thousands of these bots,” she said.

The Trump administration found about $90 million in federal student aid was fraudulently disbursed.

This includes more than $30 million given to deceased individuals and more than $40 million distributed to companies using bots disguised as fake students. 

McMahon said the agency has “totally revamped” FAFSA.

The article concludes:

While improving the FAFSA portal, the Education Department discovered the widespread fraud.

The agency launched an identity verification effort in June, and it found about 150,000 suspect identities in current FAFSA forms just within the first week.

The department announced in December it is hiring a new fraud detection team.

“We already have the team in place,” McMahon said. “We are working—it’s been amazing what we have discovered.”

“I’m very pleased with the results,” she continued, “so I think they’ve got a good team in place, and I think they’re doing a really good job.”

I am glad that this is being cleaned up, but I am tired of constantly hearing about fraud in government programs and having no one held accountable. Who received the money, and why are they not in jail?

An Incredible Coincidence?

On Saturday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the problems with the 2020 Census. It seems that many blue states were overcounted and many red states were undercounted. It’s possible that was accidental, but a look at the campaign donations of the people doing the counting makes you wonder. The article notes that the political donations of the Census Bureau employees were overwhelmingly to Democrats.

The article reports:

“In 2020, the Census Bureau undercounted in primarily deep-red states like Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi, Tennessee and Texas, all red, while overcounting in radical blue states like Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, and Rhode Island,” Hunt (Representative Wesley Hunt, R-Texas)told a Nov. 19, 2025, hearing of the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government.

“This egregious error led to many states being denied proper representation in Congress and the Electoral College. So much so that these errors costs Republicans … six seats in the House. In addition to the 2020 miscounting, including illegal immigrants in the census has improperly granted radical Left blue states 12 additional seats in the United States House of Representatives. That is a total of 18 seats gain and that is a huge problem. And those are the facts,” Hunt told the hearing.

The fact that this is being looked at may be one of many reasons a number of blue states have redrawn their voting districts. It is interesting that most of the blue states already have districts drawn in a way that blocks out Republicans. They really can’t do much more. For example, Massachusetts is currently represented by two senators and nine representatives, all of whom are Democrats. Massachusetts has 11% Republican voters, 50% independent voters and 34% Democrat voters. Where do the Republicans go to get represented?

The article concludes:

Apprised of the Census Bureau employee contribution bias, Hunt provided the following statement to The Washington Stand:

“The inaccuracies and deliberate manipulations embedded in Democrat-led Census reporting expose a level of corruption that plagued the previous administration and continues today under radical Left leadership. Despite these efforts, the American people saw through the deception and delivered a decisive victory for Donald Trump in the last election.

“Now, with Republicans holding all three chambers of government, we have both the responsibility and the obligation to correct these abuses immediately and restore integrity to the process by ensuring that Census data reflects only United States citizens.

“The irony is unmistakable. For years, Democrats have warned of a supposed threat to democracy, while actively engaging in the very practices that undermine it—manipulating systems designed to distort representation and influence elections. Democracy is not endangered by transparency and lawful governance. It is endangered by those who abuse institutions for political gain.”

Hunt will not be in the House of Representatives in 2027, as he is seeking the Republican nomination for the Senate in a hotly contested primary that also includes Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and the Lone Star State’s long-serving incumbent, Sen. John Cornyn. The primary election is March 3, 2026.

President Trump And The Deep State

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article detailing four steps President Trump has taken since he took office in 2025 to dismantle the deep state.

The article reports:

1. Reinstating ‘Schedule F’

On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order to reinstate Schedule F, which makes it easier for the president to fire bureaucrats. 

2. DOGE

The Department of Government Efficiency reportedly reduced federal employment by about 271,000 jobs. 

3. Shutdown Cuts

During the recent government shutdown, Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought cut $8 billion of blue state energy projects. 

4. Investigating ‘Deep State’ Abuses

In July, a CIA report found that John Brennan, the agency’s director in the Obama administration, overrode internal concerns to claim that Russia interfered in the 2016 election.

The deep state is still with us. Congress has codified very little of what President Trump has done, making it very easy to undo. The 2026 midterm elections are so critical because if the Democrats win either branch of Congress, all of the economic progress we made in the last year will end. Instead we will have non-stop impeachment hearings and a return to the tax and spend agenda that has nearly bankrupted our country. The easiest way to prevent the Democrats from taking over Congress is to insure an honest election. A bill to do that is currently in Congress.

Meanwhile, where are the orange jumpsuits that should be the result of all of the investigations we are hearing about?

This Is How The System Works

As the fraud in Minnesota unfolds, one of the questions I have is who wrote the grants, who signed the grants, and who approved the grants. Well, I think we now have a clue as to how all of this was allowed to happen.

On Friday, The Daily Signal reported:

A new report in Minnesota highlights how a former bureaucrat involved in granting a church millions of dollars later went to work as a consultant for the church.

The audit also says that the church failed to provide necessary reporting for hundreds of thousands of dollars of state funding.

Both the church and the former bureaucrat deny any wrongdoing, and gave their side of the story to The Daily Signal.

According to the report, issued by the Office of the Legislative Auditor last week, a grantee—later identified as Zion Baptist Church in North Minneapolis—”could not provide us detailed invoices or program participant data to support a payment of $672,647.78″ from the Department of Human Services’ Bureau of Health Administration “for a single month of work.”

Zion Baptist Church contracted with 14 subcontractors, two of which the legislative auditor visited. The church reportedly paid $40,000 to each of the subcontractors, without specifying rates per service unit.

Those subcontractors failed to show who they served with the money they received. One of them said “the grantee told them they did not need to keep detailed participant records.”

Finally, the grant manager “who approved the $672,647.78 payment left DHS a few days after approving it and later started to provide consulting services to the grantee,” the report stated.

The article notes:

Department of Human Services staff raised serious concerns about subcontractors during the grant period, but supervisors directed them “not to pursue further questioning,” and approved a grant extension.

The whistleblower said key questions remain, such as the justification for avoiding a competitive process for the grant, whether DHS performed due diligence on the subcontractors, whether subcontractors were for-profit entities, and why staff concerns were not pursued.

The whistleblower also listed four grants that Zion Baptist Church received, two of which were sole source (without competition) and together totaled more than $3 million.

“Is Zion some great place?” the whistleblower asked, noting the multi-million-dollar sole-source grants. One one contract of more than $1.4 million, the church “did just a bad job performance” and the state “cancelled it early.”

This smells more than a little fishy to me!

Trying To Get Back To Where We Started

Up until 2008, there was a definite process for funding our government. It involved separate spending bills for each department. Up until that time, there were still government shutdowns, but they were rare. The current House of Representatives is trying to bring us back to the regular order of passing budgets.

On Saturday, The Daily Signal reported:

The House of Representatives took a major step toward averting another government shutdown when it passed a funding package Thursday. 

But perhaps more importantly, House Freedom Caucus members influenced the process around the bill’s consideration in ways they say could help government spending in the future.

The House’s “minibus” package covers three of the 12 funding areas for the federal government: Energy-Water, Interior-Environment, and Commerce-Justice-Science. Appropriators have attempted to reconcile both chambers’ priorities, and the package will be considered in the Senate next week.

The article concludes:

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., told The Daily Signal after the vote on Thursday that he views the outcome as a victory for his caucus, which has long called for separate votes on individual appropriations bills.

“We’ve already done away with what we call the ‘Christmas omnibus’ [where] you pile all 12 bills together, you work them out in a smoke-filled room, nobody has any chance to say anything about them,” Harris said.

“What we did today for the first time ever is say, ‘oh, and by the way, we’re going to have a separate vote on some of the bills,’” he added.

Harris also praised the stripping of the “very offensive million-dollar earmark to a Somali led organization where the brother of the organizer was arrested as a terrorist.”

In Harris’ view, the process this process should be replicated in the future.

“The framework we’ve laid out, especially this past week, allows us to… return to… what we call regular order: Each bill considered separately, amendments allowed on the floor—you know, the way it was when I first came here, and the way we should return to.”

The legislation could still face headwinds in the Senate, though, where Paul is complaining of “billions in refugee money” in the bills.

There is too much pork in the bills. However, until we elect people who actually have a sense of fiscal responsibility, we have to consider what will actually pass Congress.

Positive Changes In Healthcare Costs

On Friday, The Daily Signal posted an article about solving the rapidly rising cost of healthcare in America.

The article reports:

Americans grappling with affordability just got a helpful boost from the Trump administration, which on Friday announced a new push to reduce health care costs. 

The move helps patients get health care prices upfront rather than astronomically high surprise bills later.

The new Transparency in Coverage (TiC) proposed rule will improve data structure, reduce unnecessary file size and increase usability. This will make transparency easier to analyze and more accessible to employers, researchers and innovators working to lower health care costs. 

By receiving prices upfront in a clear, easy-to-use format, Americans can shop around for the best provider at the lowest cost—driving more competition and empowering patients. Friday’s move was announced jointly by the Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Department of Labor, and Treasury Department.

President Donald Trump already fought hard in his first term to improve health care price transparency, and Friday’s announcement continues that momentum which continued in Trump’s February executive order.

In December 2020, Trump also signed the No Surprises Act, meant to provide patients detailed upfront price information about their care. But the Biden administration delayed implementing these policies, and the American people never saw the full benefit of price transparency.

Additionally, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 requires insurance companies and brokers to reveal all historical claims data and broker fees while also removing gag clauses. Hospitals must not surprise patients with bills after insurance companies refuse to pay more.

The article includes the following graph:

The article notes:

There’s a simple reason health care prices skyrocket above overall inflation: no free and fair competition. Costs for hospital services in particular have seen the highest rates of inflation among major U.S. consumer goods and services, per economist Mark J. Perry.  

Notice that college tuition has also gone up faster than inflation. I think that if we could get the government out of healthcare and out of student loans, the price of healthcare and of college would go down.

Let’s Make The Chaplain Corps Great Again!

On Wednesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about changes Secretary of War Pete Hegseth is planning to make to the Chaplain Corps of America’s military.

The article reports:

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has pledged to toss “New Age notions” in America’s Chaplain Corps and make the military body “great again.”  

“In recent decades, its role has been degraded in an atmosphere of political correctness and secular humanism,” Hegseth said of the Chaplain Corps in video message released Tuesday night.  

“Chaplains have been minimized, viewed by many as therapists instead of ministers,” Hegseth said, adding “faith and virtue were traded for self-help and self-care.”  

…The Chaplain Corps was established in 1775 at the request of George Washington, who at the time was serving as general of the Continental Army. Washington established the corps to meet the spiritual needs of the men.  

“For about 200 years, the chaplain corps continued its role as the spiritual leader of our service members, serving our men and women in times of hardship and ministering to their souls, but sadly, as part of the ongoing war on warriors, in recent decades, its role has been degraded,” Hegseth said.  

The article mentions the current ‘spiritual guide’ (U.S. Army Spiritual Fitness Guide):

The 112-page document mentions “God” only once, does not mention “Jesus” or “virtue,” but does mention “feelings” 11 times and “spiritual” over 350 times.  

“The guide relies on New Age notions, saying that the soldier’s spirit consists of consciousness, creativity and connection,” Hegseth said.  

“The guide itself reports that around 82% of the military are religious, yet ironically, it alienates our war fighters of faith by pushing secular humanism. In short, it’s unacceptable and unserious, so we’re tossing it,” he continued.  

Hegseth has signed a directive to eliminate the use of the Army Spiritual Fitness Guide. The secretary also announced that military is simplifying the U.S. Military’s Faith and Belief Coding System, which is used to track religions and spiritual preferences within the military.  

The system currently has over 200 faith and belief codes, according to Hegseth, who added that the majority of the military uses only six of the codes, and 11 are not used at all.  

The article concludes:

“We are going to make the Chaplain Corps great again,” Hegseth pledged, adding, “Merry Christmas.”

According to artificial intelligence:

  • Approximately 70% of Americans identify as Christians.
  • About 1.9% of the U.S. population identifies as Jewish.

Our Chaplain Corps should reflect those numbers in its faith and belief codes.

Undermining The Tax Cuts President Trump Put In Place

The Big Beautiful Bill provided tax relief for certain groups of people. A major portion of Social Security will not be taxed, tips will not be taxed and overtime pay will not be taxed. Those are targeted tax breaks given to the people who work hard (or have worked hard) and were hit hard by President Biden’s economic policies. Unfortunately, there are those in some states who really don’t care about helping those of us who work for a living.

On Monday, The Daily Signal reported:

The Trump/GOP “One Big, Beautiful Tax Cut” includes no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and a new tax-deduction for Social Security benefits. These promises helped Trump secure the White House and Republicans the U.S. House and Senate.

The GOP’s huge win in November 2024 gave Republicans a solid mandate to keep these promises. And they did.

Nonetheless, the Democrat-mismanaged states of Colorado, Illinois, Maine, and New York are rigging their tax codes so that this Trump/GOP tax relief does not reduce corresponding state levies. The same holds for Democrat-smothered Washington, D.C., which will keep higher taxes on 13 of the GOP’s 84 federal tax-cut provisions.

Colorado’s House Bill 25-1296, decoupled its state taxes from these federal tax reductions. So, next April 15, factory workers will have to render unto Democrat Gov. Jared Polis the overtime pay break that Trump and Republicans let them enjoy.

Among other things, this requires taxpayers to keep two separate records of taxable income. What a mess.

The article notes:

So, at last, Republicans deliver concrete relief to the “affordability crisis” that has become the Democrats’ latest obsession. The Trump/GOP tax cuts will help Americans pay their bills, buy groceries, fill their gas tanks, and maybe even get out of town, to pursue happiness. What could be more wonderful?

Rather than celebrate with everyday people, Democrats decrease taxpayers’ additional income and diminish their economic security. For Democrats, making Americans poorer is a bargain compared to the bonanza of denying Trump and Republicans any credit for feeling and easing the people’s pain.

Anyone who votes Democrat at this point is simply not paying attention!

The Fallout From Ending Some Of The Government Corruption

One of the biggest money-laundering operations in America was known as USAID (United States Agency for International Development). In March, the State Department announced that it was effectively dissolving USAID. Many family members of our legislators were employed by the agency in various levels, so they had to find new jobs, but there were other ramifications. 

On Sunday, The Daily Signal posted an article about one result of the end of USAID.

The article reports:

Arabella Advisors, a for-profit company that managed services for many influential dark money nonprofits on the Left, is no more—or so it seems.

Sunflower Services, a new public benefit corporation, announced on Monday that it would be acquiring “Arabella Advisors’ fiscal sponsorship servicing business.” Meanwhile, Arabella’s former CEO, Himesh Bhise, announced that he would lead a supposedly new company, Vital Impact.

A Nov. 19 email to Arabella Advisors received an automated response stating, “As of November 17, 2025 Arabella Advisors has ceased operations.”

What, exactly, is Sunflower Services? Well, it’s a completely new company financed by… lead investor New Venture Fund, with financial support from the Windward and Hopewell Funds.

These names should be familiar to longtime observers of Arabella Advisors. New Venture Fund, Windward Fund, and Hopewell Fund are three of the “seven sisters” dark money nonprofits that received services from Arabella. These are the nonprofits organized under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

These groups acted as “fiscal sponsors,” housing various quasi-independent projects that did not register as separate entities. Critics say this system allows donors to fund activist projects through the nonprofits—cloaking what their dollars are actually paying for. These groups funded many of the left-wing activist groups that fed staff and ideas into the Biden administration, particularly pushing climate alarmism. The Open Society Foundations, founded by Hungarian American billionaire George Soros and now run by his son, Alex, has contributed millions to the nonprofits who were Arabella’s clients.

The other nonprofits—Sixteen Thirty Fund, North Fund, and Impetus Fund—more politically active groups organized under Section 501(c)(4), were notably absent from the Sunflower Services press release.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. It is complex, but it provides insight as to how taxpayer money has been used in recent years to undermine America and the principles upon which it was founded.

Where The Money Is Going

According to the National Debt Clock, the current national debt is about $38 trillion dollars (that’s a lot of zeroes). In addition to cutting spending, it might also be a good idea to see how we got here.

On Sunday, The Daily Signal reported the following:

Oregon state Rep. Dwayne Yunker began asking questions when he discovered the state was using tax dollars to bring developmentally disabled clients to a strip club this past summer. 

Yunker—a Republican lawmaker in a very blue state with a Democrat super majority in the legislature—has exposed this and other controversial Medicaid spending in the state that has little or nothing to do with medical or health issues. 

On Monday, he will be in Washington meeting with members of Congress and Trump administration officials about looking into how his state—and likely others—are spending Medicaid dollars. Medicaid is a joint federal-state program intended to cover health care coverage for the poor or disabled. 

The Oregon Department of Human Services informed the lawmaker in mid-August that denying the strip club outing could jeopardize federal Medicaid funding, Yunker told The Daily Signal. 

Specifically, the state agency referred to a federal law that requires state Medicaid programs to help disabled people integrate into the community. 

“The adult day care [program] has taken developmentally disabled clients to strip clubs and bars,” Yunker said. “They say they are integrating them with the community. But we are not talking about taking them to a park or the museum.”

Yunker supports the Trump administration’s reforms to Medicaid in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that include work requirements to receive benefits. 

The article concludes:

The part of the funding paying for illegal immigrants comes from state Medicaid dollars, not federal Medicaid dollars. The state also notes online that Medicaid dollars can go for temporary rental assistance as well as nutrition assistance.  

In August, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, a Democrat, denounced Republicans’ federal Medicaid reforms, saying they will make Americans and Oregonians “sicker, hungrier, and less prosperous.” 

“I am going to work with Oregon lawmakers and community partners to do all that we can to stand up for Oregonians and get through this needless, callous hardship,” Kotek said.

In his letter to Oz, Yunker wrote, “The real hardship is what my constituents endure under Oregon’s broken Medicaid program.”

“We’ve barely scratched the surface of the broken Medicaid system,” he said.

Using taxpayer dollars to take people to strip clubs is not helping anyone (except the strip club owners).

Elections Matter

The City of New Bern (where I live) is currently having a run-off election for Mayor and one of our Aldermen. I am familiar with all of the candidates after having attended a number of candidate debates. The results of this election will be significant for the city. One of the mayoral candidates is boosted on the Craven County Democrat Party page as being in support of No Kings Day. The other candidate has successfully run the city since 2022. An example of the difference leadership can make can be found in the contrast between the Commonwealth of Virginia and the State of Maryland.

On October 20, The Daily Signal reported:

Thanks to smart fiscal management, the Republican administration of Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears just mailed numerous Virginia households checks ranging from up to $200 and $400. 

This pleasant surprise for many of us heading into the holiday shopping season is indicative of the competent, prudent leadership that will fall by the wayside if Virginians fail to continue Richmond’s fiscally conservative leadership. 

Youngkin announced these checks—tax rebates—late last month for eligible taxpayers—up to $200 if they filed individually, and up to $400 if they filed jointly. Because of Virginia’s record job growth and capital investments under Youngkin totaling $140 billion, Virginia enjoyed surpluses for four straight years.

The article concludes:

Virginia and its neighboring state Maryland provide the perfect natural experiment in what would happen if conservatives lose the Virginia’s Governor’s Mansion. Maryland’s Democrat governor, Wes Moore, squandered outgoing Republican Larry Hogan’s budget surplus.

“For eight straight years, we balanced the budget without raising taxes—in fact, we cut taxes, tolls, and fees every single year, totaling $4.7 billion in relief,” Hogan wrote in a statement in August. “When we left office, Maryland was in the strongest financial position in state history, with a record $5.5 billion surplus.”

In an about face, this year, Moore raised taxes on the backs of Maryland taxpayers instead of sending out checks.

Virginia’s choice couldn’t be more clear: prudent, abundant economic growth with conservative leadership or fiscally reckless, resource squandering, tax-raising progressive failures. My fellow Virginians: Choose wisely.

Elections have consequences.

Common Sense Invades The Federal Bureau Of Investigation (FBI)

On October 3rd, The Daily Signal reported that the FBI has severed all ties to the Southern Poverty Law Center. The SPLC kept a hate map of groups it considered hate groups. Oddly enough, a lot of the groups on that map were simply family-oriented or conservative political groups. One of those groups, a Christian nonprofit called the Family Research Council was attacked by a gunman in its headquarters in August 15, 2012, after he saw the group on the SPLC’s hate map. The FRC was placed on the hate map because it did not support the homosexual agenda. The attack was thwarted by FRC building manager Leo Johnson, who was shot in the arm, but survived.

The article at The Daily Signal reports:

The FBI has confirmed that it severed all ties to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a far-left activist group that puts conservatives and Christians on a “hate map” along with Ku Klux Klan chapters. The “hate map” has inspired at least one terrorist attack against a conservative organization.

“The Southern Poverty Law Center long ago abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine,” FBI Director Kash Patel told The Daily Signal in a statement Friday. “Their so-called hate map has been used to defame mainstream Americans and even inspired violence.”

“That disgraceful record makes them unfit for any FBI partnership,” Patel added.

The article notes:

The man who opened fire at a Republican practice session for the Congressional Baseball Game in 2017, nearly killing then-House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, had “liked” the SPLC on Facebook. The SPLC condemned that attack, as well.

The SPLC added Turning Point USA to the “hate map” mere months before an assassin with a transgender boyfriend allegedly murdered Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk.

The SPLC condemned the attack, but has not removed Turning Point USA from the “hate map.”

A bureau official told The Daily Signal that the FBI was aware that the “hate map” included Turning Point USA before the shooting.

The article concludes:

Big Tech companies like Amazon have used the “hate map” to screen recipients for its former AmazonSmile program, where customers could designate a portion of their purchases go to support certain charities and other nonprofits. Companies like Eventbrite, PayPal, and Hyatt Hotels have relied on the SPLC’s “hate” accusations to decide who they will allow to use their platforms and facilities. Donor networks worth billions have pledged to keep charitable funds from going to SPLC-labeled “hate groups.”

The SPLC enjoys this impact despite multiple scandals. The center fired its co-founder and saw its president resign in a 2019 racial discrimination and sexual harassment scandal. Amid that scandal, SPLC staff created a union that is part of a union organization that represents the radical anti-Israel group Jewish Voice for Peace. And amid a round of layoffs last year, the SPLC Union accused the center of engaging in “union-busting.”

Despite its penurious name, the SPLC has an endowment of more than $700 million, compensates its leaders handsomely, and possesses more than $30 million in offshore accounts, according to IRS filings.

Finally, the SPLC has troubling ties to Antifa, the loosely-organized movement of far-left agitators that President Donald Trump recently declared a domestic terrorist group.

It is good news that the government will no longer work with the SPLC to target innocent Americans and groups of Americans.

How You Vote For Governor In Virginia Will Have Major Impact On Your Energy Bill

On September 20, The Daily Signal posted an article about the upcoming election for governor in Virginia.

The article reports:

Virginia governor candidate Abigail Spanberger proved yet again she wants to make Virginians poor and financially struggling—endorsing a terrible state law that is projected to increase energy costs by $3,500 per customer. 

Spanberger embraced the poorly-named “Virginia Clean Economy Act,” signed into law in 2020 under former Gov. Ralph Northam, which will ban oil and gas production in Virginia, mandating that both of our state’s two utilities produce 100% renewable electricity by 2050.

This law is already having ruinous effects: Energy prices are higher, and Virginia now imports 40% of its electricity from out-of-state, up from 18% in 2020. The Act mandates Virginia transition from reliable power sources to expensive, unproven, unreliable “green energy” that has been demonstrated to be notoriously incapable of meeting the needed capacity for storage and distribution. 

Yet no energy transition is happening in the Commonwealth of Virginia, despite the Virginia Clean Economy Act being law. As of June 2025, 87% of Virginia’s net-electricity generation is primarily derived from natural gas, nuclear, and coal. Renewables—including solar and biomass—only accounted for 14.3%.

The article concludes:

California and Germany are two energy case studies of what Spanberger wants to do to Virginia. Despite massive government spending and strict “Green Energy” mandates, this state and country are failing to meet their climate change goals, all while expansively hiking up energy prices. This is an energy scarcity mindset that has no place in Virginia. 

This especially hits poor and middle-class families, who spend a much bigger proportion of their family budget on energy. California and Germany’s energy failure examples should be learned from—not duplicated and expanded.While in Congress, Spanberger voted lockstep with then-President Joe Biden for trillions in inflationary spending—including massive “Green Energy” boondoggles—that caused painful, generational inflation. She even bragged about voting for the deceptively-named “Inflation Reduction Act” in a January 2023 Fox News editorial. During the Biden-Harris administration, electricity prices soared 30%—largely due to the IRA passing. That’s not something to brag about.

Virginia doesn’t need to import Bidenomics to our beautiful Commonwealth.

On November 4th, Virginia voters will decide whether or not they want to see their energy bills increase to an average of $1,770 with economists estimating costs peaking at $3,500 per customer by 2045.

Evil, But Not Surprising

On Sunday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the sponsorship of unaccompanied children coming across America’s southern border.

The article reports:

Aaron Stevenson began to notice a disturbing trend early on in the Biden administration. As an intelligence analyst for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, it was his job to identify bad guys as well as emerging and novel threats to the U.S.  

In February 2021, a profile of an alien from Honduras with ties to the 18th Street Gang come across Stevenson’s desk. The profile of the man included language noting that he had applied to be an “unaccompanied child sponsor.” At the time, Stevenson told The Daily Signal he had no idea what that was.  

A month later, he saw the same language on another file, this time for a woman from El Salvador with ties to MS-13. And in April, he again saw reference to an “unaccompanied child sponsor” on a profile for a Romanian man with ties to a Balkan crime group. 

…In April 2021, Stevenson began calling the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement to find out if anyone was tracking human-trafficking threats within the Unaccompanied Alien Children Program. 

“No” was essentially the answer Stevenson received. There was no formal tracking of child-trafficking threats within the U.S. program designed to place a child who crossed the border unaccompanied in the care of sponsor in the U.S., according to the analyst.  

…The analyst did an interview with Project Veritas in 2021, explaining what he was seeing and expressing the concerns he had over sponsor vetting. Deborah White, an employee of the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, the office responsible for placing unaccompanied migrant children in the care of a sponsor, saw the interview, and it confirmed the trafficking patterns she was already seeing.

“In June 2021, I discovered the first case of trafficking and, along with my counterpart, Tara Rodas, reported it, but children continued to be sent to dangerous locations with improperly vetted sponsors,” White told lawmakers during a Senate Roundtable in July 2024 after she also blew the whistle on what she was seeing related to the program.  

“One case in Florida had over 12 children linked to one sponsor at multiple addresses,” according to White. “Children were sent to addresses that were abandoned houses or nonexistent in some cases.”  

The article concludes:

Among the 448,000 minors to enter the U.S. in recent years, ICE failed to issue more than 233,000 notices to appear in immigration court and more than 43,000 migrant children who were given a notice to appear in immigration court failed to do so, Joseph Cuffari, DHS inspector general, told members of Congress in July.  

“The Biden administration lost 450,000 unaccompanied children who were placed with unvetted sponsors or released into the country,” Tricia McLaughlin, assistant DHS secretary, told The Daily Signal.

Since Trump’s return to the White House, the administration has located 13,000 missing migrant children.  

Under the leadership of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, McLaughlin says the department is “leading efforts to conduct welfare checks on these children to ensure that they are safe and not being exploited.”

These children need to be found as soon as possible and either reunited with their families or put in the hands of someone who will properly care for them.