Two months after the for-profit business NewsGuard came under congressional investigation for whether its business relationships with domestic and foreign governments are tantamount to state-sponsored censorship, the self-described “only apolitical service rating news sources” is taking on new targets like the Olympics and a high-profile free-speech lawyer.
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The Department of Defense (DOD) does not know how much money it directly or indirectly sent to Chinese entities to conduct research on viruses with pandemic potential, according to a new report by the DOD’s Office of Inspector General (OIG).
The OIG’s report found that DOD has supplied Chinese entities — whether directly or indirectly via subgrants — with taxpayer cash to research pathogens and the enhancement thereof, but the exact figure is unknown because of “limitations” in the DOD’s internal tracking system. Government funding for such research in China has come under scrutiny since the coronavirus pandemic, which multiple government entities believe started when an engineered virus leaked from a Chinese laboratory that was hosting U.S. government-backed gain-of-function research.
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Newly revealed documents obtained by a watchdog group show that Amazon founder, multibillionaire, and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos hosted an event bringing together international bureaucrats, a liberal foundation, and senior Treasury Department officials at his palatial Washington, D.C. home to advance “Climate Action” efforts.
The event shows how Bezos has used his convenient capital city location and private foundation to help the Biden Administration advance its climate goals by galvanizing private finance through grants.
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Protect The Public’s Trust (PPT), a government watchdog group, filed a complaint Wednesday with the U.S. Department of Commerce, requesting an investigation into what PPT says are “apparent scientific violations” in relation to how National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) collects and reports climate-related natural disasters that exceed $1 billion in damages.
Since 1980, NOAA has reported an annual tally of the number of climate-related natural disasters in the U.S. that cause damages exceeding $1 billion after adjusting for inflation. According to NOAA’s calculations, the U.S. averaged 8.5 such events between 1980 and 2023. In the last five years, however, the average reported by the agency is 20.4 events.
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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded nearly $14 billion Thursday to three organizations with deep ties to the Biden administration and the Democratic Party.
The EPA announced the winners of $20 billion of funding from the massive Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), a program created by President Joe Biden’s signature climate bill, the Inflation Reduction Act. Among the selected awardees are Climate United, the Coalition for Green Capital and Power Forward Communities, three groups that are taking home almost $14 billion combined to establish financing operations for a wide variety of green technology and energy projects under the GGRF’s National Clean Investment Fund.
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Newly uncovered emails between Department of Homeland Security officials and journalists show the agency tasked with protecting U.S. border and domestic security admitted it is not tracking illegal immigrants after they were released from federal custody into the interior of the country.
In the emails obtained by the watchdog group Protect the Public’s Trust in a Freedom of Information Act request, one DHS official told a Washington Post reporter off the record he could not say how many immigrants are settling in Northern states via border state busing programs because the agency does not track those released from their custody.
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The country’s two largest teachers unions had direct access to the Education Department during the pandemic while parents had “no voice,” says a watchdog group of retired and former public servants.
Michael Chamberlin, the director of the group, Protect the Public’s Trust, made the claim in a recent episode of the “John Solomon Reports” podcast, saying research found “extensive coordination between … the two main teachers unions and high-level officials in the Department of Education,” namely the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association.
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The Jan. 6 Committee hired an investigative consultant who could have a major “conflict of interest,” watchdogs told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Brian Young is a senior financial investigator at the consultancy Polar Solutions Inc and a contractor for the Jan. 6 Committee, according to his LinkedIn profile and an internal congressional document obtained by the DCNF. But he is also married to House Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms (SAA) Kim E. Campbell, the second most senior official in the SAA, which like the U.S. Capitol Police is being probed by the committee for security failures in connection to the Capitol riot.
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A government watchdog group demanded that the Department of the Interior Inspector General launch an investigation into whether President Joe Biden’s Senate-confirmed Bureau of Land Management director nominee violated the False Statement Act with statements she made to Congress about her involvement in a 1989 eco-terrorism case during her confirmation process.
Tracy Stone-Manning was confirmed to lead the agency along a party-line vote on Sept. 30 amid strong opposition from Republicans who accused her of lying to the Senate Energy Committee about her involvement in an eco-terrorism case. Stone-Manning testified in federal court in 1993 that she sent an anonymous, threatening letter to the Forest Service in 1989 on behalf of her former roommate and friend which warned that a local forest in Idaho had been sabotaged with tree spikes to make the trees unsafe to log.
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A high-ranking Environmental Protection Agency political appointee received approval to maintain his professional relationship with the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology while serving in the Biden administration, according to documents obtained by a watchdog group.
EPA Deputy Assistant Administrator for Science Policy Dr. Christopher Frey disclosed in his May 11 ethics recusal statement that he had taken a two-year unpaid leave of absence from Hong Kong University following advice by the agency’s Office of General Counsel, records obtained by the watchdog group Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT) show. The ex officio chancellor of the university, Carrie Lam, is also Beijing’s hand-picked bureaucrat to serve as the chief executive of Hong Kong.
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