Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced that he had selected Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., to serve as secretary of state.
Read MoreTrump Taps ‘Fearless Warrior’ Marco Rubio for Secretary of State
Tag: Washington D.C.
Trump Selects Lee Zeldin to Head the Environmental Protection Agency
President-elect Donald Trump has picked former New York Congressman and gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin to be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency in his upcoming administration.
Read MoreVoters Decide Future of Ranked Choice Voting
Voters in Western states and the District of Columbia voted on some form of ranked choice voting or “jungle primaries” that includes ranking the final candidates in the general election.
Voters in Nevada, a battleground state in the presidential race, rejected Question 3, according to Ballotpedia. This was a ballot measure that would have moved the state to a “top five” primary if approved. That means up to five at-large primary candidates would compete in a ranked choice voting general election.
Read MoreMar-a-Lago Case Dismissal Could Spell the End of Smith’s D.C. Prosecution and Anti-Trump Lawfare
After surviving an assassination attempt over the weekend, Trump began the week with good news in the form of Judge Aileen Cannon dismissing special counsel Jack Smith’s Mar-a-Lago case against him in a seismic ruling that could spell the end of his federal legal woes and build on his existing momentum in the national spotlight.
Smith had charged Trump in connection with his storage and retention of materials at his Mar-a-Lago estate, which the FBI raided in August of 2022. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Smith in late 2022 to pursue the case and he brought an initial indictment in 2023. Trump pleaded not guilty though Smith in July of that year brought a superseding indictment with additional charges. The former president has long maintained he was innocent of any wrongdoing and that the case was part of a broader political witch hunt designed to derail his 2024 bid for the White House.
Read MoreIgnoring Parents’ Objections, Virginia County’s School Board Unanimously OKs Gender Ideology Lessons
A Northern Virginia school district will teach kindergartners about gay parents and middle schoolers about transgenderism in the wake of a unanimous vote late last month—despite significant parental opposition.
Read MoreDemocrats Draw Backlash, Suspicion over Opposition to Hill Republicans’ Citizen-Only Voting Bill
Democrats’ opposition to the passage of GOP-led congressional legislation that would require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections is drawing backlash and suspicion.
“Why are Democrats so adamantly against ensuring only American citizens vote in our elections?” GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson asked Monday on X above a repost of a Fox News story on such opposition.
Read MoreAnalysis: 55 Percent of Democrats Think Biden Should Keep Running, 45 Percent Say to Step Aside After Debate
President Joe Biden continues to command the confidence of just 55 percent of Democrats in the most recent CBS News-YouGov poll taken June 28 to June 29 in the aftermath of Biden’s disastrous June 27 debate with former President Donald Trump, where Biden occasionally appeared confused and lost his train of thought and uttered unintelligible phrases.
45 percent of Democrats think Biden should definitely step aside. Catastrophically, so do 70 percent of independents, with only 30 percent saying he should keep running. Unsurprisingly, 75 percent of Republicans say Biden should step aside, with 25 percent saying he should keep running — likely because they think he’ll be easy to beat in his current state.
Read MoreDemocrats Deny Non-Citizens are Voting in Federal Elections While Republicans Seek to Prevent It
Democrats claim that non-citizen voting doesn’t occur while Republicans and most states are trying to ensure that only U.S. citizens vote in elections.
As states are adopting constitutional amendments to prevent non-citizens from voting and Republicans are raising the alarm about the issue as more evidence has been presented, Democrats insist that it is not a concern because non-citizens are not voting in U.S. elections.
Read MoreParents Question Why Virginia High School Staging Drag Musical, Brunch
A high school theater troupe is staging the risque musical “Kinky Boots” just outside the nation’s capital “in collaboration” with a leading Virginia school syste’’s “Pride” programs, prompting concern and questions from some parents.
The Beyond the Page Theatre Company at West Potomac High School in Alexandria, Virginia, will perform “Kinky Boots” eight times between Thursday and May 4, according to emails obtained by The Daily Signal.
Read MoreTexas Transports over 100,000 Foreign Nationals to ‘Sanctuary Cities’
Since April 2022, more than 100,000 foreign nationals who have illegally crossed the border have been bused or flown from Texas to six sanctuary cities. This equates to roughly 5 percent of those who illegally entered Texas in fiscal 2023 alone, the highest number on record, The Center Square exclusively reported.
Read MoreWashington D.C. Ranked as Least Desirable Place to Live
A new survey has declared that the nation’s capital of Washington D.C. is the least desirable place to live, primarily due to high costs of living and rampant crime.
As reported by Breitbart, the survey published by Home Bay, which specializes in real estate education, asked residents to determine the most and least desirable places to live based on such factors as costs of living, home affordability, and crime rates.
Read MoreCommentary: The FBI HQ Relocation Proposal Is a Fraud
As of now, House Republicans have removed funds from the FY 2024 budget for the controversial $3.5 billion proposed relocation of the FBI’s Washington, D.C. headquarters to a new complex at one of three locations in the D.C. suburbs of Virginia or Maryland.
Some House Republicans want to keep the FBI headquarters at its current location and view the relocation proposal as unwise and wasteful. Others want to downsize, defund or eliminate the Bureau – and not to reward it with a sprawling new headquarters complex – because they believe it has been weaponized against conservatives.
Read MoreWhile Trump Faces Host of Charges, None Filed in Biden Special Counsel Probe on Classified Memos
While former President Donald Trump faces an array of federal charges in two separate cases as a result of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation, no one has yet been charged in a separate special counsel probe of President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents while he was vice president.
In January 2023, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur special counsel to investigate the Biden case.
Read MoreColleges Move to Arm Officers in Response to Inner-City Crime After Previous Calls to Defund the Police
Two inner-city colleges are arming their on-campus police officers in an effort to crack down on increased crime three years after activists called for departments across the country to be defunded.
George Washington University (GWU), located in Washington D.C., announced it will allow some officers to carry firearms while on duty after typically relying on other armed police departments, while Portland State University (PSU), located in, reversed a 2021 policy that restricted officer’s ability to arm themselves. The decisions come three years after activists across the country took to the streets in 2020 demanding policing reform, including calls to defund departments, which sources tell the Daily Caller News Foundation will better prepare officers to deal with emergency situations when they occur.
Read MoreCommentary: ‘Conservatism, Inc.’ Fiddles While the Republic Burns
While members of the conservative think tank elite, outfitted in black tie and ball gowns, sat celebrating themselves in a Washington, D.C., ballroom listening to Dierks Bentley and popping off fireworks over the Potomac, their opponents in Minnesota were pre-registering 16- and 17-year-olds to vote, enacting “motor voter” laws, and establishing pop-up polling locations wherever they expected a balloting hotspot might be (think drop boxes on steroids).
While the Left is actually working to achieve generational political power, elites on the Right seem satisfied to simply celebrate . . . what? The latest white paper? The sold-out conference on how the Left is beating them in the political arena? Another record fundraising year where 60 percent of the funds go to promote the institution rather than on-the-ground efforts to implement the ideas? It’s usually all of the above.
Read MoreAdvocates Warn of ‘Desperate’ Movement to Undermine the Electoral College
An organization’s efforts to circumvent states’ rights are “getting desperate” as they try new ways to push their interstate compact through state legislatures, two pro-Electoral College advocacy groups told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The National Popular Vote (NPV) is a group initiative to reform the U.S.’ two-step, Electoral College system by ensuring that the candidate with the most popular votes nationwide becomes the president. Now that NPV has enacted its interstate compact in all of the “easy,” bluer states as a standalone bill, it is getting creative to force the law through in swing states like Minnesota, Nevada, Michigan and Maine, Trent England of Save Our States and Jasper Hendricks of Democrats for the Electoral College told the DCNF.
Read MoreEighteen State AGs Voicing Support for New York Gun-Industry Liability Law
A coalition of 18 state attorneys general, all Democrats, on Wednesday submitted an amicus brief in support of New York’s firearms industry accountability law.
Read MoreCommentary: The Tentacles of the Social Media Octopus
by Victor Davis Hanson A shared theme in all dystopian explorations of future and current totalitarian regimes – whether China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, or Cuba – is government control of all media information, fueled by electronic surveillance. A skeptical public learns to say one thing publicly but quite…
Read MoreCommentary: The Establishment Is Still Terrified of Donald Trump
Barring intervention from the justice system, Donald Trump will be the Republican presidential nominee in 2024. His odds of defeating an abject, potato-brained failure like Joe Biden are looking better every day. Whether they admit it or not, the establishment is starting to dread the very real possibility of Trump returning to power through the normal operations of what we used to call democracy, or what’s left of it, anyway.
This is really all we need to know about the continued hysteria over January 6 and the government’s fishing expedition relating to some files Trump was keeping at Mar-a-Lago without permission from ideologically compromised librarians at the National Archives. The apparatchiks in the permanent administrative state see Trump not as a threat to democracy, as they claim, but as a threat to themselves and their power. While the bureaucrats have made significant inroads under the lawless Biden regime, they have not, at least not yet, been able to make Trump and the people he represents go away. This terrifies and angers them. As long as dissent is a possibility, they won’t be satisfied.
Read MoreCommentary: It’s Time to Dismantle the Dysfunctional, Self-Serving, Gluttonous Company Town That Is D.C.
Gertrude Stein famously warned that it was important to know how far to go when going too far.
It pains me to admit that Democrats seem to have a far better sense of all that than do Republicans. Perhaps it’s because Democrats have a visceral appreciation of William Hazlitt’s observation that “those who lack delicacy hold us in their power.” The Democrats, that is to say, long ago became expert at the game of holding their opponents to standards that they themselves violate not just with impunity but with ostentatious glee.
Read MoreWashington, D.C., Lifting COVID Mask, Vaccine Mandates but Face-Covers Still Required in Schools
Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is lifting the city’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate and will not extend its mask requirement into March.
The Democratic mayor also says that as of Tuesday many businesses in the nation’s capital will no longer be required to check that customers have at least one dose of the vaccine before allowing them to enter. However, they will still be allowed to make such a request on their own, according to dcist.com.
Read MoreAnalysis: Democrats in D.C. Brace for Two Winter Storms as Voting Bills Near Certain Failure
As Washington, D.C., prepares for its second winter storm in as many weeks, Democrats in Congress are all-in on their bid to pass their voting legislation and, if it fails, to abolish the Senate filibuster to advance it.
Their strategy has almost zero chance of success. Though Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has brought his party’s voting bills to the floor throughout 2021, they have faced insurmountable opposition from Senate Republicans every time, who have relied on the filibuster to tank the legislation that they describe as a federal takeover of elections that could invite voter fraud.
In response, Schumer and most Senate Democrats have endorsed scrapping the 60-vote threshold, but in their way stand Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. The two centrist Democrats have said time and time again that they will not support abolishing the filibuster, denying Democrats the unanimous support they need to adopt the change even though they support their party’s voting legislation.
Read MoreFormer D.C. National Guard Official Says Generals Lied to Congress About January 6th
A former member of the D.C. National Guard has accused two Army leaders of perjuring themselves before Congress in an attempt to rewrite the history of the military’s response to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
Col. Earl Matthews, a high-level Pentagon official during the Trump administration, has authored a 36-page report criticizing the Pentagon’s inspector general for what he believes is an error-riddled account created in order to protect a top Army official who argued against sending the National Guard to the Capitol, according to Politico.
Read MoreMassive Multi-State Democratic Climate Change Initiative Crumbles
Several Democratic states withdrew from an ambitious plan to curb transportation emissions less than a year after signing onto the agreement.
Massachusetts and Connecticut abandoned the Transportation and Climate Initiative (TCI) last week, citing high gas prices and irreconcilable differences, E&E News reported. Rhode Island and Washington, D.C., also joined the agreement which promised to cut transportation emissions 25% and raise $3 billion for clean energy projects.
Read MoreCommentary: Very Fine People
Jacob Anthony Chansley, who also goes by the name Jake Angeli, was one of the people who made their way into the chamber of the U.S. Senate in the Capitol on January 6, 2021, to protest the Senate’s impending certification of state electors who would install Joe Biden as the 46th president of the United States. His name may not register, but his image will: he was the fellow bizarrely attired in a coyote-fur hat sprouting black buffalo horns; shirtless, showing his muscular but heavily tattooed torso; sporting black gloves and a red knapsack; face painted in vertical red, white, and blue stripes; and carrying an American flag on a spear.
The disorderly intrusion of several hundred protesters into the Capitol was quickly characterized by the media, and by many politicians, as an “insurrection.” Moreover, the accusation of insurrection was applied to the many thousands of Trump supporters in Washington that day who had nothing to do with the intrusion into the Capitol. And that characterization became the basis for the House of Representatives to impeach President Trump for supposedly inciting the “insurrection” and the impetus for Joe Biden to order 26,000 National Guard troops to defend Washington during his inauguration on January 20.
As it happened, there was no insurrection.
Read MoreNew January 6 Related Police Records, Transcripts Appear to Show Babbitt Clearly Unarmed Before Shot
The conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch announced Thursday that it has received over 500 pages of documents from the D.C. Metropolitan Police regarding the fatal police shooting of protester Ashli Babbitt during the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.
Judicial Watch obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed in May after District officials failed to respond to requests made in April to the city’s police department and its Office of the Chief Medical Examiner for information related to Babbitt’s death.
The 35-year-old Babbitt was fatally shot trying to enter a secured area inside the U.S. Capitol Building. The 14-year Air Force veteran was unarmed at the time, as she tried to climb through a broken door window near the House chambers.
Read MoreActivists Confront Kyrsten Sinema in Airport, on Plane over Biden Agenda
Protesters and activists followed Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema through Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. and onto a plane Monday, pressing her on why she refuses to back parts of the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill.
“I’m just trying to get an explanation for the American people,” Kunoor Ojha, chief of staff of the Green New Deal Network, asked Sinema as she followed the senator through the airport, video of the encounter shows.
Read MoreCommentary: An American Horror Story
Thomas Caldwell’s wife awakened him in a panic at 5:30 a.m. on January 19.
“The FBI is at the door and I’m not kidding,” Sharon Caldwell told her husband.
Caldwell, 66, clad only in his underwear, went to see what was happening outside his Virginia farm. “There was a full SWAT team, armored vehicles with a battering ram, and people screaming at me,” Caldwell told me during a lengthy phone interview on September 21. “People who looked like stormtroopers were pointing M4 weapons at me, covering me with red [laser] dots.”
Read MoreCommentary: Jacob Chansley Pleads Guilty to Obstruction, Remains in Jail
Jacob Chansley, arguably the most iconic figure of the January 6 protest at the U.S. Capitol, today pleaded guilty to one count of obstruction of an official proceeding.
Chansley, 33, turned himself in to law enforcement and was arrested on January 9. A grand jury indicted Chansley two days later on six nonviolent counts including obstruction, civil disorder, and “parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building.” The remaining counts will be dropped.
Judge Royce Lamberth accepted Chansely’s plea agreement with Joe Biden’s Justice Department, which continues to arrest and charge Americans for even minor involvement in the Capitol protest. Nearly 200 defendants face the obstruction charge, a felony added to mostly misdemeanor cases. (I explained the charge here in March.)
Read MoreHouse Lawmakers Set to Square off with White House, Treasury Department over ‘Stifling’ Crypto Tax Plan
House lawmakers are set to return from recess Monday and will likely take up the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill the Senate passed last week — and with it, a controversial and last-minute cryptocurrency tax provision.
The bill contains a tax reporting mandate forcing cryptocurrency “brokers” to disclose gains and transactions to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) as part of a scheme designed to help cover part of the infrastructure bill’s cost. However, the bill’s definition of “broker” has been criticized by the cryptocurrency community and pro-crypto lawmakers as vague, expansive and potentially unworkable, with many fearing it could stifle the industry and force crypto companies to collect personal information on their customers.
The provision defines a broker as “any person who is responsible for regularly providing any service effectuating transfers of digital assets on behalf of another person,” and forces brokers to report transactions to the IRS in a form similar to a 1099. This means brokers have to collect and report customer information such as names, addresses, and taxpayer identification numbers.
Read MoreCommentary: Afghanistan and America’s Ruling Class
The sudden collapse of American power in Afghanistan has triggered the usual partisan blamestorming in Washington. Representative Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) has blamed the Biden Administration. How clueless does a member of the Cheney family have to be to go around assigning blame for Afghanistan? Talking points from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) office show that their plan was to blame Donald Trump for everything. Biden went on TV and blamed Trump for the plan Biden abandoned, the Afghan people for being unwilling to fight, and the Good Humor Man for running out of chocolate chocolate chip.
There’s going to be a lot to sort out in the weeks and months to come regarding this catastrophe, and all the questions that have been asked are legitimate. Should we have been there in the first place? What was our mission? What does the outcome say about the competence of our military?
Read MoreCommentary: Pennsylvania Is a Microcosm of America’s Housing Crisis
In recent years, an acute housing crisis has engulfed both America’s coastal metros and Rust Belt regions. California’s Bay Area, for example, confronts a crisis of affordability and limited supply that hastens a population exodus. Midwest cities like Detroit face low real-estate prices and low demand, intensifying urban decline.
Pennsylvania is a microcosm of such alarming housing trends, especially east of the Susquehanna River, which is seeing an influx of metro New Yorkers relocating to the area.
From the Keystone State’s middle-class suburbs to its post-industrial locales, the housing crisis is a major challenge. In the midstate, most notably in Harrisburg and Lancaster, housing has become significantly more expensive. In the northeast’s anthracite coal region, anchored by Scranton, rents are spiking. And in suburban Philadelphia’s Lansdale, a townhouse went for nearly $500,000.
Read MoreD.C. Mayor Denies Breaking Her Own Mask Mandate Despite Photo Evidence
Democratic Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser denied breaking her own mask mandate at a wedding Saturday night, despite photo evidence showing her seated maskless at a table.
The Washington Examiner first reported late Saturday that the mayor had officiated a wedding attended by “hundreds of unmasked guests” at 5-star Adams Morgan hotel, The Line DC.
The Examiner included a photograph of the mayor seated at a table maskless, noting that she “did not wear a mask despite not actively eating or drinking.” Several other guests in the picture are also not wearing masks.
Read MoreCommentary: Ashli Babbitt’s Mom Speaks
The only video Ashli Babbitt’s mom has seen of her daughter on January 6 is a clip of her walking from Donald Trump’s speech to Capitol Hill. “That brings me peace,” Micki Witthoeft, Ashli’s mom, told me by phone on Wednesday. “She was in her zone, so happy, having a great day.”
“Until that son-of-a-bitch shot her.”
Nearly seven months after a United States Capitol Police officer shot Ashli Babbitt in the Capitol building on January 6, the government and subservient corporate news media still refuse to confirm the name of the federal officer who killed her. (Investigative journalist Paul Sperry recently reported the shooter likely is USCP Lt. Michael Byrd.) The Justice Department closed its investigation into her shooting in April and announced the unnamed officer would not face criminal charges.
Read MoreCommentary: Naming the Capitol Police Officer Who Killed Unarmed January 6 Rioter Ashli Babbitt
Most police departments — including Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police — are required to release an officer’s name within days of a fatal shooting. Not the U.S. Capitol Police, which is controlled by Congress and answers only to Congress. It can keep the public in the dark about the identity and investigation of an officer involved in a shooting indefinitely.
Which is what happened with the Jan. 6 shooting of Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed protester in the U.S. Capitol riot who was fatally wounded by a plainclothes police lieutenant as she attempted to breach a set of doors inside the building.
For the past six months, as Congress has proposed legislation to reform police departments across the country, the Capitol Police has stiff-armed government watchdogs, journalists and even lawyers for Babbitt, who have sought the identity of the officer and additional details about the shooting. The USCP still refuses to release his name, in stark contrast to recent high-profile police shootings around the nation.
Read MoreHusband of Ashli Babbitt Files Lawsuit to Demand Name of Capitol Police Officer Who Killed Her
The widower of Ashi Babbitt, the Air Force veteran who was killed by a Capitol Police officer on January 6th, has filed a lawsuit seeking to finally uncover the name of the guilty officer, the New York Post reports.
Aaron Babbitt filed the lawsuit in the Washington D.C. Superior Court, demanding all information related to his wife’s murder, including video footage and statements from witnesses to the incident, in addition to seeking the identity of the officer who fired the fatal shot. Separately from this lawsuit, Babbitt’s family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit for $12 million against the Capitol Police, according to the Babbitt family’s attorney Terry Roberts.
Babbitt had previously filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), but the MPD failed to respond by the original May 12th deadline, by which time they either had to provide the material or give a formal response explaining why they could not hand over the materials.
Read MoreCommentary: Another January 6 Falsehood: $30 Million in Damages to the Capitol
The U.S. Capitol Police on Monday morning conducted what it called a “routine” training exercise on the grounds of the Capitol. The stagecraft, almost five months to the day from the January 6 protest, involved emergency vehicles and helicopters. The agency warned area residents not to be “alarmed,” which of course was the exact reaction USCP wanted.
Call it insurrection theater. The USCP has acted as the Democratic Party’s stormtroopers since January 6, attacking peaceful Americans during the protest, lying about the death of officer Brian Sicknick, and now making officers available for embarrassing cable news hits where they share their hurt feelings and the permanent trauma they’ve suffered since enduring the supposedly harrowing ordeal. The distressed officers, however, seem just fine with the fact that a still-unidentified colleague shot and killed an unarmed woman, Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt.
Capitol-employed apparatchiks have played a key role in shaping the narrative about what happened on January 6, all in service to their Democratic paymasters.
Read MoreCommentary: Upholding the Constitution Regardless of the Oligarchy in Charge
The attempt of America’s ruling class to convict 455 persons of “armed insurrection”—i.e. of waging war against the United States, a species of treason—for protesting insufficient scrutiny of the 2020 election on January 6 in the Capitol, while at the same time it excuses and even cheers the burning and looting of courthouses, police stations, and downtowns all over America, is not the exercise of a “double standard.”
The people in and out of government who do this are not corrupt. Instead, acting as part of the regime—the oligarchy—they are replacing the American republic and waging war to crush its remains.
The sooner Americans realize that we are being governed by people at war with our Constitution and contemptuous of ourselves, the sooner those people may be treated as the enemies they are.
Read MoreD.C. Jail Treatment of Capitol Riot Defendants Draws Bipartisan Outrage
Ashort drive from the U.S. Capitol, 1,500 inmates are stuck in their jail cells 22 hours a day. Until last month it was 23, and they were also barred from going outside.
A smaller group of inmates may have it even worse: those awaiting trial for alleged crimes in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. They’ve been placed in “restrictive housing,” a maximum-security designation.
The plight of nearby inmates has received surprisingly little attention on Capitol Hill for the better part of a year, since the District of Columbia Department of Corrections issued its “medical stay-in-place” policies for COVID-19 mitigation.
Read MoreCommentary: The U.S. Economy and Its Lack of Sustainability
Is the economy booming or is it riding a wave of paper money with no real underlying sustainability? That is the question which policy makers in Washington, DC should be considering.
The truth is no one actually knows, but that is exactly why this discussion must be had.
Since the China virus was inflicted upon the world, it is indisputable that the federal government has authorized $5 Trillion between the Trump spending of $3.1 Trillion to meet the crisis and Biden’s recently passed additional $1.9 trillion so he could sign checks to people too. This is on top of the $1 Trillion in planned deficits during the 2020 fiscal year.
Read MoreViolent Crime Surged in These Cities After Mass Black Lives Matter, Anti-Police Protests
Violent crime surged in several U.S. cities that saw massive Black Live Matter and anti-police protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death last summer.
The upswing of violent crime, including homicides, coincided with the protests, increased anti-police sentiment among Americans and declining morale in police departments, which have since struggled to recruit new officers. The number of murders alone increased by 36.7% in 2020 compared to 2019, according to public information compiled by data analytics reporter Jeff Asher.
“We are definitely at a critical manpower shortage here,” Louisville police union spokesperson Dave Mutchler told the Daily Caller News Foundation last week. “The climate that we all find ourselves in right now is a lot more demanding and stressful on officers.”
Read MoreChauvin Juror Says He Attended BLM Protest Before Trial Because He'd 'Never Been to DC'
A man who served on the jury that voted to convict former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin defended his participation in a Black Lives Matter protest prior to the trial.
Brandon Mitchell said he attended the Aug. 28 “Get Your Knee Off Our Necks!” protest organized by activist Al Sharpton because he had never been to Washington, D.C., according to the Associated Press. Photos recently circulated online show Mitchell wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt at the event.
“I’d never been to D.C.,” Mitchell told the AP. “The opportunity to go to D.C., the opportunity to be around thousands and thousands of Black people; I just thought it was a good opportunity to be a part of something.”
Biden Admin Won’t Say How Much ‘Emergency’ Funding for Colleges Remains Unspent, Proposes Another $12 Billion Anyway
Disclosure: The writer of this piece served as the U.S. Department of Education’s Press Secretary from summer 2019 through the end of the Trump administration and was involved in the announcement of the creation of the Education Stabilization Fund transparency portal.
Congressional Democrats and President Joe Biden enacted $40 billion in additional higher education relief funding without any public information on if, or how, the $21.2 billion allocated in December 2020 had been spent.
Even though colleges and universities were required to report their spending on January 28 and then again on February 8, the Department of Education’s Education Stabilization Fund transparency portal is still showing spending data as of Nov. 30 of last year.
Read MoreBiden Admin Won’t Say How Much ‘Emergency’ Funding for Colleges Remains Unspent, Proposes Another $12 Billion Anyway
Disclosure: The writer of this piece served as the U.S. Department of Education’s Press Secretary from summer 2019 through the end of the Trump administration and was involved in the announcement of the creation of the Education Stabilization Fund transparency portal.
Congressional Democrats and President Joe Biden enacted $40 billion in additional higher education relief funding without any public information on if, or how, the $21.2 billion allocated in December 2020 had been spent.
Even though colleges and universities were required to report their spending on January 28 and then again on February 8, the Department of Education’s Education Stabilization Fund transparency portal is still showing spending data as of Nov. 30 of last year.
Read MoreDisparate Treatment in Two Fund-Raising Fraud Cases Renews Debate Over Dual Justice System
Just a few short weeks apart, the U.S. Justice Department settled two major fund-raising cases involving foreign money injected into American elections.
In February, a longtime Democratic bundler named Imaad Zuberi, who also donated to Donald Trump’s inauguration, was sentenced to 12 years in prison and millions in fines in a criminal information that alleged he routed foreign money into U.S elections, sometimes through straw donors.
Last week, Nigerian-Lebanese billionaire Gilbert Chagoury, 75, a large donor to the Clinton Foundation, got a fine, no prison and deferred prosecution for allegedly routing his foreign money to straw donors to help Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign and some GOP congressional candidates. An associate also made a secret loan to Obama-era Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who failed to disclose the assistance.
Read MoreCommentary: Holding Big Tech Accountable for January 6
Nearly 300 Americans face a slew of charges related to the melee on Capitol Hill last January. As I’ve reported over the past few months, offenses range from assaulting a police officer to destroying government property to trespassing.
More than 70 protestors stand accused of “aiding and abetting” various crimes; even people who didn’t vandalize the Capitol or even enter the building have been charged with helping others do damage and interrupt Congress’ certification of the Electoral College results.
Nonviolent offenders languish behind bars for months, denied bail, and transported to Washington, D.C. to await delayed trials. Federal prosecutors suggest President Trump could be indicted for fueling the chaos that day. Democratic congressmen want their Republican colleagues held accountable for their alleged role, too.
Read MoreDemocrats in Congress Renew Push for D.C. Statehood, but It Faces Uphill Climb in Senate
Democrats in Congress are renewing their push for Washington D.C. statehood with their party in the majority in the House and Senate.
Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, the non-voting House member representing the District, has reintroduced the Washington, D.C. Admission Act, which has picked up 210 Democratic co-sponsors so far. Delaware Democratic Sen. Tom Carper introduced the Senate version of the bill, which has 39 Democratic co-sponsors to date.
Read MoreCapitol Police Chief: Capitol Needs ‘Permanent’ Wall to Protect Congress
Acting Capitol Police Chief Yogananda Pittman said the U.S. Capitol needs a permanent wall to protect Congress members in the wake of the riots on Jan. 6.
“In a statement on Thursday, Pittman said the security at the Capitol building must include a “permanent fencing” barrier — a similar barrier to the one halted by President Joe Biden’s administration at the U.S.-Mexico border,” Breitbart reported.
Read MoreFirearms Prohibited in DC During Pro-Trump Protests, Police Say
Firearms will be prohibited within 1,000 feet of demonstration activity in Washington, D.C. this week, according to notices posted by the Metropolitan Police Department.
All firearms are banned within 1,000 feet of where the signs are posted ahead of pro-President Donald Trump demonstrations against certifying the electoral college votes for the 2020 presidential election, Fox 5 reported. Protests are expected at Freedom Plaza, near the capitol building and at the National Mall.
Read MoreVirginia Opts Not to Join Climate Initiative, for Now
Virginia was not in the first slate of states to join the Transportation and Climate Initiative, which proponents argue will help fight climate change and opponents assert will increase costs for households.
Under the multistate agreement, a state would agree to establish a cap on diesel and gasoline sales and require wholesales to purchase carbon allowances to go over that limit, which effectively creates a carbon tax. The initiative has received support from many Democrats and opposition from Republicans.
Read More