Day: February 3, 2023

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis Scores Victory Over College Board’s AP African American Studies Course

Susan Berry, PhD

The New York Times is lamenting the College Board’s revised curriculum for its course in Advanced Placement African American Studies (APAAS) – its abandonment of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and the move to make Black Lives Matter (BLM) merely an optional topic of study – both changes that suggest Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’s (R) firm rejection of the radical content of the prior version significantly contributed to the new direction.

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Jim Jordan Says Crisis at the Border Is ‘Intentional;’ Articles of Impeachment Filed Against DHS Chief Mayorkas

Virginia Star Staff

Efforts to impeach Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the border crisis appeared to gain steam on Wednesday as the Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee met to examine the “Biden Border Crisis.”

“Month after month, we have set records for migrants coming into the country, and frankly, I think it’s intentional,” said House Judiciary Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

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Republican Lawmakers Reintroduce Bill to Permanently Block U.S. Foreign Aid Going to Fund or Promote Abortions

M.D. Kittle

The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision last year ending federalized protections for abortion under Roe v. Wade hasn’t stopped the Biden administration from promoting abortion abroad. 

A group of Republican senators is reintroducing a bill that would permanently enact and expand existing prohibitions on the use of U.S. foreign assistance to pay for the performance or promotion of abortion services overseas.

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Far-Left Dark Money Group Working to Sabotage Republican Investigations into Biden

Virginia Star Staff

As the House GOP plans numerous investigations into Joe Biden’s various scandals, ranging from government misconduct to his family’s questionable business ties, a far-left dark money group is organizing to deliberately sabotage those probes.

According to the Washington Free Beacon, the Congressional Integrity Project (CIP) plans to regularly send information to the Biden White House to help combat the probes, including opposition research on the Republicans leading the investigations, poll data, and political ads.

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More Americans than Ever Before Are Dipping into Their Retirement Savings to Make Ends Meet

Virginia Star Staff

A record-setting number of Americans are pulling money from their 401(k) plans to cover emergency expenses, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, citing data from major investment manager, Vanguard Group.

The proportion of people who pulled from their 401(k) jumped by about one-third in 2022, to 2.8%, up from 2.1% in 2021 and 2% in the pre-pandemic era, according to the WSJ. Vanguard manages roughly 5 million accounts, so the total number of people making withdrawals climbed from roughly 100,000 to roughly 140,000 in 2022, as people both struggled with financial stress ranging from credit card debt to eviction.

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Virginia Lawmakers Asked to Amend Spending to Address Education Funding Shortfall

The Center Square

Virginia lawmakers are being asked to amend their proposed spending plans to address an error with a state calculation tool, that will result in schools across the state receiving millions less in state aid than they initially expected. 

The Virginia Department of Education confirmed this week a calculation tool estimating the amount of state funding each school division will receive had an error. The tool did not account for funding changes after the state cut the grocery sales tax on Jan. 1, according to Charles Pyle, director of communications for the Virginia Department of Education. 

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Republican Attorneys General Warn CVS and Walgreens Against Mailing and Distributing Abortion-Inducing Drugs

Susan Berry, PhD

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey led 19 other Republican state attorneys general (AGs) in a warning letter to CVS and Walgreens that asserts federal law forbids using the mail to send or receive drugs that are intended to be used to produce an abortion.

Bailey and the coalition of attorneys general wrote to the two drugstore chains, informing them that their announced plan to use the mail to distribute abortion pills is both unsafe and illegal.

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Commentary: Black Reparations Inspiring a Multicolored Pandora’s Box of Intersectional Demands

RealClearWire

Until a few years ago, the idea of paying financial reparations to descendants of African slaves was dismissed as a fringe idea.   

Now a notion that President Barack Obama once rejected as impractical is becoming public policy. California offers a dramatic example as officials there review a proposal that could pay in excess of $1 million each to some black residents, while more than a dozen U.S. municipalities are moving ahead with their own race-based programs to redress the legacies of slavery.  

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Arizona Senate Rocked by Claims of Election Violations, as Lake Presses Appeal in Challenge to 2022 Vote

Just the News

The Arizona Court of Appeals held a private conference Wednesday in Kari Lake’s election challenge, as a state Senate panel is hearing explosive allegations of 2022 election failures in Maricopa County, and the Democrat Secretary of State seeks to have Lake, the 2022 GOP nominee for governor, prosecuted for tweeting evidence from the public Senate hearings of mismatched ballot signatures.

The appeals court’s conference was regarding Lake’s appeal of a December decision in Maricopa County Superior Court rejecting her election lawsuit against county election officials and Gov. Katie Hobbs. Lake’s suit alleged that numerous irregularities in the 2022 gubernatorial election, including election machine issues in nearly 60% of the county’s 115 vote centers, effectively suppressed heavily Republican Election Day vote.

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Four Lawmakers Sent Thousands of Campaign Funds to CCP-Linked News Organization

Virginia Star Staff

Four members of the House of Representatives funneled campaign money to a Chinese government-backed company during the 2022 election cycle, according to the Federal Election Commission.

Democratic NY Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democratic NY Rep. Grace Meng, Democratic CA Rep. Kevin Mullin, and Republican  NY Rep. Nicole Malliotakis sent thousands of dollars to Sing Tao U.S., a subsidiary of the Hong Kong-based Sing Tao News Corporation, according to the FEC. The money was used for campaign advertisements in Chinese publications in Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York.

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NBC Claims Law Enforcement ‘Did Not Act on Intelligence’ Ahead of January 6th

Virginia Star Staff

On Tuesday, NBC host Lester Holt claimed that federal law enforcement did not do enough to combat the peaceful protests that took place at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021, Fox News reports.

“The January 6 Committee’s final report was more than 800 pages,” Holt said in his report. “But some material did not make the cut, including much of its findings on the failures of federal law enforcement leading up to the attack.”

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Chinese Communist Party-Linked Companies Are Purchasing U.S. Military Academies, Florida Congressman Warns

Just the News

Companies linked to the Chinese Communist Party are purchasing U.S. military academies with officer training programs across the country, warns Florida GOP Rep. Michael Waltz.

“It’s incredibly concerning that there are American private schools owned by companies with strong ties to the Chinese Communist Party,” said Waltz, a member of the House Armed Services Committee and a Green Beret.

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