Day: October 27, 2022

Virginia Hires Canton Group to Build New Voter Registration System Expected to Go Live in 2025

Eric Burk

The Virginia Department of Elections has awarded a $13.5 million contract to The Canton Group, which will build a voter registration system scheduled to go live in February 2025.

“As election technology and security requirements have increased, the need to replace our current voter registration system has become imperative. Due to the critical importance of this project, this procurement was subject to the state’s high risk requirements, including review by the Virginia Information Technology Agency and the Office of the Attorney General. There is broad support for replacing VERIS, and we were determined to obtain the best solution capable of serving the Commonwealth for years to come,” Commissioner Susan Beals said in a press release.

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Youngkin Campaigns for Virginia GOP Congressional Candidates

Eric Burk

Governor Glenn Youngkin is campaigning heavily for Virginia’s congressional candidates, with a focus on VA-02, VA-07, and VA-10, but he’s also stopping in other areas. On Wednesday morning, he attended a get-out-the-vote rally for Representatives Morgan Griffith (R-VA-09) and Ben Cline (R-VA-06), and by Wednesday evening, he was in Wisconsin supporting GOP gubernatorial candidate Tim Michels.

Youngkin’s Spirit of Virginia PAC, which has reported $4.75 million in contributions in 2022, announced his “Rally for Virginia Early Voting GOTV Tour” last week. The tour has 21 stops through November 7, including six stops supporting state Senator Jen Kiggans (R-Virginia Beach) for VA-02, seven stops for Yesli Vega in VA-07, and four stops for Hung Cao in VA-10. Youngkin’s also spending money to support the candidates; his Empowering Virginia Parents PAC has spent $414,147 in the three districts, according to The Virginia Public Access Project.

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Virginia Changes Regulations to Ease Licensure Process for Social Workers from Other States

Eric Burk

The Virginia Board of Social Work has changed licensing regulations making it easier for social workers licensed in other states to get licensed in Virginia.

“There is a critical shortage in Virginia of mental health professionals, and this is a significant step by the Board of Social Work to help address this shortage,” Governor Glenn Youngkin said in a Wednesday press release. “A priority of my administration is to reduce state regulations and regulatory barriers, and this action shows how regulations can be streamlined to remove barriers to practice with the goal of bringing more mental health professionals to the Commonwealth.”

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Commentary: The Rise of the Biomedical Security State

RealClearWire

“History doesn’t repeat itself,” said Mark Twain, “but it often rhymes.” This is among the reasons we look to the past, straining as best we can through the deepening fog of time to discern lessons for our own day. Analogies to the events that came before are always imperfect, but nevertheless often useful for understanding our present moment. Thus, only a historical myopia can explain why it’s become so common to describe the events involving the covid pandemic as “unprecedented,” even though pandemics have tended to occur every hundred years or so. This nearsightedness is also perilous given, for instance, the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset Initiative” and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s recent pledge to spend $200 million on developing international biometric-based digital identifications. 

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Commentary: The IRS Is Coming to Get Virginians Unless Republicans Win Back the House

Admin

We need strong people in Washington who will stand with Americans and not against them, which is one of the important reasons Jen Kiggans is running for Congress in Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District. While Americans are struggling to pay rent, buy milk and eggs, and fill up their gas tanks, President Joe Biden, and his Democrats in Congress, are unleashing an army of tens of thousands of federal Internal Revenue Service (IRS) agents to invade the homes of hard-working Americans.

Democrats in Congress passed a phony bill titled the “Inflation Reduction Act” that had a provision hidden in the text giving tens of billions in taxpayer’s cash to the IRS for the purposes of hiring a platoon of new federal agents to collect even more taxes. Soon, voters in Virginia will have the opportunity to vote in Republicans who will repeal this provision of law.

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Migrant Caravans Are Preparing to Flood U.S. Border Ahead of Midterms, Senior Guatemalan Official Warns

Virginia Star Staff

GUATEMALA CITY, Guatemala — Guatemala’s interior minister has intelligence that large caravans of migrants will try to get to the U.S. in anticipation of the midterm elections, he said in an exclusive sit-down interview with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Migrants, who believe the midterm elections could end with Republicans taking back control of Congress, are heading to the U.S. border in large caravans, Guatemalan Interior Minister Napoleon Barrientos told the DCNF. The migrants think that they have a short window to make the trek because it may not be as easy to immigrate to the U.S. after the midterm elections, with Republican lawmakers promising to beef up border security and tighten oversight.

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Chinese Donor, Fundraiser for NYC Mayor Eric Adams Worked Closely with Communist Party Influence Operation

Virginia Star Staff

A fundraiser and donor to New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ election campaign heads a non-profit that houses a Chinese overseas police station and works closely with Communist Party influence operations, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found.

Lu Jianshun supported fundraising efforts for Adams through his role as the president of America Changle Association, an organization based in Manhattan’s Chinatown that caters to overseas Chinese from the Changle district of Fuzhou, Fujian province in China, the DCNF found. Lu himself donated $4,000 to Adams’ mayoral campaign under the adopted name “James Lu” between 2019 and 2021, according to public campaign finance records.

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McConnell Creates New Rift Inside GOP, Earning Censure from Alaska State Party

Just the News

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who caused a stir this summer by questioning the quality of his party’s candidates, has created a new rift inside the GOP by spending millions to defeat Alaska GOP Senate nominee Kelly Tshibaka.

McConnell’s leadership PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, has been running attack ads against Tshibaka in an effort to boost moderate incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski.

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Commentary: Professionalism Deniers at Fox News

Virginia Star Staff

I have just listened, courtesy of Fox News, to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson explaining “the threat to democracy” posed by “election deniers.” Benson and her host paid special attention to the MAGA crowd who still question the results of the 2020 presidential election. Fox anchors Eric Shawn and Bret Bair have often expressed annoyance that obtuse and malicious Americans are still contesting an election that, we are assured, has been thoroughly investigated and which shows no evidence of troubling irregularities. 

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House Democrats Withdraw Letter Calling for Peace Negotiations in Ukraine

Virginia Star Staff

On Tuesday, a coalition of progressive Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives announced that it would be withdrawing its letter to Joe Biden calling for the White House to lead peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.

As reported by Axios, the move comes just one day after the group of 30 lawmakers first released the letter, with signatories including Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Congressman Jamie Raskin (D-Md.). The sudden about-face appeared to be the result of backlash against the lawmakers, who suggested that negotiations between Russia and Ukraine might be the only option left for bringing about an end to the war that has now been raging for eight months.

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Germany Gives China Nearly One-Quarter Stake in Port After Vowing to Reduce Its Dependence on the Country

Virginia Star Staff

In a compromise, Germany’s cabinet agreed to allow China Ocean Shipping Company a nearly 25 percent stake in the country’s largest port Wednesday, according to Reuters.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Social Democrat ministry leaders pushed the deal through in spite of opposition within the cabinet, landing on a 24.9 percent stake in one of three terminals in Germany’s Hamburg port, Reuters reported. Although officials say they will not allow Cosco any say over port operations or management, it drew sharp criticism from members of the foreign ministry who have grown wary of foreign investment.

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Big Tech in Trouble After Brutal Earnings Reports

Virginia Star Staff

Big Tech stocks dropped this week as firms across the industry posted a series of weak earnings reports, with social media giant Meta set to post a significant slowdown after markets close Wednesday.

This year, Meta, Netflix, Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet and Apple have lost $2.5 trillion in market value combined, Reuters reported Wednesday. Meta is expected to post a 5% decline in revenue compared to last year due to reduced ad traffic as users struggle with inflation and spend more time with rival TikTok, according to The Wall Street Journal.

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‘Targets for Assassination’: Justice Alito Opens Up About the Dobbs Leak

Virginia Star Staff

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito said the leaking of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision in endangered the lives of those who were expected to overturn Roe v. Wade, making them targets for assassination.

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade June 24 in a 6-3 decision, but their preliminary decision was leaked to Politico May 2. Alito, who wrote the Dobbs decision, said the leak made him and other conservative justices targets for assassination attempts in a Tuesday interview with The Heritage Foundation.

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