Tag Archives: The Daily Signal

A Change In Leadership

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A historical museum should not reflect current cultural trends, it should reflect history,  but unfortunately the Smithsonian in recent years seems to have gone woke. An article posted at the Daily Signal on Tuesday reports that the current head of the Smithsonian, Lonnie G. Bunch III, will be stepping down before the end of the year.

The article reports:

The secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Lonnie G. Bunch III, is stepping down, amid continued criticism from the White House about the direction of the Smithsonian museums.

“There is no place like the Smithsonian—it has been one of the great loves of my life, and I am extraordinarily proud of what we have accomplished together,” Bunch said in a statement. “I leave with pride and sadness, gratitude and joy, and with enormous confidence in the people who will carry this remarkable institution forward.”

Trump administration officials have raised concerns about the Smithsonian museums in recent weeks.

A July White House report charged that the National Museum of American History had become “subject to institutional capture by a radical, activist ideology that is fundamentally opposed to telling the noble, honest story of the great country we know and love.”

Bunch criticized the report, calling it “not a fair characterization of the work” in a memo addressed to Smithsonian staffers.

The article notes:

In August, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and White House Domestic Policy Council Director Vince Haley sent a letter saying federal agencies could not “continue to support the Smithsonian under current leadership.”

…They also suggested that the institution may be involved in “significant violations of federal antidiscrimination law.”

“Indeed, the administration has recently uncovered evidence that the Smithsonian leadership’s institutional culture may have resulted in significant violations of Federal antidiscrimination law, including creating a hostile work environment and engaging in practices that classify individuals and allocate opportunities, funding and other benefits on the basis of race, ethnicity and other protected characteristics.”

The article concludes:

“We can only hope that the next Secretary of the Smithsonian will not treat the Institution as a battleground for his culture wars,” Mike Gonzalez, senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation, told the Daily Signal. “Instead, let’s hope that he or she takes seriously the mission of the national museum complex that he or she leads, that is to say to preserve and transmit America’s history, culture and art—in a word, heritage—to future generations.”

The last time I visited the Smithsonian was more than 25 years ago. At that time, it was amazing and apolitical. Hopefully we can go back to amazing and apolitical soon.

Fighting To Preserve The Deep State

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Unionizing government employees was never a good idea. There are too many instances of unions making unfair wage or procedural demands that interfere with the working of the government. One of those areas is in the hiring and firing of employees. In private industry, the goal is to make a profit, and it is fairly easy to justify the firing of an employee if he is not helping to meet that goal. The government is not about either saving money or making a profit, and that complicates things.

On Monday, The Daily Signal posted an article explaining how federal employee unions are resisting parts of President Trump’s agenda.

The article reports:

Who ultimately decides how the executive branch works? Is it the president, elected by the American people, or career federal employees and the unions that represent them?

The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest union representing federal employees, sued the White House’s Office of Personnel Management last month, aiming to block new rules governing how federal employees are evaluated, disciplined, and removed.

The lawsuit represents only the latest in a long series of legal challenges the union has brought against President Donald Trump’s administration since January 2025. According to a July roundup AFGE posted on its website, the union had filed 18 lawsuits against the administration before the latest case.

These lawsuits have targeted a wide range of administration initiatives, including government-wide reorganizations, workforce reductions, collective bargaining restrictions, employee classification reforms, and changes to federal personnel rules.

AFGE has been far from alone in these cases. Democracy Forward, a left-leaning legal advocacy organization that has represented plaintiffs in numerous lawsuits challenging Trump policies, has represented AFGE or other plaintiffs in these cases. Such challenges have involved broad coalitions, including advocacy groups and local governments, alongside labor unions.

Critics argue that these cases amount to more than traditional labor litigation, representing a form of institutional resistance from federal employees and their allies against an elected administration’s effort to reshape the executive branch.

The union was not elected to run the country–the President was. That should end the discussion.

The Move To Clean Up The Voter Rolls

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The majority of Americans want elections decided by citizens. Non-citizens voting makes no sense. If someone is not an American citizen, why should they be able to vote in American elections? Can you name any country in the world where people who are not citizens of that country are allowed to vote in the country’s elections? The Trump administration is attempting to make sure that only American citizens vote in American elections.

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal reported:

The Supreme Court’s Monday decision cleared the way for the Department of Homeland Security to establish a state-by-state list of eligible voters based on a crosscheck of citizenship data, the Social Security database, and other government information.

“The DHS can determine who is eligible to vote because the federal government does not want to be complicit in fraud through sending mail-in ballots to noncitizens,” Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, told the Daily Signal. “So it makes sense as to why the administration would want to prioritize this.”

The list would be shared with states, but states are not obligated to use the list to police voter rolls.

High-profile Democrat election lawyer Marc Elias expressed alarm over the high court’s ruling in a statement on his website, Democracy Docket.

Regarding the DHS list of eligible citizens, Elias said, “It orders the federal government to compile a list of Trump-approved eligible voters to be sent to the states.”

The above statement is spin. These voters are not Trump-approved–they are people confirmed as American citizens eligible to vote. By putting President Trump’s name into his statement, Elias hopes to distract from the validity of the idea of only citizens voting and appeal to the people who suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS).

The article at The Daily Signal concludes:

Though it was a decision on standing rather than the merits of the executive order, that is still significant in curbing what plaintiffs can do, and what national policy district court judges can block, said election lawyer Cleta Mitchell, chairman of the Election Integrity Network at the Conservative Partnership Institute.

“I obviously wish the Supreme Court had stepped up and stopped the challenge in its tracks,” Mitchell told the Daily Signal. “It may have been necessary to rule on standing to get the votes. At some point, the Supreme Court should step in with the tyrants in black robes and let them know they are not the president, they are not the legislature, and they are not the state election board.”

The tyrants in black robes need to stay in their own lane.

There Is A Difference Between Creating An Incident And Reporting On An Incident

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On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the church invasion charges against former CNN anchor Don Lemon and independent journalist Georgia Fort. Major media outlets have joined an amicus brief urging a court to dismiss the charges.

The article reports:

Forty-five media outlets and nonprofit organizations joined the brief, including The Associated Press, Dow Jones (which owns The Wall Street Journal), MS NOW, The New York Times, The NewsGuild, PEN America, ProPublica, Slate, and The Washington Post.

Lemon and Fort stand accused of violating federal civil rights laws for their alleged activity in the invasion of Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Jan. 18, protesting the pastor who works for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Justice Department brought charges against Lemon and Fort under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act and the Ku Klux Klan Act, claiming they took part in the agitation that violated congregants’ civil rights. Lemon and Fort have said they were present at the invasion in their capacity as journalists.

The amicus brief, led by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, argues that if Lemon and Fort are convicted, “federal law would be within arm’s reach of prosecutors to muzzle reporting in the public interest.” Magistrate Judge Douglas Micko of the U.S. District of Minnesota added the brief to the court record Monday.

The article notes:

Agitators, who said they targeted Cities Church because one of its pastors works for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, allegedly stood up in the middle of a service, refused to leave when asked, blocked members of the congregation from getting to their children, and chanted, “Who shut this down? We shut this down!”

The indictment notes that Lemon livestreamed the planning meeting before the church takeover, but he told his audience he was leaving out key details to avoid revealing the target beforehand. It also claims Lemon said “the whole point” of the activity was “to disrupt” the service. It further accuses Lemon of confronting the church’s pastor, refusing to leave when asked, and obstructing churchgoers as they left the building.

The indictment presents fewer concrete claims about Fort’s alleged involvement in the agitation. It alleges that she confronted the pastor and that she blocked a minivan from leaving the church’s parking lot by conducting an interview in front of it.

The actions of Don Lemon were not reporting and are not protected by the First Amendment. As soon as you block someone from exercising their right to participate in a religious service, you have broken the law. I hope the people involved in this protest, which involved trespassing if they stayed after they were asked to leave, are punished for their actions. This was not a protest–it was unlawful activity.

Avoiding Clean Voter Rolls

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When I was a young child, for a short while I lived in Jersey City. I didn’t understand at the time when my parents made jokes about people sometime around October every election year going through the cemeteries with pens and clipboards to register the people there to vote. I have a better understanding of that now.

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal reported:

North Carolina’s Democrat Gov. Josh Stein vetoed an election law reform that requires the state to cross-check voter registration rolls with death records.

The governor vetoed House Bill 958 in the battleground state, which would also reduce the number of early voting days in certain elections and grant the state auditor new powers to review election results.

Republican lawmakers have enough votes to override Stein’s veto, according to WSOC Charlotte. The bill passed along party lines.

Critics of the legislation contend it would hinder transparency for campaign finance and potentially lead to the purging of eligible voters from voter rolls. The bill allows candidates to disclose fewer donations on contributions, loans, and expenditures, increasing the required amount for reporting from $1,000 to $3,000. 

“Rather than make your life better, they want to make it harder for you to hold them accountable for their failures,” Stein said Monday of the bill’s GOP supporters, WRALRaleigh reported.

“They would rather change the rules of our elections to secure advantage than to do the work that the voters expect, which is to improve people’s lives,” the governor added.

Republicans have argued that the governor is making elections less secure with his veto, WRAL reported.

So changing the rules of our elections so that dead people don’t vote doesn’t improve people’s lives? How does dead people voting help us in any way?

The article concludes:

Under the legislation, the state and county boards of elections would be required to remove ineligible voters from voter rolls and update addresses of eligible voters. They can enter into data-sharing agreements with other states to cross-check voting records. 

The bill would also allow “any registered voter” to challenge the legitimacy of a vote or a voter’s registration.  A decision made by the county board may be appealed to the Superior Court in the county where the challenge originated. 

Early votes cast in-person must be counted at the time polls close on Election Day. The bill stipulates that if a voter lacks photo ID, he or she will get a provisional ballot. 

The bill further bans foreign nationals from donating to a referendum campaign. Numerous other states have banned direct and indirect foreign contributions on ballot measures in recent years. 

The only reason to leave dead people on the voter rolls is so you can cheat!

Pot, Meet Kettle

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On Wednesday, Victor Davis Hanson posted an article at The Daily Signal about some of the precedents set by the Democrat party in years past.

The article reports:

Recently, the Left in general and Democrats in particular have been criticizing a lot of things that this administration has done. This came up with the confirmation hearings of Attorney General Todd Blanche, and people suggested that, though he may have been qualified, he had too close a relationship as a personal attorney, or he acted in a legal capacity with [President] Donald Trump, and therefore there would be an incestuous relationship between the [Justice Department] and the White House.

But who broke that standard? I think it was broken during the JFK administration. John F. Kennedy, the Democratic president, appointed his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, as attorney general. They conferred daily. If we were worried that that was an aberration, remember Eric Holder bragged that he was, quote, Obama’s wingman. So, the Democrats have had a long history of a close relationship between the DOJ and the White House.

We’ve been told that the Democratic Party is very angry because some local, i.e., state or county or municipal, prosecutors might take a look at Anthony Fauci and see if he had criminal exposure other than federal exposure. And people said, well, what business do these local prosecutors have looking at Anthony Fauci, who was a federal bureaucrat? And if he did anything wrong, it would be a federal offense. You can’t have freelancing prosecutors all over the United States going after—yes, you can. We established that principle with Donald Trump. 

Remember that Letitia James went after him for a real estate deal in which Deutsche Bank, the lender, had no problem with the loan as it was conducted. She was the attorney general of New York. Alvin Bragg could not get Donald Trump on anything other than to bootstrap a federal campaign violation that even federal prosecutors didn’t want to touch. He was just the municipal DA of Manhattan.

The article goes on to cite the charges of a partisan IRS, election denying, and weaponizing the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and how those charges relate to past Democrat actions.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It includes great examples of the pot calling the kettle black.

The Manufacturing Boom

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On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about what is happening to manufacturing in America.

The article reports:

Beneath the cacophony of media noise, an important untold story emerges: A manufacturing boom is unfolding across America right now, and especially so in the geographic center of the country.

This developing boom represents an epochal shift because investments in factories and tangible production involve the stickiest kind of capital expenditures. The commitment to production involves a macro “bet” on a yearslong cycle, not a near-term wager on the latest fad or concerns about the price of gasoline next week.

As such, this mostly hidden story deserves to be studied and amplified, both for the economic benefits and also for the possible political windfall for candidates on the populist right.

But before considering the import of this shift, it’s important to look at the numbers, the verifiable on-the-ground data sets that prove this new reality. The most-watched gauge of productive activity, the ISM Manufacturing Index, just surged to a fresh four-year high. Specifically, that ISM reading stands at 55 now, well above the 50 mark, which signals expansion. It has been rising for seven months.

In addition, manufacturing employment is rising, similarly marking a new four-year record high. These jobs are high-paying, family-sustaining roles that make our whole society stronger, not part-time “hustles” or gig economy transitions.

The article explains the cause of the manufacturing boom:

How has this renaissance unfolded?

The answer is solid policy. First, the Trump administration insists on fair and reciprocal trade. Gone are the days of America tolerating abusive and predatory trade tactics, particularly China’s.

But even aside from our Chinese Communist Party opponents, allies and “friends” abused America economically as well. For instance, Western Europe massively subsidized exports to the U.S. through its VAT taxation system, making their goods far more affordable for Americans than U.S. goods sent across the Atlantic. Such non-tariff trade barriers have been smartly exposed and repelled by the new American approach to trade.

The article concludes:

America is welcoming a quiet but very real manufacturing renaissance. Admittedly, public economic sentiment remains skeptical right now, which is understandable after 5 years of untenable inflation. But these epochal trends in manufacturing suggest that recent pronounced blue-collar real wage gains, meaning pay adjusted for the cost of living, will only accelerate going forward.

Turning to electoral politics, the legacy media sadly has no interest in covering this huge story. Thus, it is incumbent on our movement and our candidates to broadcast the good news of a very real trend that points to far more Main Street prosperity ahead.

The good economic news has a way of slipping between the cracks when a Republican is in the White House.

This Is NOT The Way To Solve The Problem

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On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the Biden administration’s strategy to track the fentanyl shipments that were coming into America and bring a bigger criminal case against traffickers.

The article reports:

A third whistleblower came forward about a Biden-era operation involving alleged massive shipments of fentanyl into the United States that federal agents were told to track and not seize.

The U.S. Justice Department is conducting an internal probe of the operation that critics say likely led to numerous deaths. The most recent whistleblower complaint details a November 2022 fentanyl delivery from Arizona to New Mexico where Drug Enforcement Administration agents were told to monitor the shipment but not arrest anyone.

“Agents believe the courier made a minimum of at least five large deliveries over the following months, each time bringing 50,000-100,000 fentanyl pills and 20-40 pounds of methamphetamine per trip,” the complaint says. “The DEA did not arrest the courier until June 2023; at that time, agents found him with 19 kilograms of methamphetamine and 7 kilograms of fentanyl.” According to the DEA, as few as 2 milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal depending on a person’s body size and tolerance, and 1 kilogram of fentanyl has the potential to kill 500,000 people.

The new complaint also notes that during a training session, one DEA agent dismissed concerns about the operation, saying, “We walk fentanyl,” but adding that federal prosecutors were aware of it.

The complaint comes after the U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General interviewed two other whistleblowers—former DEA Special Agent David Howell and financial investigator Kevin Small, who worked as a contractor for the DEA’s Albuquerque office—on Friday and Monday, respectively.

The article explains the theory behind the actions:

Howell was the first to blow the whistle on the operation, alleging that the DEA allowed hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills into New Mexico because Justice Department prosecutors wanted to track the shipments and bring a bigger criminal case against traffickers. Former U.S. Attorney for the District of New Mexico Alex Uballez oversaw the program, Howell said. Uballez publicly defended the operation, telling The Associated Press it saved lives, was key to intelligence gathering on drug traffickers, and that “the bigger fish are worth catching.”

I don’t think that the people who lost loved ones because of fentanyl would agree with that strategy.

The Supreme Court Upholds Consequences For Terrorism

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On Tuesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a recent U.S. Supreme Court action that ruled in favor of holding terrorists accountable.

The article reports:

The Palestinian Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority lost again at the Supreme Court, this time in their effort to stop a settlement to pay American victims of attacks.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Monday signed an order rejecting an emergency application from the Palestinian authorities to stop a $656 million judgment in favor of Americans killed or wounded in Israel. The victims were injured or killed in attacks in Jerusalem in the early 2000s that killed 33 people and wounded hundreds.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority argued in court filings that making the payments to victims and their families would destabilize government services in the West Bank, The Associated Press reported. They also have argued that the cases shouldn’t be allowed in American courts.

The victims and their families have claimed Palestinian agents were either involved in the attacks or incited them.

The first judgment in favor of the victims was awarded in 2015, but it was reversed on appeal when the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals determined that U.S. courts lacked jurisdiction. The Supreme Court initially rejected the plaintiffs’ appeal in 2018.

The plaintiffs then sued under the revised Anti-Terrorism Act, a 1992 law updated in 2019 to allow the victims of the Palestinian attacks to seek damages in federal courts.

This is a valid weapon against terrorism. As long as the Palestinian authority has the money to pay the families of terrorists killed in suicide attacks, the attacks will continue. Unfortunately, the culture of the Palestinian authority encourages those attacks by honoring the people who carry them out. However, sometimes bad things decrease when they begin costing the people who do them serious money.

Equality vs. Equity

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  • Equality means providing the same resources or opportunities to everyone, regardless of their individual circumstances.
  • Equity involves recognizing individual differences and providing resources or opportunities based on specific needs to achieve fair outcomes.

As soon as you move the goalposts to “achieve fair outcomes” you are no long acting with equality. If I work 20 hours a week and my boss works 50 hours a week, should we both be paid the same amount to insure a “fair outcome”? But if I have children at home and can only work 20 hours a week, under equity, shouldn’t that be considered in providing a “fair outcome”? Should I have the same opportunity for promotion as the person who works 40 hours a week? So where am I going with this?

On Thursday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a new policy by te Education Department regarding school discipline.

The article reports:

The Department of Education is rescinding several regulations that justified racial quotas in school discipline, the Daily Signal can first report.

Disparate impact is an approach to civil rights enforcement that claims a neutral policy that does not discriminate on its face can still constitute illegal racial discrimination if it has a “disproportionate” statistical effect on different racial and ethnic groups. 

“We should be making decisions based on meritocracy,” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey told the Daily Signal in an interview. “We should be making decisions based on qualifications. This is just one additional important step, where we are demonstrating that any inclusion of race in any decision that is made within a school has to stop.”

The Obama administration used disparate-impact policy to require schools to make race a factor when considering disciplinary actions. Under Democrat administrations, the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights found schools guilty of violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 on race-neutral policies if data showed the school disciplined more minority students.

Thursday’s deregulatory action aims to ensure equal education opportunities and treatment for students, according to the Education Department. The move is in line with President Donald Trump’s executive order last April titled “Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy,” which made it the policy of the United States to eliminate all uses of disparate-impact liability.

Quotas are racist, regardless of how they are supposed to be beneficial.

What Good Is The Constitution When Those In Power Ignore It?

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The U.S. Constitution was written to limit the power of the government–not the rights of the people. It was written to protect the rights of the people–free speech, freedom from unwarranted searches, right to a fair trial, etc. But it really isn’t useful if it is ignored.

On Wednesday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the constitutional violations in the Jack Smith investigation of President Trump.

The article reports:

Former special counsel Jack Smith’s team in 2023 bypassed certain procedures to obtain and review text messages from 44 members of Congress in an investigation of President Donald Trump, according to Justice Department documents released by senators Tuesday.

The Justice Department must follow a filter review process when obtaining documents or communications related to members of Congress, under the principle of separation of powers and to prevent privileged materials from being swept up in a criminal prosecution. Communications from members of Congress about their official legislative duties are generally protected from criminal prosecution under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause.

A letter from Assistant Attorney General Patrick Davis to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis, stated that “the special counsel’s Investigative Team apparently bypassed the Filter Team and directly accessed these text messages.” The Justice Department attached documents to the letter outlining the Filter Team’s review process.

Grassley noted the matter Wednesday morning in his opening remarks at the confirmation hearing for Todd Blanche to be attorney general.

“Based on the information provided to the committee, Smith’s operation cut corners and blew through constitutional stop signs, instead of respecting them, and has been advised about the constitutional problems,” Grassley said during the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

“Even if Smith’s team had been instructed to look for congressional or other privileged information, it wouldn’t matter. Because in this example, it appears the filter routine was entirely bypassed.”

The article notes:

Smith investigated Trump’s challenge to the outcome of his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden, as well as Trump’s retention of government documents at his home in Mar-a-Lago. The text messages obtained by Smith’s team appear to be related to the election probe.

“This is yet another grotesque example of the Biden administration’s weaponization of the Justice Department,” Johnson said in a public statement Tuesday. “Jack Smith’s team acted with impunity as they disregarded their own protocols to obtain and access White House text messages, including messages to and from 44 members of Congress. At this point, no one should be shocked by Jack Smith’s recklessness and blatant abuse of power, but they should be outraged.”

Unfortunately, it is highly unlikely that Jack Smith will be held accountable for his actions other than possibly in the court of public opinion.

Virginia Voters Are Paying A Price For Their Votes

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When Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger ran for Governor, she ran as a moderate. She has not governed as a moderate, and Virginia voters who supported her are being hit in the pocketbook.

On Tuesday, The Daily Signal reported:

As July begins, Virginians brace for higher gas taxes, hoping that the $68 price of a barrel of crude oil will start to bring the price at the pump back down. However, they will very soon be hit with a 7% increase in their electric bills.

Iran? No. Trump tariffs? No.

This is because, as Gov. Abigail Spanberger promised the lords of the Green Energy Cabal, Virginia has reentered the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. This is the classic cap-and-trade scheme with a cool new, hip name.

Not a week passed after she announced the reentry into the initiative before Dominion filed with the State Corporation Commission for rate increases to cover the fees they will have to pay to the overseeing body for the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

You have to pay for credits if you use more than your allotment of carbon credits to generate your electricity. You buy them from members who don’t, and if there aren’t any to buy, the money just goes into the initiative’s bank account for when someone does have credits to sell.

Under the heading of “win-win” for Spanberger, she can blame all that electric use on data centers, not former Gov. Ralph Northam’s economic suicide pact with California called “Green Virginia 2030,” which already had Dominion take two power plants offline and turn Virginia into the largest importer of electricity in the USA. (Thus, that controversial “Valley Link” power line project.)

The article notes:

However, there is a commonwealth not far away that—to the surprise of many—pulled itself out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. That commonwealth is Pennsylvania. Similarities?

Sure, they have a Democrat governor; they even have a Democrat governor who fancies himself a contender for the presidential nomination in 2028. That’s where the similarities start to fade.

The article notes:

For good measure, Spanberger signed a law this year making it illegal to do what Youngkin did when he pulled out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Now there has to be legislation passed and signed by the governor to rescue us.

Elections have consequences.

Taking Aim At The Deep State

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On Monday, The Daily Signal posted an article about a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that will have a negative impact on the deep state.

The article reports:

The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to strike down the 90-year-old precedent in Humphrey’s Executor that insulated deep state actors when even the president sought to fire them.

“Nearly 250 years ago, the Framers decided to vest ‘[t]he executive Power’ in one person—’a President of the United States of America,’” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion. “The choice was not made lightly.”

Roberts noted that “several delegates to the Constitutional Convention pushed for a multimember council instead of ‘unity in the Executive magistracy,’ which they feared would serve as ‘the foetus of monarchy.’ But unity won out.”

“Our Constitution’s drafters knew from experience that a ‘plurality in the executive’—the model in use by most States at the time—not only ‘diminishe[s]’ the ‘activity, secrecy, and dispatch’ necessary to ensure ‘good government’ but ‘tends to conceal faults and destroy responsibility,’” he added.

Roberts delivered the opinion of the court, which Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett joined in full. Justice Clarence Thomas joined every part of the opinion except one, while Justice Sonia Sotomayor filed a dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

The deep state was very active during the first Trump administration and has not gone away. Their actions have been blunted somewhat by President Trump’s quick learning curve and by the loyalty of the people he has chosen for his cabinet this administration. In President Trump’s first administration, the deep state saw him coming and was prepared. In this administration President Trump saw the deep state coming and was prepared.

The article notes:

An RMG Research poll last year found that 75% of Washington, D.C.-area federal employees who made at least $150,000 a year and who voted for Kamala Harris in 2024 would disobey a lawful Trump order if they considered it bad policy.

That is the reason this decision is important.

The article concludes”

Trump v. Slaughter involved President Donald Trump’s ouster of Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter, but it will affect other federal boards and commissions with members appointed by Republican and Democrat presidents.

The so-called independent boards and commissions have members appointed by Republican and Democrat presidents who, in theory, operate without political concerns. They serve for a set term, regardless of whether a new president of a different party assumes office during that term.

Slaughter’s lawyer argued that independent commissions have existed in some form since the 1790s and added that such bodies don’t operate with unchecked power, since members are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.

The Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914 prohibited the president from firing a commissioner for any reason other than “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”

In Humphrey’s Executor v. United States (1935), the high court ruled that Congress could enact laws limiting the power of a president to fire executive officials of an independent agency.

Finding The Children

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During the Biden administration, approximately 450,000 children who crossed the border unaccompanied went missing. Those children were either sex trafficked or put in work situations that amounted to slavery. The Trump administration is focused on finding and rescuing those children. So far, they have located and rescued about 150,000.

On Thursday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the search for those missing children.

The article reports:

Nearly 90,000 unidentified children facing sexual abuse will finally be helped thanks to House Republicans funding the largest investment to fight child exploitation and trafficking.

A provision included in the newly passed Department of Homeland Security funding bill will allow 200 new investigators to identify victims of child sexual abuse.

“Right now, 89,000 unidentified image series of children being sexually abused have been seen by law enforcement—but these children have yet to be identified and are still waiting to be found due to resource and manpower shortages,” Tim Tebow, founder and chairman of the Tim Tebow Foundation, said.

“Today, we acted. I am grateful to our congressional leaders for getting this lifesaving legislation over the finish line, and to the law enforcement who never stop fighting for these kids,” Tebow continued.

House Republicans passed the $70 billion party-line budget bill, the Secure America Act, to fully fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. The bill passed Tuesday night, 214–212, with all Republicans voting “yes” and all Democrats voting “no.”

The Renewed Hope Act was included to allocate $108.5 million to hire 200 additional victim identification analysts, forensic analysts, and investigators to identify unknown children seen in sexual images. Now they can be located, and future potential child victims can be safeguarded.

The article notes:

Tebow credited multiple members who helped author this legislation, including Democrat Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, Jamie Raskin of Maryland, Lucy McBath of Georgia, and Madeleine Dean of Pennsylvania, all of whom decided to vote against the final passage due to it being connected to ICE funding.

What in the world has happened to the Democrat party?

Shouldn’t Every State Be Required To Pass An Audit?

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On Sunday, The Daily Signal posted an article about an audit of states that was done to verify billions of dollars in unemployment spending, Medicaid payments, and pension obligations in federally-funded programs. Needless to say, some states had problematic results.

The article reports:

The findings in the 2026 Financial Transparency Score report, released by the government watchdog Truth in Accounting, found that 13 states failed to earn clean audit opinions. The report comes as the Trump administration is cracking down on how states are spending federal dollars.

The organization used data from annual comprehensive financial reports, or ACFRs, produced by each state as a requirement for getting federal funding.

The biggest culprits of the unlucky 13 states, according to the analysis, were Delaware and Georgia, as auditors were unable to obtain enough evidence to issue an opinion at all. This is a “disclaimer” in audit terms.

…Arizona’s audit identified one of the more striking problems cited by the Truth in Accounting report.

“Arizona was unable to substantiate much of its financial statements, including a discrepancy of $231.1 million between the Arizona Department of Economic Security’s cash balance and its bank records,” the report says, citing the state’s 2023 ACFR.

…California’s most recent ACFR, which reviewed the state’s finances for 2024, found the state had to correct $1.4 billion in prior-year accounting errors, a previously unreported $950 million in loans, and a $196.5 billion unrestricted deficit driven by pension and retiree obligations. It further had to note that the state’s Medicaid system helped create an $11.8 billion budget shortfall.

The 2025 state budget act partially addressed the Medicaid shortfall; one measure included an enrollment freeze, H.D. Palmer, spokesman for the California Department of Finance, told the Daily Signal.  

Palmer added that the administration directed the Labor and Workforce Development Agency to assess potential concepts to pay down the outstanding unemployment insurance loan balance. Regarding the $196.5 billion in unrestricted debt, Palmer said it is mostly for pensions. 

…In Alaska, auditors reported that the state’s Medicaid payment-processing system relies on outside contractors. However, it says the state failed to obtain independent assurance that the contractors’ financial controls were functioning effectively during fiscal year 2024.

You get the picture. Please follow the link to the article to get the rest of the list.

Your Tax Dollars At Work

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Actually, unless you live in Los Angeles, these are someone else’s tax dollars, but the fact remains that this is a total waste and abuse of the taxpayers’ money.

On Friday, The Daily Signal reported:

A convicted murderer and alleged gang member was being paid by Los Angeles taxpayers to patrol neighborhoods as a “peace ambassador” until federal authorities arrested him Friday morning. Now, city leaders are facing questions about how he got the job in the first place.

Michael Angel Alvarez, 41, aka “Diablo,” was arrested on Friday during a traffic stop for possession of body armor by a violent felon, a crime punishable by up to five years in prison. 

Alvarez was being paid by Los Angeles city tax dollars to patrol as a “peace ambassador,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.

A program launched by LA Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, peace ambassadors were meant to be a way “to support Angelenos in moments of crisis” by providing people who are not law enforcement to aid in non-emergency situations, according to Hernandez’s website. 

“Each team consists of two unarmed workers who have lived experience in the justice or gang systems and are trained in violence prevention and trauma-informed care,” the website states.

According to U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, Alvarez earned approximately $58,000 through the program last year. Essayli alleged that Alvarez maintained ties to the 18th Street gang while employed by the city.

I can actually see the value of having a former gang member act as an ambassador to the gangs, but I would want to be absolutely sure that the former gang member had a total change of heart and lifestyle. I also would not be willing to pay him for the work. There have been many people who have come out of very rough situations who have found a relationship with Jesus and totally turned their lives around. I am personally aware of two pastors who spent time in jail and do an awesome job as pastors. However, this is an individual thing, and simply holding out money without thoroughly checking the person’s current alliances is a really bad idea. If someone volunteered without being paid, that might be an indication of a heart that wanted to help.

Losing A Good Warrior

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On Friday, The Daily Signal (and the rest of the media) reported that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard will be resigning her post effective June 30. Her husband has an aggressive form of bone cancer, and the lady has her priorities in order–she is resigning to take care of him.

The article reports:

Gabbard says her husband, Abraham, “faces major challenges in the coming weeks and months,” and she “must step away from public service to be by his side and fully support him through this battle.”

“Unfortunately, I must submit my resignation, effective June 30, 2026,” the letter says.

Gabbard’s letter to the president adds that she is “deeply grateful for the trust you placed in me and for the opportunity to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence for the last year and a half.”

The intelligence chief believes she “made significant progress at the ODNI” over her tenure, which includes “advancing unprecedented transparency and restoring integrity in the intelligence community.”

During her tenure as director of national intelligence, Gabbard initiated a restructuring of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence called “ODNI 2.0,” with which she sought to right-size the intelligence community under the belief that the office had become bloated.

Gabbard also launched initiatives aimed at “eliminating politicization and weaponization within the intelligence community.” She dismissed, reassigned, or revoked security clearances from individuals in the intelligence community she believed were responsible for politicizing intelligence.

She has done an awesome job leading the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and will be missed.

Getting The Job Done Despite The Roadblocks

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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

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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

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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?

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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.