The case of alleged murderer Luigi Mangione has peeled back yet another layer of moral rot infecting certain corners of the modern left. Here we have a privileged 26-year-old from a wealthy Maryland family, a University of Pennsylvania graduate, who—according to police and clear-as-day video evidence—gunned down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in the streets of New York City last December. A father. A husband. A man Mangione had no personal connection to.
And yet, in a disturbing reflection of the times, this brutal act has been met with a grotesque level of sympathy from some, all because the killer supposedly had the “right” motivations. His actions, they argue, were a protest against the healthcare system and the insurance industry—never mind that what he actually did was shoot an unarmed man in the back.
CNN “reporter” KaitlanCollins promoted a fundraiser for Luigi Mangione. She has since deleted the public relations post for Luigi. pic.twitter.com/7ZI72b9Yfk
But that’s not stopping the apologists. And now, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins appears to have waded right into the mess, according to reports. The network’s chief White House correspondent reportedly posted a link to a website launched by Mangione’s defense team—before quietly deleting it after the backlash hit. Why? Because people noticed.
That link, by the way, was for a legal defense fund that has already raked in over $300,000 from Mangione’s supporters. That’s right—an Ivy League-educated killer from a wealthy family, who allegedly committed a public execution in cold blood, has managed to draw in six figures’ worth of donations.
Two things stand out here: First, Collins conveniently left out the fact that Mangione’s defense attorney is another CNN insider. Second, her original post is now mysteriously unavailable, as pointed out by journalist Stephen Miller. That deletion speaks volumes.
It’s worth asking: Was Collins just blindly sharing the link without thinking? Or was this yet another example of the increasingly common habit of framing violent criminals as misunderstood victims—so long as they fit the right ideological mold?
Wow. Usually when someone makes an error and deletes a tweet, they’ll say, “my bad” and explain they’ve removed a post.
Looks like @kaitlancollins thought no one would notice the Luigi Mangione boosting.
Oops.
This isn’t the first time a murderer has been repackaged into a “cause” rather than a criminal. But what’s particularly galling here is the sheer detachment from reality. Brian Thompson doesn’t get to have a defense fund. He doesn’t get to have a website where he can share his feelings. He doesn’t get to post his gratitude to supporters. He was executed.
And yet, Mangione, a man who had every advantage in life, is now being treated like some kind of folk hero by certain circles.
Collins’ actions, whether intentional or just wildly careless, raise real questions. Is this just another example of mainstream media figures being unable to resist the impulse to glorify criminals if they fit a certain narrative? Or was this simply a case of poor judgment and a scramble to backtrack once the backlash hit? Either way, it’s not a good look.
I am expert in influenza, and have consulted with the WHO over the past two decades on the topic of flu vaccines. This is one subject matter I am extremely knowledgeable about. This goes back to my medical school days, when I worked with Robert Lamb, one of the top influenza virus specialists in the world. It extended through much of my career, including my serving as Director of Clinical Influenza Vaccine Research for Solvay Biologicals, in which I oversaw over $200 million in federal (BARDA) alternative (cell-based) influenza vaccine research funding.
What is happening now with “Bird flu” is another psyops campaign being conducted by the administrative/deep state, apparently in partnership with Pharma, against the American people. They know and we know that the “vaccines” being produced will be somewhat ineffective, as all flu “vaccines” are. The government is chasing a rapidly evolving RNA virus with a syringe, just like they did with HIV and Covid-19.
Generally, the currently circulating avian influenza strain in the US does not include any cases of human-to-human transmission. And the current mortality, with over 60 cases identified, is 0%. NOT 50%.
All the while they are getting prepared to roll out masks, lockdowns, quarantines, etc.
All the while getting ready to roll out mRNA vaccines for poultry and livestock, as well as for all of us.
The more they test, the more “Bird flu” (H5N1) they will find. This “pandemic” is nothing more than an artifact of their newly developed protocols to test cattle, poultry, pets, people, and wildlife on a massive scale for avian influenza. In years past, this was not even considered. In the past, the USG did fund a massive testing and surveillance program called “Biowatch.” That program was a colossal failure and a massive waste of money. Billions of dollars.
Of course, these facilities producing the tests have been repurposed from the Covid-19 testing facilities.
Key questions include:
Will we all comply?
Will we be forced to comply?
Will President Trump go along with the PsyWar/psyops campaign again?
We will know soon enough.
As the United States is testing everyone who has even the mildest symptoms for the H5N1 (avian) influenza, guess what – they are finding it! This is what we call in the lab, a “sampling bias.”
Globally, from 1997 until the present, there have been 907 reported cases of H5N1. And in fact, this particular outbreak was not the worst – and it is the only one where a massive testing campaign has occurred. It appears that this is partly due to the new diagnostic capabilities developed and deployed during Covid-19. The more you test, the more you find. But is it clinically significant?
The Case Study of Tetanus: Supply Chain Issues.
The CDC recommends a booster for the tetanus vaccine every 10 years for adults.
However, research published almost a decade ago suggests that the protection from tetanus and diphtheria vaccination lasts at least 30 years after completing the standard childhood vaccination series.
“We have always been told to get a tetanus shot every 10 years, but actually, there is very little data to prove or disprove that timeline. When we looked at the levels of immunity among 546 adults, we realized that antibody titers against tetanus and diphtheria lasted much longer then previously believed.”
-Mark K. Slifka, Ph.D, study author
This research, published in a highly reputable journal, suggests that a revised vaccination schedule with boosters occurring at ages 30 and 60 would be sufficient. As this was published in early 2016, the US government, at the very least, could have commissioned easily designed prospective and retrospective studies to confirm these results. And those results would have been published by now, with the tetanus adult schedule revised to reflect what is now known about the durable immunity of tetanus and diphtheria vaccines. Reducing the boosters to just two shots would save the government vast sums of money.
Not only that, but both the tetanus and diphtheria vaccines carry risks for adults. It is estimated that 50%–85% of patients experience injection site pain or tenderness, 25%–30% experience edema and erythema. Higher preexisting anti-tetanus antibody levels are also associated with a higher reactogenicity rate and greater severity (reference).
Anaphylaxis after tetanus vaccination represents a rare but potentially serious adverse event, with an incidence of 1.6 cases per million doses. That means if 100 million adults receive the booster every ten years, 320 cases of anaphylaxis will be avoided over the 30-year period – from those two boosters being eliminated. Tetanus has always been a “rare” disease, spread through a skin wound contaminated by Clostridium tetani bacteria, commonly found in soil, dust, and manure. Before vaccines were available, there were about 500 cases a year, with most resulting in death. Concerns about vaccine-associated adverse events when immunizations were performed at short intervals led to a revision of the tetanus/diphtheria vaccination schedule in 1966 to once every 10 years for patients >6 years of age.
It has recently come to my attention that the traditional stand-alone tetanus vaccine (TT) that one used to receive as an adult has been discontinued due to WHO recommendations. Their reasoning being:
Use of TTCV combinations with diphtheria toxoid are strongly encouraged and single-antigen vaccines should be discontinued whenever feasible to help maintain both high diphtheria and high tetanus immunity throughout the life course.
The CDC blames the shuttering of the only plant producing TT for the current lack of a stand-alone TT vaccine.
Now, in order to get a booster tetanus shot, an adult must take the following.
Td: Sanofi’s Tenivacprotects against tetanus and diphtheria. Given to people 7 years and older as a booster every 10 years. *A version also includes pertussis (eg DPT), but due to the risk of encephalitis, it is not recommended as a booster.
Why is the DPT combination vaccine discouraged in adults due to encephalitis risk, but is it recommended for children? Another one of those inconvenient issues that plague the CDC-recommended childhood vaccine schedule.
While supplies of diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (Tdap) vaccines (Sanofi’s Adacel and GSK’s Boostrix) aren’t limited, they are more expensive, and a very small fraction of patients can develop encephalopathy (brain damage) from the pertussis component.
In the United States, diphtheria is virtually non-existent, with only 14 cases reported between 1996 and 2018. Of those cases reported, most were from international travelers or immigrants.
The market for a stand-alone TT vaccine vanished worldwide due to WHO recommendations to stop the sales of the TT vaccine. Which was due to the relatively few, economically stressed countries where diphtheria is still an issue. So, therefore, the only facility manufacturing the TT vaccine was shut down within the last year.
The blowback from the WHO recommendations is that now there is a shortage of tetanus and diphtheria (Td) vaccine in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website.
This all comes down to poor planning. And illustrates why supply chain issues and infectious disease countermeasure stockpiles are essential considerations for governments.
The good news is that unless one is immunosuppressed, most of us have almost lifelong immunity against tetanus and diphtheria.
My recommendation is that unless one gets a very deep and dirty puncture wound and has not had a tetanus shot in over ten years or longer, avoid that booster.
Here is the ugly secret about influenza vaccines. They are given to protect one group of vulnerable people. Those who are immunosuppressed, and that cohort includes the very elderly.
If those influenza vaccine manufacturing plants only make enough vaccines for those susceptible to a severe case of the flu, there would not be enough of a market to sustain their production costs. Furthermore, if there were a pandemic of some sort of highly pathogenic influenza, there would not be sufficient capacity to make enough vaccines to meet demand.
Egg-based influenza vaccine production requires super “clean” eggs; about 100 million “clean” fertilized eggs are needed annually for vaccine production in the US alone. Candidate vaccine viruses are injected into the eggs. If the process is shuttered, the whole production comes to a screeching halt. Many vaccines can be stored for long periods. Even as long as a decade. This stockpiling system works well for DNA viruses with a low mutation rate. Stockpiling is rarely a solution for vaccines developed for RNA viruses that mutate rapidly.
Therefore, the influenza vaccine is pushed on the American people year after year. As a way to maintain “warm base manufacturing” and ensure sufficient market size to support industrial operations.
I have spoken on this subject at the WHO and US government agencies, as well as many, many conferences. Unfortunately, because the mRNA and RNA vaccine platforms require a lot of freezer space (commonly -20°C) to stockpile for even short periods, this limits the ability to stockpile. Furthermore, the frozen storage requirements are only for up to 6 months. That means stockpiling for more extended storage is not currently done, and it is back to square one on the supply chain issue.
The issue with freezer space and mRNA vaccines is one that most likely won’t be solved. This benefits the manufacturers of this vaccine technology – the US government has an endless need for new vaccines as the old ones expire.
My small hope is that the mRNA platform will be too costly to justify its continued use, as appeals concerning safety (or lack of) seem to fall on deaf FDA ears.
In the meantime, don’t believe the hype generated by ex-officials from the Biden and Trump administrations.
Both Dr. Lena Wen, CNN correspondent, and Dr. Redfield, ex-director of the CDC, have gone on to mainstream media shows and promoted the narrative that the case fatality rate for avian influenza is over 50 percent. This, frankly, is a lie that the WHO is promoting. Bird flu generally is not tested for when someone has flu symptoms. When an outbreak of avian flu occurs on a poultry farm, testing of farm workers who are seriously ill will commence. This has led to the generation of the 890 case reports since 2003. Of those seriously ill patients reported to the WHO, over 50 percent died.
This is not an actual case fatality rate of avian flu around the world. It is, again, a sampling error due to a tiny data set derived from those who are at greatest risk due to general health. And just like the WHO reported on an exaggerated case fatality rate for mPOX, which was also based on a sampling error, or for Covid-19, again a sampling error, it is now used to justify psychological bioterrorism on the world population. Please don’t fall for it.
El Gato Malo on X succinctly points out that Dr. Leana Wen and her public health ilk are advancing:
1. Do more of the same lousy testing used in Covid-19 to overstate a disease and cause panic.
2. Develop another non-sterilizing non-vaccine that does not work to be pushed on “the vulnerable.”
3. Doing it “right now” under EUA, so whoever makes these tests and jabs can cash in and be shielded from liability.
4. Claiming that proxies like “triggers antibody production” demonstrate clinical clinical efficacy.
It’s just one last smash-and-grab for cash before the Brandon administration ends. Anyone who falls for this one will truly fall for anything.
Question: what are Leana’s conflicts of interest? Who is paying her or giving her grants?
For those that haven’t viewed Dr. Redfield speaking of the avian flu case fatality rate, have a watch below. It is genuinely shocking. This fear-mongering comes from an ex-director of the CDC. Shame on him.
Frankly, it reminds me of the 51 intelligence officials claiming that Hunter Biden’s laptop was fake.
One has to wonder what conflict of interest motivated him to say this on national TV?
Remember in the US, there have been 62 cases of avian influenza discovered, and all but one case were very mild.
This deep dive into the supply chain issues is meant to show that public health has put itself into a groupthink situation that it can’t escape.
Many solutions to this quandary do not involve an evermore expanding schedule of vaccinations, stockpiled for some future use. I have some general thoughts before I sign off.
The use of early treatments via safe, proven drugs is a good solution.
We now have many antibiotics to treat bacterial infections. Vaccines do not always need to be our first defense.
Our medical system is very good at treating infectious diseases. The risks from such diseases are much less than it once was. People do not have to live in fear of infectious disease. I like to ask people, how many people do you know have died of flu? If you know of any (I don’t), how old were they?
The need to scare people into more and more vaccines is a dangerous trend.
And yes, the more vaccinations one receives, the more likely an adverse event.
Vaccinating pregnant women and babies should always be a last resort.
It is time for Congress to rethink the vaccine liability laws.
America’s promise of accountability, once the clarion call of our Founding Fathers, now finds itself muffled beneath a wall of excessive secrecy. The so-called fourth branch of government—the unelected bureaucratic state—has weaponized overclassification to limit transparency and accountability. Also called the Deep State, these entrenched bureaucrats use secrecy to enshrine their power, preventing congressional oversight and even hindering a sitting president from implementing meaningful reforms. The byzantine rules and regulations cloaked in classified information make it nearly impossible for the president, his administration or journalists to understand what is really happening within the federal agencies. The recent case of USAID blocking the Trump administration‘s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from auditing its humanitarian aid programs is just the latest example of how secrecy is wielded to protect the bureaucratic class from accountability. If Trump is to dismantle the Deep State, he must first break its stranglehold on classified information.
The Bureaucratic Black Hole of Classification
The march toward unchecked classification is neither recent nor accidental. From the modest safeguards envisioned by our early republic to the expansive, often nebulous standards codified in Obama’s Executive Order 13526, the Deep State has systematically entrenched secrecy as a mechanism of self-preservation. The Brennan Center for Justice’s estimate—that up to 90 percent of classified documents could be safely disclosed—should alarm every citizen who cherishes a government that is answerable to its people. When transparency is sacrificed on the altar of “sensitive information,” the democratic process is undermined; accountability is traded for convenience.
Historical Parallels
Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist No. 84, warned against a government that operated behind closed doors, recognizing that secrecy was the lifeblood of tyranny. The modern overclassification problem mirrors the suppression of the Pentagon Papers, where government officials classified documents not to protect national security, but to hide the failures of the Vietnam War. The same tactics persist today, as bureaucrats wield secrecy like a shield, deflecting public oversight and preserving their power.
Consider the curious case of USAID, an agency whose humanitarian mission is paradoxically shrouded in the same secrecy reserved for covert operations. During Trump’s first term, senior USAID security officials obstructed his team’s efforts to audit the agency. Initially, Trump did not fully grasp the extent of this obstruction; now, armed with experience and his DOGE team, he is confronting and dismantling these overclassification schemes. When USAID officials blocked his DOGE team this time around, they were placed on leave—a move that allowed the audit to commence. The scandal surrounding USAID thus reveals that excessive secrecy serves not to protect national security but to stifle meaningful reform and insulate power from both the executive and legislative branches.
When Secrecy Kills
The implications of overclassification extend well beyond mere opacity. The tragic lessons of September 11, as chronicled in the eponymous Commission Report, illustrate that the labyrinthine nature of modern classification hindered the timely sharing of crucial intelligence—a failure that contributed to one of the gravest security breaches in American history. The same dynamic played out during the COVID-19 pandemic when essential information on the virus’ origins and early spread was locked behind classified barriers, leaving the public and policymakers scrambling in the dark. Today, as agencies continue to guard their files with a zeal that borders on paranoia, the resulting fragmentation and internal rivalry sap our collective national defense. When agencies operate in silos, a fragmented picture of potential threats emerges, weakening the nation’s ability to preempt danger.
The Hidden Cost of Secrecy
Financially, the hidden costs are staggering. Taxpayers shoulder an $18 billion annual burden to sustain these classified systems—a sum that could instead fortify more productive public endeavors. Meanwhile, scholars, journalists and even elected officials are forced to navigate an overgrown thicket of red tape in pursuit of records that, by all rights, should be part of the public domain. The Public Interest Declassification Board’s stark characterization of our system as “outmoded, unsustainable, and fundamentally at odds with the principles of a free society” is not hyperbole; it is an urgent diagnosis of a bureaucratic malaise that must be cured.
Trump’s War on the Classification Cartel
President Trump, now in his second term, has a unique opportunity to dismantle this excessive secrecy. Unlike his predecessors, he has no allegiance to the entrenched bureaucratic class that thrives on classification as a means of self-preservation. With Elon Musk leading the newly established Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a sweeping overhaul of declassification is within reach. This effort should include:
Mandatory Declassification Reviews: All classified materials older than 15 years should be automatically reviewed for declassification, with only the most sensitive exceptions allowed.
Severe Penalties for Overclassification: Bureaucrats who misuse classification to conceal incompetence or wrongdoing should face strict penalties, including termination.
Protection for Whistleblowers: Those who expose abusive classification practices should be shielded from retaliation and offered legal avenues for challenging improper secrecy.
Public Access Portals: A streamlined system should be implemented to allow journalists and citizens to request declassification more efficiently, modeled after the Freedom of Information Act but with fewer loopholes.
By dismantling the excessive secrecy that has long shrouded the inner workings of government, we can reestablish a system where transparency and accountability are not sacrificed at the altar of expedience. Reagan famously declared, “Trust, but verify.” Yet modern bureaucrats have rewritten that to read, “Trust us, and don’t ask questions.” George Orwell’s 1984 warned of an all-powerful government that buries inconvenient truths; we are perilously close to living out that warning.
Jefferson warned that government without oversight becomes despotic; Reagan championed the notion that the more a government controls information, the less it serves its people. The Deep State’s unchecked power, fortified by overclassification, has allowed it to operate as an unelected fourth branch of government, immune to both congressional oversight and executive authority.
If Trump is to truly gut the Deep State, he must first dismantle its classification fortress. A government that dares to reveal its operations is a government that earns the trust of its citizens, ensuring that power remains checked and that democratic ideals are not consigned to the shadows. The path forward is clear: restore openness, rein in bureaucratic discretion and renew the covenant between the state and the governed.
Fear and hatred of guns have unintended consequences; political fallout and dangers which are largely missed in the running monologues that pass for “news” in America today.
Age-old wisdom suggesting knowledge of guns leading to harm is incorrect, according to leading experts on both sides of the aisle. People who avoid guns, and refuse to discuss the subject, exhibit fear bordering on paranoia, leading to accidents, defenselessness, and potentially dire consequences. Criminals now running rampant on a small number of American streets have virtually no training, and certainly don’t represent the values of marksmanship and firearms education, which generally lead to self-control and responsibility.
“A person who knows nothing about guns, and preserves that ignorance with great vigor, which many anti-gun people do, harms society’s fabric by promoting counter-productive law, hampering police efforts and putting children at risk,” I noted in a recent public speech. Starbucks, as a case in point, had ignorantly refused to serve armed police officers, people tasked with protecting society. How did that help anyone? It simply showed their disdain for something good.
Projection?
“Many people who fear guns secretly harbor internal rage, just waiting to break into violence upon some slight provocation. They project this instability onto others, falsely assuming anyone with a firearm will eventually erupt into violence and injure others — as they believe they might do, according to Gary Marbut, president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association. “They cannot imagine most people are not also plagued by the demons under which they suffer. So, they fear guns and believe everyone should be disarmed, just as they don’t trust themselves from erupting into violence,” he said. Mr. Marbut is a firearms instructor accepted as an expert witness in state and federal courts concerning self-defense, use of force and firearms safety. His cogent testimony has helped defendants wrongly charged by misguided anti-gun prosecutors.
Heavily credentialed firearms training expert and author Stephen P. Wenger notes that gun-fearing folks have what’s called “poor impulse control” and project that onto others. The lack of understanding gunless people exhibit leads to laws that affect the innocent and ignore the criminal element, which I have personally witnessed repeatedly in legislatures nationwide. People with terror in their eyes and myths on their lips over imagined dangers band together, hire lobbyists, and rally for laws to disarm people who haven’t done anything.
Real Responsibility
The gun-fearful flatly ignore actual perpetrators entirely. Frequently, the criminal perps are people of color or other “disadvantaged” types (ethnic, immigrant, poor, released prisoners, gang members) who they are afraid to single out or implicate out of fear of being called names like “racist.”
Red-flag laws are an example. Notice these laws let police confiscate your property on hearsay and without a trial, merely on suspicion of you being a potential mass murderer. Afterwards, they just set you loose back on the streets. How much more dangerous could a plan be? “You haven’t done anything, so we’re letting you out. Go buy a chainsaw, matches and some gasoline. You’re not angry at the person who had you detained, are you?” Red-flag laws were drafted by the gun-control lobby, without evidence that they work, based on their desire “to make guns go away.”
Authorities might take “your gun” for a while, but that doesn’t put you in the database preventing you from buying another gun, because you lack guilt or a conviction necessary to be included. And they may not check to see if you already have several guns. It’s an irrational response to psychotic mass murderers and sociopathic children seeking to slaughter their classmates.
Also at issue are prosecutors — or perhaps lack of prosecutors — willing to prosecute, using laws we have to incarcerate truly dangerous people using guns for illegal purposes. That’s how we get felons on our streets with mile-long rap sheets, committing one serious crime after another. In an insidious way, this serves a valuable purpose. It keeps gunless people terrified, clamoring for more so-called “gun control,” which increases government power. Just take the guns away and we’ll all be safe while leaving officials armed to the teeth. Right. The fact it hasn’t worked for decades doesn’t seem to enter the equation, and efforts continue to hamper the innocent.
There is no known way to reliably make or staff a “pre-crime” bureau, according to forensic experts, and catch psychopaths before they act out. That’s a fanciful feature of sci-fi films, with no place in the real world. “It’s hoplophobic,” said Dr. Bruce Eimer, Ph.D., a police forensic psychologist, “just a manifestation of irrational fears. Those people promoting such things need help, but typically refuse any.” Red-flag laws are delusions, typically promoted by gunless people, to quell their fears, without any hope of success.
Take a person against firearms to a shooting range, an often-reliable cure for their phobia, and help improve the safety of the nation. Dr. Eimer would advise it.
Bill Gates has been incredibly involved in shaping politics and policy, not just in the United States, but all over the world.
But now he has a massive issue with Elon Musk doing the same.
The multibillionaire Microsoft co-founder bemoaned the sudden influence of Musk on American and European politics in an interview published Saturday by The Times.
The British newspaper pressed Gates in the wide-ranging conversation to react as Musk enters the global political fray. The magazine, ironically enough, asked Gates if he wished that he “had got more involved in influencing politics like Elon Musk.”
“Not at all,” Gates responded.
“I thought the rules of the game were you picked a finite number of things to spout about that you cared for, focused on a few critical things, rather than telling people who they should vote for,” he told the outlet.
“For me it’s only ever about aid. I did think Brexit was a mistake, but I wasn’t tweeting every day,” Gates insisted.
Gates may not have the same style of political engagement as Musk’s off-the-cuff use of X, the social media platform he bought three years ago, or his appearance at rallies for Donald Trump.
But make no mistake. Gates is as political as they come.
Gates has thrown around his influence and his money, especially by means of the Gates Foundation, to move the policy conversation in his direction, especially on topics like climate change and public health.
Just two years ago, for instance, the Gates Foundation dumped $40 million into highly controversial mRNA manufacturing projects in Africa.
Gates has also been involved with buying American farmland, seemingly to encourage meat alternatives and other purported climate-friendly agriculture activities.
But remember, Musk is the actual problem for supporting Trump, raising awareness of the groomer gangs in the United Kingdom, and encouraging Germany to be a sovereign nation, or so says Gates.
“I’m ultra-different. It’s really insane that he can destabilize the political situations in countries,” Gates claimed to The Times.
“I think in the U.S. foreigners aren’t allowed to give money; other countries maybe should adopt safeguards to make sure super-rich foreigners aren’t distorting their elections,” he continued.
Conservative commentator Victor Davis Hanson said what many Gates skeptics were thinking: “Is he joking, or simply completely misinformed?”
Beyond the long history of global activism from Gates, Hanson reminded social media that the billionaire was dead silent about various other forms of foreign political interference from the global left, including in the United States.
That includes Christopher Steele, the British ex-spy who “who interfered in the 2016 presidential election by fabricating a venomous dossier to destroy the Trump campaign,” and much more recently, the fact that the Labour Party in Britain called for British activists to “swarm American swing states in service to the 2024 Kamala Harris campaign.”
Like other leftists who attack Musk and his affinity for the global right, Gates is not upset about a billionaire involving himself in politics.
Gates is only mad that the world’s richest man is not channeling his billions toward the global left instead.
“So, sir. Gates, spare us you very selective outage about Mr. Musk, given your prior deafening silence on hired foreign interference here and Democratic efforts to interfere in the elections of others,” Hanson added.
From reassigning Democratic operatives to shutting down the J6 prosecution, the new Department of Justice isn’t wasting any time cleaning house while waiting for Pam Bondi’s Senate confirmation.
Senate Democrats last week put on hold the confirmation process for Pam Bondi, President Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general. Her full Senate approval appears inevitable but Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee claimed they wanted more time to review her background file. Another hearing is scheduled for Wednesday; a vote to advance her nomination out of the committee is expected later that day.
But if Democrats had hoped postponing Bondi’s confirmation would delay the Trump administration’s carpet bombing of the Department of Justice, they are once again wrong. In fact, Trump’s DOJ is wasting no time reversing the dangerous course set by Joe Biden and Merrick Garland while redirecting resources from the now-closed January 6 prosecution to fight real security threats across the country.
Shortly after the president took the oath of office last Monday, several Trump appointees were sworn in at Main Justice to fill top posts at the department. James McHenry, a longtime immigration lawyer at the DOJ, will serve as acting attorney general until Bondi takes over; the move appears to underscore the president’s plans to prioritize immigration enforcement at the department.
Emil Bove, who represented the president in both the Alvin Bragg case in New York and former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s case in Florida, is now the acting deputy attorney general. Bove traveled to Chicago over the weekend to meet with Trump’s border czar Tom Homan and other federal law enforcement officials to coordinate mass deportations, which are underway in the Windy City. One official told ABC News that Bove had “personally observe[d] DHS immigration enforcement operations and support[ed] the efforts of FBI, DEA, ATF, USMS, and federal prosecutors who are assisting DHS in this critical mission.”
Other appointments include Omeed Assefi as acting chief of the DOJ’s antitrust division until Trump’s pick, Gail Slater, is confirmed. According to Bloomberg, Assefi sent a video message to the division’s staff last week to pledge an “aggressive stance going forward,” including pursuing investigations and lawsuits against Big Tech—which might explain all the sucking up by Big Tech titans before and on Inauguration Day.
“Can I Take My Swingline Stapler?”
At the same time, notorious political operatives inside the DOJ are getting the Milton from “Office Space” treatment, moved from their cushy role doing the dirty work of the Democratic Party to offices where they might actually get their polished fingernails dirty. George Toscas—a top National Security Division official who looked into the Hillary Clinton email server “matter,” helped initiate the FBI’s surveillance of the 2016 Trump campaign, and pushed for the armed raid of Mar-a-Lago in August 2022—has been reassigned to a newly-created unit at the DOJ to fight efforts by lawless “sanctuary cities” to obstruct deportation plans. Toscas was last seen giving former Attorney General Merrick Garland a bear hug during his grotesque Dear Leader-like march on his last day in office.
Corey Amundson, who as head of the DOJ’s public integrity unit fought hard against an FBI investigation into election fraud in Georgia in 2020, also has a new desk at the immigration unit. At least 20 DOJ employees reportedly have been moved to other positions.
This is all super unfair, according to one former assistant U.S. Attorney. “It has terrified people,” Ashley Akers, a J6 prosecutor who resigned last week, complained to MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. “It’s not sensical. You have people who are subject matter experts…and to pull them and put them in an unrelated section where they have no experience and probably on interest seems contrary to the mission of the department.”
Depoliticizing the Most Political Agency in the Land
Now Akers might be slightly bitter since her last act in office was undoing her own prosecution of several J6 defendants. Following the president’s full pardon of J6ers, prosecutors in the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s office, which handled the unprecedented investigation for four years, were forced to file dismissal motions before D.C. judges. Further, the office has a new chief, Ed Martin, a longtime conservative activist who was sworn in as acting D.C. U.S. Attorney last Monday afternoon. Martin immediately filed a flurry of motions to dismiss J6 indictments and confronted at least one judge attempting to keep in place probation for some of the 14 defendants whose sentences were commuted by the president.
And in a move cheered by J6ers, the DOJ also removed the “Capitol Breach” database from the department’s website. The portal listed the name, case number, charges, outcome, and sentence for every J6er, something defendants considered a scarlet-letter tracking mechanism of sorts to incite more harassment against them.
The DOJ’s targeting of pro-life protesters, arguably the Biden/Garland’s DOJ most vengeful and political use of federal law, also came to an end. New chief of staff Chad Mizelle on Friday sent a memo to the civil rights division strictly curtailing the application of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE ACT; the Biden/Garland DOJ prosecuted at least two dozen pro-life activists under the FACE ACT, resulting in lengthy prison sentences for most including women in their 70s. “President Donald Trump campaigned on the promise of ending the weaponization of the federal government and has recently directed all federal departments and agencies to identify and correct the past weaponization of law enforcement. To many Americans, prosecutions and civil actions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act have been the prototypical example of this weaponization. And with good reason,” Mizelle wrote.
Trump also pardoned 23 pro-lifers on the eve of the March for Life; several were immediately released from prison including 76-year-old Joan Bell, who was serving out a 27-month sentence imposed by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, an 80-year old federal judge in Washington. (Karma will be a bitch for these evil DC judges.)
More Changes Ahead
Bondi still has her work cut out for her—rooting out bad actors within the department’s whopping 34,000 employee base won’t be easy. She may face headwinds from Senate Republicans afraid to pursue much-needed internal investigations into Jack Smith and his team as well as former DC US Attorney Matthew Graves for bringing vindictive, selective prosecutions against the president and his supporters.
But reform and accountability are already underway. The once-revered Department of Justice suffers a deep public trust deficit following a decade of relentless politically charged lawfare against Republicans. It appears, however, that the right team is in place to restore that public’s trust and return the DOJ to its original crime-fighting mission—something the country desperately needs.
The Department of Justice is finally being reclaimed from the grips of partisan weaponization. President Trump’s administration, in its second term, is delivering a long-overdue reckoning. Over 20 career officials, entrenched in a culture of bias and selective enforcement, have been sidelined overnight. This isn’t just a shake-up—it’s a war against the corruption that has festered for years under the guise of justice. Trump’s team is not just draining the swamp; they are dismantling it, brick by brick, to restore fairness and accountability to an institution that has betrayed the American people.
The abrupt sidelining of over 20 long-serving DOJ officials marks the death knell of what conservatives rightly decried as the “Merrick Garland Reign of Terror.” For years, Garland’s DOJ symbolized the grotesque transformation of justice into a political weapon, targeting Trump and his allies while coddling Democratic operatives. This two-tiered system eroded trust in one of America’s most critical institutions. But with Trump’s return to the White House, the administration is laser-focused on uprooting this corruption and restoring equal justice under the law.
President Trump’s team has employed an ingenious strategy to bypass bureaucratic roadblocks. Federal regulations shield career employees from reassignment for 120 days after new leadership takes over. However, the Trump administration identified a loophole:
Because Acting Attorney General James McHenry has been with the DOJ for more than 120 days, he is not bound by federal regulations requiring a waiting period before reassigning career employees. If Pam Bondi were confirmed, she would have to wait 120 days to make similar changes. Ironically, Senate Democrats’ delays in confirming Bondi have provided Trump with a unique advantage to expedite the much-needed house-cleaning at the DOJ. McHenry’s tenure as the head of a Justice Department unit focused on immigration enforcement underscores his alignment with Trump’s vision of law and order. By the time Pam Bondi is confirmed the McHenry should have purged the corrupt actors at Justice. Together, this team exemplifies the administration’s unwavering commitment to dismantling the deep state and restoring integrity to the DOJ.
The reshuffling of DOJ leadership is nothing short of revolutionary. Ed Martin, a champion of election integrity and leader in the “Stop the Steal” movement, now holds the position of Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. Martin’s appointment is a clarion call to those who weaponized the legal system against conservatives: their time is up. Martin’s record of defending January 6 defendants and his unwavering stance against abortion and illegal immigration sends a powerful message about the administration’s priorities. Just the other day, when Judge Mehta, at the behest of congressional Democrats, modified Trump’s commutation of eight January 6th political prisoners Martin was on the case filing a motion challenging Judge Mehta’s imposition of release conditions on the commuted sentences of January 6th defendants.
John Durham’s legacy also finds new life in the Eastern District of New York, where his son now leads. Known for his relentless pursuit of criminal networks like MS-13, Durham’s son reflects the administration’s no-nonsense approach to crime and immigration enforcement. In the Southern District of New York, Danielle Sassoon—renowned for prosecuting Sam Bankman-Fried and dismantling sex trafficking rings—brings a pedigree that includes clerking for Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative icon. Her appointment signals a return to principled, results-driven law enforcement.
The FBI, long accused of partisan overreach, is undergoing a seismic transformation. Christopher Wray, whose leadership became synonymous with the politicization of federal law enforcement, has been removed. Paul Abbate has retired. Taking the reins is Tom Ferguson, a former FBI veteran who worked alongside Rep. Jim Jordan to expose the weaponization of government. Ferguson’s disdain for “woke” ideology and socialism underscores his commitment to restoring the FBI’s mission of impartial justice. With these changes, the FBI is finally being returned to the people. Until Kash Patel, President Trump’s pick for FBI Director, is confirmed by the Senate, Ferguson’s leadership ensures the Bureau will remain in good hands, continuing the administration’s efforts to purge corruption and restore accountability.
This is not just a personnel change; it is an existential challenge to the deep state, the network of bureaucratic elites who have long wielded power without accountability. For years, conservatives have watched as these entrenched interests undermined Trump’s presidency and targeted his supporters. The Trump administration’s bold appointments are dismantling this shadowy cabal, replacing it with leaders who prioritize justice over ideology and accountability over partisan gain.
The Trump DOJ overhaul represents a historic correction to years of corruption and abuse. For too long, the Department of Justice and the FBI have been weaponized against conservatives, eroding public trust and undermining the rule of law. Under President Trump’s leadership, the era of unchecked bureaucratic power is coming to a dramatic end. This is not merely a shake-up; it is a reformation, a decisive step toward restoring America’s faith in its institutions. The swamp is being drained, the deep state is being exposed, and justice is finally being reclaimed for the American people. Trump promised to fix the system, and as we witness these changes, one thing is clear: he is delivering.
Hello liberal haters. As you’re eye scanning this, I can only assume you’re trying to pick your tears out of your cosmopolitans as the second Donald Trump administration is underway. It’s the end of democracy, you’re saying — but at least former President Joe Biden did the proper thing by allowing a “dignified transition of democratic power,” or whatever term you’ve doubtlessly aped from MSNBC’s coverage of the inauguration shindig.
Well, let me disabuse you of two of the facts implicit in that thought. First, Joe Biden isn’t making any decisions on his own these days, except maybe what ice-cream flavor he gets for not reading the teleprompter instructions. Second, as first lady Melania Trump pointed out in an interview before the inauguration, keep in mind that the Obamas — the beau ideal of the leftist presidential couple — didn’t warmly participate in the transition of power back in 2017.
During the sit-down with Fox News’ Ainsley Earhardt, Melania Trump talked about the “challenging transition” the first time Trump entered the White House.
“The difference is I know where I will be going, I know the rooms where we will be living. I know the process,” Melania said during the interview, which aired on Jan. 13, when asked what had changed since her 2017 move-in to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
“The first time was challenging, we didn’t have much of the information,” she added.
“The information was [withheld] for us from [the] previous administration,” she added.
This time, she said, she’s “already packed” for the move-in.
“It’s [a] very different transition second time around,” she said.
She was asked whether the Bidens had helped her out this time around.
“They’re still living there, and they will be out on Jan. 20,” she said. “The transition team has only five hours to move Bidens out and to move us in.”
Michelle didn’t attend Jimmy Carter’s state funeral on Jan. 9, reportedly due to a “scheduling conflict” with her vacation (because apparently, the avocation of former first lady as a professional calling isn’t enough of a vacation for her). This time, a source leaked to People Magazine, it’s because she really, really, really hates the living hell out of Donald Trump. (The source didn’t use those exact words, instead saying Michelle didn’t want to “plaster” on a fake grin for the sake of paying homage to the principle of the unbroken transfer of power.)
“There’s no overstating her feelings about [Trump]. She’s not one to plaster on a pleasant face and pretend for protocol’s sake,” the source said.
“Michelle doesn’t do anything because it’s expected or it’s protocol or tradition.
“She would be expected to swallow her feelings in the spotlight if she attended his second inauguration.”
The magazine also noted, the source told them “that Trump’s history of attacking the Obama family” played into her decision. Oh, yes, because the Obamas have been great to Trump over the years.
As for Trump being “someone whom she still considers a threat to American democracy,” as the source also claimed, most of this rhetoric has Barack Obama as patient zero — with the former president first dismissing Donald Trump as some peon who had made his money before he got into politics instead of getting into politics to make money, then hyping him as Literally Hitler™, with the rest of the Democrats and the media gladly following his lead and declaring that they were With Her.
But I’ll stop myself before I give everyone a migraine over the double-standard. The point is that, beneath their carefully manufactured exteriors — their preternatural scripted cool, their improbably hipster-perfect book choices and playlists, their worshipful treatment by an adoring media — these are petty, vain, and childish creatures. To the extent that the Bidens look any better, it’s just because the power half of the couple passed the point of senility before he was elected in 2020 and only went downhill from there.
If you want to see what class and unity looks like, watch Melania state the unpleasant realities about how the Democrats acted during her husband’s two inaugurations herself — no anonymous source leaking quotes about how a girlboss former first lady refuses to “plaster on a pleasant face and pretend for protocol’s sake” to a trash celeb rag — with a smile on her face and with reserve and poise. It’s what real confidence and courage looks like.
In short: Keep crying those tears in your cosmos, libs. That cosmo is going to be 99 percent saline by the time January is over, and it’ll only get better for America from there.
For those of you pining for the sturm und drang of Donald Trump’s first term, I’m the bearer of good news: The first attempt to impeach the newly minted president is already underway.
Sure, as political pseudoevents go, it’s about as anticlimactic, low profile, and ill-conceived as a Limp Bizkit reunion album. But #TheResistance 2.0 has to begin somewhere, and it’s apparently beginning with leftist interest group Free Speech For People.
The group — whose website looks like it dates from the era where Daily Kos’ site interface looked positively cutting edge — bills itself as a “non-partisan campaign, but is focused on a bevy of leftist issues, including stopping “voter suppression” (read: preventing anti-voter fraud initiatives), eliminating dark money in politics (unless it comes from George Soros, one assumes), and tackling “corporate abuse of power.”
It’s perhaps best known for its opposition to the 2010 Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which ruled independent campaign expenditures counted as free speech. (Floyd Brown, founder of The Western Journal, was also the founder of Citizens United, the plaintiff in that case.)
But now, the group has a more important mission. Free Speech For People — which apparently knows about as much about what “high crimes and misdemeanors” are as it does about using definite articles to make their organization’s name sound less awkward — began a campaign to impeach Trump on the day he was inaugurated.
The group’s petition is “calling on the U.S. Congress to initiate an immediate impeachment investigation into Donald Trump’s violations of the Emoluments Clauses and into his unlawful, corrupt campaign practices.”
“Trump’s return to the White House poses an unprecedented threat to our democracy,” says John Bonifaz, organization president.
“During his campaign and in the months before his inauguration, Donald Trump engaged in unlawful, unconstitutional conduct and threatened more. He has once more positioned himself to abuse the office for personal profit and power in violation of clear constitutional commands and at the expense of our democratic institutions, constitutional precedent, and the safety of our country’s most vulnerable.”
The petition refers to two sections of the U.S. Constitution Free Speech For People believes Trump has violated: Article I, Section 9, Clause 8; and Article II, Section 1, Clause 7.
The first clause they believe is impeachment-worthy: “No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States: and no person holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state.”
The second: “The President shall, at stated times, receive for his services, a compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that period any other emolument from the United States, or any of them.”
By the way, in case you’ve forgotten from the last go-around, “emolument” means “the returns arising from office or employment usually in the form of compensation or perquisites.”
Sorry to insult the intelligence of most of our readership but I’d wager there’s probably some “White Dudes for Harris” straggler reading this in the dark as he munches his Beyond Meat chicken tendies in his faded pink, unwashed knit p**** cap, thinking to himself: “Hot diggity! So you’re saying there’s still a chance! But, uh, what’s an ’emmermonumment’?”
This, by the way, is the same bovine effluence the left tried to make stick the last time before James Coney, Robert Muller, and Alexander Vindman gave them shinier objects to gaze upon — and, one assumes, it’ll have even shorter legs this time.
“Trump has refused to sell his ownership stake in companies through which he is assured to receive substantial payments from foreign governments in violation of the Foreign Emoluments Clause,” the group’s statement said.
“At least five foreign governments pay a combined $2 million per month in fees for their units in Trump World Tower; and because all five of these foreign governments are currently paying Trump these monthly fees, Trump is in violation of the Foreign Emoluments Clause from the moment he took the oath of office.”
If you want a good laugh, try doing a Google search for “Free Speech For People Hunter Biden Burisma” or “Free Speech For People Hunter Biden CEFC.” See how many hissy fits the organization had about those emolument-looking arrangements when they happened. For gambling types, I’m setting the over-under on relevant search results at 0. Anyone who picked the over can just give me your money now.
And, by the way, there’s a huge difference between the Trump family and the Biden family. Trump came to the presidency after a career in the private sector — and a successful one at that. Of course he had assets — especially real estate — and of course the wealthy were drawn to the Trump name before and after he became president. That’s not an emolument, that’s business as usual.
Joe Biden, meanwhile, has spent four of the last 52 years in the private sector — and he spent it writing a book which he improperly retained classified documents to complete. Hunter, meanwhile, mysteriously began getting well-remunerated roles with companies in countries like Ukraine and China in fields which he had no experience in, and while he was in the throes of a drug, alcohol, and sex addiction that would make Hunter S. Thompson and Charlie Sheen blush. His father claims that he had no knowledge of or discussions about his son’s overseas dealings, which is why he took numerous photos with his son’s foreign business contacts, a trove of which were released as Uncle Joe was exiting the White House:
Oh, and it’s not just the emoluments clauses! “The campaign lists additional impeachable offenses committed during Trump’s 2024 election campaign and leading up to the inauguration, including: threatening physical violence, including murder, against political opponents, journalists, and protestors; using racist, xenophobic rhetoric that has endangered immigrant communities; and violating campaign finance laws by offering benefits in exchange for campaign contributions,” the release reads.
Unlike their fulmination over alleged violations of the emoluments clauses, however, there’s absolutely no supporting evidence of this given — and there’s also no impeachable offense in there once you reduce the febrile rhetoric to what it is, which is positions Trump and his supporters have taken that they disagree with.
If this is what they think will produce the third impeachment of Trump, it’s practically adorable. I doubt that Free Speech For People will be the last organization advocating for this kind of futile opposition to The Donald’s second term. It’ll be hard to top them for sheer unintentional humor value, however.
Morons just never, ever learn. Einstein’s definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.
Moments of extraordinary peril have demanded extraordinary action. Today, as the nation teeters on the precipice of economic turmoil and national insecurity, President Trump finds himself facing an adversary not foreign but domestic: a Congress shackled by obstructionism. The Democrats’ calculated stonewalling of key cabinet nominations, including CIA nominee John Ratcliffe and DOJ nominee Pam Bondi, has left federal agencies rudderless, vulnerable and infiltrated by what can only be described as the Deep State. Trump’s power to adjourn Congress—a constitutional provision buried in the seldom-visited corridors of Article II, Section 3—may be the nation’s best hope for restoring order and ensuring competent leadership at the helm of our government.
The Framers of the Constitution, wise to the capricious nature of politics, granted the president the power to adjourn Congress “in extraordinary occasions” when the House and Senate fail to agree on adjournment. Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist No. 70, extolled the virtues of a decisive executive, arguing that energy in the executive is “a leading character in the definition of good government.” While this power has never been exercised in the nation’s history, its inclusion underscores the Framers’ recognition that paralysis within the legislative branch can imperil the republic.
Indeed, Justice Joseph Story’s commentaries on the Constitution describe the adjournment clause as a safeguard against legislative dysfunction. The current congressional deadlock, with Democrats weaponizing procedure to undermine executive appointments, exemplifies the very “extraordinary occasions” that justify invoking this power.
The stakes could not be higher. With the CIA and DOJ operating under interim leadership, their ability to counteract threats—both foreign and domestic—is severely hampered. Ratcliffe’s delay ensures that the CIA remains a playground for DEI zealots and entrenched bureaucrats. Similarly, without Pam Bondi’s confirmation, the DOJ continues to sidestep Trump’s mandate to root out ideological rot. Recent revelations of agencies rebranding DEI positions to evade detection highlight the Deep State’s subversive ingenuity—a direct challenge to Trump’s executive orders banning such programs. The message is clear: without Trump appointees in key positions, federal agencies will remain unaccountable fortresses of woke orthodoxy.
Historically, periods of executive action have often followed legislative gridlock in times of crisis. Abraham Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s aggressive New Deal measures illustrate that decisive action, while controversial, is sometimes necessary to preserve the nation’s integrity. The present crisis, though less visible, is no less existential. National security cannot afford to be a casualty of political gamesmanship.
The economic ramifications of congressional obstruction extend beyond the Beltway. With inflation persisting, global markets jittery and outgoing Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warning that the government will run out of money this week, the United States faces a dire emergency. Yellen’s suggestion for the incoming treasury secretary to implement extraordinary measures underscores the urgency. Without Trump’s treasury secretary nominee, Scott Bessent, at the helm, who is running the show—a second-string quarterback? Treasury, commerce and energy, among others, require Trump-aligned leadership to implement policies that restore fiscal discipline and energy independence, ensuring America’s financial stability during this critical moment.
Consider the contrast: during the Reagan administration, swift executive appointments enabled the rapid implementation of supply-side economics, catalyzing a historic economic boom. Conversely, today’s delays have left markets uncertain and businesses hesitant, awaiting clarity from an administration hamstrung by partisan brinkmanship. By adjourning Congress and making recess appointments, Trump can bypass the stalemate and restore confidence in America’s economic stewardship.
Critics may balk at the unprecedented nature of adjourning Congress, invoking fears of executive overreach. Yet such criticisms ignore the reality that precedent is not destiny. When Ronald Reagan fired air traffic controllers during the PATCO strike, he faced similar accusations of authoritarianism. History, however, vindicated him as a leader who prioritized national interest over fleeting norms.
Furthermore, the Constitution’s silence on the length of adjournment grants Trump significant discretion. As the Supreme Court’s decision in NLRB v. Noel Canning clarified, a recess of 10 days is sufficient to activate the Recess Appointments Clause. By adjourning Congress over a weekend, Trump can legally appoint his cabinet, ensuring that Senate deliberations proceed without jeopardizing national security or economic stability.
The specter of the Deep State looms large. Recent investigative reports reveal an entrenched bureaucracy—particularly within intelligence and law enforcement—dedicated to undermining Trump’s agenda. These unelected officials have exploited vacancies to shield their machinations, from rebranding DEI departments to slow-walking compliance with executive orders. By filling these vacancies, Trump can dismantle this unelected cabal and restore accountability to the executive branch.
How it Would Work
The president could trigger the adjournment clause with the help of either the House or Senate through a specific series of events. First, one chamber, say the Senate, led by Majority Leader John Thune, would need to pass a resolution to adjourn for a period of more than three days. This could be done with a simple majority vote, as a motion to adjourn cannot be filibustered according to Senate Rule XXII(1). Next, the House, under the leadership of Speaker Mike Johnson, would need to either actively reject the Senate’s adjournment resolution or fail to act on it before the proposed adjournment date. Given the Republican majority, the Senate could lose up to three votes, while the House could lose up to five votes, and still pass the resolution. This lack of agreement between the chambers would then allow the president to step in and formally adjourn Congress to a time of his choosing. This scenario highlights how the president could use the adjournment clause, with the cooperation of one chamber of Congress, to potentially create a recess and make recess appointments.
The time for half-measures has passed. In this moment of crisis, Trump must wield the constitutional tools at his disposal to adjourn Congress and make recess appointments. The stakes—national security, economic stability and the integrity of federal agencies—are too high to allow congressional obstruction to persist. Just as Lincoln’s bold actions preserved the Union, Trump’s decisive use of the Adjournment Clause can ensure that the republic remains secure, prosperous and true to its constitutional principles. To paraphrase Reagan, history will remember not the critics who howled but the leader who acted.
House Republicans reveal stonewalling, major security lapses, and misrepresentations by top law enforcement officials related to the still at-large J6 pipe bomber, ‘aka’ the fake deep state alternate plan ready to go on a moment’s notice had J6 never happened.
Four years after what the FBI describes as an act of domestic terror–the protest at the Capitol on January 6, 2021–federal authorities have not yet solved the most consequential crime of that day: the presence of two explosive devices within blocks of the U.S. Capitol.
A report issued today by Representatives Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky), chairmen of House subcommittees examining the events of January 6 and the work of the January 6 Select Committee, details how the FBI investigation into the so-called pipe bomber went cold by early 2021 despite dedicating significant resources into finding the suspect and initially identifying several “persons of interest.”
The FBI originally claimed an individual wearing a hoodie planted the devices near the headquarters of the Republican National Committee and outside the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee on January 5, 2021 between the hours of 7:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. The devices were not discovered until 17 hours later, coincidentally, around the same time the Joint Session of Congress convened at 1:00 p.m. on January 6 to debate the results of the 2020 presidential election. A woman doing her laundry found a pipe bomb in an alleyway near the RNC headquarters at around 12:40 p.m.; a plainclothes Capitol Police officer discovered a similar device outside the DNC headquarters at 1:05 p.m.
The latter situation posed an extreme danger to incoming Vice President Kamala Harris, who left the Capitol at 11:25 a.m. and inexplicably went to the DNC, where she remained until around 1:15 p.m. As I have reported, several officers including numerous Secret Service agents and a bomb-sniffing canine failed to detect the device sitting just steps away from the building’s entrance.
News of the devices prompted the evacuation of nearby buildings and set off the first wave of panic that afternoon. Some top law enforcement officials including former U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund believe the devices were a diversionary tactic. “[While] law enforcement has not identified the suspect responsible for planting both pipe bombs, the explosive devices played a critical role in how the events of that day unfolded. Whether intended to or not, both pipe bombs acted as diversions, forcing law enforcement to draw resources away from the Capitol,” the report states. The first exterior breach of Capitol grounds occurred at 12:53 p.m.
But no one has been arrested despite a $500,000 reward offered by the FBI. Further, the failure to locate the J6 pipe bomber doesn’t add up considering the extensive investigative tools still being used by the FBI to track down and arrest J6 protesters, a caseload now approaching 1,600 individuals.
Footdragging, Stonewalling, and Non-Interest by J6 Truth Seekers
Not only did the trail go cold, either intentionally or organically, the same political leaders and government officials who promised to expose the “truth” about the events of January 6 oddly are uninterested in the pipe bomb threat and not cooperating with Republicans in their separate attempts to find the bomber. The report discloses extensive stonewalling by federal and local agencies including the FBI, the ATF, the U.S. Secret Service, and the Metropolitan (DC) Police Department related to House Republicans’ requests for documents and interviews to help better understand the failed pipe bomb investigation.
“[The] FBI has failed to provide any responsive documents. On December 12, 2023, FBI Deputy Assistant Director Matthew Foder briefed the Committee on the status of the FBI’s pipe bomb investigation. Deputy Assistant Director Foder’s briefing failed to satisfy even the Committee’s most basic informational needs and dealt exclusively with information already in the public domain.”
The former head of the Washington FBI field office, Steven D’Antuono, who led the pipe bomb investigation for nearly two years, also appears to have misled Congress by claiming some of the cell phone files obtained by the FBI were “corrupted,” which impeded their investigation. But according to today’s report, “the major cell carriers confirmed that they did not provide corrupted data to the FBI and that the FBI never notified them of any issues with accessing the cellular data.”
Further, despite promises to fully investigate every aspect of January 6, the January 6 Select Committee ignored what represented the biggest threat to public safety and the safety of top elected officials including Harris and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“A thorough review of almost three terabytes of data turned over by the Select Committee yielded shockingly few results regarding the pipe bombs— emphasizing how the Select Committee failed to thoroughly investigate the security and operational failures surrounding the events of January 6,” the report reveals. Rep. Bennie Thompson, chair of the now defunct committee, told Massie in 2023 that his committee did not look into the pipe bomb matter. The committee’s final 845-page report devoted less than three pages to the pipe bomb incidents and relegated it to the appendix.
Even after the devices were detected on Jan 6, security perimeters established around both locations insufficiently protected the public, commuters, and nearby Congressional buildings, the report confirms. A motorcade carrying Pelosi drove past the device after it was detected but before it was detonated. “Prior to Speaker Pelosi’s motorcade driving by the DNC pipe bomb, federal law enforcement had allowed more than fifteen vehicles to drive past the DNC pipe bomb despite repeated calls over the radio for law enforcement units to stop all traffic passing by the explosive device. The breakdown in command and control around the DNC pipe bomb and the failure to correct the breaches of the security perimeter culminated in law enforcement risking the safety of congressional leadership.”
Plenty of Leads, No Answers
The subcommittees’ report describes a full throttle investigation into the pipe bombs early on.
In the immediate aftermath of January 6, the FBI’s case team worked aggressively to cultivate and pursue leads toward apprehending the pipe bomb suspect. As of January 2021, the FBI’s investigation consisted of over fifty investigators, including special agents, data analysts, Task Force officers, and support staff. Of those more than fifty investigators, thirty were special agents assigned to the case. The investigation also comprised of a range of investigative support teams such as the Cellular Analysis Survey Team, the Computer Analysis Response Team, and the Digital Imaging and Video Recovery Team. As a result, by April 2021, the FBI had collected over 105,000,000 data points in connection with the investigation.
In February 2021, the FBI identified 186 phone numbers of interest; 36 numbers were assigned to agents for interviews, 98 required additional investigative steps. Fifty-one were categorized as “not needing further action” because the phones “belong[ed] to law enforcement officers or persons on the exclusion list.”
By using another sophisticated investigative technique–tracking advertising data–the FBI case team, according to the report, “identified one [individual] whose movements matched the suspect’s movements as outlined by the video the FBI released tracking the suspect’s whereabouts.” But the result of that “significant lead…remains unclear,” the report states.
More Unanswered Questions
How is it possible the pipe bomber remains at large given the extensive resources first expended by the FBI and at their disposal to this day? Why did the J6 Select Committee avoid looking into the threat, particularly since it posed a mortal danger to both the incoming vice president and the Speaker of the House, who created the committee? Why did Kamala Harris never discuss her near-assassination attempt on the campaign trail? Why did D’Antuono mislead Congress about the condition of cell phone data? Why has the media stopped covering the pipe bombs?
This is why scumbags Wray and others have jumped ship early and Pelosi’s out of country in Europe for supposed surgery.
The good news for now is that House Republicans are not backing down. The key to permanently unraveling the entire Jan 6 narrative is tied to the mystery pipe bomber—and once that missing puzzle piece is found, the public will find more shocking revelations.
Take, for instance, a recent story that made the rounds on social media. According to these reports, Oxfam — the British NGO — found that a huge chunk of the World Bank’s spending on climate change-related issues was “missing.”
Thank heaven for REAL fact-checkers like the Australian Associated Press — a Poynter Institute-accredited fact-checker from down under — which set us all straight: “An Oxfam report did not find that $US41 billion has gone ‘missing’ from the World Bank’s climate change fund, contrary to claims online.”
What a relief. Instead, the AAP noted, the Oxfam report found that the World Bank just doesn’t really know where the money went.
See? Totally different!
The controversy centers around an Oct. 2024 report titled “Climate Finance Unchecked: How much does the World Bank know about the climate actions it claims?” Answer: not as much as it probably should.
The findings are front-loaded in a TL;DR on page two of the 33-page report, in case you’re not interested in reading the whole thing through: “Oxfam finds that for World Bank projects, many things can change during implementation. On average, actual expenditures on the Bank’s projects differ from budgeted amounts by 26–43% above or below the claimed climate finance. Across the entire climate finance portfolio, between 2017 and 2023, this difference amounts to US$24.28–US$41.32 billion,” the report states.
“No information is available about what new climate actions were supported and which planned actions were cut. Now that the Bank has touted its focus on understanding and reporting on the impacts of its climate finance, it is critical to stress that without a full understanding of how much of what the Bank claims as climate finance at the project approval stage becomes actual expenditure, it is impossible to track and measure the impacts of the Bank’s climate co-benefits in practice.”
The Oxfam report stated “generous accounting practices by different countries and providers, combined with the lack of transparency and consistency in how climate finance is defined, calculated, and reported, is at the root of the crisis of trust in climate finance.”
As the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists pointed out in a November summation of Oxfam’s findings, this is sort of a big deal when you consider how the World Bank is in the process, more or less, of turning itself into the Global Climate Change Savings & Loan.
“In recent years, the World Bank has touted its spending on climate finance and its plans to dramatically expand it,” the ICIJ noted.
“World Bank President Ajay Banga said in December that the bank had met its goal to devote 35% of its financing to climate three years ahead of schedule and set a new target of 45% by 2025. That goal is well within reach; the bank announced in September that its climate finance investments reached 44% of total financing, or $42.6 billion, over the past fiscal year. ‘We’re putting our ambition in overdrive,’ Banga said.”
The report underscored that there’s a huge difference between the World Bank’s ambition and the world bank’s accounting processes, however, and one that needs to be addressed. But both Oxfam and the AAP fact-checking team wanted to you to be sure that the NGO “was not alleging any mismanagement of funds due to corruption or waste; it was concerned about the World Bank’s reporting process for deviations in planned and actual climate finance.”
“This distinction is significant,” a spokesperson for Oxfam said.
“Oxfam’s report doesn’t suggest funds are missing but points to a transparency issue that makes it difficult to know precisely what the Bank is delivering in terms of climate finance: where it’s going and what it’s supporting.”
Yes, well, excuse us for sounding like negative Nancys, but this sounds a bit like one of those cheerful bosses who describes a major organizational setback as an “opportunity for breakthrough improvement.” Indeed it might be, on some level, but a Panglossian refusal to acknowledge the bedrock realities of the situation that accompanies it becomes downright hilarious — unless you’re on the hook for it, of course.
And if you’re an American, you are! According to a Congressional Research Service report, the U.S. contributes over 16 percent of the World Bank’s total capital through its financial commitments, and has significant voting power on all of the World Bank organizations that provide climate change funding.
Yes, this may be a drop in the bucket in terms of your tax dollars, and yes, there are bigger climate hustle bureaucrats that have spent your cash on (hey, whatever happened to that promising green energy start-up Solyndra?), but the difference between “a transparency issue that makes it difficult to know precisely what the Bank is delivering in terms of climate finance” and “missing” sounds an awful lot like the difference between “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky” and “Indeed, I did have a relationship with Miss Lewinsky that was not appropriate and in fact, wrong.”
Of course, when it comes to virtually any other institutional spending issue, using the word “missing” to refer to something being lost or something being unaccounted for would be a distinction without a difference. Here, it’s unspoken why it’s problematic and why fact-checkers are taking issue with it: When it comes to spending on issues related to climate change and green energy, there are Good Guys and there are Bad Guys.
The Good Guys say this is merely an accounting quibble while the Bad Guys say that this means at least $24 billion and up to $41 billion of World Bank funds are somewhere in the ether of global finance networks thanks to variances in accounting practices that charitably can be described as ‘curious’.
Thus, it’s not, “contrary to claims online,” missing. It’s just not accounted for! At this point, I’m not sure which is the bigger racket: dubious national or supranational funding of projects that fall loosely under the aegis of purported climate change mitigation, or fact-checking. At least this can be said about fact-checking: It costs a hell of a lot less.
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