By Neland Nobel
By Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)
We have long called for regime change in Iran. Regime change means that the people of Iran have the right to freedom of speech. In order to accomplish this they must be armed, as we Americans are under the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The following article reveals that there may be coming an “Operation Second Amendment.”
Donald Trump said an unarmed population has little chance against a heavily armed state, pointing to the high death toll among anti-regime demonstrators.
By: Satyam Singh
The US may be preparing to open a new front in the standoff with Iran — not on the battlefield, but inside the country itself. US President Donald Trump has raised the prospect of putting weapons in the hands of Iranian citizens amid escalating pressure over repeated ceasefire violations in the Strait of Hormuz. In an interview, Trump framed the US position as dominant, insisting “one way or the other, we win”.
The remarks, delivered during a phone interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt Show, come amid a fragile ceasefire and continued clashes between the US and Iranian navies. According to Trump, the capabilities of the Iranian military and economy have been seriously hampered, given that US efforts have made it difficult for Iran to manage its military strength and stability at home.
The US President’s comments turned sharply towards internal unrest in Iran, where he indicated that an unarmed population faces little chance against a heavily armed state apparatus. “If they had guns, which they don’t have, if they had guns, they would fight back. I’m convinced of that,” Trump said, adding that protesters have faced overwhelming force from regimes’ security personnel equipped with automatic weapons.
He admitted the risks of encouraging mass mobilisation, flagging the high death toll among demonstrators. “You can’t have an unarmed population against people with AK-47’s and stand there, even if you have 250,000 people,” he said.
“They have to have guns. And I think they’re getting some guns. As soon as they have guns, they’ll fight like, as good as anybody there is,” the US President added.
The comments echo earlier revelations made by him. He admitted that the US had attempted to supply weapons to Iranian protesters through Kurdish intermediaries. However, it failed to reach intended recipients. Kurdish groups have denied receiving such shipments.
Throughout the interview, Trump repeatedly emphasized the superiority of the American armed forces, stating that Iran’s navy had been obliterated. According to him, most of their naval vessels had been destroyed, and their last attacks were conclusive.
On the prospect of starting a war with Iran, he said: “We’ve already won that.”
However, the US President is taking a two-track strategy of putting pressure alongside the potential for negotiations. A very important condition set by Washington is that highly enriched uranium be returned to America.
“Yes, we do. We want it back. We want it back 100 per cent,” Trump said when asked whether recovering nuclear material is a red line for any deal.
Despite the assertive tone, Trump stopped short of declaring the ceasefire over, leaving open the possibility of fresh military action. When asked directly whether strikes could resume imminently, he declined to reveal the possibilities.
“Well, I can’t tell you that,” he said.
This is because the situation remains ambiguous since neither side is fully engaging in combat yet, but only playing around the red line without stepping over it. According to the Pentagon, Iran’s activities so far have not crossed the threshold of major military escalation.
“We’re not looking for a fight. They said they control the strait, they do not,” Pete Hegseth said, adding that the ceasefire is not over.
©2026 Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.). All rights reserved.
By The Daily Signal
The Trump administration is proposing almost three dozen new rules to scale back gun regulations that proliferated during the Biden administration.
The 34 rules placed in the Federal Register on Wednesday included reversing a 2024 Biden administration rule that attempted to force firearms dealers to run background checks on buyers at gun shows. Gun control advocates called this the “gun show loophole.”
Another change ends the 2023 Biden administration rule that restricted pistol braces. Pistol braces are attachments that allow a person holding a pistol to keep the weapon against their shoulder. The Biden administration justified the regulation by claiming the attachment turned the pistol into a barreled rifle that is subject to stronger regulation.
Earlier this week, the Senate confirmed Robert Cekada as director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
“ATF’s mission is to protect public safety and enforce the law—and these reforms reflect our commitment to doing that through regulations that are clear, legally sound, and narrowly tailored to that purpose,” Cekada said in a statement. “Our enforcement focus from here on out is on willful violators and criminal actors, not inadvertent compliance issues by responsible owners and licensees.”
The focus of the proposed rules, now open for public comment, is to scale back enforcement against licensed gun dealers and gun owners who make paperwork errors, and to emphasize a focus on criminals.
The Gun Owners of America, a pro–Second Amendment group, had filed several lawsuits against the federal government opposing regulations, but “that all went away with this new ATF director,” Gun Owners of America national spokesman Stephen Willeford said.
The top priorities for the Gun Owners of America were doing away with the pistol brace regulation and reversing the Biden rule that categorized anyone selling a firearm as being in the business of selling firearms.
But, he said, the changes have come later than promised, which he blamed on former Attorney General Pam Bondi, a former Florida attorney general.
“The Trump administration told us in the first week they would undo all of the Biden administration rulings in the first week, not laws but rulings,” Willeford, co-author of “A Town Called Sutherland Springs: Faith and Heroism Through Tragedyopens in a new tab,” told the Daily Signal. “We were worried when Pam Bondi became attorney general. She was never pro-2A in Florida.”
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche asserted the Trump administration is taking a different path than the prior administration.
“The Second Amendment is not a second-class right,” Blanche saidopens in a new tab in a statement. “This Department of Justice is ending the weaponization of federal authority against law-abiding gun owners. We will continue to vigorously defend their rights as the Constitution demands.”
The rules include repealing existing regulations, modernizing firearms regulations, reducing burdens on gun owners and gun dealers, and providing legal clarifications.
The changes are a response to President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14206, “Protecting Second Amendment Rights,” signed in February 2025, geared at ending “the federal government’s violation of Americans’ fundamental Second Amendment right to protect themselves, their families, and their freedoms.”
Gun control advocates are upset with the changes. Nick Wilson, senior director of public safety at the Center for American Progress, took aim at scrapping the gun show regulation.
“The Trump administration is once again prioritizing the interests of the gun industry over the safety of American families,” Wilson said in a statement Thursday. “The new proposed rule guts a key provision of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022—essentially getting rid of near-universal background checks. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche attempted to spin this as ‘the most comprehensive regulatory reform package in the history’ of ATF, but this is really an irresponsible effort to strip away lifesaving protections in order to maximize gun industry profits.”
AUTHOR
EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.
By The Editors
Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes
ANALYSIS
While the elite talk about “public safety” after each tragic shooting, the data shows they are ignoring several practical options for the comfort of focusing solely on disarming the law-abiding.
While the media fixates on tragedy, they ignore that Americans use firearms for self-defense between 500,000 and 3 million times annually, proving that a “good guy with a gun” isn’t a myth—it’s a massive, uncounted insurance policy for civil order.
The Mental Health Margin: Despite “gun control” dominating the airwaves, the federal government allocated only about $1.1 billion toward school-based mental health in the latest major safety act—a drop in the bucket compared to the $557 billion in total societal costs they claim gun violence incurs, yet they refuse to pivot the budget toward the root cause.
The FBI’s 2024 data confirms that while total violent crime dropped 4.5%, the push for “assault weapon” bans targets a category of firearms used in less than 3% of all homicides, proving the legislative crosshairs are on your collection, not the criminal’s toolkit.
94% of mass public shootings since 1950 have occurred in “gun-free zones,” where the state’s promise of protection is most absolute and its failure most total.
The Warning Sign Gap: A staggering 93% of mass shooters showed observable warning signs or “signs of crisis” prior to their attacks, yet the legislative focus remains on the tool rather than the intervention of the person—proving that the “mental health” pivot isn’t just a talking point; it’s the missing link in actual prevention.
AT WHAT COST?
The surrender of the ultimate “sovereignty of the individual” to a federal bureaucracy that has proven it cannot even secure its own border, let alone your cul-de-sac. We are trading a fundamental right for a false sense of security managed by the very people who failed to provide it.
WHAT IS THE ALTERNATIVE?
We should look toward the “Hardened School” model: treating campus security with the same $20 billion seriousness we treat airport terminals and federal courthouses. The alternative is a “Security-as-a-Service” mindset—investing in private safety infrastructure and mental health intervention rather than signing over your Second Amendment rights.
The data is clear: the push for “control” is a bad-faith strategy designed to manage your rights rather than manage the risk. If we want to secure our future, we must stop auditing the law-abiding and start hardening the targets that the “Control Cartel” has left undefended.
“To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them.” – George Mason
-The Editors
By Crime Prevention Research Center
By The Editors
By The Editors
By The Daily Caller
A Texas philanthropist is abusing the nonprofit legal system to quietly fund Democratic priorities such as ranked-choice voting, a conservative watchdog group claims.
John Arnold’s Action Now Initiative pretends to be a social welfare organization to enjoy tax-exempt status while spending heavily on campaigns, American Accountability Foundation (AAF) alleged in an IRS complaint obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. In one instance, Action Now Initiative’s IRS filings seemingly failed to report hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on a 2020 ranked-choice voting campaign in Alaska, AAF told the agency Feb. 4, citing public records.
“Our organization fully complies with all applicable tax laws and reporting requirements, and any claim otherwise is false,” a spokesperson for Arnold Ventures, Arnold’s private company, told the DCNF in response to an inquiry sent to Action Now Initiative. Arnolds is also a board member at Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, its website shows.
Arnold’s organizations promote gun control, lenient criminal justice policies and “racial justice,” though he has portrayed himself as opposed to “partisan” politicians. Sixty-one percent of Arnold Ventures’ campaign donations went to Democrats in 2024, according to the database Open Secrets. Action Now Initiative’s website declares its goal of supporting “the mission of Arnold Ventures to MAXIMIZE OPPORTUNITY AND MINIMIZE INJUSTICE through evidence-based policy reform.”
Records show “substantial evidence of failure to report state political spending by [Arnold] to influence a successful ballot initiative in Alaska and him abusing the federal tax code to do it,” AAF told the IRS.
Action Now Initiative spent around $3 million in 2019 and 2020 on Alaska’s ranked-choice voting ballot initiative while reporting just $2,500 in expenses for 2019 and $8,693 for 2020 in IRS filings, AAF noted. The discrepancies “strongly indicate violations” of tax law, according to the watchdog group.
“While [Arnold’s] ideology is not itself unlawful, the use of a § 501(c)(4) entity to channel large-scale electoral spending — particularly when paired with materially incomplete federal reporting — constitutes an abuse of the social welfare form and warrants heightened enforcement scrutiny,” AAF wrote.
The complaint asks the IRS to investigate Action Now Initiative’s financial disclosures, decide whether it is improperly acting as a political organization and impose “all appropriate enforcement actions” if needed, such as revocation of its tax-exempt status. The IRS did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
AUTHOR
DCNF Crime and Extremism Reporter
RELATED ARTICLE: EXCLUSIVE: IRS Quietly Puts On New Face, Ousts Anti-Trump Spokeswoman With Drunk Driving Record
EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.
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.
By Geoffrey Ingersoll
By Bruce Bialosky
By Todd Woodard
By Family Research Council
A new wave of elected Democrats in Virginia is showing how much of a difference one election can make.
In Virginia’s 2025 midterm elections, Democrats managed to sweep the state, claiming three high-ranking political positions: governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general. It didn’t take long for the shift in power to translate into policy action. Governor Abigail Spanberger was sworn in on January 17, 2026, and almost immediately, a flurry of new legislation emerged from the Democratic-controlled General Assembly.
Some of the early proposals included gun-related measures that critics argued targeted Second Amendment rights, such as expanded restrictions or heavy taxes on firearms and ammunition. However, scrutiny has intensified across the board as Democrats continue to push broader priorities that stir controversy and appear to diverge sharply from campaign promises.
One high-profile example is House Bill 863, sponsored by Democratic Delegate Rae Cousins. The bill seeks to eliminate mandatory minimum sentences for a range of serious crimes, including manslaughter, rape, possession and distribution of child pornography, assaulting law enforcement officers, certain repeat violent felonies, and even the mandatory five-day jail sentence for some first-time DUI offenders. According to The Post Millennial, “many left-wing activists have criticized mandatory minimum sentencing, labelling the practice as racist.”
Supporters have described it as a “common-sense proposal” that removes “one-size-fits-all” requirements. “This change would give the experienced judges in our communities more discretion to make decisions based on the unique facts of each case,” Cousins said. Proponents also argue it promotes fairer, more individualized sentencing and addresses long-standing criticisms of mandatory minimums as overly rigid or disproportionately harmful. Critics, however, are sounding the alarm.
Law enforcement advocates and former Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares, for example, warn that removing these required prison terms could lead to lighter punishments for dangerous offenders, potentially undermining accountability, endangering public safety, and increasing risks of re-offending. One expert, Josh Ederheimer of the University of Virginia’s Center for Public Safety and Justice, explained to Fox News that “from a law enforcement standpoint, I think police generally want offenders to be held accountable, and frustration among law enforcement officers grows when individuals are released quickly and subsequently re-offend — and even more so if it involved a violent felony.”
Considering how this would affect victims and their families, he added, “I think that the police and public alike have expectations that convicted criminals will be held accountable, and that full sentences should be served. Mandatory minimums assure victims — and the community — that a convicted person will serve their sentence. It is the circumstance when convicted felons are released early that victims may feel a sense of betrayal or that justice was not served. That’s the dilemma.” Notably, HB 863 is only one part of a larger Democratic push on criminal justice reform in the 2025-2026 session.
But for some Virginians, the concerns expand beyond gun rights and criminal justice. For instance, shortly after Democrats consolidated power, a separate set of tax proposals were introduced — mirroring (if not surpassing) some of California’s rates.
Only months after campaigning on affordability and vowing lower costs for families, Virginia Democrats set forth legislation that would create new higher-income tax brackets, including an increase to 8% on income over $600,000 and 10% on income over $1 million. They also added measures like a 3.8% net investment income tax on higher earners, which could lower after-tax returns on investments and discourage saving and investing. Combined, some say these could push Virginia’s top effective income tax rate to around 13.8%, which would potentially surpass California’s current top rate, the highest in the nation.
Even so, supporters frame the changes as a “Fair Share” approach, arguing that millionaires and high earners should contribute more to fund education, housing, public services, and affordability initiatives. Groups like The Commonwealth Institute, a left-wing policy group backing the tax plan, estimate such reforms could generate over $1 billion annually for these priorities. Meanwhile, critics are accusing Democrats of breaking campaign promises.
During her 2025 run, Spanberger emphasized an “Affordable Virginia Plan” to lower health care, housing, and energy costs, with pledges to deliver savings in 2026. Opponents, including House Minority Leader Terry Kilgore (R) and the Republican Party of Virginia, call the tax hikes a betrayal that could drive jobs, investment, and residents away — following what they describe as the “failed paths” of high-tax states like California and New York. National figures like Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform have labeled the timing “particularly foolish” amid competitive pressures from neighboring states lowering taxes.
Family Research Council’s Matt Carpenter, director of FRC Action, addressed the apparent shift in priorities with The Washington Stand. “When [Spanberger] was representing the people of Virginia’s 7th congressional district,” he said, “she was an informal member of the ‘mod squad’ of allegedly moderate House Democrats who wanted to work with their Republican counterparts on issues of mutual interest, like agriculture, veterans’ affairs, and fentanyl. She may have done some work on these issues with moderate Republicans, but the reality is Spanberger’s vote history in Congress shows her to be committed to the left-wing cultural revolution playbook.”
As he went on to explain, “She was a reliable vote when taxpayer funded abortion, gender transitions on minors, special rights for adults’ ‘sexual orientation and gender identity,’ and more, came up. And yet, during the 2025 election, she was adept at stepping around controversial topics like men participating in women’s sports throughout the campaign, maintaining her carefully curated moderate brand.”
These early moves, from gun laws to criminal justice to taxes, illustrate how dramatically one election cycle can reshape a state’s direction. With Democrats holding trifecta control for the first time in years, the 2026 legislative session is already advancing these and other priorities at a rapid pace. And yet, Carpenter concluded, it’s not surprising. Rather, he said, “It’s safe to assume [Spanberger] will do as governor just as she did while in Congress: campaign as a centrist and govern as a bona fide leftist.”
AUTHOR
Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.
EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2026 Family Research Council.
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.
By Katelynn Richardson
By John Lott
By The Geller Report
Increasingly, evidence suggests that federal taxpayer dollars are being funneled—through NGOs, grants, fraud, and systemic corruption—into the hands of those destroying this country.
The latest example comes from a report by the Tennessee Star, which indicates that the transgender individual who murdered six people at Covenant Christian School in Nashville in March 2023 may have purchased firearms using federal student aid money. Journal pages released this week by the Federal Bureau of Investigation show the shooter meticulously comparing firearms and recording grant payments received through FAFSA and Nossi College of Art and Design—including Pell Grant funds—alongside notes about gun purchases. The documentation appears to corroborate statements previously made by the shooter’s parents to Nashville police, with the mother bluntly stating, “It was the grant money.” The case underscores a growing and alarming pattern: taxpayer funds meant to educate and uplift are instead being misused, with no meaningful safeguards, oversight, or accountability—sometimes with deadly consequences.
By AWR Hawkins
A report by the Tennessee Star appears to show that the transgender individual who killed six at Covenant Christian school on March 27, 2023, purchased her guns with federal grant money.
The Star points to pages from a journal the she allegedly kept during 2021.
Copies of the journal pages were released by the FBI Monday, and readers can see how the transgender shooter compared and contrasted certain aspects of various guns–including various sight configurations and accuracy.
After weighing different types of guns, the Star noted that the shooter, a woman who felt she was a man, referenced the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) and numerous payments received from Nossi College when she was attending the Nossi College of Art and Design in Nashville.
At the top of one entry, the transgender shooter wrote, “FASFA [sic] grant checks started at $2,050.86.”
Below that she noted: “$2,656.87 (x3 checks from Nossi).” The next ledger entry states, “+$530.00 (x1 check Nossi) ($3,186.87).”
The Star summarized: “[The] reference to Hale’s federal student aid, located in the writings next to her entries about guns she considered buying, appears to corroborate the claims made by her parents to Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) detectives in 2023, when they told law enforcement their child purchased the firearms using federal Pell Grant money.”
Speaking to the Nashville Metropolitan Police, the shooter’s mother said, “It was the grant money.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and holds a PhD in Military History with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
AUTHOR
RELATED ARTICLES:
Federal Officials Launch Massive Operation in Response to Billions-Scale Minnesota Fraud
Jihad Mamdani Appoints al Qaeda Terrorist Lawyer for Top Role
DAY 4 IN IRAN: Students, Women Take to the Streets Despite Live Ammo and Crackdown
New Year’s Eve Islamic Terror Attack Thwarted in Texas
EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.
By Neland Nobel
By Neland Nobel
By Majority Report
While being strangled she shoots her attacker. Then gets fired!
There is a story out of Oklahoma that tells you everything about the modern corporate mind.
It’s the story of a young mother, alone at night as a 7-Eleven manager, who gets strangled by a man trying to pawn off a fake hundred-dollar bill, which she refused to accept.
While being choked, she shoots her attacker. He lives. But she gets fired. Why? Because carrying a weapon to work violates company policy.
Her name is Stephanie Dilyard, and at twenty-five, she was the only person standing between a violent repeat offender and a cash register.
When she refused to accept the counterfeit money, the man turned violent. Not just annoyed, irritated, or hostile. But violent.
He threatened to cut off her head. He threw things at her. He shoved himself behind the counter. He grabbed her by the neck. He slammed her against a sandwich case. He tried to strangle her into unconsciousness.
She tried to call the police. She tried to run. She tried everything the safety posters tell you to try.
Then she realized something. If she kept following 7-Eleven rules, she was not going to make it home to her kids. Not for Thanksgiving. Not for Christmas. Not for graduations, weddings, grandbabies, or any of the moments parents live for.
She drew her own firearm, which she carried legally, and fired once. The attack stopped. Police said she acted within Oklahoma’s self-defense laws, which are designed to protect innocent people from being murdered. This was not complicated.
But then, astonishingly, her employer weighed in.
Not to offer counseling. Not to thank her for surviving. Not to name her employee of the month. Not even to say good job for stopping a dangerous man who later fled the scene and, being injured, called 911.
Instead of praising the worker, the corporation decided she had violated policy. She had carried a weapon, which is apparently more offensive to 7-Eleven than a man threatening to decapitate their employees.
We now live in a country where predators get empathy, and victims get pink slips. Where billion-dollar corporations expect their overnight, defenseless clerks to fight off violent criminals with whatever happens to be within reach at two in the morning. A plastic spoon, a stale donut, maybe a floor mop if you are lucky. But certainly not a tool that might actually keep you alive.
You can almost hear the executives lecturing her. You defended your life. How dare you? Think of our brand image. Think of the bad publicity of shooting a “customer.”
Her coworkers openly discuss the dangerous working conditions online.
If something terrible happens, you are supposed to grab the nearest object and hope it scares away a man who just said he will cut off your head. The company even bans mace and pepper spray.
Imagine working alone through the night, surrounded by strangers, knowing you are not allowed to possess the same protections a jogger carries on a walking trail.
Meanwhile, the man who allegedly strangled her has been charged with assault, battery, threats of violence, attempted fraud, and a parole violation.
Stephanie summed it up perfectly. She said she was put in a corner. Between her life and her job. And she chose her life, because her children depend on her. She wanted to go home.
That used to be something American companies respected. Now, you get fired for it.
How many more people have to be assaulted, injured, or killed while corporations issue memos about brand guidelines? How many mothers need to risk their lives because someone in a distant office thinks a gun in the hands of a law-abiding woman is more dangerous than a violent criminal threatening to sever her head?
Stephanie says she hopes other women see her example and remember their right to defend themselves. She is correct. She did the right thing. She acted with courage. She chose her family.
If only her employer had the common sense to know that bad publicity is not an employee shooting an attacker who is strangling her and threatening to behead an employee.
Bad publicity is when a customer walks into 7-Eleven and sees a decapitated clerk lying behind the hot dog counter with only a plastic fork in her hand.
AUTHOR
Martin Mawyer is the President of Christian Action Network, host of the “Shout Out Patriots” podcast, and author of When Evil Stops Hiding. Subscribe for more action alerts, cultural commentary, and real-world campaigns defending faith, family, and freedom.
©2025 All rights reserved.
Please visit the Patriot Majority Report substack.
Paid subscribers to Patriot Majority Report unlock access to every category of our work: Front Lines. Culture. Screened. Prophecy & AI. The Ledger. Films. and more. So, check back weekly for updates.
By John R. Lott, Jr.
By Neland Nobel
Receive regular news, commentary, and analysis straight to your inbox.
POWERED BY
DrRichSwier.com | ThePricklyPear.org