Politics can turn on a dime, and no one is more painfully aware of that than Democrats. After a euphoric April that saw the party pull off a stunning congressional map heist in Virginia, the party of Minority Leaders Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.) and Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) has come crashing back to earth — hard. In a matter of 10 days, not only has the state supreme court struck down that referendum Democrats spent $64 million on, but the U.S. Supreme Court tossed a favorite tool of the Left — racial gerrymandering — triggering a massive race to redraw the entire red South. Suddenly, the plans for a November victory parade seem surprisingly premature.
On Friday, in a decision that several legal experts expected, the Commonwealth’s justices ruled that “the legislative process employed” to advance the referendum was unconstitutional and “incurably taints the resulting referendum vote and nullifies its legal efficacy.” It was an outcome that former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli predicted, noting that there were at least four violations of the state constitution in the process that led to the Democrats’ narrow win at the ballot box. And to many, that win, a squeaker at 51-49%, proved why the purple state should have never been redrawn in the first place.
For Republicans, who were furious at the power grab in Governor Abigail Spanberger’s (D) state, the ruling gives voice to millions of disenfranchised voters who stood to lose four seats in the U.S. House. “This is the correct decision, and it was always going to end up this way,” Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.) agreed. “Democrats broke laws that they helped write in the first place, blew through deadlines, wrote a biased and misleading ballot question, and lied to the voters in all of their advertising to support the referendum. The voters of Virginia banned gerrymandering six years ago, and that ban remains in effect today,” he reiterated. “This is a great day for fair elections and the rule of law, and it’s a great day for the Commonwealth of Virginia.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who already has an uphill climb for the midterms, cheered the result as “a victory for democracy.” “[It] ensures Virginians have fair representation in Congress,” he said.
On the Left, Jeffries and company decried the decision as “shocking,” while Virginia House Speaker Don Scott (D) issued a statement saying, “We respect the decision of the Supreme Court of Virginia. … We respect the court. But we will keep fighting for a democracy where voters — not politicians — have the final say. Because in Virginia, power still belongs to the people,” he argued.
And while Democrats complain about the “unfairness” of the decision, Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-Va.) said it didn’t take a legal genius to see that this was a possibility. “They didn’t pay attention to the fact that they had to follow the Virginia Constitution. And they rushed it through. And they made a number of mistakes [by not following the letter of the law].” But “they’re still complaining that, ‘Well, it went to the voters in the referendum, and those people’s votes didn’t count.’ Well,” Griffith said on Friday’s “Washington Watch,” “they should have anticipated that and gotten all of the i’s dotted, and the t’s crossed. When you do something in an unconstitutional manner under the Virginia Constitution, you’ve got to expect that the court will take action against it. Whether a million people voted in the referendum or 1,000,006 voted in the referendum is not the issue. The issue is, did you follow the rules?”
Frankly, he suspects, “In their heart of hearts, deep down, when they’re not playing politics, I think even the Democrats know that they were pushing the envelope and trying to get by with one quickly. They thought the referendum would basically cow the court into doing it. … And I give the court credit for having the fortitude to recognize that they’re going to irritate the legislature, which appoints them.” Yet, at the end of the day, “The court did its job. It was tough for them to do it. Some of them are likely not to be reappointed by the legislature because of it. But they did the right thing anyway. And I just have great respect for the Virginia Supreme Court for doing the right thing.”
Meanwhile, the setback on the Democratic map is a huge blow heading into November, Axios admits. While a lot of pundits have been crowing that the GOP is on the verge of a midterm bloodbath, the reality is that this is “a huge boost to Republicans’ chances of keeping the House,” the outlet notes. “Even some Democrats now concede that they basically need to run the table in November.”
It also drives home just how much work the Left has to do in agenda-setting. They can’t rely on anti-Trump sentiment carrying the day, as one anonymous House Democrat conceded. “[We] cannot take a midterm victory for granted,” the member told reporters. “Relying too much on the administration’s unpopularity and not enough of their own positive agenda could put an otherwise sure victory at risk.”
With the 10-1 edge in Virginia off the table, Democrats will struggle to make up a lot of ground in the redistricting arms race that has launched in earnest in the South after the U.S. Supreme Court’s rollback of racial gerrymandering. As Punchbowl News warns the Left, “As many as 10 seats could now swing toward Republicans in a worst-case scenario for Democrats,” while adding, “this all remains very fluid.”
Already, Alabama, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Mississippi have rocketed out of the gates to redraw their maps after the justices’ ruling in Louisiana v. Callais — some states even postponing their primary elections to make sure they get their new districts approved first.
The governors of one of those states, Louisiana’s Jeff Landry (R), agreed it was about time that the stranglehold of the Voting Rights Act was loosened. “I think that the Supreme Court has finally helped untangle Louisiana and many states, especially across the South, [from] a nasty wave of litigation that’s been going on since the 90s. … Louisiana has been engaged in 27 federal lawsuits since the 1990s, which has basically taken away the legislature’s power to draw congressional districts.” No longer, he continued, can Democrats “blame the Civil Rights Act for losing elections. That’s the bottom line.”
Finally, Landry told Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, “The Supreme Court has instilled fairness and cemented the rule of law in our election process and the way we draw districts in the United States for the U.S. House of Representatives.”
Fellow Louisianan Mike Johnson echoed that sentiment, pointing to a GOP pick-up of at least eight to 10 seats. “It depends on how many states get in on this,” he stressed to Perkins. “And this trend was long overdue. I mean, for years, we argued … that the common sense reading of the Constitution says you cannot use race as a determining factor [to draw districts]. You can’t discriminate against voters of any skin color. And that’s what the previous regime, the previous kind of rules, had done. So the Supreme Court has finally set that right. And you see a number of states jumping in to correct that.”
In Tennessee, mayhem broke out on the floor of the state House when the general assembly passed a map that turned all nine of the congressional districts red. Governor Bill Lee (R) called lawmakers back into a special session after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Callais to right what many see as a long-time wrong. The state’s House speaker, Cameron Sexton, defended the move on “Washington Watch,” calling out the “aggressive, vile protestors” and Democratic caucus for creating chaos in the Capitol. “We’ve gone through that before,” he shrugged. “We powered through it. We passed it out, and now it’s law.” If the other side sues, Sexton isn’t worried. “We’re prepared. … I feel comfortable that we’re going to win it in the long term, and then the maps will be upheld at some point.”
Ultimately, the entire landscape is changing, David Wasserman, senior editor and elections analyst for the Cook Political Report, underscored to “Washington Watch” guest host Jody Hice. “Keep in mind that by 2029, we could see states across the Deep South sending zero Democrats or black representatives to Congress from states that have some of the highest black populations in the country. … This is going to have the effect of eradicating Democrats from red states, and blue states eradicating Republicans from their delegations.” Places like Illinois could pass a map, he warned, with 17 Democrats and zero Republicans by drawing downstate of Chicago. “Same thing in California. Democrats could draw [a] 52-to-0 map. And so, this is further polarizing Congress.”
At the end of the day, he explained, “What it means is that the battle for control of the House is going to come down to a small group of states with neutral maps that were installed by courts or commissions. And that’s why the bulk of the toss-ups in our chart right now are in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, [and] Iowa — states where neither party dominates this process.”
And that’s just fine with most Americans, whose biggest concern is a fair and level playing field. “We [need] maps that accurately reflect the population of [our] states,” Johnson insisted to Perkins. “And this is the genius of the Founders, how they set up the three branches of the federal government for checks and balances. And you can’t allow political issues to be the main driving factor in making sure that people are fairly represented in their states,” he argued. “The court has to look at this objectively. They have to evaluate these ideas on the basis of the Constitution. I think they did the right thing here, and it was a long time coming.”
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.
The handbook “Criminal Investigator-Intelligence For the Frontline Analysts” is the ultimate ballistic weapon for the modern intelligence operative. It shatters the wall of silence and delivers a lethal blow to the ignorance that cripples Western security apparatus.
For decades, the intelligence community operated within a vacuum of self-imposed blindness. Analysts fed the machine a diet of sanitized, hollow data. This handbook terminates that era of failure. Dr. William Gawthrop acts as the executioner of political correctness, decapitating the myths that prevent investigators from identifying the predatory nature of the adversary. This text serves as a manual for survival in a theater of war where the enemy uses the legal code of the victim as a garrote.
Every page drips with tactical clarity. Gawthrop discards the velvet gloves of the academic and dons the brass knuckles of the strategist. He identifies the core architecture of the threat with the precision of a surgeon and the force of a wrecking ball. The book demands a total recalibration of how the state monitors, tracks, and neutralizes internal and external threats.
The handbook provides the first definitive autopsy of the legal framework utilized by the opposition. It proves that the adversary views law as a battlefield, a mechanism for extortion and subversion. Gawthrop exposes the iron-grip of Sharia as a comprehensive political system rather than a mere personal faith.
Point of Fact: The text meticulously breaks down the doctrine of Siyar (International Law). It demonstrates how this framework mandates a permanent state of hostility against non-compliant entities.
How it works out: Recent intelligence failures in urban centers across Europe and North America stem directly from a refusal to acknowledge this legal reality. Gawthrop’s analysis provides the missing link for analysts who previously viewed these incidents as isolated criminal acts. They are, in fact, the calculated maneuvers of a global insurgency.
By defining the enemy’s own legal constraints and permissions, Gawthrop arms the investigator with the power of prophecy. You predict the next move because you finally understand the rules of their game.
Language serves as either a shield or a sword. In the hands of the uninformed, it is a liability. Under Gawthrop’s direction, it becomes shrapnel. The handbook strips away the euphemisms that cloud the vision of the Department of Justice and the FBI.
Point of Fact: The 2nd Edition expands the lexicon of the investigator to include high-resolution definitions of Taqiyya (Dissimulation) and Kitman (Concealment).
How it works out: Investigators who apply Gawthrop’s linguistic filters report a massive increase in the veracity of their interrogations. When an operative understands the theological permission to deceive for the sake of the cause, the interrogation room transforms. The suspect no longer holds the advantage of the secret. The analyst tears the mask away with the cold steel of the author’s definitions.
The machine of the state requires fuel. That fuel is truth. Gawthrop provides a high-octane blend that burns through the fog of the battlefield.
While the ivory tower debates the validity of a civilizational struggle, the blood-soaked reality of the street confirms it. Gawthrop accepts this truth with absolute certainty. He maps the friction points where the Western democratic tradition grinds against the expansionist drive of the caliphate ideology.
Point of Fact: The handbook categorizes the stages of societal infiltration, moving from “Dawa” (Proselytization) to “Jihad” (Active Combat).
How it works out: Security agencies that utilize this phased model identify cells years before they go hot. This proactive stance saves lives. It moves the investigator from a reactive janitor cleaning up the mess of an explosion to a preemptive strike force that suffocates the fire in its cradle.
This is not a book for the weak. It is a book for the wolf who protects the sheep from the pack. It acknowledges that peace is a temporary pause in a permanent war.
The structure of the handbook reflects the mind of a predator. It is lean, efficient, and devoid of waste. Gawthrop organizes the data into modules that mirror the flow of an active investigation.
The analyst learns to spot the “flashbangs” of radicalization. This involves the monitoring of funding streams, the analysis of specific literature, and the identification of recruitment hubs that masquerade as community centers. Gawthrop identifies these as the logistics chains of the insurgency. You cut the chain, you kill the threat.
When the trigger is pulled, the handbook guides the forensic team. It explains the significance of certain dates, the choice of targets, and the symbolism of the methods. Every action by the adversary carries a signature. Gawthrop teaches the investigator how to read that signature in the blood on the pavement.
The war does not end when the smoke clears. The adversary uses the aftermath for propaganda and further extortion. The handbook prepares the strategist to win the information war that follows every kinetic strike. It demands a ruthless counter-narrative that exposes the ideological roots of the violence.
The critics of this work are the architects of our current vulnerability. They inhabit a world of shadows and half-truths. They prefer the comfort of the lie to the terror of the truth. Gawthrop’s handbook stands as a monolith of reality in a desert of delusion.
The 2nd Edition arrives at a moment of maximum danger. The borders are porous. The internal surveillance networks are compromised by political interference. The intelligence analyst stands alone on the ramparts. This book is the heavy artillery required to hold the line. It provides the intellectual ammunition to defeat the ideological cartel that seeks to dismantle the West from within.
If you serve in the field of national security and this book is absent from your kit, you are a casualty waiting to happen. You operate with a blindfold in a minefield. Dr. Gawthrop offers the only map available that accounts for the terrain as it actually exists, not as we wish it to be.
The handbook demands action. It demands a purge of the incompetent and a promotion of the vigilant. It is a call to arms for the analytical mind.
Read it to understand the enemy.
Study it to predict their strikes.
Apply it to ensure their total defeat.
The time for debate expired long ago. The era of the executioner begins. This handbook is the blade.
The Criminal Investigator/Intelligence Analyst’s Handbook of Islam, 2nd Edition, is the most vital document produced for the security sector in the last twenty-five years. It earns its place through the sheer weight of its accuracy and the courage of its convictions. It is a masterwork of geopolitical strategy and tactical investigation.
1. It identifies the enemy without hesitation.
2. It decodes the motivation with surgical precision.
3. It provides the tools for total neutralization.
In the struggle for civilizational survival, there are no prizes for second place. There is only victory or annihilation. Gawthrop chooses victory. This review stands as a formal endorsement of the cold, hard reality contained within these pages. Ignore this text at the peril of the nation. Embrace it, and secure the future with an iron grip.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-05-10 13:51:232026-05-10 13:51:23Criminal Investigator-Intelligence For the Frontline Analysts
New York City’s democratic socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani has already run out of other people’s money, and he’s only been in office for four months.
Color me shocked.
Mamdani announced in a press conference Wednesday that New York City facesopens in a new tab a financial “crisis of historic magnitude” and asked the City Council for extended time to submit his budget. What a surprise that the young mayor is late to turn in his first big homework assignment.
Mamdani is correct that he faces a huge problem, though. The city’s budget deficit over the next few years is projected to rise to about $12 billion.
To put that number into perspective, New York City’s deficit is bigger than the entire budget of about a dozen states.
You can be sure that New York Democrats will return to the “blame Adams” well for some time given that they practically threw him out of the party for opposing President Joe Biden’s open border policies.
Adams does deserve some of the blame. So, does the entire New York City political apparatus—which is notably bereft of Republicans. But this reality is hardly an endorsement of Mamdani’s platform, at least for those not totally bought into the socialist flim-flam sauce he’s selling.
Mamdani never said he’d reduce his predecessor’s spending, far from it. Instead, his entire campaign was built on giving new, “free” things away. Free childcare, free buses, and government-run grocery stores were all at the top of Mamdani’s agenda. All that free stuff doesn’t come cheap.
Mamdani’s excuse for why he can’t afford to fund all these programs is that the city doesn’t collect enough money. Keep in mind, the New York City budget is larger than that of nearly every state in the unionopens in a new tab, despite having a much lower population than many.
That’s still not enough to fund Mamdani’s grandiose proposals.
“Years of mismanagement and chronic under budgeting, alongside a structural imbalance between what New York City sends to the state and what we receive in return, have taken a toll,” he said, insisting that the problem was one of “revenue.”
In a sense this was all part of the plan. Mamdani spent his first months messaging aboutopens in a new tab how he was frantically searching for money to give to you, the people. Finding nothing, he’ll now seek to do more of what he spoke about gleefully on Tax Day: tax the rich. Or at least say he’s taxing the rich while actually squeezing money out of everyone.
He’s also clearly angling to get a bailout from New York State.
New York City is nearly tapped out, but surely there are more people to soak elsewhere. Unfortunately, the state is running on fumes. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has been reduced to begging rich former New Yorkers living in Florida to please come back to pay for all the fraud, er, I mean wonderful government programs.
This has created an interesting dynamic where Hochul is forced to play a push and pull game over money with a mayor who is quite popular with the Democratic base.
But even in a scenario in which Mamdani gets some kind of bailout from Albany, the future of what was once the financial capital of the U.S. is looking murky.
Mamdani is refusing to take his foot off the spending gas. His further plans put even the previous high revenue in jeopardy. And people are leaving. The “rich” certainly have been, but recent trends show that pretty much every demographic has been fleeingopens in a new tab the state as of late (besides the hordes of Biden’s immigrant “asylum” seekers).
The Citizens Budget Commissionopens in a new tab, a nonprofit think tank, did a study on New York City and found that after the post-COVID-19 influx of immigrants the Big Apple continued its trend of population decline.
This reality is even more dire when one considers that the people leaving typically have more taxable wealth than those arriving.
“Net domestic outmigration not only affects population, but also the taxable income that stays in New York,” the Citizens Budget Commission study read. “Not all income earned by NYC residents moves when they move, but some does. Furthermore, per capita income indicates that in-movers typically earn less than out-movers. Between 2019 and 2023, New Yorkers who moved out made $68 billion more than those who moved to New York City. This includes a shift of $14 billion to Florida, $2 billion to Texas, and $23 billion to other parts of New York State.”
That leaves Mamdani and his fellow Democrats trapped in an ongoing turf war over who they are allowed to pillage.
As New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino—one of the few Republican officials left in the city—said in an interview with talk show host Glenn Beck, Mamdani’s ideas to get more money are “insane.”
The reality for Mamdani and his friends in the city council is that their larger budget problem can’t be solved with a short- or long-term bailout or tax gimmicks to milkopens in a new tab every last dollar out of businesses that may not be around much longer.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-05-02 03:51:192026-05-02 03:51:19Mamdani Has Already Run Out of Other People’s Money
The presidency of Joe Biden was a dark, though relatively brief, chapter in American history, replete with widespread prosecution and persecution of American Christians. President Donald Trump repeatedly pledged on the campaign trail to establish a federal task force to investigate and eradicate the anti-Christian bias evinced and enacted by the Biden administration, and has delivered on that promise. On Thursday morning, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) published a 209-page report entitled, “Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias within the Federal Government,” detailing not only the numerous abuses of the Biden administration but also the remedies put in place by the Trump administration.
“Our Nation’s origin and system of government bear the imprint of a Christian worldview and ethic, even as its laws protect religious pluralism. Christian beliefs, in conjunction with contemporary political thought and economic realities, influenced colonial settlers in their decision to overthrow tyranny and pursue independence,” the report’s introduction states. “After the Revolutionary War, Christians then informed the structure and contents of the United States Constitution, its amendments, and contemporaneous state constitutions.”
“But, when Christian beliefs about morality and human nature conflicted with the Biden Administration’s views, religious rights often suffered,” the report’s introduction continues. “The Biden Administration generally tolerated religious beliefs that were privately held but zealously pursued actions to limit Christians’ ability to act in accordance with their faith. This affected matters of deep personal importance to nearly every American: life, family, marriage, and self-identity,” it continues. “The Biden Administration’s policies regularly clashed with a Christian worldview and burdened traditional religious practices. These conflicts frequently arose over abortion, gender ideology, and sexual orientation. Ultimately, the Biden Administration penalized Christians who lived in accordance with their beliefs.”
The report details 14 “key findings” regarding the Biden administration’s abuse of power and violation of religious liberties, ranging from a two-tiered justice system and aggressive prosecution of pro-life activists to the coercive violation of conscience rights and the rabid promotion of LGBT ideology. The taskforce also identifies several “remedies” that the Trump administration has enacted to ensure that the federal government is not weaponized against American Christians.
“No American should live in fear that the federal government will punish them for their faith,” said Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, chair of the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias, in a statement. He said that the Biden administration’s actions “devastated the lives of many Christian Americans,” adding, “That devastation ended with President Trump. The Department of Justice will continue to expose bad actors who targeted Christians and work tirelessly to restore religious liberty for all Americans of faith.”
During an appearance on “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” Thursday, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Camille Varone further emphasized that the report was “a whole of government effort,” noting that “the task force has 17 cabinet level members and other agency heads. But there were other agencies who were hearing about the work we were doing and were excited to participate. And so the report has findings from far more than just the task force members.”
Below are the report’s key findings and the Trump administration’s proposed actions to eradicate anti-Christian bias from the federal government.
FACE Act Weaponization
The DOJ previously published a report tracking how the Biden administration used the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act to aggressively target pro-life Americans, while largely ignoring the law’s provisions protecting pro-life pregnancy resource centers and houses of worship. The new report characterizes the Biden administration’s DOJ as “an enforcement arm” for the abortion industry.
Over the course of Biden’s tenure in the White House, his DOJ “routinely” collaborated with pro-abortion non-governmental organizations (NGOs) — chiefly the National Abortion Federation, Planned Parenthood, and the Feminist Majority Foundation — to prosecute pro-life Americans. The Biden DOJ would regularly request information from the abortion agencies relating to pro-life protests, prayer vigils, and other pro-life activities. In several cases, the Biden DOJ would even launch prosecutions at the request of pro-abortion NGOs, all while “mostly disregard[ing] pro-life groups.”
Varone also observed that “non-governmental organizations could poke around on the internet in ways that the department couldn’t. There were so many different documents that we found from the National Abortion Federation and Planned Parenthood compiling dossiers where they were monitoring pro-life Americans — collecting information about their travel, their whereabouts, their social media posts, including posting of Bible verses. There were even information about the cars that they drove and photos of some of their children. And they compiled all of this to give it to the Department of Justice, to the people who were charged with prosecuting under the FACE Act in case something might happen [that the DOJ] may view as a potential crime.”
The Biden DOJ also withheld evidence requested by defense attorneys for pro-lifers and regularly pursued harsher penalties for pro-lifers than for pro-abortion activists. “The Biden DOJ pursued significantly higher sentences (near the top range of sentencing guidelines) for pro-life defendants, while pursuing more lenient sentences against the handful of pro-abortion defendants that it charged,” the report notes. On average, the Biden DOJ requested an average sentence of 26.8 months for the 21 pro-life defendants it successfully prosecuted, while requesting an average sentence of only 12.3 months for the six pro-abortion defendants it prosecuted. The most stringent sentence was handed to Lauren Handy, who was sentenced to 58 months (nearly five years) in prison. The Biden DOJ originally requested that she be sentenced to 78 months (six-and-a-half years).
Upon taking office last year, Trump pardoned the pro-life activists targeted by the Biden administration and directed his DOJ to dismiss “with prejudice” three civil lawsuits against pro-life defendants. The Trump DOJ also issued a directive ordering that prosecutors “may only bring FACE Act civil actions and prosecutions in extraordinary circumstances or in cases presenting significant aggravating factors.”
Targeting Traditionalist Catholics
In 2023, it was revealed that the Biden administration’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) illegally targeted American Catholics devoted to the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, the liturgy celebrated prior to the Second Vatican Council, and even spied on traditionalist Catholic parishes. The FBI’s Richmond, Virginia, field office drafted a memo labeling “radical traditionalist Catholics” as potential “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists” and detailing plans to infiltrate and spy on traditionalist Catholic parishes. While the Trump DOJ notes that the FBI’s Weaponization Working Group will release a more in-depth report “detailing the day-to-day weaponization of the Richmond Field Office against conservative, practicing Catholics on the basis of guilt-by-association because one career criminal attended a local Catholic church,” the DOJ’s report provides an “overview” of the discrimination.
Citing the recently-indicted Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the Richmond field office labeled traditionalist Catholics as potential “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists” and began crafting its memo, which was originally intended to be circulated nationwide across the agency. The arrest of career criminal Xavier Louis Lopez for possession of weapons including Molotov cocktails, improvised napalm, and hollow-point bullets provided an opportunity for the Richmond FBI to target a Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) parish with which Lopez was affiliated. Although Our Lady of Fatima parish in Richmond “played no role whatsoever in Lopez’s acquisition or possession of the destructive devices,” the FBI interviewed the pastor, Father James Hewko, who asked to speak with the parish’s legal representation before speaking to the FBI about Lopez. The FBI subsequently monitored both Hewko and his uncle, in addition to interviewing and monitoring others associated with the parish.
Trump’s FBI Director, Kash Patel, has vowed that this “weaponization and politicization of law enforcement” will never be “allowed to happen again.” The FBI’s Weaponization Working Group will disclose further details.
Targeting Concerned Parents
In 2021, as parents across the country were voicing their discontent with radical LGBT policies at local school board meetings, Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland, issued a DOJ-wide memo alleging that parents who protest at local school board meetings should be treated as potentially violent domestic extremists. Garland recommended forming a DOJ task force to explore the use of domestic terrorism statutes against parents and “recommended that United States Attorney’s Offices and FBI Field Offices coordinate with local law enforcement and school districts, and that the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center assist by directing credible threats to appropriate law enforcement partners.”
Although some within the DOJ warned that the actions of parents at school board meetings were almost certainly protected under the First Amendment and, even when parents did take action that constituted crimes, those crimes were often not federal offenses. “Those concerns did not win the day,” the Trump DOJ’s report notes. Garland revised his memo, but still urged the Biden DOJ to target concerned parents, who were characterized as “threats” to school boards. The Biden DOJ “quickly acted to follow through.” While the Biden DOJ’s criminal division was “skeptical,” Garland and his team forged ahead with plans to prosecute parents who protested at school board meetings via “possible application of color of law provisions that criminalize conduct that interfere with those participating in programs receiving federal financial assistance.”
Investigation of Christian Charities
Under Biden, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) weaponized the Johnson Amendment against Christian nonprofit organizations. The Johnson Amendment is a U.S. tax code provision prohibiting most nonprofit organizations from endorsing or explicitly opposing political candidates. Biden’s IRS, the Trump DOJ’s report explains, used the Johnson Amendment to target “Christian churches and non-profit institutions, particularly those who espoused traditional Christian views that could be construed with a political valence, scrutinizing their statements for violations.”
The Biden IRS seemingly singled out churches and nonprofit organizations that were characterized as supportive of Republican candidates and conservative issues, while failing to apply the Johnson Amendment to churches and nonprofit organizations aligned or affiliated with Democrats, even those that explicitly supported Democratic candidates or politicians. The investigations were not limited to the speech of pastors, but sought wide-ranging information on the finances and operations of targeted churches and nonprofit organizations. “The Biden IRS’s pattern of enforcement,” the Trump DOJ’s report says, “raised serious concerns about the IRS attempting to regulate what certain pastors could say from the pulpit and chilled the speech of many other clergy.”
The Trump administration’s Treasury Department has subsequently revised its standards for application of the Johnson Amendment, clarifying that houses of worship can communicate to their congregations regarding moral and political matters in accord with their respective teachings without falling afoul of the Johnson Amendment. “Bona fide communications internal to a house of worship, between the house of worship and its congregation, in connection with religious services,” neither “participate” nor “intervene” in political campaigns, “any more than does a family discussion concerning candidates.”
Fining Christian Universities
The Biden administration’s Department of Education levied hefty fines against Christian colleges and universities, while largely failing to pursue similar penalties against secular, non-religious institutions for similar regulatory violations. According to the Trump DOJ’s report, the “average fine against a Christian school was $815,000, compared to $228,571 against public and private institutions.” The two largest fines levied against Christian universities were against Grand Canyon University ($37.7 million) and Liberty university ($14 million).
The fines against Liberty University were for supposed violations of the Clery Act, which provides the public with information regarding a university’s safety. The Trump DOJ’s report notes that the fines against Grand Canyon University and Liberty University “dwarfed the fines levied against Pennsylvania State University ($2.4 million) for 11 Clery Act violations involving the school’s failure to report sex offenses relating to its assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky’s serial child molestation, and against Michigan State University ($4.5 million) for its failure to disclose sex offenses committed by Larry Nassar, a team physician who sexually assaulted hundreds of athletes.”
Under the Trump administration, the Department of Education has not only dismissed its case against Grand Canyon University, but rescinded its fine and has “also committed to no longer disproportionately targeting Christian colleges and universities and to affirming the rights of Christian colleges and universities to act in accordance with their faith-based identity.”
Conscience Violations
In numerous cases, the Biden administration also failed or refused to prosecute federal conscience violation cases, allowing institutions to coerce Christians into violating their sincerely held religious beliefs or penalizing them for adhering to their Christian morals. In one example, the Biden DOJ dropped a lawsuit against the University of Vermont Medical Center for compelling Christian employees to participate in committing abortions.
“This case is emblematic of the Biden Administration’s approach to conscience enforcement: When the scope of federal protections was legally contested, the Administration generally chose the interpretation least protective of religious objectors and resolved active enforcement matters through administrative means, if possible, rather than litigation,” the Trump DOJ’s report comments. “Government inaction of this kind is an especially damaging source of anti-Christian bias precisely because it is difficult to see and harder to remedy.”
Anti-Christian Policy
The Biden administration’s anti-Christian bias was not relegated to enforcement actions, but also to policy choices. The administration supported the “Equality Act,” which would have “fully eliminate[d] statutory religious protections for Christians and other religions that hold traditional social values” by barring, without exemption, “discrimination” on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity in areas such as public accommodations and facilities, education, federal funding, employment, housing, credit, and the jury system. Although numerous academics and religious leaders warned that the legislation would amount to a significant infringement on First Amendment rights, the Biden administration forcefully supported the legislation in Congress.
“Although the Biden Administration was ultimately unsuccessful in its push to enact the Equality Act, it sought to implement the same policy goals wherever possible through executive actions, guidance memoranda, and rulemakings,” the Trump DOJ’s report announced. The administration’s “overbroad” application of the U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in Bostock v. Clayton County targeted Christians and Christian organizations for their biblical worldview on biological sex and human sexuality, while Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) worked overtime to entrench transgender ideology in the federal bureaucracy and classify gender transition procedures as necessary and life-saving medicine.
Biden’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) “dismissed sincerely held religious beliefs regarding sexual orientation and gender identity as ‘discrimination in hiring … cloaked as religious practice,’” while the Department of Education likewise shifted its non-discrimination policies to promote and hide gender transition procedures for children. The Departments of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Labor, and Agriculture all similarly revised their guidance on key statutes and legal precedents, such as Bostock and Titles VII, IX, and X of the Civil Rights Act, to shield progressive agenda items.
In many cases, when Christians and other professionals or professional organizations suggested, based on empirical evidence and research, that gender transition procedures (especially for children) may not be harmless or beneficial, the Biden administration and its agencies often sidelined or outright silenced those voices, or ignored them. For example, when the British government published the extensive Cass Review, detailing the significant dangers posed by exposing minors to gender transition procedures and ultimately terminating the British government’s support for the practice, the Biden administration “maintained that the report did not alter their support for minors’ access to sex-rejecting procedures and medical intervention.”
The Biden administration’s policy decisions also encouraged state and local governments to bar Christian couples from participating in foster programs, claiming that the couples’ sincerely held religious beliefs on biological sex or human sexuality would pose a threat to children who identify as transgender or homosexual. Other actions targeted talk-based Christian therapy designed to assist those struggling with unwanted same-sex attraction and even attempted to bar Christians from practicing therapy in many areas.
Numerous executive actions were also taken by the Biden administration to proliferate the practice of abortion, even after the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling overturning Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Biden administration actions attempted to skirt federal statutes barring taxpayer funding from being used for abortions and directly used federal agencies to facilitate abortions. The Biden administration regularly replaced departmental faith offices with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) offices and repeatedly sidelined Christians and Christian organizations.
Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS), for example, hosted 59 meetings and roundtables with non-Christian faith-based organizations to discuss potential terrorist threats and safety. The Biden DHS hosted only two such meetings with Christian organizations. The Trump DOJ referred to Family Research Council’s report on increasing hostility against Christians to note that the “disparity is notable given that Christians comprise an estimated 62 percent of the U.S. population and have faced increased hostility and violence in recent years.”
Other Biden administration actions that targeted Christians included adverse employment actions, such as eliminating religious discrimination safeguards in the EEOC and issuing blanket denials of religious exemption requests, particularly those related to COVID-19 restrictions and mandates. According to a survey of federal employees, nearly one third (30.1%) were denied pay based on their religious objections to COVID-19 mandates, while others were denied travel, reassigned, lost their security clearances, or were formally reprimanded. Nearly one fifth (18.3%) reported having been removed from their posts and nearly 12% said that they were fired.
What’s Next?
While the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias will continue its work through 2027, it has already begun working to eradicate anti-Christian bias from the federal government. Pursuant to the taskforce’s recommendations, most federal agencies have opened and operate faith offices, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued memos reinforcing religious liberties, and the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) has issued guidance on religious liberty protections afforded by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, in addition to other actions taken by federal agencies. The task force will publish further remedial actions taken in its 2027 report.
Religious liberty advocates have thanked the Trump administration for its efforts to tackle the issue of anti-Christian bias and the weaponization of the federal government against Americans of faith, but have warned that there is still much work to be done. “This is a very good report on the pervasive anti-Christian bias under the Biden administration; capturing many of the domestic religious liberty concerns we have noticed in recent years, especially on marriage, family, sexuality, and life issues — as well as hostility against Christianity in general,” said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins in a statement. He noted that hostility towards Christians skyrocketed under Biden’s tenure, including violent attacks on pro-life pregnancy resource centers and Christian churches. “Yet, as this DOJ report shows, the Biden administration did very little in response and instead weaponized its resources to target Christians including imprisoning grandmothers praying outside of abortion centers.”
“This report does raise questions about what comes next. And what happens the next time a radical progressive like President Biden comes to power? We must ensure this targeting never happens again under any future administration,” Perkins asserted. “We must ensure that the bedrock of American society and culture is placed on a firm footing in which freedom is respected for everyone. What better time to do this than our nation’s 250th birthday? Religious freedom is seldom handed to the passive; it is claimed by those who exercise it even when a hostile culture says they may not.”
“Now is the time to take this insight and put in safeguards at the federal, state, and local levels that will prevent future Democrat administrations from hollowing out the First Amendment, making it difficult for them to pervert America,” Perkins continued. “Ultimately, the preventative prescription to anti-Christian bias from our own government is Christians sharing the gospel and living out their faith in a God honoring way. While we should press on the government to act justly, it’s up to the church to change the culture that has given rise to this anti-Christian bias.”
During “Washington Watch” Thursday, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Varone indicated that the DOJ is currently investigating whether leftist NGOs violated the law in their dealings with the Biden administration. “At minimum, it would violate best practices,” she noted. “And so we’d start with that. There are concerns that some of the conduct here may have gone further. I can’t get into specifics because DOJ handles all of its internal personnel and investigations privately. But as the report mentions, appropriate referrals have been made.”
Travis Weber, vice president for Policy and Government Affairs at FRC, said in comments to The Washington Stand, “With this report, President Trump and his administration have issued an important corrective to the anti-Christian bias that was tolerated, advanced, and/or enabled for too long by the Biden administration. Yet we must not stop here, but rather must determine next steps and consider how this hostility manifests in our culture and the local communities on which our country is knit together.” He added, “For America to flourish in the long-term, we must move beyond the political ‘see-saw’ we are currently on and regain that ‘common ground’ of national consensus on which freedom rests.”
“We must remember that what the Trump administration is responding to politically is — more deeply — a cultural and spiritual issue,” Weber observed. “We are often ‘responding’ to bias and hostility. Instead, we need to think proactively about how to shift our culture back toward a respect for freedom and faith — and the role that both play in society, for the benefit of ALL members of society. As the Trump administration considers what to do with the findings detailed in this report, Christians in America also need to be asking ourselves the same question: ‘What’s our next step?’”
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.com2026-05-01 14:51:372026-05-01 14:51:37DOJ Report Reveals Biden Admin.’s Expansive Religious Liberty Violations and Hostility to American Christians
Audits are a very important Election Integrity matter
As most readers know, I have been heavily involved with the Election Integrity issue since the 2020 election. After many hundreds of hours of research, meetings, etc., it is quite clear to me that the single biggest omission of our current election system is the lack of meaningful audits. As such I was pleased that the federal Election Assistance Commission (EAC) is working on publishing a document “Voluntary National Standards for Election Audits – A Practical Guide.”
Public comments are due Monday night (4-27-26) by midnight. I’m sharing with you the current draft of my comments. Astoundingly only 42 have been submitted so far — so please feel free to submit something. These are mine:
I am an independent physicist who has been extensively involved (nationally) with the Election Integrity Issue. For example, I put together a team of independent experts who wrote ten (10) election integrity Reports. (Our initial Report was the first post-2020 election report published in the US.) See these insightful Reports here.
THANK YOU to the EAC for further addressing the foundational issue of election audits. A point of interest is that our tenth Report was about Post-Election Audits.
Despite being posted for over five years, and widely written about, none of our unique and powerful election integrity Reports has been shown to be inaccurate.
I appreciate the sensitivity needed when the Federal Government (e.g., EAC) gets involved in what is perceived to be a State matter. However, election integrity (particularly regarding elections for Federal positions) is a national issue, and it should not be allowed to be compromised by State politics.
My first recommendation is that the EAC explain up front that their Practical Guide document is only about audits for FEDERAL elections. This would likely result in fewer arguments that the EAC is infringing on State rights.
Further, once a State enacted proper election audits for Federal elections, it would be much easier for them to extend this to State and Local elections.
My second recommendation is that if a primary objective is to restore public confidence in our National elections, this document should change its strategy from suggestive and flexible to normative and aspirational. Even if EAC’s Election Audit Standards cannot be mandated, they should be framed as proper and reasonable goals for any State that desires to have accurate and secure National elections.
The following are some additional suggestions to improve this good EAC document…
3. On Page 6, “Timely” is just mentioned in passing. It’s critically important that some post-election audits be completed prior to State election certification (as mentioned on Page 23). As a result, in such cases, timeliness is paramount.
Recommendation: Timeliness should be an additional Topic: Effective Standard.
4. Nothing is mentioned regarding the goal of accuracy of the Audit. A competently conducted audit will provide accurate results.
Recommendation: Accuracy should be an additional Topic: Effective Standard.
5. Nothing is discussed regarding the statistical soundness of the Audit (!). Using appropriate statistical procedures is key to an effective audit.
Recommendation: Statistically Sound should be a new Topic: Effective Standard.
6. Since the EAC certifies voting machines, it has a unique responsibility to address the limitations of those machines. The EAC should make clear to the public that it recognizes the inherent fallibility of the systems that they certify, moving the burden of proof from trusting the machine to verifying the physical record.
Recommendation: Under the Secure or Professional sections, add a standard for Software Independent Verification. This should explicitly state that a system is only truly secure if the results can be verified by a manual, hand-count audit of ballots by legitimate voters, that is independent of the machine’s internal software.
7. The current list of audit types (Access, Ballot Design, etc. on Page 3) is a catalog that confuses compliance procedures (checking if rules were followed)with outcome verification (checking if the results match the physical ballots). Who cares if the Logic and Accuracy test was performed if the final vote count is suspect? The EAC must clarify that procedural audits are not a substitute for a hand-count of legitimate voter-verifiable paper ballots.
Recommendation: Create a clear, bold distinction in the Standards Framework between Procedural Audits and Verification Audits.
8. Flexibility (Pages 25 & 26) can be code for we can lower our standards if we don’t have enough money. Instead of implying you don’t have to do it if it’s hard, the EAC should establish some minimum standards while acknowledging local constraints.
Recommendation: Rename the Flexibility standard to something like Scalability of Verifiability.
9. The section on Transparency (Page 32) says public observation is desirable but must not interfere. This is institutional language used to justify excluding legitimate observers. If the EAC defines meaningful by default, it becomes much harder for local officials to justify rotating observers or keeping them in a different room.
Recommendation: Rewrite this to define Meaningful Observation. It should spell out that observers must be given a clear visible line of sight, the right to document the process (within privacy laws), and the right to log challenges in real-time.
10. Since the EAC cannot force compliance, it should use its function as a national clearinghouse to create a public incentive structure. If the EAC provides an adherence template for this profile, they aren’t forcing anything; they are providing a tool. Once the template exists, local media and citizen watchdog groups will do the work of holding officials accountable for their score.
Recommendation: Add a section under Accountable that suggests each election jurisdiction publish an Audit Transparency Profile. This profile would check off which of EAC’s voluntary standards they have adopted.
11. A common post-election issue is that when States report their election results (e.g., to Edison), they often report negative ballots. (There were some 4 Million of these in 2020! One of our Reports covered this.) The States claim that these are corrections, but zero documentation is provided (or available) to confirm such major adjustments.
Recommendation: Negative Ballot Transparency for federal elections should be an additional Standard somewhere in the EAC Election Audits Guide.
12. The document appears to lack any mention of what to do when something goes wrong. Currently, officials often treat discrepancies as minor errors and bury them. By making this a standard, the EAC creates an expectation that discrepancies are data, not just nuisances to be ignored.
Recommendation: Add a standard under Objective or Accountable for Discrepancy Reporting. This should mandate that if an audit finds an anomaly, that anomaly must be recorded, published, and investigated, regardless of whether or not it changes the outcome of the election.
Here is other information from this scientist that you might find interesting:
I urge all readers to subscribe to AlterAI — IMO the absolute best AI option for subjective questions.
I will consider posting reader submissions on Critical Thinking about my topics of interest.
My commentaries are my opinion about the material discussed therein, based on the information I have. If any readers have different information, please share it. If it is credible, I will be glad to reconsider my position.
Check out the Archives of this Critical Thinking substack.
C19Science.info is my one-page website that covers the lack of genuine Science behind our COVID-19 policies.
Election-Integrity.info is my one-page website that lists multiple major reports on the election integrity issue.
WiseEnergy.org is my multi-page website that discusses the Science (or lack thereof) behind our energy options.
Media Balance Newsletter: a free, twice-a-month newsletter that covers what the mainstream media does not do, on issues from climate to COVID, elections to education, renewables to religion, etc. Here are the Newsletter’s 2026 Archives. Please send me an email to get your free copy. When emailing me, please make sure to include your full name and the state where you live. (Of course, you can cancel the Media Balance Newsletter at any time!)
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-04-28 18:51:132026-04-28 18:51:13My Comments about Proposed Election Assistance Commission’s “Election Audits: A Practical Guide”
President Donald Trump and Republicans are hoping to cash in politically on the extra amount of cash in Americans’ wallets this Tax Day.
Across the country, Americans are cashing in on the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s tax provisions and receiving a boost from real wage growth in the Trump economy.
“This tax season, nearly half of all filers have claimed tax cuts that every single congressional Democrat voted against,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., told The Daily Signal.
The financial relief from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, now commonly referred to as the Working Families Tax Cuts by Republicans in Congress, has become a major talking point for the GOP in recent months, as the party argues that strong economic fundamentals have helped soften the economic impact of the war in Iran.
Key Provisions Target Workers, Families, and Seniors
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently announced that “nearly half of all filers” have benefited from at least one of the benefits included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s tax cuts. More than 4.6 million have claimed no tax on tips; nearly 20 million have claimed no tax on overtime.
The largest provisions included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act include the child tax credit, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, senior deductions, and deductions on car loan interest.
Daniel Kowalski, director of the Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, noted to The Daily Signal other provisions that are making an economic impact. “OBBB provisions, such as permanent full expensing of business equipment, stimulate business investment and drive increased productivity, which leads to higher real wages for workers,” Kowalski said.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, even though inflation is rising, wages are also increasing. From February 2025 to February 2026, average wages increased faster than inflation, resulting in higher real wages.
The IRS reported that cumulative refunds reached $221.7 billion at the start of March, a 13.6% increase from 2025, and almost a 20% increase since Joe Biden was in office in 2024. The average refund is set to be over $3,500, an 11% increase from last year.
“The Working Families Tax Cuts show, once again, that Republicans are putting hardworking Americans first, while Democrats obstruct and make life harder for the American people,” Emmer continued.
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., told The Daily Signal he thinks the rebrand of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to the Working Families Tax Cuts is worthwhile. “People are very pleasantly surprised at the amount of refunds they are getting, and it’s made a big difference,” Johnson said.
“What’s been made pretty obvious is Republicans now are the party of working Americans and Democrats the party of illegal immigrants,” Johnson claimed.
Iran War and Energy Costs Cloud Economic Outlook
The war in Iran, the closing of the Strait of Hormuz, and increasing oil costs will “probably have a pretty big impact” on the economy, Johnson also claimed.
But Johnson believes the tax cuts “will certainly counteract any of the negatives of the war in Iran.”
Johnson reiterated that without the tax cuts, there would have been “a massive automatic tax increase” because the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was set to expire. The staved-off tax hike was expected to cost Americans trillions of dollars in taxes.
“Whether it’s no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, the increased child tax credit, or the Social Security tax deduction, everyday Americans are the real winners of Republicans’ historic tax cuts,” Emmer concluded.
According to federal government data, the government loses more taxpayer dollars every year to fraud than it spends on the entire budgets of several Cabinet agencies. Thank goodness President Donald Trump has launched the Task Force to Eliminate Fraud and directed Vice President JD Vance to lead the effort.
The Government Accountability Office recently conducted a government-wide study to get an idea of just how much fraud costs taxpayers. That study estimated annual fraud losses to be between $233 billion and $521 billion. On the low end, that would pay for the entire budgets of the departments of State, Commerce, and Labor, and there would still be enough left over to pay for NASA; on the high end, you could add to the budgets of those departments the budgets of the departments of Education, Energy, Justice, and Interior.
That’s an awful lot of money to lose to deliberate theft every year. Keep in mind, we’re talking solely about fraud, not its siblings, waste and abuse.
The Trump administration is determined to address the fraud problem. He chose his highest-profile public address of the year (and the biggest audience of the year, which goes with it) to make the announcement; during his State of the Union address in late February, Trump announced a War on Fraud.
The very next day, Vance announced a pause on $260 million in federal government payments to the government of the state of Minnesota, home to a massive social services fraud that’s been unfolding over the last several years, and which could end up costing taxpayers as much as $9 billion. Vance announced the payments would be frozen until the state government put systems in place to show that the money was going to its intended recipients.
The implementation of the Trump administration’s “war on fraud” began with the announcement of the creation of a White House task force. It was followed by the vice president’s announcement of the pause on the cash flow to Minnesota. Those two steps were only the start.
In addition, the administration created a new senior position at the Department of Justice to focus on the problem. That position, the assistant attorney general for national fraud enforcement, has been filled by Colin McDonald. McDonald is a veteran federal prosecutor who has most recently been serving as associate deputy attorney general, the right-hand man to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.
McDonald has the right kind of experience. In one particular case, when he was working as an assistant U.S. attorney in Southern California, he prosecuted the Honolulu police chief and his wife, along with two Honolulu police officers, for conspiracy and obstruction of justice for their roles in a public corruption scandal.
Demonstrating the White House’s commitment to the effort, Vance explained that the new assistant attorney general for national fraud enforcement will take direction from the president and the vice president.
Creating new positions and task forces and appointing people to fill out the org chart are important moves, but they’re only first and second steps on the road. The real test of the Trump administration’s commitment to its war on fraud will be what it does with those people and with others it’s already had working on the problem.
Early signals are encouraging.
For instance, the focus on Minnesota right out of the gate is important because the fraud there is centered on the state’s generous social services programs. Medicaid in particular is vulnerable to scammers. Its federal-state match, in which federal dollars heavily outweigh the states’ contributions, provides all the incentive needed for state-level welfare state bureaucrats to look the other way and fail to police their systems properly.
The vice president’s task force might also want to keep an eye on New York City, where Mayor Zohran Mamdani, an admitted democratic socialist, recently appointed Julie Su to serve as deputy mayor for economic justice. Su, who served as President Joe Biden’s acting secretary of labor, famously oversaw between $30 billion and $40 billion in fraudulent payments in her previous position as director of California’s Employment Development Department. Letting the new mayor know folks in Washington are keeping an eye on his administration might be a good preemptive strategy to help reduce or even prevent fraud before it ever occurs.
Theft of taxpayer funds is a cancer on the body politic. It’s long past time that the federal government took action to eliminate it. Thank goodness Trump and Vance are on the job.
We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.
Jenny Beth Martin is honorary chairman of Tea Party Patriots Action. Jenny on X: @jennybethm,
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-04-14 10:52:262026-04-14 10:52:26President Trump’s War on Fraud
Federal authorities in California have dismantled a sprawling $50 million hospice fraud ring in a coordinated April 2 crackdown dubbed “Operation Never Say Die,” charging 15 individuals and arresting eight tied to sham hospice operations across Southern California.
The scheme allegedly targeted vulnerable individuals—many not terminally ill-paying them kickbacks to pose as patients so operators could fraudulently bill Medicare, with some facilities showing wildly abnormal “non-death” discharge rates as high as 90%. Key suspects are accused of billing millions, using aliases to evade criminal histories, and even running operations from prison, while siphoning taxpayer funds into luxury lifestyles—part of what federal officials describe as a rapidly expanding “kingdom of fraud” in California’s hospice industry.
California has reportedly lost at leat 180 billion dollars to fraud, high ranking official and experts confirm.
This is a historic scandal. Newsom needs to resign in disgrace.
CHRIS RUFO: “Experts from Harvard, from the Department of Health and Human Services, from LexisNexis fraud division, have told us that fraud in California is unprecedented, it represents the largest financial crime in American history, and scammers have been stealing billions of dollars per year.”
Federal authorities in California have announced a massive takedown of a $50 million hospice fraud operation, dubbed “Operation Never Say Die,” with raids and arrests occurring on April 2, 2026.
Key Details of the Bust:
Arrests and Charges: Eight individuals were arrested, and a total of 15 people—including nurses, a psychologist, and a chiropractor—were charged in connection with fraudulent schemes.
Location: The fraudulent activities were centered in Southern California, with raids and arrests in locations such as Anaheim, Covina, Glendale, and Tarzana.
The Scheme: Defendants were accused of running “sham” hospice facilities that targeted vulnerable people—many of whom were not terminally ill—and paying them kickbacks (sometimes $300 a month) to pose as patients to bill Medicare.
Key Suspects:
Lolita Minerd (Artesia): Accused of billing over $9 million and operating a hospice with an 85% “non-death” rate.
Gladwin and Amelou Gill (Covina): Allegedly used their daughter’s name to bypass criminal histories and operate a hospice that billed $5.2 million.
Nita Palma (Glendale): Accused of running fraudulent hospices while incarcerated in federal prison for previous fraud charges.
Scale of Fraud: Investigators found that one facility had a 90% non-death discharge rate, far exceeding the national average. The fraudulent funds were used for personal expenses, including luxury items and international travel.
(Los Angeles Daily News)
This investigation is part of a broader crackdown on what federal officials describe as a “kingdom of fraud” in California’s hospice industry, which has seen explosive growth in the Los Angeles area.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-04-04 05:51:182026-04-04 05:51:18NEWSOM’S DEATH FRAUD EMPIRE: $50M Scam Paid People To Pretend They Were Dying
WASHINGTON, March 30 (Reuters)—The U.S. military is upgrading White House facilities for the new East Wing, the administration said on Monday, after President Donald Trump said the ballroom would be built atop a “massive” fortified complex.
“The military is making some upgrades to their facilities here at the White House, and I’m not privy to provide any more details on that,” White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said at a press briefing.
Leavitt’s comments followed Trump’s own update on the $400 million White House ballroom to replace the demolished East Wing.
On Sunday, Trump showed a large rendering of the new building to reporters aboard Air Force One, touting security features including “bulletproof glass” and a “drone-proof roof.”
“Now the military is building a big complex under the ballroom, which has come out recently because of a stupid lawsuit that was filed. But the military is building a massive complex under the ballroom, and that’s under construction,” Trump said.
“The ballroom essentially becomes a shed for what’s being built under … including from drones and including from any other thing.”
The 90,000-square-foot ballroom will replace the East Wing, which Trump ordered demolished in October. Underneath that building was the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, an emergency bunker for the president.
The demolition drew criticism from lawmakers, historians, and preservation advocates, as well as an ongoing lawsuit. Critics objected to the decision to demolish the old structure without federal reviews or public comment, and they have critiqued the massive new facility on aesthetic and historical grounds.
The National Capital Planning Commission, one of two federal bodies required to sign off on the project, has a vote on the changes scheduled for Thursday.
Trump has said the ballroom, which will accommodate 1,000 people, is a necessary upgrade to the cramped and dated reception facilities at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest.
(Reporting by Bo Erickson and Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Michelle Nichols, Colleen Jenkins and David Gregorio)
Bo Erickson is a White House reporter for Reuters.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-04-01 01:51:212026-04-01 01:51:21White House Ballroom Project to Include ‘Massive’ Military Complex
The Senate and the House of Representatives are still sparring over funding for a critical federal agency, even as air travel is crippled and the threat of terrorist acts looms large. In the earliest hours of Friday morning, while much of America still slept, Senate Republicans attempted to end the impasse they had reached against their Democratic counterparts and end the longest Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shutdown in U.S. history.
The deal was met with outrage by House Republicans, however, as the bill provided funding for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Coast Guard, and other DHS components, but deliberately excluding funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the two DHS agencies responsible for immigration enforcement and border security, labeled problematic by Democrats.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) touted the bill’s passage as a win for Democrats, charging that Senate Republicans “caved to our demands to fund DHS without a blank check for ICE and CBP.” He added, “Democrats held firm in our opposition that [President] Donald Trump’s rogue and deadly militia should not get more funding without serious reforms, and we will continue to fight for those reforms.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) lambasted the funding bill as a late-night “gambit” and a “joke,” suggesting that Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and other Senate Republicans likely hadn’t even read the text of the bill they approved. “I’m quite convinced that it can’t be that every Senate Republican read the language of this bill,” Johnson quipped. “It’s pretty alarming.” He cited a portion of the bill clarifying that there will be no funding provided to ICE and CBP, commenting, “We’re not doing that.”
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) spoke forcefully against Senate Republicans for passing the bill and then immediately leaving Washington, D.C. for the Easter recess period. “It is absolutely offensive to the people that we represent that the Senate would send over a bill that doesn’t fund Border Patrol and the core components of ICE,” he told reporters Friday. “It’s absurd. And the fact that they would expect us to take that up and pass it today, as they leave town — I mean, could the Senate be any more lazy than to send to us a bill that doesn’t do the job and then leave town? We’re going to stand up and say no to that. We’re going to send back a bill that’s responsible to the American people.”
Accordingly, House Republicans passed their own funding bill to ensure that the entirety of DHS receives federal funding, faulting Democrats for allowing the agency to be shut down for nearly 50 days now, even as war with Iran heightens national security concerns. “Is our border secure? Are our airports safe? Will hardworking personnel receive their paychecks? Can Secret Service plan for the security of upcoming national events? Do Americans have confidence that their government is doing its job to protect the country? This bill answers those questions with certainty,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) in a statement. “It ends the Democrat shutdown, restores full funding for the Department of Homeland Security, and ensures the men and women on the front lines of safeguarding our nation are paid, supported, and able to carry out their duties without continued disruption. It brings stability back to DHS now — and makes clear where the House stands: with our citizens.”
The House bill is a stopgap measure intended to fund DHS fully for a 60-day period while lawmakers continue battling over long-term funding. Congressional Democrats originally refused to fund DHS starting February 14, in an effort to halt ICE and CBP operations, maligning the immigration agencies as lawless and aggressive following controversial operations in Minnesota earlier. Since then, travelers have been waiting longer and longer periods of time in line at airports as unpaid TSA staff either quit or refuse to show up for work. Late Friday, 209 House Republicans were joined by three House Democrats and one Independent to pass the funding measure, while 203 Democrats voted against it. Eight Republicans and eight Democrats did not vote.
Schumer pledged that Senate Democrats would shut down the House bill, just as they have killed previous House efforts to fully fund DHS, describing the new bill as “dead on arrival.”
In a “Washington Watch” interview Friday night, Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) suggested that the House bill will likely fail in the Senate, instead recommending that DHS be funded through the budget reconciliation process, a theory floated previously by Thune. “The good news is ICE and CBP were funded by the One, Big, Beautiful Bill for a period of time. So we have a way to cure this. What we need to do is get this behind us, get on the same page,” he said. Through the reconciliation process, Johnson suggested, Republicans can pass “a very focused and very rapidly-passed reconciliation bill. My suggestion is let’s pass all of DHS for the Trump term and beyond.” He continued, “Again, it’s going to be a big price tag, but it’s going to be in lieu of appropriations, so Democrats can never use DHS and the men and women of DHS as pawns in their political games.”
Johnson shared that he was “disappointed” that the House rejected the Senate funding package, noting that friendly mainstream media coverage largely protects congressional Democrats from being held accountable by voters. “We can’t force Democrats to do certain things when you have no accountability, no pressure by the mainstream media. So that’s the pickle we’re in as Republicans. It’s not a fair fight. It’s not a level playing field,” he said. “I mean, if we could have passed something we would have done that. We would have done that days ago, weeks ago. But it’s not going to pass. So it’ll be right back in this House’s lap.”
Also on “Washington Watch” Friday, Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.) addressed many of the points raised by Johnson. Grothman said that Republican senators who backed the funding bill isolating ICE and CBP “would tell you … we have enough money available right now that we can do a reconciliation package and get the money to fund these two vital organizations before they run out of money.” He continued, “The problem is we have a very slim majority in the House of Representatives, and there is no guarantee that we can put together any package that will only cause us to lose two votes and could easily be one vote.” The congressman added, “Therefore we feel it would be reckless not to pass a bill that is fully funding both ICE and Border Patrol right now.”
In response to the funding crisis, the president issued an executive order demanding that DHS use funding already available to it in order to pay TSA agents. “As the Democrat-caused shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) continues well into its sixth week, America’s air travel system has reached its breaking point. This is an unprecedented emergency situation,” the president wrote. He added that the approximately 50,000 TSA agents who have gone unpaid for weeks have been denied funds by “Democrats’ reckless decision to prioritize criminal illegal aliens over American citizens and shut down DHS until their demand to prohibit enforcement of Federal immigration law is met.”
“If Democrats in the Congress will not act to honor the service of our TSA officers, who are now performing their critical public safety responsibilities without knowing whether they will be able to buy food for their families or pay their rent, then my Administration will take action,” the president announced. “As President of the United States, I have determined that these circumstances constitute an emergency situation compromising the Nation’s security.”
Grothman commented, “Donald Trump solved the biggest problem by … announc[ing] that he is going to fund the people at the airports. And I think that of all the things that Homeland Security does, that’s the one thing that has to get done and the people care about.” He suggested that without the public pressure resulting from the lapse in TSA funding, congressional Republicans may be more likely to fight Democrats to fund ICE and CBP. “So since he has just announced he is going to fund that, I think the other parts of the law, well, hopefully we’ll be able to come to a compromise on them.”
Some Senate Republicans have voiced that they would like to fight Democrats on the issue. Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah), for example, said in a Sunday night social media post, “Waiting for a deal to materialize with Chuck Schumer applies no pressure on Senate Democrats to fund DHS. Interrupting their recess and forcing them to debate DHS funding on the Senate floor *would* apply pressure. We can’t reward unprecedented obstruction with two-week recesses.” He further suggested that the president could exercise his constitutional authority to convene an “extraordinary” Senate meeting in order to force debate and a vote.
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.com2026-03-30 16:51:352026-03-30 16:51:35DHS Funding Drama Pits House against Senate
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-03-30 16:51:312026-03-30 16:51:31Immigration Vote Grades U.S. Congress — Florida by Numbers USA
n the wake of growing revelations about massive welfare fraud, U.S. taxpayers are naturally demanding that every public worker suspected of thievery, as well as those government officials who failed to prevent it, be held to account. What began with independent journalist Nick Shirley’s December 2025 investigation of Somali‑run daycare centers in Minnesota has mushroomed into reports of billion-dollar Medicaid scams in California and New York, corruption in the federal government’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, and schemes to provide phony addiction and autism treatments in multiple states.
President Donald Trump has already responded by forming a National Fraud Enforcement Division within the Department of Justice and appointing Vice President J.D. Vance to the newly created position of federal “antifraud czar.” Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services is also releasing previously unpublished data on provider claims to Medicaid, so that both the public and the press can more easily identify suspicious billing practices.
But if the goal of such efforts is not just to punish those who have already committed welfare fraud but to prevent similar crime from occurring in the future, the psychological aspects of working either in or for a contemporary American welfare program should not be overlooked. For as management experts have long argued, any employer that requires its staffers to perform a service they privately know to be largely inconsequential is effectively legitimating dishonest behavior. And as studies such as the Russell Sage Foundation’s “Administrative Burden” have documented, few organizations so relentlessly groom this moral weakness in their own workforce as the modern welfare agency.
Invalid Research
To understand why this is so true, one must appreciate the fact that more than half of all the research that has ever been used to design America’s social safety net is likely untrue — the implication of a now famous paper published in 2005 by Dr. John Ioannidis, co-director of Stanford University’s Meta-Research Innovation Center. After trying to duplicate the results of influential social science long considered “settled science,” he was astonished to discover that they could not be replicated — in other words, they were never valid.
Even to this day, as Ioannidis himself laments in a recent report to the Institute of Art and Ideas, the majority of published social science research is still not accurate enough to reliably achieve any practical purpose — certainly not useful enough to cure a drug addiction, reduce homelessness, decrease neighborhood crime, or combat domestic violence. The blog Retraction Watch, which exists to identify flawed scientific papers and encourage their retraction, now flags more questionable psychological and sociological findings than when it first went online in 2010.
Universities’ Agenda
Ironically, a way to provide the American welfare system with more effective therapies and procedures — and as a consequence, reduce its tendency to legitimate employee fraud — has long been known. All that has ever been needed is for the professors who conduct the underlying research to adopt tighter study controls. In other words, to have a high threshold for what they regard as a “statistically significant” finding, to pre-register their study protocols and report any mid-stream alterations, and to use large sample sizes.
But ever since the Great Society legislation of the 1960s, America’s colleges and universities have prioritized a very different agenda. As social critic Irving Kristol (1920-2009) was the first to recognize, the massive research funding that accompanied President Lyndon B. Johnson’s signature domestic program, while well intended, had the unforeseen effect of turning higher education from a seeker of truth into the chief advocate for what has come to be called “progressivism.” Namely, the belief that the best way to improve society is through large, bureaucratic programs based on government-financed studies.I
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-03-30 04:51:192026-03-30 04:51:19JUNK SCIENCE SHOCK: Study Says Half of Welfare Policy Research False As Fraud Crisis Explodes Nationwide
Minnesota Rep Krista Knudsen says they just found out the state TURNED OFF tracking for money being sent overseas
They turned it on for two weeks. Saw all the money leaving, and Democrats quickly SHUT OFF TRACKING to allow it to keep happening
“Today in the fraud committee, the Department of Human Services testified that they haven’t been tracking the IP addresses of money that’s being literally flown out of our state and where it’s going.
They did turn on that reporting for two weeks, and they found that yes, a lot of those IP addresses were tied to overseas computers, and then they quickly shut it off after just two weeks of seeing where this money is actually going”
“Every time we turn around, it’s just more and more fraud scandals in our state”
(St. Paul, Minnesota) – A Minnesota state representative is raising serious concerns about how taxpayer money was handled, claiming officials tracked funds leaving the state and heading overseas before ultimately shutting the program down.
Rep. Krista Knudsen says state agencies were aware of suspicious financial activity tied to ongoing fraud investigations but failed to act immediately. According to her claims, money was traced out of the country before intervention occurred.
The allegations come as Minnesota continues to grapple with multiple fraud-related scandals that have drawn scrutiny from lawmakers and watchdog groups.
State officials have not publicly detailed the full scope of the claims, but the situation is likely to intensify calls for tighter oversight and accountability in how public funds are monitored.
Derek Barrs knew cleaning up the trucking industry would be a big job when President Donald Trump gave him the task, having spent years cracking down on commercial drivers for the Florida Highway Patrol.
Yet, even Barrs was surprised when he took the reins of the federal agency that manages the trucking industry — a crucial facet of the country’s economy currently beleaguered with illegal migrant drivers who can’t speak English, shady companies skirting enforcement regulations and hundreds of trucking schools handing out licenses like candy.
“Don’t get us wrong, we’ve always had problems,” Barrs, who has been heading the Transportation Department’s (DOT) Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) since his confirmation in October, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
“We have seen an increase in the non-domiciled CDLs [commercial driver’s licenses], and we’ve also seen an increase of what we believe are these chameleon carriers,” Barrs said. “This is more than what I thought and do not ever remember anything like this before.”
Issues surrounding the trucking industry took center stage in August when an Indian commercial driver was accused of making an illegal U-turn on a busy interstate that resulted in the deaths of three people. The non-English speaking driver was later confirmed to be in the country illegally and a subsequent investigation revealed that he barely recognized U.S. highway signs, drawing into question how he was ever able to get his hands on a CDL to begin with.
Since that Florida crash, numerous other horrific roadside accidents have occurred involving illegal migrant truck drivers, including a wreck in California that killed three, a crash in Oregon that killed two and a horrific accident in Indiana that killed four.
All of the drivers successfully obtained non-domiciled CDLs before totaling their big rigs.
Investigators look over the scene of a crash between an SUV and a semi-truck full of gravel near Holtville, California on March 2, 2021. (Photo by Patrick T. FALLON / AFP) (Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)
‘Zero Curriculum’
After investigating the circumstances that led to the fatal crash in Florida, the DOT in September handed down severe restrictions against non-domiciled CDL holders and identified state governments that were purportedly issuing licenses to foreign truck drivers unlawfully. The DOT in February doubled down with more rules to keep illegal migrants away from big rigs, rolling out new screening processes and eliminating a loophole that previously allowed foreigners with bad driving records to obtain trucking licenses.
Labor groups closely aligned with the Democrat Party quickly sued to squash the new regulations, claiming that the rules would harm hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals.
Barrs argues that the rules are solely intended to keep American highways safe.
“No one wants to lose good, qualified drivers,” Barrs told the DCNF, speaking about the number of migrant drivers expected to be taken off the roads over the next several years due to the tighter regulations. “To me, this is the safety aspect — we have to always bring it back to that piece.”
“I am not willing, in the role I have at FMCSA, to compromise safety just to put someone in the seat of a truck,” he continued.
The Trump administration has also heavily targeted truck driving schools allegedly doling out commercial licenses without any real training, otherwise known as “CDL mills.” In February, the DOT announced more than 550 commercial driving schools that train truckers and bus drivers would be closing down after investigations found they employed unqualified instructors and failed to appropriately test students.
“We have been in driver training schools that we have shut down where there was actually zero curriculum at all,” Barrs revealed to the DCNF.
Another major area of concern for Barr’s FMCSA has been the prevalence of so-called chameleon carriers, trucking companies that maliciously rotate through Department of Transportation (DOT) registration numbers, names or ownership structure in order to avoid enforcement actions.
Barrs noted that his agency can find one single address tied to up to well over 50 companies, exemplifying how deep these network of chameleon carries can be.
“We believe that they’re tied a lot together, meaning these companies have common addresses. “There is a real-life example of like 100 or so, all at the address in the middle of an interstate,” Barrs said. “That’s not acceptable.”
“And the reason why that’s not acceptable is, how in the world can you run a business from the interstate?” he added.
The presence or chameleon carriers in high-profile trucking incidents have sparked politicians at the very top of Washington, D.C., to take action.
Indiana GOP Sen. Jim Banks, whose constituents have been killed by unlawfully present truck drivers, urged the DOT in February to more fervently tackle the issue of chameleon carriers. Similarly, Wyoming GOP Rep. Harriet Hageman introduced a bill to eliminate their presence in the trucking industry, legislation that earned the endorsement of the most powerful Teamsters Union in the country.
Trump highlighted the trucking industry crisis onto the national stage when he introduced “Dalilah’s Law” during his latest State of the Union address.
“Many, if not most, illegal aliens do not speak English and cannot read even the most basic road signs as to direction, speed, danger or location,” Trump stated during the address. “That’s why tonight I’m calling on Congress to pass what we will call the Dalilah law — barring any state from granting commercial driver’s licenses to illegal aliens.”
The bill is named after Dalilah Coleman, a young California girl severely injured after getting hit by an 18-wheeler in June 2024. The driver of that big rig was an illegal migrant and the company involved was allegedly a chameleon carrier.
“I can tell you that, under Secretary Sean Duffy’s leadership and the direction that I have and the job that I and our team at FMCSA are charged with, my expectation is for us to clean up the mess that we have and try to make it as safe as possible,” Barrs said.
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.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-03-26 15:51:242026-03-26 15:51:24EXCLUSIVE: Top Trump Official Sheds Light On ‘Mess’ Lying Under Hood Of Illegal Trucker Crisis
Secretary of State Marco Rubio skipped the interpreter and took matters into his own hands Saturday, switching to fluent Spanish to deliver President Donald Trump’s agenda directly to a dozen Latin American leaders at the Shield of the Americas Summit.
“We don’t need an interpreter for this one,” Rubio told Trump before addressing the room in Spanish, as shown in the video shared by The White House. The moment went viral across social media. Trump looked on with approval as his top diplomat assumed translation duties.
The exchange set the tone at Trump National Doral in Miami. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth followed Rubio to the podium and told the president, “I only speak American,” PJ Media reported from the scene. Rubio responded by joking that he speaks Cuban, according to a social media post cited by PJ Media.
Reporter Sarah Anderson, who attended the event, noted warm personal rapport between Rubio and the attending heads of state. The secretary of state told the group that alliance with America “is a good thing. It’s reciprocated,” per the State Department feed cited by PJ Media.
Trump signed a proclamation creating the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition before departing for Dover Air Force Base to receive the remains of six U.S. troops killed in the Iran conflict, Fox News reported. The White House framed the 12-nation gathering as a historic push to dismantle drug cartels and counter foreign interference across the Western Hemisphere.
With Trump headed to Delaware, Rubio ran a working lunch and introduced Kristi Noem in her new capacity as Special Envoy. He told leaders they would “see a lot of her” and that Noem would engage with each country “at a personal level and on a daily and weekly and monthly level,” according to the State Department’s official transcript.
Saturday’s event added yet another responsibility to Rubio’s expanding portfolio. Trump tapped the secretary of state to oversee the Shield of the Americas initiative alongside Noem just days before the summit.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-03-08 12:51:222026-03-08 12:51:22‘Don’t Need An Interpreter For This One’: Marco Rubio Makes Trump’s Message Clear For Latin America
By afternoon Sunday, the U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran sunk nine Iranian ships and took out dozens of Iranian leaders, President Donald Trump announced.
“I have just been informed that we have destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships, some of them relatively large and important,” Trump posted on Truth Social Sunday.
“We are going after the rest–They will soon be floating at the bottom of the sea, also!” Trump’s post continued. “In a different attack, we largely destroyed their Naval Headquarters. Other than that, their Navy is doing very well!”
Separately, Fox News reported that Trump said 48 Iranian leaders were wiped out in the strikes.
Most notably, the air strikes killed the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and targeted Iranian military sites to stop the country’s ability to develop and deploy nuclear weapons.
U.S. Central Command reported Suday afternoon that B-2 stealth bombers, armed with 2,000 pound bombs hit Iran’s ballistic missile facilities.
Minutes after Trump’s post, the Associated Press reported that a senior White House official said the “new potential leadership” in Iran suggested they were open to talks.
CBS News reported that Trump told CBS News Sunday morning a diplomatic solution is “Much easier now than it was a day ago, obviously.” He said that’s since “they are getting beat up badly.”
Trump called for Iran, the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, to fully dismantle its nuclear program, which Iran’s government had been unwilling to do. Trump indicated on Friday the negotiations were not going well.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said Sunday that a new leadership council “has begun its work” after death of Khamenei. Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said a new supreme leader will be chosen in “one or two days,” the Associated Press reported.
EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.
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Speaker Johnson, Vice President Vance, first lady of the United States, second lady of the United States, members of Congress and my fellow Americans, our nation is back: Bigger, better, richer and stronger than ever before.
Less than five months from now, our country will celebrate an epic milestone in American history, the 250th anniversary of our glorious American independence. This July 4th, we will mark two and a half centuries of liberty and triumph, progress and freedom in the most incredible and exceptional nation ever to exist on the face of the earth. And we’ve seen nothing yet. We’re going to do better and better and better. This is the golden age of America.
When I spoke in this chamber 12 months ago, I had just inherited a nation in crisis, with a stagnant economy, inflation at record levels, a wide-open border, horrendous recruitment for military and police, rampant crime at home and wars and chaos all over the world. But tonight, after just one year, I can say with dignity and pride that we have achieved a transformation like no one has ever seen before and a turnaround for the ages. It is, indeed, a turnaround for the ages. And we will never go back to where we were just a very short time ago. We’re not going back.
Today our border is secure. Today our border is secure, our spirit is restored, inflation is plummeting, incomes are rising fast, the roaring economy is roaring like never before, our enemies are scared, our military and police are stacked, and America is respected again, perhaps like never before. After four years in which millions and millions of illegal aliens poured across our borders totally unfettered and unchecked, we now have the strongest and most secure border in American history, by far. In the past nine months, zero illegal aliens have been admitted to the United States. But we will always allow people to come in legally, people that will love our country and will work hard to maintain our country. Deadly fentanyl across our border is down by a record 56% in one year. In the last year, the murder rate saw its single largest decline in recorded history. This is the biggest decline, think of it, in recorded history, the lowest number in over 125 years. In 1900, in fact, substantially before my wonderful father — I had a wonderful father, Fred — before he was born, substantially before he was born, that’s a long time ago, he wouldn’t like me to say that, but that’s a long time ago.
The Biden administration and its allies in Congress gave us the worst inflation in the history of our country. But in 12 months, my administration has driven core inflation down to the lowest level in more than five years. And in the last three months of 2025, it was down to 1.7%. Gasoline, which reached a peak of over $6 a gallon in some states under my predecessor and was, quite honestly, a disaster, is now below $2.30 a gallon in most states, and in some places $1.99 a gallon. And when I visited the great state of Iowa just a few weeks ago, I even saw $1.85 a gallon for gasoline, the lowest in four years, and falling fast.
And the annual cost of a typical new mortgage is down almost $5,000 just since I took office, one year. And lower interest rates will solve the Biden-created housing problem, while at the same time protecting the values of those people who already own a house that really feel rich for the first time in their lives. We want to protect those values. We want to keep those values up. We’re going to do both — and keep it that way. The stock market has set 53 all-time record highs since the election. Think of that, one year, boosting pensions, 401Ks and retirement accounts for the millions and the millions of Americans, they’re all gaining. Everybody is up, way up. In four long years, the last administration got less than $1 trillion in new investment in the United States. And when I say less, substantially less. In 12 months, I secured commitments for more than $18 trillion pouring in from all over the globe.
Think of it — much less than $1 trillion for four years, versus much more than $18 trillion for one year. What a difference a president makes. A short time ago, we were a dead country. Now we are the hottest country anywhere in the world. The hottest. As thousands of new businesses are forming and factories, plants and laboratories are being built, we have added 70,000 new construction jobs in just a very short period of time. Getting bigger and bigger and stronger. Nobody can believe what they’re watching. American oil production is up by more than 600,000 barrels a day. And we just received from our new friend and partner, Venezuela, more than 80 million barrels of oil. American natural gas production is at an all-time high. Because I kept my promise to drill, baby, drill.
More Americans are working today than at any time in the history of our country. Think about that. Any time in the history of our country. More working today, and 100% of all jobs created under my administration have been in the private sector. We ended DEI in America. We cut a record number of job-killing regulations, and in one year we have lifted 2.4 million Americans — a record — off of food stamps. And for all of these reasons, I say tonight, members of Congress, the state of our Union is strong. Our country is winning again. In fact, we’re winning so much that we really don’t know what to do about it. People are asking me, please, please, please, Mr. President, we’re winning too much. We can’t take it anymore. We’re not used to winning in our country until you came along, we’re just always losing. But now we’re winning too much. And I say, no, no, no, you’re going to win again. You’re going to win big. You’re going to win bigger than ever. And to prove that point, to prove that point, here with us tonight is a group of winners who just made the entire nation proud. The men’s gold medal Olympic hockey team. Come on in.
Go ahead. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen them get up. And actually, not all of them did get up. But they beat a fantastic Canadian team in overtime, as everybody saw, as did the American women who will soon be coming to the White House. They were in the Oval Office before, and I just want to say a second, very big congratulations to Team USA. But I have to say that – and I told them this and we took a vote of the team. I said, anybody votes no, I’m not doing it.
So they stood there. They weren’t about to say no because I’ve never seen a goaltender play as well as goalie Connor Hellebuyck. Think of it, 46 shots on goal. And I asked him – one shot, the one where you put your stick in the back and it hit the neck of your stick and bounced off — you practice that? Or was that a little lucky? He refused to answer that question. But I just want to tell you that the members of this great hockey squad will be very happy to hear, based on their vote and my vote. And in this case, my vote was more important, that I will soon be presenting Connor with our highest civilian honor, which we will be given and which has been given to many athletes over the years. But when I say many, not too many, like 12, it’s called the highest civilian honor in our country. The Presidential Medal of Freedom. Great athletes have gotten that. Very great, the best. And I thought he deserved it. And I did take a vote. Every single one of them. I said, I’m not giving it if anybody goes no, and every single one of them rapidly put up their hand. So I want to thank you all. What a special job you did. What special champions you are. Thank you very much.
I’m also pleased to say that the next time the Olympic torch is lit, it will be here in America for the 2028 Olympics. And it’s the summer version, right? In Los Angeles. We’re going to do a good job in Los Angeles. And Los Angeles is going to be safe, just like Washington, D.C. is now one of the safest cities in the country. And this year, and I must say, I got them both. I got them in the first term. And I was disappointed because I didn’t think I’d be the president when this happened. But strange things took place, and now I’ve got them because I got the Olympics. And I’ve got the 2026 FIFA World Cup, and I wanted to claim the 250th, but I didn’t get away with that one. I couldn’t claim that one for myself. But we’re getting the World Cup, so we have the World Cup and the Olympics coming and that is exciting news.
So this will be a year to celebrate our country and the heroes who have kept it free. Men like Buddy Taggart. At age 17, Buddy volunteered to defend America in World War II, serving in the Pacific under the great General Douglas MacArthur. He fought bravely in the famous Battle of Manila. He worked so hard he was badly wounded and almost killed by enemy machine guns at Luzon. And 81 years ago this month, he liberated the largest internment camp in the Philippines, one of the largest anywhere in the world. But he earned many honors, including a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star, came home, started a family, and tonight he is in the gallery, looking forward to July 4th, 2026, his 100th birthday. So Buddy, you’re a brave man and we salute you.
Even in times of challenge, setback and immense heartache, the spirit of 1776 has always shone through very brightly. It was July 4th of last year when floodwaters tore through a girls summer camp in central Texas. One of the worst things I’ve ever seen. I was there, rising 26ft in the matter of minutes, tragically claiming many, many lives. You all remember that one. As the waters threatened to sweep her away, 11-year-old Milly Cate McClymond closed her eyes and prayed to God she thought she was going to die. Those prayers were answered when Coast Guard rescue swimmer Scott Ruskin descended from a helicopter above. Nobody knew where he came from. It was Scott’s first ever rescue mission — young guy, but very brave, very, very top. Always top in his class. And he lifted not just Milly Cate, but 164 others to safety.
People watched Scott from a distance and they couldn’t believe what they were seeing. The winds were blowing, the rain was pouring, everything was going. And that rapid water, nobody’s ever seen anything like it. They said, wow, that’s something. Tonight, Scott and Milly Cate are here together, reunited for the very first time. Thank you, Scott. Milly Cate. And Petty Officer Ruskan, I’m pleased to inform you that I am now awarding you the Legion of Merit for extraordinary heroism. Which is what it was, extraordinary heroism. Thank you. And I’d like to have the military aide to please come down and take care of this service. Military aide, thank you very much. Take care of that very important service. Thank you very much.
From 1776 to today, every generation of Americans has step forward to defend life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And they were doing it for the next generation. But now it’s our turn. Together we’re building a nation where every child has the chance to reach higher and go further. Where government answers to the people, not the powerful, and where the interests of hardworking American citizens are always our first and ultimate concern. That is the debt we owe to the heroes who came before us. And that is the promise we must keep to America for our 250th year.
Last year, I urged this Congress to begin the mission by passing the largest tax cuts in American history, and our Republican majorities delivered so beautifully. Thank you Republicans. All Democrats, every single one of them voted against these really important and very necessary massive tax cuts. They wanted large-scale tax increases to hurt the people instead. But we held strong. And with the great Big Beautiful Bill, we gave you no tax on tips, no tax on overtime and no tax on Social Security for our great seniors. And we also made interest on auto loans tax deductible the first time, but only if the car is made in America.
Recently in Pennsylvania, I met Megan Hemhauser, a devoted mom who homeschools her children. Beautiful two children during the day while waiting tables at night as her husband works overtime operating very heavy equipment. Megan is here this evening and she’s happy to tell you that she is so, so much richer because with no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and our expanded child tax credit done again by Republicans, Megan and her husband will take home more than $5,000 extra just for the year, cutting her tax bill in more than half. Megan, please stand up. We’re fighting for you, Megan. Thank you Megan. Thank you, Megan, we’re fighting for you Megan.
Under our bill, parents like Megan can also activate their children’s brand new Trump Accounts. And I didn’t name it. I did not. I did not name them. Nobody believes me, but I did not name it. It was named by a very tall man standing right there in the third row. Nice man, a good man. Tax free investment accounts for every American child. This is something that’s so special. Has taken off and gone through the roof. Millions will be refunded courtesy of the U.S. Treasury and private individuals like Michael and Susan Dell, who have donated 6 billion, 250 million dollars to fund the Trump accounts for 25 million American children. They’re great people.
When I asked Michael Dell, “How do you make all that money? He said, “Well, I just sat in my dorm in school, and I made computers and I’d sell them to people. And I just kept selling and selling and selling and …” Pretty amazing story. That’s called the American Dream. He sold a lot of computers, a lot of those laptops. So I congratulate him on that. But I really thank him and Susan, as well as others like Brad Gerstner, a very tremendous guy. He was behind it right from the beginning. Brad Gerstner thank you, Brad.
So with modest additional contributions, these young people’s accounts could grow to over $100,000 or more by the time they turn 18. Think of it. How much money is that for somebody that started with nothing, over $100,000, could be much more than that. To make this investment in our children’s future, go to trumpaccounts.gov, trumpaccounts.gov. And a lot of people are doing it. They’re setting every record in the book. It’s popular. They knew what was going to, what it was going to take. So proud of them. I’m so proud of the people that got it started. And now it’s just taken off.
One of the primary reasons for our country’s stunning economic turnaround, the biggest in history, where the Dow Jones broke 50,000, four years ahead of schedule, and the S&P hit 7000 where it wasn’t supposed to do it for many years, were tariffs. I used these tariffs, took in hundreds of billions of dollars to make great deals for our country, both economically and on a national security basis. Everything was working well. Countries that were ripping us off for decades are now paying us hundreds of billions of dollars. They were ripping us so badly. You all know that. Everybody knows it. Even the Democrats know it. They just don’t want to say it. And yet these countries are now happy and so are we. We made deals — the deals are all done and they’re happy. They’re not making money like they used to. But we’re making a lot of money. There was no inflation, tremendous growth. And the big story was how Donald Trump called the economy correctly. And 22 Nobel Prize winners in economics, didn’t. They got it totally wrong. They got it really wrong. And then just four days ago, an unfortunate ruling from the United States Supreme Court, it just came down, came down. Very unfortunate ruling.
But the good news is that almost all countries and corporations want to keep the deal that they already made — right, Scott? — knowing that the legal power that I, as president, have to make a new deal could be far worse for them, and, therefore, they will continue to work along the same successful path that we had negotiated before the Supreme Court’s unfortunate involvement. So, despite the disappointing ruling, these powerful countries saving, is saving our country the kind of money we’re taking in, peace protecting — many of the wars I’ve settled was because of the threat of tariffs, I wouldn’t have been able to settle them without — will remain in place under fully approved and tested alternative legal statutes. And they have been tested for a long time. They’re a little more complex, but they’re actually probably better — leading to a solution that will be even stronger than before. Congressional action will not be necessary. It’s already time-tested and approved. And as time goes by, I believe the tariffs, paid for by foreign countries, will, like in the past, substantially replace the modern-day system of income tax, taking a great financial burden off the people that I love.
Moving forward, factories, jobs, investment and trillions and trillions of dollars will continue pouring into the United States of America because we finally have a president who puts America first. I put America first. I love America. For decades before I came along, we had the exact opposite. From trade to health care, from energy to immigration, everything was stolen and rigged in order to drain the wealth out of the productive, hardworking people who make our country great, who make our country run. Under Biden and his corrupt partners in Congress and beyond, it reached a breaking point with the Green New Scam, open borders for everyone — they poured in by the millions and millions from prisons, from mental institutions, they were murderers — 11,888 murders — they came into our country, you allowed that to happen. And record-setting inflation that cost the typical family $34,000 in just a speck of time.
Now, the same people in this chamber who voted for those disasters suddenly used the word affordability, a word, they just used it because somebody gave it to them, knowing full well that they caused and created the increased prices that all of our citizens had to endure. You caused that problem. You caused that problem. They knew their statements were a lie, they knew it, they knew their statements were a dirty, rotten lie. Their policies created the high prices. Our policies are rapidly ending them. We are doing really well. Those prices are plummeting downward. The price of eggs is down 60%, Madam Secretary, thank you. The cost of chicken, butter, fruit, hotels, automobiles, rent is lower today than when I took office by a lot. And even beef, which was very high, is starting to come down significantly. Just hold on a little while. We’ll get that down. And soon you will see numbers that few people would think were possible to achieve just a short time ago.
Nobody can believe when they see the kind of numbers, and especially energy, when they see energy going down to numbers like that, they cannot believe it. It’s like another big tax cut. I’m also confronting one of the biggest rip-offs of our times, the crushing cost of health care, caused by you. Since the passage of the “Unaffordable Care Act,” sometimes referred to as Obamacare, big insurance companies have gotten rich. It was meant for the insurance companies, not for the people. With our government giving them hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars a year, as their stock prices soared 1,000, 1,200, 1,400 and even 1,700%, like nothing else. That’s why I introduced the great health care plan. I want to stop all payments to big insurance companies and instead give that money directly to the people, so they can buy their own health care, which will be better health care at a much lower cost. In addition, my plan requires maximum price transparency. That’s a big deal. Sounds so simple, so big. And I did that in my first term and the Democrats immediately terminated it, with the full knowledge that they were doing a very bad thing for the people. Costs were going to go way up and that’s what happened, and now I’m bringing them way down on health care and everything else.
I’m also ending the wildly inflated cost of prescription drugs like has never happened before. Other presidents tried to do it, but they never could. They tried, most didn’t try, actually, but they tried, they said they tried. They couldn’t do it. They didn’t even come close. They were all talk and no action. But I got it done, under my just-enacted most-favored nation agreements, Americans who have for decades paid by far the highest prices of any nation anywhere in the world for prescription drugs will now pay the lowest price anywhere in the world for drugs, anywhere, the lowest price.
So, in my first year of my second term — should be my third term, but strange things happen — I took prescription drugs. a very big part of health care, from the highest price in the entire world to the lowest. That’s a big achievement. The result is price differences of 300, 400, 500, 600% and more, all available right now at a new website called trumprx.gov — and I didn’t name that one, either, by the way. And here tonight is the very first customer ever to get that big discount, and it is big, Catherine Rayner. For five years, she and her husband have struggled with infertility and they turned to IVF. One drug has been costing Catherine $4,000 to purchase, but a few weeks ago she logged onto the TrumpRX website and got that same drug that cost $4,000, got it for under $500, a reduction of much more, actually, than $3,500. Catherine, we are all praying for you and you’re going to be a great mom.
So now I’m calling on Congress to codify my most-favored nation program into law. Now, the one thing I’m not sure it matters, because it’s going to be very hard for somebody that comes along after me to say, let’s raise drug prices by 700 or 800%. But, John and Mike, if you don’t mind, codify it anyway, they may do it. Codify it anyway. Thank you. And many Americans are also concerned that energy demand from AI data centers could unfairly drive up their electric utility bills. Tonight, I’m pleased to announce that I have negotiated the new ratepayer protection pledge. You know what that is? We’re telling the major tech companies that they have the obligation to provide for their own power needs. They can build their own power plants as part of their factory, so that no one’s prices will go up and in many cases, prices of electricity will go down for the community, and very substantially then.
This is a unique strategy never used in this country before. We have an old grid. It could never handle the kind of numbers, the amount of electricity that’s needed. So I’m telling them they can build their own plant, they’re going to produce their own electricity. It will ensure the company’s ability to get electricity, while at the same time lowering prices of electricity for you and could be very substantial. For all of these cities and towns, you’re going to see some good things happen over the next number of years.
Another pillar of the American dream that has been under attack has been home ownership. With us tonight is Rachel Wiggins, a mom of two from Houston. She placed bids on 20 homes and lost all of those bids to gigantic investment firms that bypassed inspection, paid all cash and turned all those houses into rentals, stealing away her American dream. She was devastated. Stories like this are why last month I signed executive order to ban large Wall Street investment firms are buying up in the thousands single family homes.
And now I’m asking Congress to make that ban permanent, because all this for, people, really, that’s what we want. We want homes for people, not for corporations. Corporations are doing just fine. Rachel thank you very much. Good luck with your home. You’ll get one soon.
We’re also working to make it easier for Americans to save for retirement. And under this administration, we will always protect Social Security and Medicare. They are not protecting it for our seniors. We will always protect Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. Since I took office, the typical 401(k) balance is up by at least $30,000. That’s a lot of money. We have millions and millions of people. Because the stock market has done so well, setting all those records. Your 401(k)s are way up. Yet half of all of working Americans still do not have access to a retirement plan with matching contributions from an employer. To remedy this gross disparity, I’m announcing that next year my administration will give these oft-forgotten American workers, great people, the people that built our country, access to the same type of retirement plan offered to every federal worker. We will match your contribution with up to $1,000 each year, as we ensure that all Americans can profit from a rising stock market. Let’s also ensure that members of Congress cannot corruptly profit from using insider information.
They stood up for that. I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it. Did Nancy Pelosi stand up, if she’s here? Doubt it. Pass the Stop Insider Trading Act without delay. I wasn’t sure if anybody even on this side was going to applaud for that. I’m very impressed. Thank you. I’m very impressed. But when it comes to the corruption that is plundering, really, it’s plundering America, there’s been no more stunning example than Minnesota, where members of the Somali community have pillaged an estimated $19 billion from the American taxpayer. We have all the information. And in actuality, the number is much higher than that. And California, Massachusetts, Maine and many other states are even worse.
This is the kind of corruption that shreds the fabric of a nation, and we are working on it like you wouldn’t believe. So tonight, although started four months ago, I am officially announcing the war on fraud to be led by our great Vice President JD Vance. He’ll get it done. And we’re able to find enough of that fraud, we will actually have a balanced budget overnight. It’ll go very quickly. That’s the kind of money you’re talking about. We’ll balance our budget. The Somali pirates who ransacked Minnesota remind us that there are large parts of the world where bribery, corruption, and lawlessness are the norm, not the exception. Importing these cultures through unrestricted immigration and open borders brings us problems right here to the USA. And it is the American people who pay the price in higher medical bills, car insurance rates, rent, taxes, and perhaps most importantly, crime. We will take care of this problem. We’re going to take care of this problem. We are not playing games.
Dalilah. Dalilah Coleman was only five years old in June 2024, when a 18-wheel tractor trailer plowed into her stopped car, traveling at 60 miles an hour or more. The driver was an illegal alien, let in by Joe Biden and given a commercial driver’s license by open borders, politicians and California. Doctors said Dalilah would never be able to walk or talk, have a good life. She wouldn’t even be able to eat again. But against all odds, she is now in the first grade, learning to walk. And she’s here this evening with her dad, Marcus, a fantastic man. Dalilah, please. You are a great inspiration. Please stand up. Thank you. Dalilah. Many, if not most, illegal aliens do not speak English and cannot read even the most basic road signs as to direction, speed, danger or location. That’s why tonight I’m calling on Congress to pass what we will call the Dalilah law – barring any state from granting commercial driver’s licenses to illegal aliens.
And yesterday, as you probably saw at the White House, I hosted a ceremony with Americans who lost their treasured loved ones to the scourge of illegal immigration. People came into our country. How we allowed this to happen with our open borders. These are the angel moms and families that for decades our government betrayed and our media totally ignored. Totally. It was terrible. Hard to believe, actually. In 2023, a 16-year-old high school cheerleader named Lizbeth Medina was supposed to perform in her town’s Christmas parade, but she never arrived. Her mother, Jacqueline, went home to look for her, and she found her lying dead in a bathtub, bleeding profusely after being stabbed 25 times. Lizbeth’s killer was a previously arrested illegal alien who had broken in and brutally, just brutally extinguished the brightest light in her family’s life. Violently and viciously. Her heartbroken mother is in the gallery to remind everyone in this chamber exactly why we are deporting illegal alien criminals are – our country at record numbers, and we’re getting them the hell out of here fast. We don’t want ’em. Thank you very much, Jacqueline. Thank you.
We can never forget that many in this room not only allowed the border invasion to happen before I got involved, but indeed, they would do it all over again if they ever had the chance. If they ever got elected, they would open up those borders to some of the worst criminals anywhere in the world. The only thing standing between Americans and a wide-open border right now is President Donald J. Trump and our great Republican patriots in Congress. Thank you. As we speak, Democrats in this chamber have cut off all funding for the Department of Homeland Security. It’s all cut off, all cut off. They have instituted another Democrat shutdown, the first one costing us two points on GDP. Two points we lost on GDP, which probably made them quite happy actually. Now they have closed the agency responsible for protecting Americans from terrorists and murderers. Tonight, I’m demanding the full and immediate restoration of all funding for the border security, homeland security of the United States, and also for helping people clean up their snow. We have no money because of the Democrats, and it would be nice. We’d love to give you a hand at cleaning it up, but you gave no money. Nobody’s getting paid. It’s a shame. So you have to think about it. We have, in case you didn’t know, a pretty large snowstorm out there. One of the great things about the State of the Union is how it gives Americans the chance to see clearly what their representatives really believe. So tonight, I’m inviting every legislator to join with my administration and reaffirming a fundamental principle. If you agree with this statement, then stand up and show your support: The first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens.
Isn’t that a shame? You should be ashamed of yourself not standing up. You should be ashamed of yourself. That is why I’m also asking you to end deadly sanctuary cities that protect the criminals and enact serious penalties for public officials who block the removal of criminal aliens. In many cases, drug lords, murderers all over our country. They’re blocking the removal of these people out of our country. And you should be ashamed of yourself.
And perhaps most importantly, I’m asking you to approve the Safe America Act, to stop illegal aliens and others who are unpermitted persons from voting in our sacred American elections, the cheating is rampant in our elections. It’s rampant. It’s very simple. All voters must show voter ID. All voters must show proof of citizenship in order to vote. And no more crooked mail-in ballots except for illness, disability, military or travel. None. And this should be an easy one. And by the way, is polling at 89%, including Democrats, 89%. And even the new communist mayor of New York City. I think he’s a nice guy, actually speak to him a lot. Bad policy, but nice guy. Just said they want people to shovel snow. They got hit hard. Wants them to shovel snow. But if you apply for that job, you need to show two original forms of ID and a Social Security card.
Yet they don’t want identification for the greatest privilege of them all: voting in America. No, it’s no good, no good. Both Republicans and Democrats overwhelmingly agree on the policy that we just enunciated, and Congress should unite and enact this common sense, country saving legislation right now. And it should be before anything else happens.
And the reason they don’t want to do it, why would anybody not want voter ID? One reason, because they want to cheat. There’s only one reason. They make up all excuses. They say it’s racist. They come up with things. You almost say what imagination they have. They want to cheat, they have cheated, and their policy is so bad that the only way they can get elected is to cheat. And we’re going to stop it. We have to stop it, John.
And here is one more opportunity to show common sense in government.
In the gallery tonight are Sage Blair and her mother, Michele. In 2021, Sage was 14 when school officials in Virginia sought to socially transition her to a new gender, treating her as a boy and hiding it from her parents. Hard to believe, isn’t it? Before long, a confused Sage ran away from home. After she was found in a horrific situation in Maryland, a left wing judge refused to return Sage to her parents because they did not immediately state that their daughter was their son. Sage was thrown into an all boys state home and suffered terribly for a long time. But today, all of that is behind them. Because Sage is a proud and wonderful young woman with a full ride scholarship to Liberty University. Sage and Rachelle, please stand up. And thank you for your great bravery.
And who can believe that we’re even speaking about things like this? 15 years ago, if somebody was up here and said that, they’d say, “what’s wrong with him?” But now we have to say it because it’s going on all over numerous states. They’re not even telling the parents. But surely we can all agree no state can be allowed to rip children from their parents’ arms and transition them to a new gender against the parents’ will. Who would believe that we’re even talking about it? We must ban it, and we must ban it immediately.
Nobody stands up, these people are crazy. I’m telling them they’re crazy.
Amazing. Boy oh boy.
We’re lucky we have a country. With people like this — democrats are destroying our country. But we’ve stopped it just in the nick of time, didn’t we?
No one cares more about protecting America’s youth than our wonderful First Lady. Now a movie star, a movie star. Who would have believed that?
Over the past year, she has had an incredible impact championing AI legislation, advancing a landmark executive order on foster care, and helping secure $30 million to launch the Melania Trump Foster Youth to independence initiative. It’s a tremendous, really a tremendous thing that happened and had a lot of bipartisan support. She gets much better bipartisan support than I do. I get none, she gets a lot. Someday you’re gonna have to tell me how you did that. And students and educators in every state have joined the First Lady’s efforts in the presidential. I challenge keeping America’s next generation position to succeed and strongly succeed in the future. Tonight, we welcome two young people whose lives reflect the first Lady’s impact. Sierra Burns and Everest Nevraumont. Thank you both. And Melania, thank you. I know how hard you worked on it.
Thank you very. I’m very proud to say that during my time in office, both the first four years and in particular this last year, there has been a tremendous renewal in religion, faith, Christianity and belief in God. This is especially true among young people, and a big part of that had to do with my great friend Charlie Kirk. Great guy. Great guy.
So last year, Charlie was violently murdered by an assassin. And martyred, really, martyred for his beliefs. His wonderful wife, Erika is with us tonight. Erika. Please stand.
Thank you. Erika, thank you a lot. In Charlie’s memory, we must all come together to reaffirm that America is one nation under God. And we must totally reject political violence of any kind. We love religion, and we love bringing it back. And it’s coming back at levels that nobody actually thought possible. It’s really a beautiful thing to see, above all, unleashing America’s promise requires keeping our communities safe. We have made incredible strides, yet dangerous repeat offenders continue to be released by pro crime Democrat politicians again and again.
We are honored to be joined tonight by a woman who’s been through hell, Anya Zarutska. In 2022, she and her beautiful daughter. So beautiful. What a beautiful young woman Iryna fled war-torn, war-torn Ukraine to live with relatives near Charlotte, North Carolina. And by the way, what’s going on with Charlotte? Last summer, 23-year-old Irina was riding home on the train when a deranged monster who had been arrested over a dozen times and was released through no cash bail, stood up and viciously slashed a knife through her neck and body. No one will ever forget. There were people on that train. No one will ever forget the expression of terror on Irene, his face as she looked up at her attacker in the last seconds of her life. She died instantly. She had escaped a brutal war, only to be slain by a hardened criminal set free to kill in America came in through open borders. Mrs. Zarutska, tonight, I promise you, we will ensure justice for your magnificent daughter, Iryna.
How do you not stand, how do you not stand? I’m asking this Congress to pass tough legislation to ensure that violent and dangerous repeat offenders are put behind bars, and, importantly, that they stay there.
Starting last summer, I deployed our National Guard and federal law enforcement to restore law and order to our most dangerous cities, including Memphis, Tennessee — big success. New Orleans, Louisiana. A big success in our nation’s capital itself. Washington, D.C., where we have almost no crime anymore in Washington, D.C. How did that happen?
In fact, crime in Washington is now at the lowest level ever recorded, and murders in D.C. this January were down close to 100% from a year ago.
They don’t like to hear that.
One of the brave service members who helped achieve this stunning turnaround was 20-year-old West Virginia Army National Guard Specialist Sarah Beckstrom. After a four month deployment, she voluntarily extended her service. Her rank was going to be lifted and she was doing so well and was so proud of her. But the very next day, she was on patrol in the White House when she was ambushed and shot in the head by a terrorist monster from Afghanistan. Shouldn’t have been in our country. And all because she wore the uniform of our nation. She was shot. He traveled here because he didn’t like people wearing our uniform. He was sick, and deranged. Shouldn’t have been in our country. Sarah Beckstrom died in order to defend our Capitol, and we are honored to be joined by her wonderful parents, Gary and Evalea.
Your daughter was a true American patriot and she will be greatly missed. She was a great person. I saw reports on her, they’ve never seen anything like it.
So sorry. Thank you very much. A great young lady. I saw reports they were like, perfect, she’s perfect.
Serving alongside Sarah that day was Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe. The terrorist shot Andrew in the head, and no one thought he could possibly make it. The two of them, Sarah and Andrew shot violently in the head. Neither was expected to make it. They weren’t even given any chance. Except his wonderful mother, named Melanie, who I spoke to the same night, and she was so positive. The doctors thought that Andrew was gone, but his mother said, “no, no, Mr. President, he’s going to be fine” and no before he’s going to make it. I’ve never seen anything like it. I mean, he was given almost no chance. She said, “I have no doubt, Sir, he’s going to be okay.” This was the conversation that I had with her that night, with the son laying in bed, blood all over. Everybody is praying. She said, “Sir, he will be okay.” The doctors didn’t understand what she was saying and after looking at the results of the damage done, neither did I. She was so strong and conclusive that even Andrew’s great father felt she didn’t really understand the gravity of the situation, but she turned out to be right. Right, Melanie? She turned out to be right.
Amazing actually. I said “where does this woman come from, she’s the most positive person I’ve ever met?” With God’s help, Andrew has battled back from the edge of death. And we’re talking about the edge of death, on his way to a miraculous recovery. He’s got a little work to do, but he’s doing great. Nice to see you — he’s a good-looking guy. Nice to see you. Thanks, Andrew. Thank you very much.
So Andrew now you’re up, I’m going to ask a highly respected Gen. James Seward to present staff sergeant Andrew Wolfe and the great family of Sarah Beckstrom with the award created by our late, great president, George Washington himself. It’s called the Purple Heart.
We love you all. Love you.
We’re proudly restoring safety for Americans at home, and we are also restoring security for Americans abroad. Our country has never been stronger. My first 10 months, I ended eight wars, including Cambodia.
Isn’t it funny? You sick people.
Cambodia and Thailand. Pakistan and India would have been a nuclear war. 35 million people said the Prime Minister of Pakistan would have died if it were not for my involvement. Kosovo and Serbia, Israel and Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia. Armenia and Azerbaijan, the Congo and Rwanda. And of course, the war in Gaza, which proceeds at a very low level. It’s just about there. And I want to thank Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner for your help. Thank you Steve. Thank you Jared. And I also want to thank the man they report to Secretary of State. Marco Rubio.
Thank you. Thank. People like you. You know, Marco got 100% of the votes when he was in confirmation — I think our next one was about 54%. And some of the Democrats are now saying, I can’t believe we approved that guy. And he said, it’s an honor that they feel that way. Right, Marco? You have done a great job, great Secretary of state. I think he’ll go down as the best ever. Under the cease fire, I negotiated every single hostage, both living and dead, has been returned home. Can you believe that?
Nobody thought it was possible. Nobody thought that was possible.
Both living and dead. And those parents who had a dead son, their boy, they’d always tell me their boy. They wanted him as much as though he were living. That was an amazing period of time. And they came back. And when we got all of the living hostages back and many, many before them. But I always said those last 20 are going to be very tough. But we got many, many more hundreds. But I said those last 20 are going to be tough. We got them back, but we only got back 14 or 15 of the dead of the 28
And believe it or not, Hamas worked along with Israel and they dug and they dug and they dug. It’s a tough — it’s a tough thing to do, going through bodies all over, passing up 100 bodies sometimes for each one that they found.
Tough job and they finally got it back to 27 and then Steve and Jared they got it back to 28. They found all 28 nobody thought that was possible but we did it and I remember the family of the 28th they were so grieved but they were so happy as happy as it’s possible to be they had their boy back. The mother said ‘sir we have our boy back.’ What a period of time that was, but we got them all back, so thank you both very much.
And we’re working very hard to end the ninth war, the killing and slaughter between Russia and Ukraine, where 25,000 soldiers are dying each and every month — think of that, 25,000 soldiers are dying a month. A war which would have never happened if I were president. Would have never happened.
As president, I will make peace wherever I can, but I will never hesitate to confront threats to America wherever we must. That’s why in a breakthrough operation last June, the United States military obliterated Iran’s nuclear weapons program with an attack on Iranian soil known as Operation Midnight Hammer. For decades, it has been the policy of the United States never to allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon. Many decades. Since they seized control of that proud nation 47 years ago, the regime and its murderous proxies have spread nothing but terrorism and death and hate. They’ve killed and maimed thousands of American service members and hundreds of thousands and even millions of people. With what’s called roadside bombs. They were the kings of the roadside bomb. And we took out Soleimani. I did that during my first term. Had a huge impact. He was the father of the roadside bomb. And just over the last couple of months with the protests, they’ve killed at least, it looks like, 32,000 protesters — 32,000 protesters in their own country. They shot them and hung them. We stopped them from hanging a lot of them with the threat of serious violence.
But this is some terrible people. They’ve already developed missiles that can threaten Europe and our bases overseas, and they’re working to build missiles that will soon reach the United States of America. After Midnight Hammer, they were warned to make no future attempts to rebuild their weapons program, and in particular nuclear weapons, yet they continue. They’re starting it all over. We wiped it out and they want to start it all over again and are at this moment again pursuing their sinister ambitions. We are in negotiations with them. They want to make a deal, but we haven’t heard those secret words, “We will never have a nuclear weapon.” My preference, my preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy. But one thing is certain, I will never allow the world’s No. 1 sponsor of terror, which they are by far, to have a nuclear weapon. Can’t let that happen.
And no nation should ever doubt America’s resolve. We have the most powerful military on earth. I rebuilt the military in my first term. We’re going to continue to do so also, which is to prove a trillion-dollar budget. We have no choice. We have to be strong, because hopefully we will seldom have to use this great power that we built together. It’s really called peace through strength, that has been very, very effective.
So thanks to Republicans in Congress, we’re investing that record number of dollars — we have no choice — in the United States Armed Forces, also creating a lot of jobs, but we’re not even doing it for that reason. Because as I said, we have more jobs, more people working today than ever before in the history of our country. And NATO countries, our friends and allies — they are, they’re our friends and they’re our allies — have just agreed, at my very strong request, to pay 5% of GDP for military defense rather than the 2%, which they weren’t paying, we were paying for almost all of that. Now they’re paying 5, as opposed to not paying 2. And getting that 5% was something which everyone said would never be done, could not happen. We got it really easily with one meeting. And a big difference between 2% that’s not paid, we were paying the freight of many of them, very few were paid up, now 5% then they’re paid. And everything we send over to Ukraine is sent through NATO and they pay us in full. They pay us totally in full, every branch of our Armed Forces is setting records for recruitment. This is so exciting.
And every service member. And every service member recently received a warrior dividend of $1,776. You know, they cleared up my desk, we got the money from tariffs and other things, a lot of money we have with, much more money than people understand, have to rebuild that program a little bit but it won’t take long. But we got all the money and it was $1,775 and they wanted my approval. And I said, what’s the number? $1,775. I said, wait a minute, for one more dollar, we can have $1,776. I said, we’re going to figure that out. I never asked anybody if we could afford it. One more dollar. I said $1,776. And I said that’s good. And I’ll tell you what, our military, that was four months ago, I never see a person in the military that doesn’t thank me for it. So we’re honored to do it. They deserve it. And we call it “1776.” It was great. And we love our military. We love our law enforcement. We love a fireman. The firemen don’t get mentioned enough. We love firemen.
We’re also restoring American security and dominance in the Western Hemisphere, acting to secure our national interests and defend our country from violence, drugs, terrorism, and foreign interference for years. Large swaths of territory in our region, including large parts of Mexico, really large parts of Mexico, have been controlled by murderous drug cartels. That’s why I designated these cartels as foreign terrorist organizations and I declared illicit fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction. And with our new military campaign, we have stopped record amounts of drugs coming into our country and virtually stopped it completely coming in by water or sea, you probably noticed that. You’ve very seriously damaged their fishing industry, also. Nobody wants to go fishing anymore. We’ve also taken down one of the most sinister cartel kingpins of all. You saw that yesterday.
In January, in January, elite American warriors carried out one of the most complex, spectacular feats of military competence and power in world history. No one’s seen anything like it. Foreign leaders, I won’t tell you who, called me and they said, very impressive, very impressive. They couldn’t believe, they all watched, they saw what happened. This is a different fighting force than we had years ago when we fought to tie. You know, it’s a great fighting force. I’m so proud of it. Look at Space Force. Space Force is my baby. As we did that, my baby is becoming so important. And America’s Armed Forces overwhelmed all defenses and utterly defeated a an enemy — good fighters — to end the reign of outlawed dictator Nicolas Maduro and bring him to face American justice. And this was an absolutely a colossal victory for the security of the United States. A bright new beginning for the people of Venezuela. We’re working closely with the new president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, to unleash extraordinary economic gains for both of our countries and to bring new hope to those who have suffered so terribly. They really did suffer.
With us tonight is Alejandro Gonzalez. Se grew up in a tight-knit Venezuelan family and was especially close to her beloved Uncle Enrique. But after Enrique ran for office and opposed Maduro, he was kidnapped by Maduro’s security forces and thrown into the regime’s really infamous prison in Caracas. Alejandro feared she would never see her uncle again. She feared for her own life, also. But since the raid, we have worked with the new leadership, and they have ordered the closure of that vile prison and released hundreds of political prisoners already with more to come.
Alejandro, I’m pleased to inform you that not only has your uncle been released, but he is here tonight. We brought him over to celebrate his freedom with you in person. Enrique, please come down. Thank you, Enrique. Have a good time. Nice to have you back, Enrique.
There were many heroes on that January raid to capture Maduro. Really great heroes. It was very dangerous. They knew we were coming. They were all set. But the deeds of one warrior that night will live forever in the eternal chronicles of military valor. Chief Warrant Officer 5 Eric Slover planned the mission and was the flight lead in the cockpit of the first helicopter. A big, beautiful, powerful helicopter. Was a massive Chinook carrying, as you can imagine, many, many American warfighters wearing the dog tags his wife Amy had blessed with holy water before he left. She knew it was going to be a rough one. Eric steered the Chinook under the cover of night and descended swiftly upon Maduro’s heavily protected military fortress. This was a major military installation, protected by thousands of soldiers and guarded by Russian and Chinese military technology. How did that work out? Not too good.
While preparing to land, enemy machine guns fired from every angle. And Eric was hit, very badly, in the leg and hip, one bullet after another. He absorbed four agonizing shots, shredding his leg into numerous pieces. And yet, despite the fact that the use of his legs was vital to successful helicopter flight, Mike said the most important part of flying a helicopter to deliver the many commanders who would capture and detain Maduro was the only thing Eric was thinking about. And even as he was gushing blood, which was flowing back down the aisle – helicopter lands at a steep angle. The machine guns stood right in front of him. They were right in front of him. Two machine-gunners who escaped the wrath of the previous planes. Eric maneuvered his helicopter with all of those lives and souls to face the enemy, and let his gunners eliminate the threat, turn the helicopter around so the gunners could take care of business, saving the lives of his fellow warriors from what could have been a catastrophic crash deep in enemy territory.
Only after safely landing the helicopter with all the warriors aboard in the exact right spot, which was vital to the mission, probably would have happened. Maybe cancel the mission if that didn’t happen. Eric told his copilot, also wounded, but not as gravely, to take over. I’m about ready to pass out. The success of the entire mission, and the lives of his fellow warriors hinge on Eric’s ability to take searing pain. It was unbelievable what’s happened to his legs. Of the bullets and keep on flying and landing. People knew what was happening. Everybody in the back of the helicopter knew because they saw the blood pouring down the aisle. Chief Warrant Officer Slover is still recovering from his serious wounds, but I’m thrilled to say that he is here tonight with his wife, Amy. Eric and Amy, come on in. So we have a surprise, Eric and Amy. In recognition of Eric’s actions above and beyond the call of duty, I would now like to ask General Jonathan Braga to present Chief Warrant Officer Slover with our nation’s highest military award, the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Well, thank you very much, Eric and Amy. Great to get to know you. I met with them and with a lot of their fellow warriors at Fort Bragg recently. You notice the name Fort Bragg. We have it back. We brought it back. We won the First World War with it, the Second World War with it, and then they decided to change the name. But we changed it back. Everybody wanted it changed back too. And 10 of Eric’s fellow warriors from that incredible night of victory will also be receiving medals at a private ceremony that will soon be held at the White House. And it will be the.
Thank you, Eric. That’s a big one. Tonight we’ve celebrated many truly extraordinary American patriots. But there is one last living legend to honor before we go. He is one more heroic American aviator, Navy fighter pilot Royce Williams served in World War II, Korea, Vietnam, flying more than 220 missions in the skies over Korea. In 1952, Royce was in the dogfight of a lifetime. Legendary dogfight. Flying through blizzard conditions, his squadron was ambushed by seven Soviet fighter planes. It was his first aerial combat of the war, and despite being massively outnumbered and outgunned, Royce led the takedown of four enemy jets and almost destroyed the others, vanquishing his adversaries while taking 263 bullets to his own plane and being seriously hurt. His story was secret for over 50 years. He didn’t even want to tell his wife, but the legend grew and grew. But tonight, at 100 years old, his brave Navy captain is finally getting the recognition he deserves. He was a legend long before this evening. Royce, please stand up and I will ask the first lady of the United States to present Captain Royce Williams with his Congressional Medal of Honor.
Thank you Eric. I’ve always wanted the Congressional Medal of Honor, but I was informed I’m not allowed to give it to myself, and I wouldn’t know why I’d be taking it. But if they ever opened up that law I will be there with you someday. But you know, that’s our highest honor, the Congressional Medal of Honor. And that’s a big thing. And it’s an honor to be in the same room with you. Thank you both very much. Thank you.
Thank you. Two-hundred fifty years is a long time in the life of a nation. But in another sense, it’s really a mere moment in the eye of history. Two of the gentlemen we met in the gallery this evening took their first breaths one century ago. One hundred years before that, on July 4th, 1826, the author of the Declaration of Independence, brilliant Thomas Jefferson, drew his last breath. Just a single long human life span separates the giants who declared and won our independence from the heroes who stand among us tonight.
Everything our nation has done, everything we have achieved, has been the work of those few great lifetimes. In those brief chapters, Americans built this nation from 13 humble colonies into the pinnacle of human civilization and human freedom. The strongest, wealthiest, most powerful, most successful nation in all of history. Americans ventured out across the daunting and dangerous continent. We carved pass through an unforgiving wilderness, settled a boundless frontier, and tamed the beautiful but very, very dangerous wild west. From empty marshes and wide-open plains, we raised up the world’s greatest cities. Together we mastered the world’s mightiest industries, shattered history’s monstrous tyrannies. And we liberated millions from the chains of fascism, communism, oppression and terror.
Americans lifted humanity into the skies or the wings of aluminum and steel. And then we launched mankind into the stars on rockets powered by sheer American will and unyielding American pride. We wired the globe with our ingenuity. We captivated the planet with American culture and now we are pioneering the next great American breakthroughs that will change the entire world. All of this, and so much more, is the enduring legacy, unmatched glory of the hard-working patriots who built and defended this country and who still carry the hopes and freedoms on all of humanity’s backs. For years, they were forgotten, betrayed, and cast aside. But that great betrayal is over, and they will never be forgotten again. Because when the world needs courage, daring, vision and inspiration, it is still turning to America.
And when God needs a nation to work his miracles, he knows exactly who to ask. There is no challenge Americans cannot overcome, no frontier too vast for us to conquer, no dream too bold for us to chase, no horizon too distant for us to claim. For our destiny is written by the hand of Providence. And these first 250 years were just the beginning. From the rugged border towns of Texas to the heartland villages of Michigan, from the sun-kissed shores of Florida to the endless hills of the Dakotas, and from the historic streets of Philadelphia to right here in our nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., the golden age of America is upon us.
The revolution that began in 1776 has not ended. It still continues because the flame of liberty and independence still burns in the heart of every American patriot, and our future will be bigger, better, brighter, bolder, and more glorious than ever before. Thank you. God bless you and God bless America.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-25 16:51:212026-02-25 16:51:21President Donald J. Trump’s 2026 State of the Union Address
The U.S. Intelligence Community has awarded more than a dozen sensitive defense grants to researchers affiliated with institutions connected to the Chinese government and its military, according to a report exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Since 2017, at least 14 U.S. defense research projects supported by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) — which is tasked by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) with investing in “high-risk, high-payoff research programs” — have included investigators simultaneously affiliated with Chinese national laboratories, state surveillance entities, military units and nuclear weapons development institutions, according to the report published by Parallax Advanced Research, a nonprofit funded by U.S. federal, state and municipal governments. Participants in at least two of the IARPA projects cited in the report conducted similar research during the same period with Chinese government-tied institutions, raising serious concerns about U.S. defense technology transfer to a hostile foreign power.
“These studies reveal a deliberate effort by China’s intelligence and public security apparatus, alongside military-affiliated entities, to extract lessons, methodologies, and technical knowledge from IARPA-funded programs,” the report warns. “This includes attempts to reverse-engineer research outputs, replicate experimental designs, and adapt [U.S. Intelligence Community] technologies for use in China’s mass surveillance apparatus and strategic military capabilities.”
Researchers with ties to adversarial nations, like China, should be prohibited from collaborating on U.S. intelligence and defense research, the report’s co-author, L.J. Eads, director of research intelligence at Parallax, told the DCNF.
“What I found most concerning was the sheer number of IARPA funded projects that IARPA itself describes as having clear Intelligence Community value that have involved — and in some cases continue to involve — Chinese institutions and companies, including personnel directly tied to the [People’s Liberation Army],” said Eads.
ODNI and IARPA did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
‘Grave National Security Threats’
In one 2024 case study highlighted in the report, the lead investigator for IARPA’s BRIAR Program was allegedly found to have “a long history” of simultaneous collaboration with Chinese institutions connected to China’s military as well as U.S. government-sanctioned researchers.
IARPA’s ongoing BRIAR Program aims to produce detection and tracking software for individuals by “extracting biometric signatures from the whole-body (e.g., gait and/or body shape) and face,” according to IARPA, and supports U.S. counterterrorism, military force protection, and border security.
The lead investigator for the $11 million BRIAR Program is a Michigan State University faculty member, who has simultaneously collaborated on Chinese government-funded projects with a number of institutions including “Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech), in China, on similar gait research,” according to the report.
SUSTech has “documented partnerships across China’s defense research ecosystem,” the report states, citing a threat assessment from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, which is a think tank partially funded by that nation’s Department of Defense.
Additionally, the lead investigator for IARPA’s BRIAR Program has also allegedly collaborated on research with the deputy director of China’s liaison office in Hong Kong, according to the report. The U.S. Treasury Department added that deputy director to its “Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons” list, which flags entities “controlled by, or acting for or on behalf of, targeted countries,” resulting in their assets being blocked, according to the U.S. Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC).
China’s research sectors have “deep entanglements” with U.S. intelligence defense programs, and “present grave national security threats,” former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Cella told the DCNF after reviewing Parallax’s findings.
“[I]t is critical to the U.S. and its Free World allies to do a deep-dive self-assessment and begin the process of de-risking, and in some sectors, de-coupling,” said Cella, who now serves as director of the Michigan-China Economic and Security Review Group.
A Michigan State University spokesperson declined to answer questions related to the report’s findings and referred the DCNF to the school’s policy on academic conflicts of interest and disclosure requirements.
‘Intelligence Applications’
In another case study highlighted in Parallax’s report, datasets from IARPA’s BABEL Program were used by PLA researchers, U.S. and Chinese academics to conduct experiments for a 2018 publication concerning speech recognition technologies.
Operating under the control of the Chinese Communist Party, the PLA “focuses squarely on overcoming the United States through a whole-of-nation mobilization effort,” and aims to achieve “‘strategic counterbalance’ against the United States in the nuclear and other strategic domains” by 2027, according to the Department of Defense.
The BABEL Program aims to support the U.S. intelligence community by developing technologies capable of generating a “speech transcription system for any new language within one week,” according to IARPA.
Despite its value to the U.S. intelligence community, the 2018 publication included a researcher from PLA Unit 62315, who “concurrently filed a related patent in China “with other members of the same unit,” Parallax’s report found.
“Although extensive searches of Chinese-language sources did not yield public information on the internal mission or structure of PLA Unit 62315, its role using IARPA-provided datasets, combined with the concurrent filing of a related patent by the same unit, demonstrates a clear PLA interest in advancing speech recognition and acoustic modeling capabilities,” the report states.
‘Security Problem’
The report also flags a 2023 IARPA-funded publication that included a researcher from the China Academy of Engineering Physics (CAEP).
Subordinate to China’s Central Military Commission, CAEP is “the technology complex responsible for the research, development and testing of China’s nuclear weapons” and is on the Entity List, according to the U.S. Federal Register.
The Entity List identifies persons likely involved in “activities contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States,” and, consequently, prohibits certain items, like semiconductors, from being exported to those entities, according to the federal government.
The 2023 publication involving the CAEP researcher was connected to IARPA’s LogiQ Program, which “aims to advance quantum computing” in order to solve problems “of interest to the Intelligence Community and the U.S. Government as a whole,” according to IARPA.
CAEP’s involvement in IARPA’s LogiQ program “means sensitive U.S. quantum error correction innovations may have been exposed to [China’s] nuclear and quantum military ecosystem,” the report warns.
“This report only scratches the surface of a much larger and more serious research security problem,” Eads told the DCNF.
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.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-23 14:51:182026-02-23 14:51:18EXCLUSIVE: U.S. Intel Funded Projects Riddled With Chinese Gov’t-Linked Researchers
Twelve Democrats plan to skip President Donald Trump’s Feb. 24 State of the Union address to attend a left-wing activist event titled the “People’s State of the Union” instead.
The event, hosted by progressive political advocacy group MoveOn and left-wing media outlet MeidasTouch, will be held on the National Mall during Trump’s State of the Union address as a form of protesting the Trump administration, according to a MoveOn press release.
“We cannot give Trump the attention he wants, or validate his lies to the American people,” MoveOn states on a flyer for the event. “We cannot treat this SOTU as business as usual.”
The event, hosted by former MSNBC anchors Joy Reid and Katie Phang, will feature people “impacted” by Trump, including Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn.; Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass.; Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore.; Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.; and the chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas.
“Democrats have no obligation to reward him with an audience as he lies and attacks people who disagree with him,” Murphy wrote in MoveOn’s press release.
Van Hollen echoed his colleague’s remarks, adding that he “will not normalize Donald Trump’s march toward fascism by attending his state of the union address.”
“We cannot pretend this is business as usual,” the senator added.
Other Democrat officials in attendance will include Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn.; Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Ariz.; Rep. Becca Balint, D-Verm.; Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-N.J.; Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas; and Rep. Deila Ramirez, D-Ill.
In a statement, Ansari said that this event builds on her protest of Trump’s joint address to Congress last year.
“Last year, I walked out of President Trump’s State of the Union because I refused to normalize the most corrupt and authoritarian administration in American history,” Ansari said in a statement. “This year, we are elevating the voices of those directly harmed by this administration’s policies.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal, who recently introduced the “Trans Bill of Rights,” will also attend the event.
Trump, Jayapal says, “is trampling on our constitutional rights and completely disregarding the rule of law in this country—all while saying everything is going great. We don’t need to hear his take on the State of the Union.”
Democrats confirmed their participation at the event after House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries urged Democrat officials to sit in “quiet defiance” or miss the entirety of the address.
Other progressive-aligned entities, such as a campaign by the nonprofit Amplify Edge called Young People Address the Nation, echoed Jeffries’ remarks by urging members of Congress to boycott the address earlier this week.
“Young people are not asking for symbolic statements,” Young People Address the Nation Executive Producer Dillon St. Bernard wrote in a communique obtained by The Daily Signal. “When constitutional norms and civil liberties are in question, pretending this is business as usual sends the wrong message.”
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https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-20 15:51:272026-02-20 15:51:27Democrats to Boycott State of the Union With Progressive Activists
Dan “Ox” Ochsner, is a 26 year conservative political talk show host. Dan’s show Hot Talk with The Ox airs M-F 8a-11a Central on AM 1450 and FM 99.3 KNSI in Minnesota. Dan is a Member of the Minnesota Capitol Press Corps.
Twice embedded in Iraq as a broadcast journalist. “Hot Talk with The Ox” regularly features live broadcasts from Washington DC as well as the Republican and Democrat National Conventions.
Also, “The Ox” has shared donuts with, and welcomed Kamala Harris’s VP pic Tim Walz in studio many times.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2026-02-19 15:51:152026-02-19 15:51:15PODCAST: An Insiders Look Into the Minnesota Protests
