In Munich, on the margin of the NATO conference, 200,000 people took part in the largest rally so far against the Iranian Islamic regime. Inside Iran, after the killings of 36,500 protesters and the wounding of 300,000, demonstrators now restrict themselves to synchronized yelling against the regime from their apartment windows. Outside the country, the Iranians in exile from Toronto to Los Angeles to London declared themselves, in huge demonstrations, in favor of “Death to the Dictator” and “Long Live the Shah [Reza Pahlavi].” On the margin of the Munich Security Conference, 200,000 people took part in the largest single rally so far against the Iranian regime. More on this rally can be found here: “About 200,000 gather as Iran’s exiled prince Reza Pahlavi urges US action at Munich rally,” AFP, February 14, 2026:
The exiled son of Iran’s last shah said he was ready to lead the country to a “secular democratic future” at a rally in Munich on Saturday, after US President Donald Trump said a change of power would be the “best thing”….
US-based Reza Pahlavi, who has not returned to Iran since before the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the monarchy, told the crowd of around 200,000 people of his supporters that he could lead a transition.
The crown prince has assured everyone that he will not be an absolute ruler like his father, but only a constitutional monarch, on the British model, more of a figurehead to serve his countrymen as a unifying symbol. And if the Iranians were to decide that they don’t want him to be that unifying symbol once a new, democratic regime is installed, he is clearly perfectly happy to step down.
Pahlavi has urged Iranians at home and abroad to continue demonstrations against the authorities, calling on them to chant slogans from their homes and rooftops at 8:00 pm (1630 GMT) Saturday and Sunday {Feb.14 and 15], to coincide with protests in Germany and elsewhere.
Chanting anti-regime slogans from their homes and rooftops will keep those protesters alive and still able to express, by chanting from on high, their hatred of the regime.
Trump had said on Friday that a change of government in Iran would be the “best thing that could happen”, as he sent a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East to ratchet up military pressure on Tehran.
And 200,000 people echoed that sentiment in Munich on February 13. Did the voices from that mighty chorus reach Trump’s ear and strengthen his resolve to give the Iranians “the best thing that could happen” to them — that is, the overthrow of the regime that has been tormenting them for 47 years?
According to the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, at least 7,008 people, mostly protesters, were killed in the crackdown, though they and other rights groups warn the toll is likely far higher.
More than 53,000 people have been arrested, it added….
The latest figures on casualties compiled by Iranian exiles from their contacts inside Iran give a figure of 36,500 protesters killed, and more than 300,000 wounded.
The 200,000 people, almost all of them Iranians in exile, showed the strength of the anti-regime forces. In total, across Europe and North America, a total of almost two million people have shown up to demonstrate against the supreme leader. The crown prince was responsible for calling the protest.
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The January inflation reading offered encouraging signs for consumers and the U.S. economy, with the Consumer Price Index coming in below Wall Street expectations and falling to its lowest level in nine months. “Inflation fell to the lowest level since May, and key items such as food, gas and rent are cooling off,” Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, said in an email. “This will provide much-needed relief for middle-class and moderate-income families.”
Here are five takeaways from today’s CPI report, which tracks changes in prices of goods and services across the U.S. Inflation came in cooler than expected.
Friday’s report showed that inflation in January dipped to 2.4% on an annual basis, a shade below economists’ forecasts of 2.5%.
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A Texas philanthropist is abusing the nonprofit legal system to quietly fund Democratic priorities such as ranked-choice voting, a conservative watchdog group claims.
John Arnold’s Action Now Initiative pretends to be a social welfare organization to enjoy tax-exempt status while spending heavily on campaigns, American Accountability Foundation (AAF) alleged in an IRS complaint obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. In one instance, Action Now Initiative’s IRS filings seemingly failed to report hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on a 2020 ranked-choice voting campaign in Alaska, AAF told the agency Feb. 4, citing public records.
“Our organization fully complies with all applicable tax laws and reporting requirements, and any claim otherwise is false,” a spokesperson for Arnold Ventures, Arnold’s private company, told the DCNF in response to an inquiry sent to Action Now Initiative. Arnolds is also a board member at Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, its website shows.
Arnold’s organizations promote gun control, lenient criminal justice policies and “racial justice,” though he has portrayed himself as opposed to “partisan” politicians. Sixty-one percent of Arnold Ventures’ campaign donations went to Democrats in 2024, according to the database Open Secrets. Action Now Initiative’s website declares its goal of supporting “the mission of Arnold Ventures to MAXIMIZE OPPORTUNITY AND MINIMIZE INJUSTICE through evidence-based policy reform.”
Records show “substantial evidence of failure to report state political spending by [Arnold] to influence a successful ballot initiative in Alaska and him abusing the federal tax code to do it,” AAF told the IRS.
Action Now Initiative spent around $3 million in 2019 and 2020 on Alaska’s ranked-choice voting ballot initiative while reporting just $2,500 in expenses for 2019 and $8,693 for 2020 in IRS filings, AAF noted. The discrepancies “strongly indicate violations” of tax law, according to the watchdog group.
“While [Arnold’s] ideology is not itself unlawful, the use of a § 501(c)(4) entity to channel large-scale electoral spending — particularly when paired with materially incomplete federal reporting — constitutes an abuse of the social welfare form and warrants heightened enforcement scrutiny,” AAF wrote.
The complaint asks the IRS to investigate Action Now Initiative’s financial disclosures, decide whether it is improperly acting as a political organization and impose “all appropriate enforcement actions” if needed, such as revocation of its tax-exempt status. The IRS did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
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Iran will never agree to dismantle it’s nuclear program. Any deal that Iran’s leaders do sign with the Trump Administration, will be ripped to shreds as soon as President Trump leaves office in January 2029.
Only decisive military action by the U.S and Israel will prevent Iran from going nuclear.
President Trump must stop these insane negotiations with Iran’s leaders.
President Trump’s top advisors reportedly warned him that making a deal with Iran on its nuclear program is historically “difficult to impossible.”
Trump asked special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner what the chances were of reaching an agreement with Tehran, according to a senior US official, Israel’s Channel 12’s Barak Ravid said on Telegram Saturday.
The pair told the president history shows the West has never been able to strike a positive deal with the Islamic Republic leaders, but that they would continue to “take a tough line” during negotiations, Ravid reported.
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The U.S. Supreme Court will allow the federal government to freeze more than $4 billion in foreign aid payments that President Trump tried to cancel last month using a rare “pocket rescission.”
The justices voted 6-3 to grant the Trump administration’s emergency appeal, which stopped a lower court’s order to release the funds that had already been set aside.
A spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget said, “This is a huge win for restoring the President’s power to carry out his policies. Left-wing groups can no longer take over the president’s agenda.
The U.S. Supreme Court will allow the federal government to freeze more than $4 billion in foreign aid payments that President Trump tried to cancel last month using a rare “pocket rescission.”
The justices voted 6-3 to grant the Trump administration’s emergency appeal, which stopped a lower court’s order to release the funds that had already been set aside.
A spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget said, “This is a huge win for restoring the President’s power to carry out his policies. Left-wing groups can no longer take over the president’s agenda.
Most of the justices agreed that “the harms to the Executive’s conduct of foreign affairs appear to outweigh the potential harm faced by respondents.”
We recently learned that the founder of ‘Hot Girls for Zohran” is a Muslim man whose tweets defended Hamas and during the war tweeted, “Tell Iran we voting for a Muslim in NYC please let them know lmao.”
When asked to condemn his supporter, Mamdani refused to address the question and left the room.
He’ll have another shot because one of his appointees is even worse. The invaluable Canary Mission (you can see why Islamic and radical groups have been trying to criminalize its research work) has exposed some even uglier stuff.
Canary Mission profiled Achmat Akkad, describing him as a Mamdani appointee working as a ‘community engagement training specialist’ for the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Here are some of his views.
On June 1, 2025, Akkad posted on X: “Hamas is to Palestine what the National Liberation Front was to Algeria, the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola was to Angola, and Mau Mau were to Kenya. White people always hate the armed resistance groups born from illegal occupations but never the occupiers.”
“To save Israel, Zionists are leading the largest resurgence of white supremacy.”
“Jews that don’t support apartheid are safe. Zionist aren’t!”
And yes, he hates America too.
On June 21, 2025, during the Israeli and American war against Iran, Akkad posted on X: “The United States is the largest most powerful terrorist organization in the world.”
Akkad posted on X: “Americans are colonizers, and like all colonizers, their politics will always serve the interests of colonization…”
“I am a Black male with a Muslim name living in New York City. I am also LGBTQ, a veteran and Shiite.”
Achmat Akkad is a Communications and Special Projects Coordinator with NYC Veterans, and just one of the wonderfully diverse and talented Black Men of City Hall. Read more on Medium.
Nothing says wonderfully diverse and talented like supporting the murder of Jews.
Back then Achmat was listed as the “Communications and Special Projects Coordinator” at the Department of Veterans Services.
He seems to have moved up since.
This is the ‘Mamdanization’ of New York. This is what happened in London, Paris and other major cities. The upsurge of genocidal and terrorist rhetoric urging on greater violence and tearing apart society.
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SECRETARY RUBIO: Thank you very much. We gather here today as members of a historic alliance, an alliance that saved and changed the world. When this conference began in 1963, it was in a nation – actually, it was on a continent – that was divided against itself. The line between communism and freedom ran through the heart of Germany. The first barbed fences of the Berlin Wall had gone up just two years prior.
And just months before that first conference, before our predecessors first met here, here in Munich, the Cuban Missile Crisis had brought the world to the brink of nuclear destruction. Even as World War II still burned fresh in the memory of Americans and Europeans alike, we found ourselves staring down the barrel of a new global catastrophe – one with the potential for a new kind of destruction, more apocalyptic and final than anything before in the history of mankind.
At the time of that first gathering, Soviet communism was on the march. Thousands of years of Western civilization hung in the balance. At that time, victory was far from certain. But we were driven by a common purpose. We were unified not just by what we were fighting against; we were unified by what we were fighting for. And together, Europe and America prevailed and a continent was rebuilt. Our people prospered. In time, the East and West blocs were reunited. A civilization was once again made whole.
That infamous wall that had cleaved this nation into two came down, and with it an evil empire, and the East and West became one again. But the euphoria of this triumph led us to a dangerous delusion: that we had entered, quote, “the end of history;” that every nation would now be a liberal democracy; that the ties formed by trade and by commerce alone would now replace nationhood; that the rules-based global order – an overused term – would now replace the national interest; and that we would now live in a world without borders where everyone became a citizen of the world.
This was a foolish idea that ignored both human nature and it ignored the lessons of over 5,000 years of recorded human history. And it has cost us dearly. In this delusion, we embraced a dogmatic vision of free and unfettered trade, even as some nations protected their economies and subsidized their companies to systematically undercut ours – shuttering our plants, resulting in large parts of our societies being deindustrialized, shipping millions of working and middle-class jobs overseas, and handing control of our critical supply chains to both adversaries and rivals.
We increasingly outsourced our sovereignty to international institutions while many nations invested in massive welfare states at the cost of maintaining the ability to defend themselves. This, even as other countries have invested in the most rapid military buildup in all of human history and have not hesitated to use hard power to pursue their own interests. To appease a climate cult, we have imposed energy policies on ourselves that are impoverishing our people, even as our competitors exploit oil and coal and natural gas and anything else – not just to power their economies, but to use as leverage against our own.
And in a pursuit of a world without borders, we opened our doors to an unprecedented wave of mass migration that threatens the cohesion of our societies, the continuity of our culture, and the future of our people. We made these mistakes together, and now, together, we owe it to our people to face those facts and to move forward, to rebuild.
Under President Trump, the United States of America will once again take on the task of renewal and restoration, driven by a vision of a future as proud, as sovereign, and as vital as our civilization’s past. And while we are prepared, if necessary, to do this alone, it is our preference and it is our hope to do this together with you, our friends here in Europe.
For the United States and Europe, we belong together. America was founded 250 years ago, but the roots began here on this continent long before. The man who settled and built the nation of my birth arrived on our shores carrying the memories and the traditions and the Christian faith of their ancestors as a sacred inheritance, an unbreakable link between the old world and the new.
We are part of one civilization – Western civilization. We are bound to one another by the deepest bonds that nations could share, forged by centuries of shared history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen heir.
And so this is why we Americans may sometimes come off as a little direct and urgent in our counsel. This is why President Trump demands seriousness and reciprocity from our friends here in Europe. The reason why, my friends, is because we care deeply. We care deeply about your future and ours. And if at times we disagree, our disagreements come from our profound sense of concern about a Europe with which we are connected – not just economically, not just militarily. We are connected spiritually and we are connected culturally. We want Europe to be strong. We believe that Europe must survive, because the two great wars of the last century serve for us as history’s constant reminder that ultimately, our destiny is and will always be intertwined with yours, because we know – (applause) – because we know that the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own.
National security, which this conference is largely about, is not merely series of technical questions – how much we spend on defense or where, how we deploy it, these are important questions. They are. But they are not the fundamental one. The fundamental question we must answer at the outset is what exactly are we defending, because armies do not fight for abstractions. Armies fight for a people; armies fight for a nation. Armies fight for a way of life. And that is what we are defending: a great civilization that has every reason to be proud of its history, confident of its future, and aims to always be the master of its own economic and political destiny.
It was here in Europe where the ideas that planted the seeds of liberty that changed the world were born. It was here in Europe where the world – which gave the world the rule of law, the universities, and the scientific revolution. It was this continent that produced the genius of Mozart and Beethoven, of Dante and Shakespeare, of Michelangelo and Da Vinci, of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. And this is the place where the vaulted ceilings of the Sistine Chapel and the towering spires of the great cathedral in Cologne, they testify not just to the greatness of our past or to a faith in God that inspired these marvels. They foreshadow the wonders that await us in our future. But only if we are unapologetic in our heritage and proud of this common inheritance can we together begin the work of envisioning and shaping our economic and our political future.
Deindustrialization was not inevitable. It was a conscious policy choice, a decades-long economic undertaking that stripped our nations of their wealth, of their productive capacity, and of their independence. And the loss of our supply chain sovereignty was not a function of a prosperous and healthy system of global trade. It was foolish. It was a foolish but voluntary transformation of our economy that left us dependent on others for our needs and dangerously vulnerable to crisis.
Mass migration is not, was not, isn’t some fringe concern of little consequence. It was and continues to be a crisis which is transforming and destabilizing societies all across the West. Together we can reindustrialize our economies and rebuild our capacity to defend our people. But the work of this new alliance should not be focused just on military cooperation and reclaiming the industries of the past. It should also be focused on, together, advancing our mutual interests and new frontiers, unshackling our ingenuity, our creativity, and the dynamic spirit to build a new Western century. Commercial space travel and cutting-edge artificial intelligence; industrial automation and flex manufacturing; creating a Western supply chain for critical minerals not vulnerable to extortion from other powers; and a unified effort to compete for market share in the economies of the Global South. Together we can not only take back control of our own industries and supply chains – we can prosper in the areas that will define the 21st century.
But we must also gain control of our national borders. Controlling who and how many people enter our countries, this is not an expression of xenophobia. It is not hate. It is a fundamental act of national sovereignty. And the failure to do so is not just an abdication of one of our most basic duties owed to our people. It is an urgent threat to the fabric of our societies and the survival of our civilization itself.
And finally, we can no longer place the so-called global order above the vital interests of our people and our nations. We do not need to abandon the system of international cooperation we authored, and we don’t need to dismantle the global institutions of the old order that together we built. But these must be reformed. These must be rebuilt.
For example, the United Nations still has tremendous potential to be a tool for good in the world. But we cannot ignore that today, on the most pressing matters before us, it has no answers and has played virtually no role. It could not solve the war in Gaza. Instead, it was American leadership that freed captives from barbarians and brought about a fragile truce. It had not solved the war in Ukraine. It took American leadership and partnership with many of the countries here today just to bring the two sides to the table in search of a still-elusive peace.
It was powerless to constrain the nuclear program of radical Shia clerics in Tehran. That required 14 bombs dropped with precision from American B-2 bombers. And it was unable to address the threat to our security from a narcoterrorist dictator in Venezuela. Instead, it took American Special Forces to bring this fugitive to justice.
In a perfect world, all of these problems and more would be solved by diplomats and strongly worded resolutions. But we do not live in a perfect world, and we cannot continue to allow those who blatantly and openly threaten our citizens and endanger our global stability to shield themselves behind abstractions of international law which they themselves routinely violate.
This is the path that President Trump and the United States has embarked upon. It is the path we ask you here in Europe to join us on. It is a path we have walked together before and hope to walk together again. For five centuries, before the end of the Second World War, the West had been expanding – its missionaries, its pilgrims, its soldiers, its explorers pouring out from its shores to cross oceans, settle new continents, build vast empires extending out across the globe.
But in 1945, for the first time since the age of Columbus, it was contracting. Europe was in ruins. Half of it lived behind an Iron Curtain and the rest looked like it would soon follow. The great Western empires had entered into terminal decline, accelerated by godless communist revolutions and by anti-colonial uprisings that would transform the world and drape the red hammer and sickle across vast swaths of the map in the years to come.
Against that backdrop, then, as now, many came to believe that the West’s age of dominance had come to an end and that our future was destined to be a faint and feeble echo of our past. But together, our predecessors recognized that decline was a choice, and it was a choice they refused to make. This is what we did together once before, and this is what President Trump and the United States want to do again now, together with you.
And this is why we do not want our allies to be weak, because that makes us weaker. We want allies who can defend themselves so that no adversary will ever be tempted to test our collective strength. This is why we do not want our allies to be shackled by guilt and shame. We want allies who are proud of their culture and of their heritage, who understand that we are heirs to the same great and noble civilization, and who, together with us, are willing and able to defend it.
And this is why we do not want allies to rationalize the broken status quo rather than reckon with what is necessary to fix it, for we in America have no interest in being polite and orderly caretakers of the West’s managed decline. We do not seek to separate, but to revitalize an old friendship and renew the greatest civilization in human history. What we want is a reinvigorated alliance that recognizes that what has ailed our societies is not just a set of bad policies but a malaise of hopelessness and complacency. An alliance – the alliance that we want is one that is not paralyzed into inaction by fear – fear of climate change, fear of war, fear of technology. Instead, we want an alliance that boldly races into the future. And the only fear we have is the fear of the shame of not leaving our nations prouder, stronger, and wealthier for our children.
An alliance ready to defend our people, to safeguard our interests, and to preserve the freedom of action that allows us to shape our own destiny – not one that exists to operate a global welfare state and atone for the purported sins of past generations. An alliance that does not allow its power to be outsourced, constrained, or subordinated to systems beyond its control; one that does not depend on others for the critical necessities of its national life; and one that does not maintain the polite pretense that our way of life is just one among many and that asks for permission before it acts. And above all, an alliance based on the recognition that we, the West, have inherited together – what we have inherited together is something that is unique and distinctive and irreplaceable, because this, after all, is the very foundation of the transatlantic bond.
Acting together in this way, we will not just help recover a sane foreign policy. It will restore to us a clearer sense of ourselves. It will restore a place in the world, and in so doing, it will rebuke and deter the forces of civilizational erasure that today menace both America and Europe alike.
So in a time of headlines heralding the end of the transatlantic era, let it be known and clear to all that this is neither our goal nor our wish – because for us Americans, our home may be in the Western Hemisphere, but we will always be a child of Europe. (Applause.)
Our story began with an Italian explorer whose adventure into the great unknown to discover a new world brought Christianity to the Americas – and became the legend that defined the imagination of a our pioneer nation.
Our first colonies were built by English settlers, to whom we owe not just the language we speak but the whole of our political and legal system. Our frontiers were shaped by Scots-Irish – that proud, hearty clan from the hills of Ulster that gave us Davy Crockett and Mark Twain and Teddy Roosevelt and Neil Armstrong.
Our great midwestern heartland was built by German farmers and craftsmen who transformed empty plains into a global agricultural powerhouse – and by the way, dramatically upgraded the quality of American beer. (Laughter.)
Our expansion into the interior followed the footsteps of French fur traders and explorers whose names, by the way, still adorn the street signs and towns’ names all across the Mississippi Valley. Our horses, our ranches, our rodeos – the entire romance of the cowboy archetype that became synonymous with the American West – these were born in Spain. And our largest and most iconic city was named New Amsterdam before it was named New York.
And do you know that in the year that my country was founded, Lorenzo and Catalina Geroldi lived in Casale Monferrato in the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia. And Jose and Manuela Reina lived in Sevilla, Spain. I don’t know what, if anything, they knew about the 13 colonies which had gained their independence from the British empire, but here’s what I am certain of: They could have never imagined that 250 years later, one of their direct descendants would be back here today on this continent as the chief diplomat of that infant nation. And yet here I am, reminded by my own story that both our histories and our fates will always be linked.
Together we rebuilt a shattered continent in the wake of two devastating world wars. When we found ourselves divided once again by the Iron Curtain, the free West linked arms with the courageous dissidents struggling against tyranny in the East to defeat Soviet communism. We have fought against each other, then reconciled, then fought, then reconciled again. And we have bled and died side by side on battlefields from Kapyong to Kandahar.
And I am here today to leave it clear that America is charting the path for a new century of prosperity, and that once again we want to do it together with you, our cherished allies and our oldest friends. (Applause.)
We want to do it together with you, with a Europe that is proud of its heritage and of its history; with a Europe that has the spirit of creation of liberty that sent ships out into uncharted seas and birthed our civilization; with a Europe that has the means to defend itself and the will to survive. We should be proud of what we achieved together in the last century, but now we must confront and embrace the opportunities of a new one – because yesterday is over, the future is inevitable, and our destiny together awaits. Thank you. (Applause.)
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, I’m not sure you heard the sigh of relief through this hall when we were just listening to what I would interpret as a message of reassurance, of partnership. You spoke of intertwined relations between the United States and Europe – reminds me of statements made decades ago by your predecessors when the discussion was: is actually America a European power? Is America a power in Europe? Thank you for offering this message of reassurance about our partnership.
This is actually not the first time that Marco Rubio is here at the Munich Security Conference – been here before a couple of times, but it’s the first time he has been and he is the speaker as Secretary of State. So thank you again. We have only a couple of minutes now for just a few questions, and if I may, we collected questions from the audience.
One of the key issues here yesterday, today, is, of course – continues to be the question of how to deal with the war in Ukraine. Many of us in the discussions over the last day, the last 24 hours, have voiced their impression that the Russians – let me put it colloquially – the Russians are playing for time, they’re not really interested in a meaningful settlement. There is no indication that they’re willing to compromise on any of their maximalist objectives. Offer to us, if you could, your assessment of where we are and where you think we can go.
SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, I think where we are at this point is that the issues at play that have to be – here’s the good news. The good news is that the issues that need to be confronted to end this war have been narrowed. That’s the good news. The bad news is they’ve been narrowed to the hardest questions to answer, and work remains to be done in that front. I hear your point about – the answer is we don’t know. We don’t know the Russians are serious about ending the war; they say they are – and under what terms they were willing to do it and whether we can find terms that are acceptable to Ukraine that Russia will always agree to. But we’re going to continue to test it.
In the meantime, everything else continues to happen. The United States has imposed additional sanctions on Russia’s oil. In our conversations with India, we’ve gotten their commitment to stop buying additional Russian oil. Europe has taken its set of steps moving forward. The Pearl Program continues in which American weaponry is being sold for the Ukrainian war effort. So all these things continue. Nothing has stopped in the interim. So there’s no buying of time here in that regard.
What we can’t answer – but we’re going to continue to test – is whether there is an outcome that Ukraine can live with and that Russia will accept. And I would say it’s been elusive up to this point. We’ve made progress in the sense that for the first time, I think in years, at least at the technical level, there were military officials from both sides that met together last week, and there’ll be – and there’ll be meetings again on Tuesday, although it may not be the same group of people.
Look, we’re going to continue to do everything we can to play this role of bringing this war to an end. I don’t think anybody in this room would be against a negotiated settlement to this war so long as the conditions are just and sustainable. And that’s what we aim to achieve, and we’re going to continue to try to achieve it, even as all these other things continue to happen on the sanctions front and so forth.
QUESTION: Thank you very much. I’m sure if we had more time there were many questions on Ukraine. But let me conclude by asking a question about something entirely different. The next speaker here in just a couple of minutes will be the foreign minister of China. When you served in the Senate, sir, people considered you a kind of a China hawk.
SECRETARY RUBIO: So did they.
QUESTION: So did they?
SECRETARY RUBIO: Yeah.
QUESTION: The – we know that there will be, in about two months’ time, a summit meeting between President Trump and President Xi Jinping. Give us your expectation. Are you optimistic? Can there be a, quote/unquote, “deal” with China? What do you expect?
SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, I would say this. The two largest economies in the world, two of the big powers on the planet, we have an obligation to communicate with them and talk, and so do many of you on a bilateral basis as well. I mean, it would be geopolitical malpractice to not be in conversations with China. I would say this: because we’re two large countries with huge global interests, our national interests will often not align. Their national interests and ours will not align, and we owe it to the world to try to manage those as best we can, obviously avoiding conflict, both economic and worse. And that – so it’s important for us to have communications with them in that regard.
On areas in which our interests are aligned, I think we can work together to make positive impact on the world, and we seek opportunities to do that with them. So – but we have to have a relationship with China. And any of the countries represented here today are going to have to have a relationship with China, always understanding that nothing that we agree to could come at the expense of our national interest. And frankly, we expect China to act in their national interest, as we expect every nation-state to act in their national interest. And the goal of diplomacy is to try to navigate those times in which our national interests come into conflict with one another, always hoping to do it peacefully.
I think we also have a special obligation because whatever happens between the U.S. and China on trade has a global implication. So there are long-term challenges that we face that we’re going to have to confront that are going to be irritants in our relationship with China. That’s not just true for the United States; that’s true for the broader West. But I do think we need to try to manage those the best we can to avoid unnecessary friction if it’s possible. But no one is under any illusions. There are some fundamental challenges between our countries and between the West and China that will continue for the foreseeable future for a variety of reasons, and it’s some of the things we hope to work together with you on.
QUESTION: Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. We’ve run out of time. I’m sorry that I can’t take questions from all those who wanted to ask questions. Mr. Secretary of State, thank you for this message of reassurance. I think this is much appreciated here in the hall. Let’s offer a round of applause. (Applause.)
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-17 14:51:332026-02-17 14:51:33VIDEO: Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Munich Security Conference
Vance’s tone was urgent and paternalistic, made starker by the fact the U.S. was a child of Europe. However, he urged Europe not to fear its own voters, stunning the audience and forcing a reckoning with how Europe had strayed from its heritage of liberty, rooted in Enlightenment ideals but underpinned by centuries of Christian moral theology.
This initial punch landed hard, setting the stage for a year of what Rubio would later allude to as punishment for forsaking Western ideals in their governance. Under Trump, American policy shifted toward reciprocity. Trump demanded that NATO allies meet defense spending targets. He placed tariffs on European goods to counter unfair trade practices. The U.S. leveraged its military might to pressure Europe to implement reforms, including halting migration flows, securing its borders, and revitalizing industries.
While some countries balked at the requirements, seeing them only as punishments, the U.S. clearly regarded them as corrective measures for wrongs committed against its people and the ideals of Western civilization. It echoed biblical notions of chastisement as a means of growth. Vance’s speech was the verbal harbinger of this phase, exposing Europe’s neglect of its people and heritage.
But Europe needed to hear the U.S.’s rebuke of its failings. Without Vance’s speech, they wouldn’t have understood why Rubio’s address will go down in history (I hope) as the catalyst for a renewed Western civilization, one that doesn’t hate or feel ashamed of its heritage but embraces it as one of humanity’s greatest accomplishments.
Rubio’s 2026 address marked the redemptive second punch that brought Europe back into the fold. It built on Vance’s foundation but pivoted toward unity and renewal, rather than chastisement. He emphasized the importance of shared bonds and a path forward. He opened by invoking the MSC’s history amid Cold War divisions, celebrating the transatlantic alliance’s past triumphs over communism.
Still, Rubio didn’t hold back in acknowledging both the U.S. and Europe’s mutual mistakes in pushing deindustrialization, outsourcing our sovereignty, appeasing a climate change cult, and allowing unchecked mass migration that “threatens the cohesion of our societies, the continuity of our culture, and the future of our people.”
“We made these mistakes together, and now, together, we owe it to our people to face those facts and to move forward, to rebuild,” Rubio said, positioning the U.S. under Trump as a leader in this renewal, and inviting Europe to join not out of obligation but shared destiny.
“We care deeply about your future and ours,” Rubio said, “because we know that the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own.”
WATCH: Secretary Rubio Delivers Remarks to the Munich Security Conference in Munich, Germany. https://t.co/MSnxmlRf2w
Central to Rubio’s redemptive message was our shared Christian heritage. He wove it as the thread binding the West forever. He repeatedly invoked the West’s Christian faith as the “sacred inheritance” linking America and Europe. He credits it with the West’s cultural marvels, such as Mozart, Michelangelo, and the ideas of liberty and the rule of law.
Rubio argued that Western civilization’s pride and confidence stem from this heritage, and without it, the West risks civilizational erasure. Rubio framed Christianity’s universal truths of love, justice, and redemption as the West’s unique gift to humanity. He correctly warned that in a modern world threatened by authoritarianism, secularism, and cultural erosion, embracing our Christian heritage is the only salvation for the West.
Together, Vance and Rubio model a diplomacy that saves the West not through power but spiritual renewal. Grounded in Christian theology, this strategy reconnects the West to its heritage, ensuring survival amid contemporary perils. As Rubio eloquently put it, the West must be “unapologetic in our heritage and proud of this common inheritance” to shape a future worthy of its past.
It’s no surprise that this message landed with leaders in Europe. Despite their efforts to ignore or discount their heritage, it is part of what makes them unique and binds them forever to the U.S.
Many accuse the Trump administration of being isolationist. The idea was never to pit the U.S. against the world, but rather to expose the rest of the West to their failings and to offer them a path to renewal. Vance and Rubio showed the West the paths before them. It is now up to the leaders to decide if it will be punishment or redemption.
AUTHOR
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-17 14:51:322026-02-17 14:51:32ROOKE: Vance And Rubio Deliver One-Two Punch To Our Western Allies In Munich
A new Trump-aligned nonprofit is launching to fill a gap in enforcement of the president’s election integrity executive order.
Nicole Kelly, senior counsel at Lex Politica, the law firm that represents Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and other Republicans, is the president of a new 501(c)4 called Save Election Day to lead the fight in battleground states to implement the initiatives identified by President Donald Trump’s executive order last March.
“President Trump’s executive order that came out last March that really sparked the initial idea here because this organization was founded for one single purpose,” Kelly told The Daily Signal, “which we believe is existential to the future of the United States democracy, which is to lead the fight in the states to implement the key initiatives that were identified and outlined by President Trump.”
Save Election Day is particularly aimed at implementing several policies nationwide: one single Election Day; requirements of photo ID to vote; elimination or reduction of mail-in balloting and early voting periods; elimination of post-Election Day ballot receipt periods; and bans on noncitizen voting.
“This organization is specifically designed for state law and to lead the fight specifically in the states to implement the executive order,” Kelly said.
While other conservative groups have fought bad election laws with litigation, Kelly said Save Election Day will work to actually change those laws.
“This organization is actually going to be focused on changing the laws that are on the books through legislation, through ballot initiatives, through administrative actions, constitutional amendments,” Kelly said.
“It will, in some cases, necessarily involve litigation, just because, of course, Democrats are going to sue over some of the changes that they don’t want made in elections to clean them up,” she said, “but the focus here will be changing the law that’s on the books, so that when it comes to election integrity operations, whatever is being enforced is actually good law, not just trying to be defensive.”
While Kelly says conservative legal organizations have done great work in elections, the needle hasn’t moved enough.
“The president has a lot of passion and fervor, and we wanted that same energy for this type of organization to be very action oriented, to make sure that these very important election reforms are made,” she said.
While many states have already passed election reform, a lot of work remains, Kelly says.
Fourteen states currently do not require any ID to vote, and 11 states currently have ID requirements considered “weak,” allowing voters to sign an affidavit or vouch for identity without presenting photo ID or undergoing a signature comparison.
Furthermore, 14 states currently allow mail ballots to be received after Election Day, and 32 states lack any explicit noncitizen voting ban in their state constitutions.
“Our priorities are going to be battleground states that have significant impact for Republicans in 2026 and 2028,” Kelly said, “but again, and we’re not going to stop this mission until 50 out of 50 states have all of these tenants of the executive order implemented.”
While President Trump has been focusing on curbing Iran’s uranium enrichment program, the Israelis are much more worried about the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missiles. Iran has between 1,500 and 2,000 missiles still intact after the 12-Day War last June, when about 1,500 were destroyed, and its missile plants have been producing between 50 and 300 new missiles each month. The Israelis know that Iran’s nuclear program was severely damaged in that war, though not, as Trump said, “obliterated,” and will become a threat only in two years or more, but the ballistic missiles Iran possesses are a threat right now. Iran is racing to build more of those missiles, while Israel is racing to shore up its anti-missile defenses. More on both efforts, by Israel and by Iran, can be found here: “Iran Races to Rebuild Missile Arsenal, Israel Tests Upgraded Defenses Amid Fragile US Nuclear Talks,” by Ailin Vilches Arguello, Algemeiner, February 12, 2026:
As the prospect of renewed conflict looms, Iran is scrambling to restore its battered missile capabilities while Israel tests upgraded air defenses and accelerates military preparations for a potential confrontation.
Iran had 25 key sites housing long-range ballistic missile capabilities, 19 of which were struck during last June’s 12-day war, when the US and Israel bombed the regime’s nuclear facilities, according to Israel’s Channel 14.
The outlet’s latest report, drawing on satellite imagery, research by the Alma Institute for Middle Eastern Studies, and confirmations from security officials, reveals that all sites were equipped with underground infrastructure and suffered extensive surface and subterranean damage.
Yet, with the shadow of a new conflict looming, Iran has rushed to restore its shattered defense capabilities, reportedly completing some partial repairs already.
As of last month, the country’s main launch bases — whose surfaces suffered moderate to severe damage — appear to show clear signs of recovery and resumed operational activity.
However, Iran’s missile launch capacity remains limited by shortages of launchers and rocket fuel, even as it reportedly works to restore these critical components as well….
Washington and Tehran resumed negotiations last Friday in Oman, marking the first direct engagement between US and Iranian officials since nuclear talks collapsed after the 12-day war in June.
With the chances of a deal still uncertain, US President Donald Trump has simultaneously launched a massive military buildup in the Gulf, pressuring the Iranian regime to return to the negotiating table if it wants to prevent a potential conflict.
But Trump has reiterated he really wants to make a “deal,” and will do his damnedest to avoid having to attack Iran. The Israelis are alarmed by his apparent unwillingness to use force against Iran, for they believe there is no other way both to make Iran halt its nuclear program, and more importantly right now, to end its ballistic missile production and to limit the number of ballistic missiles it will keep from its current store.
Yes, the Iranians and the Israelis both know that Iran’s ballistic missile program is right now the most important issue for both. For it will take years for Iran to bring its nuclear program back up to the level it had reached just before the Twelve-Day War. And right now, Iran has 2,000 ballistic missiles ready to be launched at Israel, and the Islamic Republic is currently producing up to 300 more missiles each month. This is Israel’s nightmare: that it has so far been unable to convince Donald Trump, so dead-set on “making deals,” that the ballistic missile threat is an immediate one. Unlike after other meetings they have had in the past, Trump and Netanyahu did not meet with the press. Netanyahu released a laconic statement about his having stated Israel’s security concerns, and Trump said that he “insisted” to Netanyahu that the talks with Iran should continue. Netanyahu left the White House by a back entrance, to avoid having to talk to the press.
The Israelis can only hope that Iran sticks to its maximalist position, refuses to stop enriching uranium, and continues to hold onto the 400 kg. of uranium it has enriched to a level of 60%, one step below weapons-grade of 90%. And should Iran also continue its refusal to discuss the ballistic missile issue or its continued support for its terror group proxies, will Trump finally realize that the Iranians have been stringing him along in order to add to their store of missiles — missiles that threaten not just Israel, but American bases in the region, and Saudi oil facilities, and can even reach Europe? And if he does, not wanting to be played for a fool, will Trump, in a lucid interval, give the order many of us in the Western world are hoping for: bombs away.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-16 14:51:182026-02-16 14:51:18Iran Racing to Build More Ballistic Missiles; Israel Racing to Shore Up Its Anti-Missile Defenses
Here are 21 explosive facts about the Jeffrey Epstein case that have received scant attention, including some new facts from the DOJ and forensic experts who reviewed prison video footage on the night of Epstein’s death:
1) Bill Clinton claims that he “never visited” Epstein’s private island, but at least three people have stated that they saw Clinton on the island, including Virginia Giuffre (one of Epstein’s victims), Steve Scully (a worker on the island), and Doug Band (Clinton’s right-hand man during his post-presidency). Furthermore, White House visitor logs show that Epstein visited the Clinton White House at least 17 times while bringing at least eight different women with him.
2) Maria Farmer, who reported Jeffrey Epstein and his associates to the FBI for molesting children 3 decades ago, told CBS News that Epstein’s mansion in New York was loaded with hidden cameras. Describing a surveillance room with a large number of monitors, she said, “I looked on the cameras, and I saw toilet, toilet, bed, bed, toilet, bed.” She then asked Epstein “What do you do with this?” he replied, “I keep it. I keep everything in my safe.”
3) Two days after Epstein’s arrest in 2019, the DOJ sent a letter to a federal judge stating that a search of Epstein’s New York residence on the night of his arrest found “compact discs” in “a locked safe” with “hand-written labels” like “Girl pics nude” and “Young [Name] + [Name].”
4) An FBI agent testified at Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial that the FBI abandoned the contents of Epstein’s New York safe and left his home unguarded. When the FBI came back four days later, the contents of the safe were gone. This breach, which a veteran police detective described as violative of “basic protocols” and “unprecedented in my experience,” allowed one of Epstein’s most notorious accomplices to take and potentially scrub the evidence before handing it over to the feds.
5) Seven months after Epstein’s death, DOJ employees sent internal emails revealing that the search of Epstein’s New York mansion uncovered “approximately 40 devices that would have storage (computers, hard drives, thumb drives, etc.) and that’s not even counting at least 60+ CDs.” The emails also stated, “Notwithstanding their many promises to us about quick and effective processing of the 60+ devices they seized, the FBI is completely f*cking us on this.”
6) When the DOJ asked the FBI in 2025 for the “full and complete files related to Jeffrey Epstein,” the FBI withheld “thousands of pages of documents” and failed to disclose the “existence of these files.”
7) After the FBI arrested Epstein, federal prison officials placed him in a cell with a murderous, hulking ex-cop, which is a death trap for any child molester because they are frequently targeted by violent inmates. The cellmate, named Nicholas Tartaglione, was eventually convicted of torturing and strangling a man to death with a zip tie while making his nephew watch. He then took the nephew, another nephew, and a family friend of the man he murdered to a “remote wooded location, forced them to kneel, and executed them with gunshots to the back of the head.”
8) Less than two weeks after Epstein was placed in a cell with Tartaglione, prison guards found Epstein in the middle of the night in a semiconscious state with a rope and “friction marks” around his neck.
9) Despite a court order requiring the prison to preserve video surveillance footage near Epstein’s cell during the strangulation, federal prison officials failed to do so and also lost the backup due to “technical errors.”
10) Federal prison officials took Epstein off “suicide watch” just one day after the strangulation without determining whether Epstein was attacked by his cellmate or tried to commit suicide.
11) One day before Epstein’s death, federal prison officials removed his new cellmate and didn’t replace him. They did this even though a prison psychologist sent an email to over 70 prison staffers stating that Epstein “needs” a cellmate — a common suicide prevention measure.
12) While describing Jeffery Epstein as “arguably” one of the “most notorious” federal inmates, the DOJ Inspector General wrote that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons “provided” him “with the opportunity to take his own life.”
13) One day before Epstein’s death, a federal court unsealed more than 2,000 pages of lawsuit records that named and implicated wealthy and powerful people in Epstein’s child sex crimes, as well as federal officials in covering up the crimes. Among the named people were Palm Beach billionaire Glenn Dubin and his wife Eva Andersson-Dubin, Britain’s Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, former Democratic Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, former DNC Chairman Bill Richardson, artificial intelligence pioneer Marvin Minsky, and modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel — who was later arrested in France for sex trafficking and allegedly died of suicide in a high-security prison.
14) One day before Epstein’s death, federal prison officials permitted Epstein to make a completely unmonitored phone call in direct violation of prison policy under the patently false pretense that he was calling his mother, who had died 15 years earlier.
15) Federal officers placed a hoard of linens in Epstein’s cell, which is commonly prohibited because they can be used to create nooses.
16) Federal officers left Epstein alone in his cell for nearly eight hours on the night he died — despite the fact that they were required to check on all inmates in his unit “at least twice per hour” and were only 15 feet from Epstein’s cell.
17) Federal officers falsified records to show that they had checked on Epstein, a violation of federal law punishable by up to five years in prison.
18) Federal prosecutors “dismissed all charges pending against” the two officers who falsified the records and “declined” to prosecute others who “falsely certified inmate countslips and round sheets on the day before and the day of Epstein’s death.”
19) Federal prison officials failed to record footage from 9 of the 11 surveillance cameras around Epstein’s cell on the night of his death, including one that showed Epstein’s cell tier and cell door.
20) Contrary to multiple federal officials who claimed that footage from one of the working cameras proves that no one entered Epstein’s cell tier on the night of his death, forensic experts who reviewed the footage told CBS News that “there was no way to conclusively determine from the video whether an unseen visitor was or was not let into the Epstein unit.”
21) The FBI and DOJ state that “Epstein harmed over one thousand victims” but have provided no explanation of how he could have done all that with only one accomplice who has been prosecuted for these crimes (Ghislaine Maxwell).
All of these facts accord with the contention that others were complicit in the sex crimes and death of Jeffrey Epstein but have not been held accountable.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-16 14:51:172026-02-16 14:51:17JUST FACTS: Epstein Case Red Flags
The day is quickly coming, and is already here, says the Lord, when the United States of America will weep at night, tears from sea to once shining sea. Among all her mighty allies there will be none to comfort her; most have become her enemies, and what terribly few remain, have become like acquaintances.
Like a woman in harsh labor, America will find no resting place. The once golden pathways to her have grown dark and desolate. Her priests and ministers who once stood proudly in mighty pulpits now simply groan and spew empty words, and she lies in bitter anguish for all to see but many go about life in their bubble of being comfortably numb.
America’s foes have become bolden, her enemies no longer fear her and are at ease. The Lord has allowed increase grief because of her many sins. Her children no longer rise up and honor her. Her splendor has dimmed. Those who once stood in halls of honor and power are much like deer who no longer can find water or green pastures; in weakness they have fled and gone into hiding. There will be coming days of affliction and wandering, and many upon many will remember all the treasures that were so evident, that were so naturally American in days of old
America, a nation once a shining light to the world has sinned greatly and so has become unclean. Many who honored her now have become neutral, for they have truly now seen her nakedness; she herself groans at the sight and turns away. Her filthiness clings to her. She did not stop and consider her future given her uncleanness. Her fall from a standing of power and uniqueness is astounding, and there was no one to comfort her.
Her treasures have been scattered and taken. Pagan nations and tribes have entered her and set-up camps and altars throughout her land that once was reserved to honor Me, the Lord of her making. Her people will groan as they search for bread, they barter their few treasures remaining for food to keep themselves alive. The eyes of her people will overflow with tears, and no one is near to comfort her or her people, no one coming forward to restore her spirit, her dignity, her stature. America stretches out her hands, but there is no one to comfort her.
America will be brought to a place where she will cry-out aloud, ‘The Lord is righteous, He alone, yet I rebelled against His command. Listen, all you peoples; look upon my suffering and repent…I am deeply distressed, I am in torment, and my heart is greatly disturbed, for I have been most rebellious.’ All of her enemies have heard her distress, and they secretly laugh and rejoice.
Thus says the Lord, the One God, the Alpha and Omega.
Upon writing the message of the Lord you just read, He then reminded me of these truths.
The Lord looks for His true ministers and the people of His Remnant, to stand in the face of great calamity and proclaim His words. He wants His Watchmen to sound the Shofar of Warning for the day of His wrath and correction are quite near and have already begun across America. To those who He has given platforms to speak and teach, begin quickly to get His words out across the land, and, indeed, the world as you have been commissioned; to repent and come into submission (cooperation) with the plans I AM providing; plans that will give you a hope and a future. The Lord impressed upon me to remind His people, “I AM the Lord God, full of love and compassion that never fails when My people find their hope in Me, not man, not government, not systems of this world. Remind My people to seek Me now. Remind My people that My love and forgiveness are new every morning.”
BOOK: Our Forefathers Truly Appealed to Heaven – Barnes N Noble, Amazon, Walmart Books and now an eBook
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-16 14:51:162026-02-16 14:51:16A Message to Awaken Now Not Later
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Thursday committed “the single largest deregulatory action in U.S. history,” as EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin described it, by eliminating an Obama-era verdict against carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The 2009 Endangerment Finding functioned as the bottommost block in the Left’s Jenga tower of climate regulation, and the Trump administration hopes to save U.S. taxpayers more than $1.3 trillion by knocking it clear.
“The Trump EPA is strictly following the letter of the law,” Zeldin proclaimed, “returning commonsense to policy, delivering consumer choice to Americans, and advancing the American Dream.”
America’s two-decade mistake of treating carbon dioxide as a dangerous pollutant began during the Bush administration, when left-wing activists and progressive-leaning states sued the administration for not regulating carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act of 1963.
On April 2, 2007, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Massachusetts v. EPA, in which a 5-4 liberal majority determined that carbon dioxide was a pollutant under the Clean Air Act, finding that its definition includes “any physical, chemical … substance or matter which is emitted into or otherwise enters the ambient air” and “embraces all airborne compounds of whatever stripe.” It directed the EPA to study whether carbon dioxide was worthy of regulation.
Of course, carbon dioxide is not a pollutant under any common understanding of the word. A pollutant is a substance that contaminates the surrounding environment with something foreign or harmful — like an oil spill or the harmful compounds that cause acid rain. Carbon dioxide, however, is the primary product of human (and animal) respiration and the primary input to the photosynthesis of plants.
Along with water vapor (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2) is produced in any combustion reaction involving hydrocarbon-based (CHX) fuels and oxygen gas (O2) — whether in a simple fire or in cellular energy production. It is therefore the natural byproduct of any carbon-based form of energy production, whether by wood, charcoal, coal, natural gas, oil, or some other product.
However, on December 7, 2009, Obama administration EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson found that atmospheric carbon dioxide (and five other gaseous compounds) “threaten[ed] the public health and welfare of current and future generations.”
This finding “led to trillions of dollars in regulations that strangled entire sectors of the United States economy, including the American auto industry,” Zeldin lamented. “The Obama and Biden administrations used it to steamroll into existence a left-wing wish list of costly climate policies, electric vehicle mandates and other requirements that assaulted consumer choice and affordability.” Since then, the U.S. government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars propping up green energy projects that were not ready for economic prime time, leading to widespread blackouts and lost investment in impractical electric vehicles. At the same time, the endangerment finding has been used to rachet up the fuel efficiency requirements on cars, making those cars more expensive in the process.
However, the EPA cited two more recent Supreme Court decisions that it said justified its decision to rethink the law. The first was West Virginia v. EPA (2022), which struck down a Biden-era carbon tax scheme based on the Endangerment Finding on the ground that such “major questions” of policy should be decided by Congress, not an agency. In 2024, the Supreme Court issued Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which overruled the infamous Chevron test and reframed the level of deference due to agencies in rulemaking.
Following these decisions, President Trump issued a day-one executive order, “Unleashing American Energy.” In the order, Trump authorized an “immediate review of all agency actions that potentially burden the development of domestic energy resources,” which would include the 2009 Endangerment Finding.
The EPA’s decision came after an extended public comment period of 52 days, four days of virtual public hearings with testimony from more than 600 individuals, and approximately 572,000 public comments on the proposed rule. The extent of the feedback illustrates the magnitude of its consequences for American energy and business.
As a result of that review, the EPA concluded that the Clean Air Act “does not provide statutory authority for EPA to prescribe motor vehicle and engine emission standards in the manner previously utilized,” and therefore “the 2009 Endangerment Finding made by the Obama Administration exceeded the agency’s authority to combat ‘air pollution’ that harms public health and welfare, and that a policy decision of this magnitude, which carries sweeping economic and policy consequences, lies solely with Congress.”
Notably, the EPA ran “the same types of models utilized by the previous administrations and climate change zealots” and found that, “even if the U.S. were to eliminate all GHG emissions from all vehicles, there would be no material impact on global climate indicators through 2100.” The only effect such auto emissions standards would have is to make life more difficult for American consumers.
President Trump was present at the White House press conference announcing the EPA’s decision. “We are officially terminating the so-called endangerment finding, a disastrous Obama-era policy that severely damaged the American auto industry and massively drove up prices for American consumers,” he said. “This determination had no basis in fact — none whatsoever. And it had no basis in law. On the contrary, over the generations, fossil fuels have saved millions of lives and lifted billions of people out of poverty all over the world.”
Naturally, the left-wing response to the announcement was furious. NBC News memorialized the 2009 Endangerment Finding as “the legal finding that it [the EPA] has relied on for nearly two decades to limit the heat-trapping pollution that spews from vehicle tailpipes, oil refineries, and factories.” Unmentioned was the way that carbon dioxide also “spews” from human lungs with every exhalation, or the way that its “heat-trapping” quality prevents the earth from turning into the dark side of Mercury at night.
Of more substantial impact, major environmental groups have promised to challenge the decision’s legality. The Trump administration would likely have to ask the Supreme Court to overturn Massachusetts v. EPA.
In the meantime, however, the Trump administration has smashed the rule “referred to by some as the ‘Holy Grail’ of the ‘climate change religion,’” as Zeldin put it. It “didn’t just regulate emissions, it regulated and targeted the American dream,” he said. Even more fundamentally, the Trump administration has exonerated the essential, natural compound of carbon dioxide. As Interior Secretary Doug Burgum weighed in, “CO2 was never a pollutant.” And it should never have been regulated as one.
The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.
“They are programmed…,” Soviet defector and ex-KGB man Yuri Bezmenov warned decades ago about the ideologues we call “leftists.” “You cannot change their mind…. You are stuck with them.”
It’s common for people to say today when contrasting our two major ideological groups, “Conservatives think leftists are misguided; leftists think conservatives are evil.” I, though, am different.
I know leftists are evil.
That is, practically speaking. Theologically speaking, I’m not judging their souls or inborn nature. Putting it plainly, however, and alluding to the reality that leftists have embraced evil, I will say they are so. I’m going to now explain how they got that way, too, and why Bezmenov was right: You will never, ever change their minds.
One more caveat: Because what’s true in principle is not always true in the particular, there are exceptions to the above rule. This is evidenced by the leftists who get “red-pilled.” Now let’s proceed.
It’s common to hear warnings about the effects of modern education’s left-wing indoctrination. We’ve all heard the stories, too, about young people entering college seeming normal and then going haywire—and even, sometimes, disowning their parents over political differences. Yet believing education is the only, or even main, culprit misses much.
The proverbial saying goes, “Give me a child until he is seven, and I will show you the man.” Psychologist Nicolai Sennels, who worked with delinquent Muslim youths in Denmark, once explained that what’s inculcated into a kid during his first seven years can become almost unchangeable (i.e., you’re “stuck” with it). And the “age of reason” has traditionally been considered seven.
The point is that by this age a person’s foundation (emotional and in other dimensions) is already largely formed. This means, too, that most formation occurs before the child has any schooling. But what is happening, mainly, during this period?
Ancient Greek philosopher Plato explained it well. Children must be raised in an atmosphere of nobility and grace, he stated, so that—and this is the crux—he will develop an erotic (as in emotional) attachment to virtue. (Note: Virtue is “that set of objectively good moral habits.”)
This is important because during these tender years, the child is too cognitively immature to grasp virtue’s importance intellectually. Once this emotional attachment is established, however, upon reaching maturity the individual will be much more likely to accept the dictates of reason. (For example, “There’s no such thing as a free lunch” or “You’re not owed other people’s money.”)
This is just common sense, of course. We all know how significant the formative years are (ergo the term “formative”); thus is abuse, especially sexual, during this period so devastating. Little children are as sponges, absorbing whatever truths, tastes or toxins surround them; they are as wet clay, too, highly malleable.
And whatever the negative influences, the point is this: Do the opposite of Plato’s prescription and raise a child in a degraded atmosphere, and the result is the opposite: He develops an erotic attachment to vice. Upon then reaching the age of reason, he will generally be very unreasonable. He not only will be less likely to accept reason’s dictates, but they may be anathema to him.
Unfortunately, too, forging a child in vice is far easier than inculcating virtue because, left to themselves, things naturally move towards disorder. (Think here of a house or car left to sit for years without maintenance.) In the case of individual moral development, this leads to what theologians might call “disordered thinking.”
As you might’ve guessed, too, the weaned-on-vice children tend to become what we in our time call “leftists” (or low-virtue people, LVP). And this explains a common experience normal people often have when debating them:
You present a logical point and factual evidence—and the LVP rejects it, responding emotionally.
Bezmenov referenced this phenomenon thus: You cannot change such a person’s mind even when exposing him “to authentic information. …The facts tell nothing to him.”
It also explains why two young people will attend the same college, exposed to identical propaganda, but respond very differently. The first will perhaps go along to get along, but roll his eyes and emerge with his degree—and with sanity (and politics) unchanged or even improved, having been spurred on to growth via exposure to error.
The second will become a raving, perhaps violent “leftist.”
Most would say the latter changed, and perhaps he did. What’s for certain is that each young person embraced ideology that corresponded to his early-years-forged emotional/moral foundation. The first student retained ideas that aligned with virtue because he was essentially virtuous.
The second easily gravitated toward ideas aligning with vice because he was essentially vice-imbued, an LVP. You could say that his college “transformation” was just a matter of what with animals is called “instinctual drift.” Only a catalyst was necessary—and the professors and their “teaching” were it.
This helps explain, mind you, the “red-pilled” leftists who experience political conversion. They are very often not LVP, just temporarily deceived people. And when finally witnessing leftism’s ugly face—such as merciless “cancel culture” or unjust political violence—they are viscerally repelled and then gravitate toward where they finally realize the greater virtue resides: the so-called “right.” (Note: “Greater” doesn’t mean “complete.” It means those in question are higher-virtue people, HVP.)
This also explains findings such as those presented in Peter Schweizer’s 2008 article “Don’t listen to the liberals – Right-wingers really are nicer people, latest research shows.” But they are “nicer” because they are HVP.
Philosopher C.S. Lewis framed this LVP-HVP difference very well in his 1943 book The Abolition of Man.
“No justification of virtue will enable a man to be virtuous,” he warned. “Without the aid of trained emotions the intellect is powerless against the animal organism. I had sooner play cards against a man who was quite skeptical about ethics, but bred to believe that ‘a gentleman does not cheat’, than against an irreproachable moral philosopher who had been brought up among sharpers.”
“Conservatives” are more likely to be bred believing “a gentleman does not cheat”; leftists are more likely to have “been brought up among sharpers.”
Anyone fancying this mere partisan prejudice doesn’t have to take my word for it. Just listen to LVP Democrat operative Scott Foval. He himself admitted on hidden camera in 2016 that there “is a level of adherence to rules on the other side [Republicans] that only when you’re at the very highest level, do you get over.”
So this is why I say, and know, that in principle leftists are evil. If this sounds uncharitable to anyone, I’ll offer hope: Leftists, you don’t have to wallow in wickedness. You can begin that journey into the light and seek virtue anytime you wish. The choice is yours.
On another charitable note, you don’t have to be a “sharper” to raise a sharper-like child. Why not? Well, harking back to Plato and raising kids, does an “atmosphere of nobility and grace” at all describe our culture today? With vulgarity and perverse sexuality infusing virtually everything now, with “Bad Bunny” truly epitomizing a bad collective sense of virtue, we now have a culture of vice. You don’t need abusive parenting or corruptive schooling to yield an LVP (though it helps). Just expose the child, unfettered, to enough TV, internet, and popular music.
And this is why, my friends, I’ve said that we can’t MAGA unless we MAMA: Make America Moral Again. A vice-ridden culture begets vice-ridden people—who then gravitate toward vice-reflecting ideology.
It’s so simple, perfect and demonic a scheme for creating citizens “of intemperate minds” who’ll invite and deserve tyranny that the suspicious could almost think it’s a conspiracy, and suspicious theists could almost think it’s a conspiracy transcending man. For we’ve heard that “politics is downstream from culture,” but the cleverest beings know that culture is downstream and upstream from human hearts.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-16 13:51:172026-02-16 13:51:17Yes, Leftists are “Evil.” Here’s How They Got That Way—and Why You’ll Never Change Them
The Stonewall National Monument, located in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village, has become the epicenter of LGBT-related symbolism. Having been designated by President Obama in 2016, this is the location of the 1969 Stonewall Uprising, which many have argued to be the birthplace for the so-called LGBT rights movement. But now, the Trump administration has directed the National Park Service (NPS) to remove a large rainbow Pride flag from the monument, causing a flurry of both outrage and celebration.
The change came quietly over the weekend of February 7-9 in conjunction with a January 2026 memorandum from the Department of the Interior. Signed by NPS Acting Director Jessica Bowron, the guidance is meant to reinforce a longstanding federal policy that only the U.S. flag, the Department of the Interior flag, and the POW/MIA flag are permitted on NPS-managed flagpoles. While there are a narrow set of exceptions — like historical flags in context, military banners, or those of federally recognized tribal nations — there remains no special exemption for advocacy, activist, or identity-based symbols.
Predictably, leftist voices erupted in outrage. Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, for example, claimed in an Instagram post that the removal was part of an attempt to “erase” LGBT-related history, further noting that this very history “cannot” be erased, and that “our Pride flag will be raised again.” New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin (D) echoed this, calling it “a deliberate and cowardly attempt to erase that history” and “an attack on LGBTQ+ New Yorkers.” Menin insisted that “our history will not be rewritten, and our rights will not be rolled back.”
Government officials chimed in as well, with State Senator Erik Bottcher claiming the move was “a shameful attempt to rewrite history. Stonewall is where our community fought back and demanded to be seen. You cannot separate that place from the symbol that grew out of it.”
Yet despite this criticism, NPS officials have firmly emphasized that this isn’t about diminishing historical events. In a statement, they clarified: “Under government-wide guidance, including General Services Administration policy and Department of the Interior direction, only the U.S. flag and other congressionally or departmentally authorized flags are flown on NPS-managed flagpoles, with limited exceptions. Any changes to flag displays are made to ensure consistency with that guidance. Stonewall National Monument continues to preserve and interpret the site’s historic significance through exhibits and programs.”
Ultimately, this move aligns with broader efforts from President Donald Trump to eliminate what many view as preferential treatment in federal operations toward progressive ideologies — particularly during the Biden administration — and refocus on shared American symbols. As many have wondered, why fly one group’s flag on public land while denying others the same privilege? Some argue that this policy levels the playing field, especially for taxpayers, who are often forced to fund the favoritism of political or cultural causes.
Many supporters of the recent action have also argued that preserving history doesn’t require flying a modern advocacy flag year-round on federal property. The monument’s exhibits, signage, and educational programs remain intact, meaning that visitors will still learn about the Stonewall riots and their aftermath. Independent journalist Nick Sorter, for example, stated in a post on X how “the gay flag has NO BUSINESS being flown next to the American flag.”
In related developments, several conservative-led states have advanced or enacted their own legislation to ensure Pride and other ideological flags are not displayed in classrooms, government buildings, or on public property. The assertion is that these measures promote neutrality on public land and in taxpayer-funded institutions, preventing any one group from receiving preferential symbolic treatment while allowing focus on unifying American and state symbols.
Utah led the way as the first state to enact a comprehensive ban in 2025, which took effect in May of that year, by prohibiting schools and government entities from flying any flags outside a strict list, which included the U.S. flag, state flag, military/POW-MIA flags, tribal flags, university flags, and Olympic banners. The law restricts flags from being flown that represent both sides of the political spectrum — from Pride flags to others like MAGA or BLM symbols. Violators could face fines of up to $500 per day.
Idaho followed closely behind, passingbills in 2025. One restricted displays of flags representing “political viewpoints” such as sexual orientation or gender ideology, while another limited government entities to official flags only. Montana enacted similar restrictions through HB819, signed in May 2025, which stated that “government property, including state buildings and grounds, public schools, and other government-owned facilities, should serve neutral governmental functions and not be used to promote political or ideological advocacy.”
These state-level actions, which go beyond the states mentioned, mirror the Trump administration’s federal guidance at Stonewall: refocusing public institutions on shared national identity rather than divisive activism. And so, as critics frame this as an assault on rights, supporters see it as common-sense governance that puts America first, honors the flag that unites all Americans, and stops turning national landmarks into platforms for one-sided activism.
The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-15 13:51:192026-02-15 13:51:19Stonewall’s Rainbow Falls: Trump Pulls Pride Flag from ‘Birthplace’ of Modern LGBT Movement
Time is running out for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his repressive regime in the Islamic Republic of Iran. In fact, a unique window of opportunity for the Iranian people opens next week, and the Trump administration is likely preparing to lend support this time before the window closes yet again.
Like he did in early 2025, President Donald Trump is giving Iran a limited opportunity to negotiate a satisfactory solution. As in 2025, however, Iran has shown no signs of negotiating in good faith, indicating its reluctance to fully surrender their nuclear program and refusal to discuss a ballistic missile program that is an existential threat to Israel and a malign proxy network that has destabilized the region for decades.
The strategy of suppressing at home and threatening abroad has been an abject failure. Yet despite their weakness, the ayatollah and his loyalists appear more willing to face defeat than admit failure.
The United States and its allies and partners in the region have had a month to marshal offensive resources and array defensive measures. Meanwhile, the Iranian regime is using the same negotiating playbook of stalling, threatening, and avoiding while the possibility of strikes against them looms large.
Trading away their nuclear program would be to admit failure, and that is a bridge too far for a regime whose pride may be the only thing more motivating than its own survival. The Iranian nuclear program has been the centerpiece of the conceit of Iran’s leaders, worthy of up to a half trillion dollars of investment and opportunity cost. Even though the program was largely turned to rubble in one night last June by seven American B-2s, trading it away would acknowledge that the ayatollah and his loyalists have wasted the well-being of the Iranian people and squandered their future.
Next week, the 17th and the 18th of February specifically, mark the end of the 40-day mourning period for the thousands — if not tens of thousands — of protestors who were ruthlessly slaughtered by the Iranian regime in early January. Reports indicate that there is a surge of dissatisfaction simmering among the Iranian people, and these mourning people will uniquely combine large crowds with powerful passion. The United States is properly postured to support the protestors this time around and may see strikes as a catalyst to allow the bubbling frustration to burst forth yet again.
The preparations by the United States for such a situation are made even more evident by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the White House this week. A visit that had been scheduled for next week has been accelerated, indicating that preparations made next week may be too late. That the prime minister is bringing along his incoming air chief, an atypical plus-one for such a strategic meeting, is a telling indication of operational planning. Thus, the United States and Israel are telegraphing strategic steps that indicate a looming military operation.
Finally, President Trump’s credibility is on the line. After claims that the United States is “locked and loaded” — on top of presidential promises to protestors that “HELP IS ON ITS WAY” — Iran has blatantly exceeded Trump’s red lines. Without an active response that supports his claims, Trump realizes that his legacy will include a condemning asterisk of weakness. He is unlikely to allow such a blemish on his record.
Next week offers an opportunity where geopolitical pretext meets military preparation. Meanwhile, the Iranian regime negotiates in bad faith, creating a situation where they would rather face defeat instead of admitting failure. By using the same failed negotiating tactics, the repressive regime in Iran should expect the same ruinous outcome from a year ago, this time accompanied by a defeat that may allow the Iranian people to finally shed their repressive regime.
United States Air Force Brig. General (Ret.) John Teichert is a leading expert on foreign affairs and military strategy. He served as commander of Joint Base Andrews and Edwards Air Force Base, was the U.S. senior defense official to Iraq, and recently retired as the assistant deputy undersecretary of the Air Force for international affairs.
The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-15 13:51:182026-02-15 13:51:18Iran’s Ayatollah Is Facing Defeat instead of Admitting Failure
I have learned to trust my instincts and that when things don’t make sense something else is going on. America 1st President Donald J. Trump has done extraordinary things to strengthen the United States and Make America Great Again (MAGA). Journalist Joan Swirsky lists the extraordinary first-year accomplishments of President Trump ’45 (2016-2017) in her September 6, 2025, article posted on The Post & Email, “A Fitting Diagnosis: Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
The 2016-2017 Trump presidency was remarkable for its stunning accomplishments… high employment across all demographics, energy independence to last a thousand years, foreign actors paying their fair share into NATO (for the first time), a significantly strengthened U.S. Military, widespread deregulation resulting in billions of dollars saved, the unprecedented Abraham Accords in the Middle East that helped lessen long-standing Middle East tensions, expanding access to affordable healthcare choices, and lowering drug prices, on and on and on.
Swirsky continues listing the accomplishments of Trump ’47 with:
… employment is high, Wall St. is pipping and popping, cesspools of crime like D.C. are being cleaned up, illegal criminals are being deported, wars that raged on for years are being ended, vicious anti-Semitism in American colleges and universities is being aggressively sanctioned, but the derangement and obsessiveness only grow. In fact, writer Zoe Tillman documents that just since President Trump’s second term began this year [2026], 74 Lawsuits Have Already Been Filed. But records show that he has been largely successful in fighting this rabid lawfare onslaught by dozens of partisan leftwing judges, to the everlasting handwringing and hysteria of the Get Trump cabal.
The virulence with which President Trump’s steadfast commitment to his America 1st MAGA policies and protocols have been attacked by the radical leftist Democrat party and its globalist handlers is staggering. Yet recently there has been a deeply concerning shift in President Trump’s own Middle East policies and protocols that threaten his own America 1st MAGA commitments. We begin with President Trump’s steadfast commitment to peace in the Middle East and his unwavering commitment to the sovereignty of the State of Israel––the singular democracy in the Middle East.
The land of Israel is the seed and source of Western civilization where Judaism, the first monotheistic religion, was born over 3,000 years ago. Israel is also the birthplace of Jesus Christ, born a Jew who became the first Christian approximately 2,000 years ago. Israel is the birthplace of the Judeo-Christian infrastructure of Western civilization, and its global importance in geopolitical policies and protocols cannot be overstated. Islam, which came into being approximately 1400 years ago, six centuries after Christianity and sixteen centuries after Judaism, has laid its claim to Israel because Muslims consider Jerusalem the third holiest city after Mecca and Medina. According to Islamic doctrine the Prophet Muhammad’s Night Journey miraculously transported him from Mecca to the “Farthest Mosque” in Jerusalem where he prayed, ascended to heaven, and received instructions that include praying five times a day.
Doctrinal Islam is central to the illusiveness of peace in the Middle East (ME). All religions are not the same and all ideologies are not equal. The United States of America is the greatest experiment in individual freedom the world has ever known. It is the first system of governance to establish a separation between religion and state. This separation is an essential component of Americanism. Islam has no such separation. To the contrary, five-times-a-day prayer is a daily reminder to Muslims worldwide that no separation exists between their religious selves, their personal life, and Islam’s religious governmental authority. Religious sharia law governs all aspects of Muslim life; there is no individual freedom in Islam.
Islam is not a religion like any other. Islam is a theocracy. It is a supremacist, expansionist, binary, sociopolitical replacement ideology with a religious wing. Islam distinguishes itself in its founding 7th-century doctrinal text, the Qur’an, as the only “religion” on the planet that advances genocide against non-believers––Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians. For 1400 years Muslims have been taught that there will only be peace on Earth when all the world is Muslim, which means after the establishment of a global Islamic caliphate. The tactical method for achieving the Islamic caliphate is jihad which has two faces. Violent Islamic terrorism that specifically targets civilians, and polite stealth jihad that pretends peace while making war on non-believers using its twin signature tactics––taqiyya (lying in the service of Islam) and hudna (ceasefire pauses used to rearm, resupply, and reattack).
“Death to America” is not an empty threat, it is the expression of religious Islamic doctrine and its stated expansionist goal of establishing a worldwide Islamic caliphate. Israel is the West’s Middle East sentinel and bulwark against Islamic expansionism. President Trump’s steadfast commitment to his America 1st MAGA policies necessarily require support for Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East (ME) and the symbol of our Judeo-Christian tradition. The President’s recent shift in ME policy does not make sense and requires examination.
When things don’t make sense something else is going on––the shift.
1. After the savage October 7th (2023) Hamas invasion and attack on Israel, President Trump was squarely committed to protecting Israel, America’s ideological and strategic ally in the ME.
2. In September 2025 President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the Gaza Peace Plan. During the announcement President Trump specified that if Hamas does not accept the peace deal, “Israel would have my full backing to finish the job of destroying the threat of Hamas.” The announcement was reported on The Geller Report and posted on Dr. Rich Swier’s blog, September 30, 2025, “One of the Greatest Days Ever in Civilization”: Trump and Netanyahu’s Gaza Peace Plan.” The article includes the text of the plan:
Trump’s full 20-point plan to end Israel’s war in Gaza:
Gaza will be a deradicalized terror-free zone that does not pose a threat to its neighbors.
Gaza will be redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Gaza, who have suffered more than enough.
If both sides agree to this proposal, the war will immediately end. Israeli forces will withdraw to the agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release. During this time, all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal.
Within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement, all hostages, alive and deceased, will be returned.
Once all hostages are released, Israel will release 250 life sentence prisoners plus 1,700 Gazans who were detained after Oct. 7, 2023, including all women and children detained in that context. For every Israeli hostage whose remains are released, Israel will release the remains of 15 deceased Gazans.
Once all hostages are returned, Hamas members who commit to peaceful co-existence and to decommission their weapons will be given amnesty.
Upon acceptance of this agreement, full aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip. At a minimum, aid quantities will be consistent with what was included in the Jan. 19, 2025.
Entry of distribution and aid in the Gaza Strip will proceed without interference from the two parties.
Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic. … Trump will chair a supervising “Board of Peace” to oversee the new government, set to include and former British Prime Minister and others.
A Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energize Gaza will be created by convening a panel of experts who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East.
A special economic zone will be established with preferred tariff and access rates to be negotiated with participating countries.
No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return. We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza.
Hamas and other factions agree to not have any role in the governance of Gaza, directly, indirectly, or in any form.
A guarantee will be provided by regional partners to ensure that Hamas, and the factions, comply with their obligations and that New Gaza poses no threat to its neighbors or its people.
The United States will work with Arab and international partners to develop a temporary International Stabilization Force (ISF) to immediately deploy in Gaza.
Israel will not occupy or annex Gaza. As the ISF establishes control and stability, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will withdraw.
In the event Hamas delays or rejects this proposal, the above, including the scaled-up aid operation, will proceed in the terror-free areas handed over from the IDF to the ISF.
An interfaith dialogue process will be established based on the values of tolerance and peaceful co-existence to try and change mindsets and narratives of Palestinians and Israelis.
While Gaza re-development advances and when the PA reform program is faithfully carried out, the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.
The United States will establish a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a political horizon for peaceful and prosperous co-existence.
The article quotes President Trump:
The President also criticized the countries that “foolishly” recognized a Palestinian state but explained that they did so because “they’re tired of what’s been going on for so many decades. The Presidents and Prime Ministers, when they deal with the Middle East, talk about the same thing over and over.”
Reviewing the history leading up to the war, he recounted: “The Palestinians elected Hamas. Israel withdrew from Gaza, thinking they would live in peace, remember that? But that didn’t work out; there was the opposite of peace. I never forgot that, because I said, ‘That doesn’t sound like a good deal to me, as a real estate person, they gave up the ocean.’ They gave up the most magnificent piece of land in the Middle East and said all we want to do now is have peace, and that request was not honored.”
“Instead of a better life for the Palestinians, Hamas diverted resources to build over 400 miles of tunnels and terror infrastructure, rocket production facilities, and hid military command posts and launch sites in hospitals, schools, and mosques, so if you went after them, you’d end up knocking out a hospital, school, or a mosque.
“I challenge the Palestinians to take responsibility for their destiny.”
3. Hamas and Islamic Jihad immediately refused to disarm. An October 17, 2025, article by journalist Joshua Klein describes the situation, “Hamas and Islamic Jihad Defy Trump’s Ceasefire, ‘Negotiating with Himself’; No Disarmament Commitment.” President Trump’s 20-point peace plan was met with derision and disrespect from Mohammed Nazzal, a Jordanian-born senior Hamas politburo member based in Doha, Qatar:
Speaking Wednesday from Doha, where Hamas’s political leadership has resided for years, Nazzal went further — declaring Hamas intends to maintain armed control over Gaza indefinitely. “On the ground, Hamas will be present,” he stated, directly contradicting Trump’s plan requiring the terror group to cede all security functions to a technocratic civilian administration overseen by international monitors.
Islamic Jihad deputy secretary-general Muhammad Al-Hindi told Qatari news media outlet Al Jazeera, that “Hamas and the resistance have not agreed to disarm,” and dismissed Trump as “fundamentally ignorant of the region.”:
“He does not understand the history, beliefs, and culture of the region,” the Islamic Jihad official claimed, adding that Trump cares only about “deals and investments.” Al-Hindi also rewrote history entirely, claiming “Islam has been in the region for less than 1,400 years. Where was Israel 3,000 years ago? It existed for a little more than 70 years” — erasing millennia of Jewish civilization in the land of Israel.
President Trump responded:
On Thursday — one day after Nazzal’s interview and two days after Al-Hindi’s rejection — Trump escalated his ultimatum in response to Hamas’s continued killings and violations.
“If Hamas continues to kill people in Gaza, which was not the Deal, we will have no choice but to go in and kill them,” Trump wrote on Truth Social following a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The president also told reporters Thursday he expects Hamas to honor its word. “We have a commitment from them, and I assume they’re going to honor their commitment,” Trump said.
Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad have now made explicit they will not disarm until Palestinian statehood is achieved — inverting Trump’s framework entirely by demanding political concessions before security guarantees instead of the reverse.
That position is fundamentally irreconcilable with both Israel’s core security requirements and Trump’s peace plan, which makes immediate disarmament a precondition for any reconstruction or governance transition. Their defiance now threatens to collapse the agreement altogether — and Trump has made clear that further violations will be met with force.
Due to what they describe as the mediators’ leniency regarding Hamas’ refusal to disarm, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain have issued warnings that the effort to end the war is at risk of collapsing. Arab and US diplomatic sources confirmed to Israel Hayom that messages to this effect were sent by the Gulf states of the moderate Sunni axis to the White House and to the architects of the Gaza plan, President Donald Trump’s envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. …
In their latest communication with Washington, the Saudis warned that unless there is a decisive US response and a change in approach by the mediators—Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey—to enforce the plan’s terms on Hamas, Saudi Arabia will not participate in the continuation of the process. A Saudi diplomatic source confirmed to Israel Hayom that such messages were delivered to the Americans.
He said that for months Saudi Arabia has made clear its position: there is no viable solution to the war in Gaza or to the future of the Palestinians in general as long as Hamas remains part of the equation. “This organization has inflicted enormous harm on the Palestinian people, a war that led to the deaths of tens of thousands of its own, the destruction of the entire Gaza Strip, and now it insists on preserving the muqawama (armed resistance)?”
He added that it is “a resistance that has caused a catastrophe even worse than the Nakba. It is absolutely clear that Hamas will sabotage any force—Palestinian, Arab, or international—seeking to restore order in the Strip. As long as there is no serious move to eliminate Hamas’ influence and control over Gaza, there is no chance of its rehabilitation and reconstruction.”
In the messages sent to the US, it was explicitly stated that Saudi Arabia is downgrading its level of engagement in the implementation of the Trump plan, and that it is unlikely to attend the reconstruction conference Egypt plans to host next month.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Emirati ruler Mohammed bin Zayed did not attend the Sharm el-Sheikh meeting in Egypt hosted by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. According to a Saudi source, “Qatar was expected to help Hamas maintain its presence and return at an opportune moment.” This is a very credible statement considering Gatestone Institute contributing writer, Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury’s November 28, 2025 article, “Qatar’s Campus Conquest: Importing Muslim Brotherhood Policies in a War for the Future of the West.”
Qatar continues to conduct one of the most extensive foreign influence operations in modern history. Through hundreds of billions of dollars — estimated at up to a trillion dollars — funneled into Western universities, research centers, media platforms and political advocacy networks, Qatar has become the leading global patron of the Muslim Brotherhood in pushing an ideological agenda aimed at reshaping democratic societies from within.
New findings by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) show that Qatar’s funding is not benign philanthropy; it is a strategic investment in Islamist soft power, with far-reaching consequences for the United States, India, Europe, and beyond. According to a shocking new report by the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), as well as Jihad in America: The Grand Deception, a 2012 film by the Investigative Project on Terrorism, the Muslim Brotherhood, along with its major patron, Qatar, has a dangerous ideological agenda aimed at undermining the West from within.
5. Hamas (Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya, or Islamic Resistance Movement) was founded in 1987 and is an offshoot of the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. It’s 1988 Charter defines itself as “one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine” and states that the Brotherhood is the universal Islamic movement. Qatar donates huge sums of money and political support to both Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. Since 2012 it is estimated that Qatar has transferred over $1.8 billion to Gaza under Hamas rule and has been home to much of the Hamas senior leadership.
6. The Israeli hostages have finally been returned home to Israel, dead and alive, but Hamas has steadfastly and vociferously refused to disarm. In his February 6, 2026 report, “Former Israeli Hostage Revealed the Shocking Truth He Was Told by a Senior Hamas Official,” Avi Abelow quotes Segev Kalfon, who was “kidnapped from the Nova music festival and held for hundreds of days inside Hamas terror tunnels, has come out with testimony that should shatter every fantasy still floating around in diplomatic circles. Senior Hamas officials told him directly:
They have no problem promising Netanyahu that there would be no more October 7th massacres, as they would then massacre Jews on October 8th and October 9th instead.”
From Hamas’s perspective, concepts like peace, de-escalation, or restraint are not end goals but tactical language— deception used as a tool of strategy. They frame temporary truces as pauses—much like the early Islamic precedent of a hudna, a time-limited truce, exemplified in 628 with the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah when Muhammad agreed to a ceasefire with the Jewish tribe of Quraysh of Mecca after a failed confrontation. A pause that gave Muhammad the time to regroup and attack again at a later date, upon which he succeeded in conquering them.
President Trump’s envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff reflect a seismic shift in President Trump’s attitude toward Islam from naming it as an existential threat to managing it. Journalist Aynaz Anni Cyrus offers an incisive summary in her December 30, 2025 article, “When the Deal Replaces the Fight: Trump 2.0’s Islamist Turn.” I encourage you to read this important article in its entirety. I have excerpted the text below.
Tone and Narrative: From Naming Islam to Managing It
The difference between Trump’s campaign language in 2015 and 2016 and his presidential language in 2025 is not subtle. In his first run, he spoke openly about Islam as a civilizational problem, insisted on using the phrase “radical Islamic terrorism,” and attacked political leaders for sanitizing the threat. Naming the ideology was part of the message. Refusing to name it was framed as weakness.
In 2025, the vocabulary has changed. Trump’s speeches at the United Nations and across the Middle East emphasize peace, stability, and shared security. His partners now include Qatar, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and a post-Assad Syria led by a jihad commander. The language is managerial rather than confrontational. Islam is no longer described as a system that produces conflict, but as a world that must be balanced, negotiated with, and brought into functional arrangements.
Trump still speaks forcefully about border security and crime. He still uses harsh language when discussing migration and violence. But the target has shifted. The problem is no longer Islam as an ideological project with legal and theological demands. It is an abstract pool of bad actors from bad places, detached from doctrine, structure, or religious law. Meanwhile, specific Islamic regimes and Islamist actors are praised as partners, mediators, or guarantors of order.
The narrative shift is straightforward. Trump 1.0 cast himself as the barrier between Western civilization and political Islam. Trump 2.0 presents himself as the dealmaker who can integrate that same Islamic world into managed outcomes. The threat is no longer confronted. It is administered.
7. For me, the danger of the disparity between Trump ’45 and Trump ’47 is best understood with reference to an essential reference document, “The Explanatory Memorandum from the Archives of the Muslim Brotherhood in America.” My dear friend Valerie Price, owner, editor, and publisher of Act for Canada, provided the summary below to familiarize her readers with its content:
April 24, 2019
Dear Members of ACT! For Canada:
Most people understand the threat of Islamic terrorism. Far fewer, however, understand that terrorism is merely one strategy of Jihad – holy war against Islam’s enemies – and actually a relatively ineffective one. Terrorism alerts people to danger. Although it may scare them into submission, it may also unite them against an easily identifiable and morally clear threat.
There is another form of Islamic holy war that is far more subtle, sophisticated, and difficult to oppose. It is called civilizational Jihad and it operates through peaceful methods, seeking to weaken western peoples from within by leading them to under-estimate the threat of Islam.
Civilizational Jihad involves diffuse forces that mingle in civilian life, deploying propaganda and misinformation. It infiltrates the school system and the culture at large to indoctrinate the youth and the general public to misunderstand the intentions, objectives, and methods of Islamic supremacism. It encourages non-Muslims to welcome Islamic operatives into government and other positions of influence.
The “Explanatory Memorandum” of the Muslim Brotherhood is a short document that explains the intentions behind pre-conquest Islamic infiltration. The document was discovered by the F.B.I. in a secret sub-basement in the Virginia home of a top Muslim Brotherhood operative and was later published by the Center for Security Policy. It outlines Muslim Brotherhood goals and strategies to establish Shariah Law in North America, stating that its plan involves “eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house.” It provides a comprehensive strategy as well as a convenient list of 29 Muslim Brotherhood-controlled groups, many of them still in operation in North America today.
This short, clear document is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the determination and long-term tenacity of those who wish to fundamentally transform North American society.
The Explanatory Memorandum is a tactical manual for doctrinal Islamic expansion and conquest. It is the equivalent of reading The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx to understand the existential threat of communism. Israel is the bulwark against Islamic expansionism in the Middle East; the Muslim Brotherhood Explanatory Memorandum documents its civilizational jihad against the United States. This means that Qatar and every other Muslim nation that supports Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood are enemies of the United States. Trump ’45 understood the existential threat. What happened to Trump’47?
How is it possibly America 1st to embrace Qatar as an ally and peace partner?
This is a stunning revelation into the mind of Donald Trump. Just before the inauguration, Trump’s crypto company, World Liberty Financial, struck a secret deal with the head of security in the UAE for a 49% stake for $500 million. The quid pro quo was for Nvidia’s AI computer chips. The reverse quid pro quo is that Islam gains another foothold in America. Why is Trump unequally yoked with one of the worst violators of human rights in the world? If you dance with the devil, your clothes will get burned.
Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International describe the UAE as “severely restricted” in human rights: no elected legislature, no legal political opposition, no free speech, criminalization of most dissent, pervasive surveillance, and harsh treatment of activists and critics. In other words, it is a dictatorship. Other monarchies in the region are no better off.
Trump’s 2025 “Gulf investment tour” alone featured headline pledges of roughly $3.2 trillion dollars in announced deals and investment frameworks with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE—many overlapping with or reinforcing pre‑existing business relationships.
The Pax Silica Declaration was recently signed by the UAE and Qatar. Prospects are high that Saudi Arabia will join soon. Pax Silica tightly binds those nations to the US AI policies.
Trump is building his legacy as the Islamic President who bound America’s future to the mortal enemies of freedom and liberty. This is another level of the betrayal that we brought out in our book, The Final Betrayal: How Technocracy Destroyed America. This is not “Making America Great Again.” ⁃ Patrick Wood, Editor.
President Donald J. Trump and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff are co-founders emeritus of World Liberty Financial which is run by members of the Trump and Witkoff families. This, in my opinion, presents a serious financial conflict of interest regarding United States foreign policy in the ME in addition to doctrinal Islam’s ideological conflicts with our Judeo-Christian infrastructure and sovereignty.
* After Trump left office in 2021, Kushner quickly set up a new private equity firm, Affinity Partners, which raised over $3 billion in capital by 2022, with about $2 billion coming directly from the Saudi Public Investment fund, the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund.
* Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman serves as the chairman of the Public Investment Fund, and reportedly personally intervened to approve the investment and overruled a panel of advisors who called the sum “unsatisfactory in all aspects.”
* Kushner developed a close relationship with bin Salman while he served as a White House advisor during Trump’s presidency, helping to approve a $110 million weapons sale to the kingdom after it faced public backlash for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi—which the Department of National Intelligence later reported was directed by the crown prince.
Qatar’s particular role in civilizational jihad is in funding pro-Muslim anti-American educational indoctrination, a tactical operation of polite stealth jihad. Qatar has donated billions of dollars to buy chairs for “Islamic Studies” at universities which explains the pro-Muslim, antisemitic, anti-Israel, anti-Christian, anti-American indoctrination emanating from their curricula. Follow the money going to universities across America and you will understand the doctrinal roots of the anti-American sentiment of American students. This is civilizational jihad waged by Muslim nations that Trump ’45 knew were a threat.
Qatar’s funding includes buying media influence. Journalist Ariel Zilber explains in her December 11, 2025 article, “Dems rip Paramount Skydance’s hostile WBD bid over Saudi and Kushner-linked funding: report.” The recent hostile takeover bid of Paramount Skydance against Warner Bros. Discovery had backing from Saudi, Qatari, and UAE wealth funds and Jared Kushner’s private equity firm Affinity Partners. This is a national security threat. Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff should immediately be relieved of their duties as special envoys to the ME and should be replaced with Secretary of Defense Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth who represent and embody the America 1st MAGA principles that elected Trump ’45 and Trump ’47.
On September 29, 2025, President Trump issued a shocking executive order “Assuring the Security of the State of Qatar.” It is difficult to understand Trump ’47’s stupefying action that guarantees the security and territorial integrity of the State of Qatar––an ideological enemy of the United States––against external attack. Only President Donald J. Trump can resolve the disparity conundrum between Trump ’45 and Trump ’47.
President Trump needs to end the charade of “peace deals” in Gaza and return to his America 1st MAGA tone and narrative that recognizes the existential threat that Islam poses to the United States of America. Demography is destiny and Islam is a replacement ideology that threatens Western countries with uncontrolled Muslim immigration accompanied by its hostile supremacist Islamic doctrine and its five-times-a-day prayer asserting there will be peace on Earth when all the world is Muslim. The societal ramifications of this are enormous.
Multiculturalism is a fiction regarding Muslims because there is no multicultural tolerance in Islam. There is only Islamic compliance to sharia law. Business deals and peace deals are all made in service to Islam’s long-term religious imperative to make the world Muslim. The world is in a 21st-century religious war between the Western Judeo-Christian tradition and Islamic doctrinal expansionism that demands conversion or death. The Jewish State of Israel is the current target of Islamic expansionism, but it is the Christian United States of America that is Islam’s primary target.
Islamic expansionism is visible and very real in Western Europe. It forecasts the future of the United States if we do not stop Islamic infiltration and expansion in our government institutions, our educational institutions, and our political institutions.
The fall of Britain began with the election of London’s Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan in 2016. The parallel election of New York’s Muslim Mayor Zohran Mamdani in 2025 is the beginning of the end of America as a constitutional republic. Mamdani’s brazen rejection of U.S. Constitutional law in favor of Islamic sharia law is his opening salvo. The United States Constitution and Islamic sharia law have irreconcilable differences, and America must divorce herself from Islam.
The laws of every country define and reflect its culture. Creeping Islamism is incrementally redefining Americanism in its effort to Islamize and conquer the United States of America exactly as it is written in the Muslim Brotherhood Explanatory Memorandum––the Islamic manual for civilizational jihad in America.
Silence is no longer an option. It is time for all freedom-loving Americans to share and discuss this information with their family and friends. We must pressure our elected officials, including President Trump ’47, to reject Islamism and reclaim America to Make America Great Again!
Space Is No Longer the Final Frontier––Reality Is is available in paperback, hardback, and ebook formats on barnesandnoble.com, amazon.com, and directly from Ingram in paperback.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-15 12:51:262026-02-15 12:51:26The Conundrum of President Donald J. Trump
One key cause of elevated worst case needs is immigration. Between 2021 and 2024, the foreign-born population of the United States increased by more than 6 million—the largest such increase over such a short period in American history. The foreign-born population now stands at more than 53 million individuals, making up the highest share of the American population in history. This immigration-driven increase in households has contributed to a significant increase in housing demand, thus driving up housing prices. In fact, in some markets, immigration has accounted for nearly all of the increase in housing demand in recent years. This year’s report shows two realities. The first is that economic growth has been insufficient to lift the wages of low-income renting families high enough to make rent affordable. The second is that national macroeconomic policies, such as record immigration, have combined to drive sustained high rental demand, which has continued to place upward pressure on rent prices. As a result, in 2023, only 59 affordable units were available per 100 very low-income renter households, and only 38 units were available per 100 extremely low-income renter households. Worst case needs were common in every region and metropolitan category across the nation but most prevalent in the West, the South, and urban suburbs.
“AFFORDABILITY” IS THE CATCHY SLOGAN THAT IS SUPPOSED TO CONVINCE VOTERS THAT THE GOVERNMENT WILL TAKE CARE OF THE “FORGOTTEN MAN” WHO STRUGGLES DAILY TO PAY HIS BILLS AND TRY TO TAKE GOOD CARE OF HIS FAMILY. THIS IS A FRONT AND AN AFFRONT TO ALL OF US IN THE RUBRIC OF THE “FORGOTTEN MAN”; FOR OUR COSTS EXCEED OUR REVENUE UNLESS WE ARE SCRUPULOUS WITH EVERY EXPENSE, WITH NO UNANTICIPATED PROBLEMS ARISING.
EVEN AT GOODWILL, WHERE THE “FORGOTTEN MAN” MAKES INNUMERABLE PURCHASES OF NECESSARY ITEMS FOR THE FAMILY AND HOME FROM CLOTHING TO FURNITURE, PRICES HAVE DOUBLED! FOR INSTANCE, INFANTS’ CLOTHES HAVE HIKED FROM $.99 FOR A PAIR OF PANTS TO $1.99; PAJAMAS HAVE INCREASED FROM $1.99 TO $2.99; AND TOYS ONCE SELLING FOR $1.99 HAVE JUMPED TO $2.99 AND MORE. ALTHOUGH MANY BLAME THE “TARIFFS” FOR PRICE HIKES, GOODWILL’S ITEMS FOR SALE ARE DONATIONS, NOT SUBJECT TO TARIFFS BUT SUBJECT TO MORE-MONEY MOTIVES.
BEFORE THE VAST INFLUX OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION, GOODWILL HAD REGULAR SALES THAT OFFERED POOR AMERICAN FAMILIES RELIEF FROM MONETARY BURDENS. AFTER COUNTLESS CARTS PILED HIGH WITH GOODWILL SALES GOODS BY NON-ENGLISH SPEAKERS, ALL THE SALES AND DISCOUNT DAYS WERE DISCONTINUED.
The same politicians promising “affordability” for the struggling “forgotten” American family are simultaneously protesting against removals of illegal aliens from this country without regard to the overwhelming financial burdens on the “forgotten” Americans. When there is competition for affordable goods and services, the poor Americans lose!
At Wal-Mart, after-Christmas sales reduce costs by 75 percent, but non-English speakers flood the aisles, piling their carts with goods also needed by poor Americans. Again, when there is competition for affordable goods and services, the “forgotten” American loses. Likewise, for affordable housing, which becomes less affordable and less available for the “forgotten” American.
When there is competition for medical care, the “forgotten” poor American waits much longer for health services to be provided. When there is competition for medical supplies, the supplies run out or run low for “forgotten” poor Americans. Our insurance costs rise due to an influx of uninsured persons requiring medical care or government-paid medical care. Likewise, vehicle insurance costs escalate when uninsured drivers are involved in collisions.
In our schools, the influx of illegal alien children has caused costs to rise precipitously as well as communicable diseases in our classrooms. On the streets, rising crime rates cost the poor “forgotten” Americans money, health, and lives due to criminals who should never have been here with full access to hurt children whose lives were ended or harmed irreparably.
Key diseases reported in illegal immigrants include:
Tuberculosis (TB), HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis B and C, measles, scabies, and other bacterial infections.
The CDC traced 76% of TB cases in 2023 to non-U.S. born individuals.
Key Communicable Disease Concerns:
Tuberculosis (TB): Frequently cited as a significant concern, with reported increases in cases linked to international migration. Skin Infections & Parasites: Scabies, chickenpox, and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) have been reported, particularly in crowded, unsanitary conditions.
Vaccine-Preventable Diseases: Measles, polio, diphtheria, and pertussis.
Blood-borne Pathogens: HIV, Hepatitis B, and Hepatitis C.
Other Infections: Syphilis, gonorrhea, leprosy, typhoid, cholera, and malaria.
The costs of illegal immigration to the poor “forgotten” American family of all ages and locations across this nation are immeasurable and infinite in terms of generations of citizens who are impacted by massive illegal influxes of persons competing for the same finite goods, services, and money. The infinite economic, medical, and societal costs are incompatible with the slogan of “affordability.”
The American pie only has a set finite size, and the more pieces consumed, the smaller the size of each piece for the “forgotten” poor Americans who should have the rights to which they are Constitutionally-entitled. Unchecked competition against the rights of poor “forgotten” Americans are undemocratic, unfair, and unAmerican.
EXCLUSIVE: Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner slammed the Biden administration for what he called an illegal immigration and refugee crisis that rattled the housing market – particularly for low-income renters – though some analysts dispute the findings.
Every two years, HUD releases its “Worst Case Housing Needs Report” – considered the agency’s flagship assessment of the state of the housing market for low-income Americans – and how many lack affordable and adequate housing. The report serves as a nationwide barometer of housing stress and shows whether the availability of affordable housing is improving or worsening, and who may be being hurt by the current conditions, which Congress can then use to craft policy.
Policymakers use it to gauge gaps in the supply of low-cost rentals, target federal housing programs, and understand trends in who is being left behind. In short, it’s HUD’s way of tracking the renters in the greatest need — and how the U.S. housing system is failing to meet them.
Turner told Fox News Digital there are damning findings in this year’s assessment that he places right on the policies of former President Joe Biden’s immigration crisis.
“The unchecked illegal immigration and open borders policies allowed by the Biden administration continue to put significant strain on housing, pricing out American families,” Turner said.
“These policies have plagued America’s housing market, but in President Trump, Americans finally have a leader fighting to restore sanity to American immigration policy.”
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-15 12:51:242026-02-15 12:51:24“Affordability” and Illegal Immigration are Mutually-Exclusive: It’s the Math, Stupid
Last Friday, Florida began administering English-only driver’s license exams, only the fourth state to do so. English-only driving exams make the roads safer for all drivers, and every other state should follow suit.
Recently, the Florida Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles office announced that all driver’s license exams will be administered in English only, including all knowledge exams, commercial learner’s permit, and commercial driver’s license exams. All road signs are in English, so it’s common sense for all driving exams to only be administered in English.
In April, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to strengthen laws ensuring English proficiency for commercial drivers. Before Trump took office, English proficiency requirements were not enforced to obtain a commercial driver’s license.
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In 2016, under the Obama administration, commercial drivers who failed to prove proficiency in English, including reading and speaking English and understanding the road signs in English, were not prohibited from operating commercial vehicles.
The Biden administration launched the Commercial Motor Vehicle Operator Safety Training Grant Program in 2024, which included expanding commercial driving opportunities to refugees. Multiple people have died because of the lack of English-language proficiency enforcement.
In August, Harjinder Singh, a 28-year-old alien from India who illegally crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in 2018, killed three Floridians. He tried to make an illegal U-turn across all lanes of a highway, causing an SUV to crash into the truck.
Singh had obtained a commercial license in Washington state and California. The Department of Transportation revealed that he failed to prove proficiency in English, both on paper and in reading road signs. Singh was issued his Washington state commercial license in July 2023 and his California license in July 2024.
In December, Yisong Huang, a 54-year-old Chinese national who illegally entered the U.S. in 2023, killed a woman and injured two others in Tennessee when he crashed into a tractor-trailer while distracted by his phone.
Huang obtained a Class B license in New York under the Biden administration because he was provided with a Social Security card and work authorization papers.
According to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, Huang “failed a basic English test” but was issued a license earlier in 2025 anyway because he was given a Social Security card and work documents—both necessary to obtain a license—when he was released from U.S. Border Patrol after crossing illegally.
Last week, Bekzhan Beishekeev, a 30-year-old illegal alien from Kyrgyzstan, killed a family of four in Indiana. He obtained his commercial license in Pennsylvania.
If someone is incapable of taking a driving exam in the same language as the road signs, then that person should not be allowed to drive. Doing so puts American drivers at risk, which has, unfortunately, already happened.
Florida follows Oklahoma,South Dakota, and Wyoming as the fourth state to administer driving exams in English only. California offers its regular Class C driver’s license exam in 10 languages, including Chinese, Farsi, Punjabi, and Spanish. New York also offers its driver’s license exam in multiple languages, including Arabic, Bengali, Haitian Creole, and Urdu.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ move to make driver’s license exams in English only follows the Trump administration’s efforts to hold trucking companies accountable for hiring non-English-speaking drivers, which would also aid in preventing illegal aliens from being hired.
The Trump administration also arrested over 140 illegal alien truck drivers in Operation Midway Blitz, and thousands of truck drivers and commercial driver’s licenses have been affected for failing English proficiency.
Illegal aliens who enter our country are not authorized to work. Nor should they receive ill-gotten benefits subsequent to illegally entering the U.S., including a driver’s license or a commercial driver’s license.
To save lives, it is imperative that the Department of Transportation continue to remove every illegal alien driving with a commercial license from our roads. And states should ensure that all types of drivers can pass English-only road safety exams to receive a license.
Erin Schniederjan is a research assistant for homeland security and Asian studies at the Border Security and Immigration Center at The Heritage Foundation.
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And still the world……blames the Jews. It’s a societal sickness, a madness.
In his own chilling words, would-be Muslim terror mastermind Walid Saadaoui boasted of his twisted desire to massacre British Jews, saying he wanted to ‘run rivers of their impure blood’ — with any murdered Christians ‘a bonus’.
The Tunisian-born former hotel entertainer, who was allowed to live in this country after marrying a British holidaymaker, said a knife would not be enough to satisfy his lust for what he saw as ‘revenge’ for Israel’s military operations in Gaza.
Telling a fellow extremist known as Farouk that ‘only the automatic gun’ would be capable of inflicting the slaughter he was planning, Saadaoui said: ‘I want to kill as many as possible.
‘Jews have reason to be fearful,’ top police officer says. Jewish communities in the country ‘put up with a way of life that nobody else has to put up with’, a police chief has said.
Sir Stephen Watson, the Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police, said Jews ‘have more justification to be fearful than anybody else’, which needed to be addressed.
This is the moment a jihadist caught plotting the ‘worst ever’ terror attack on British Jews pledges allegiance to ISIS, saying they are ‘real Muslims’.
In a chilling reminder of how rising anti-Semitism since the October 7 massacre is fuelling violence against Jewish communities in the UK, migrants Amar Hussein and Walid Saadaoui had sought to buy a stash of firearms and over 900 rounds of ammunition.
But what police chiefs described as their ‘genuinely chilling’ plot was foiled by an ‘exceptionally brave’ undercover operative (UCO) sent to infiltrate the terror cell.
As the ‘committed terrorists’ were today jailed for a total of 63 years, the moment Hussein admitted he was an ISIS supporter was revealed.
Further new footage shows detectives finally telling Saadaoui that he has been duped, and that the man he regarded as an armourer and fellow terrorist has in fact been secretly recording all their conversations.
Jailing both men for life today, Mr Justice Mark Wall ordered Saadaoui to serve a minimum of 37 years and told Hussein he would spend at least 26 years in prison before being eligible for parole.
The judge commended the UCO for his bravery in bringing the pair to justice, saying: ‘His is a dangerous and difficult job and he undertook it with great skill and patience.
‘He has potentially saved very many lives by risking his own.’
Fuelled by a twisted desire to exact revenge for Israel’s military response to the Hamas atrocity on Britain’s streets, the extremists planned to gun down participants at a march against anti-Semitism in Manchester.
Harpreet Sandhu KC, prosecuting, told Preston Crown Court that the case had fallen between two other attacks on the Jewish community – one at a synagogue in Manchester and the other on Bondi Beach in Sydney – but stressed it ‘could have been very much more serious.’
‘I say this to demonstrate how widely affected the Jewish community and the world would have been had these terrorists’ ambitions been realised,’ the barrister added.
‘Had the preparations for mass murder been enacted, the defendants would have committed one of the deadliest attacks involving firearms in the UK’s history and certainly the worst firearms attack against the Jewish community.’
Tunisian-born Saadaoui – a former hotel entertainer who once ran an Italian restaurant in Great Yarmouth – and Hussein – who claimed to be a former Iraqi soldier and told police he was ‘proud’ to be a terrorist – planned to target schools and synagogues in the Manchester’s Jewish community.
The jihadists had spent six months in contact with ‘Abu Bilal’, unaware he was an undercover operative (UCO).
The UCO, who gave evidence under the pseudonym Farouk, duped them into believing a cache of assault rifles, handguns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition was being transported to the UK via a cross-Channel ferry.
He first engaged with Saadaoui online, then began meeting him in person, telling his bosses he believed ‘a lot of people’ would be killed if they failed to intervene.
Police were so worried about the UCO’s safety they established a huge armed operation to protect him.
Armed officers followed the UCO as he travelled with the men from Greater Manchester to the White Cliffs National Trust nature reserve near Dover, posing as tourists to observe the security checks at the port below, where the weapons were to be imported from France.
Assistant Chief Constable Rob Potts said the UCO ‘put himself in significant danger each time he met with two would-be terrorists. At any point he could have become a target himself.’
But he managed to conceal his identity and, unbeknown to the plotters, the apparently deadly arsenal consisted of deactivated guns.
Dramatic bodycam footage showed the moment officers pounced and arrested Saadaoui as he arrived for the handover in the car park of a Lancashire spa hotel on May 8, 2024, with a brief pursuit ensuing before he was dragged to the ground.
Simultaneously, Hussein was arrested at his electrical business.
Under questioning, Hussein – who told detectives he was ‘proud’ to be a terrorist – was asked if he supported ISIS, the bloodthirsty terrorist group also known as Islamic State.
Admitting he does, Hussein tells police: ‘All Muslims, they are hypocrites, but ISIS, they are real Muslims, they make Sharia.’
He later added: ‘I’m proud, be terrorist here, I’m proud. It’s not from us, god sent to us. We are army from god.’
At his own interview, Saadaoui is finally informed that he has been duped by ‘Abu Bilal’ and that he was in fact working undercover for counter-terror police.
The UCO was so convincing that initially, arrogant Saadaoui failed to believe them, adding: ‘I’ll still call him my mate cause I’ve bonded with him, he was a good guy.’
Breathing heavily at the bombshell news, he can be seen sticking to his story, telling detectives: ‘Whether he’s undercover or not, I was not expecting any guns to come over, I was not involved in any planning of harming people, and what I’ve said to you is true.’
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-15 12:51:222026-02-15 12:51:22Moment Muslim Migrants Caught Plotting to Kill ‘As Many Jews as Possible’ in UK’s ‘Worst Ever’ Terror Attack
