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On November 9, 2024, the Associated Press called Arizona for Donald Trump. Arizona was the last state the media called — four days after Election Day. As Arizona Senate president, I know that kind of delay can’t happen again. Voters deserve timely results, especially in a pivotal battleground state.

The outcome of the presidential race became clear in the early hours of election night, November 6. But Arizona’s slow count still invited unnecessary angst — and would have fueled mistrust if the margin had been tighter. It doesn’t have to work this way. That’s why we’re looking at common-sense, bipartisan reforms that improve transparency and speed without compromising integrity.

If the governor won’t work with the legislature on meaningful reforms, we will take this directly to the voters in the November general election.

Florida shows what’s possible. Over the past few cycles, Florida has counted the vast majority of ballots within hours of polls closing. Races get called, electoral votes get assigned, and the country moves on.

Florida didn’t arrive there by accident. The “hanging chads” debacle of 2000 forced the state to rebuild confidence through clearer rules and cleaner procedures. In 2024, more than 3 million Floridians voted by mail, more than 5 million voted early, and more than 2.5 million voted on Election Day. Florida counted 99% of those ballots before midnight. That’s a standard Arizona should meet.

So what does Florida do differently?

First, Florida keeps clear lanes for voting: vote by mail, early voting, and Election Day voting. Each lane has its own procedures, and voters understand the differences.

Second, Florida limits Election Day drop-offs. Vote-by-mail ballots can be returned at early voting locations, but on Election Day they must be delivered to the supervisor of elections — Florida’s equivalent of Arizona’s county recorders — not dropped at every polling place.

Third, Florida removes needless envelope handling for in-person early voting. Envelopes belong with vote-by-mail ballots, not in-person voting. Early in-person voters use the same ballots and the same tabulators used on Election Day — they just vote during the early window.

Fourth, Florida posts key numbers on election night. Counties must report how many vote-by-mail ballots they have received and how many remain uncounted. That kind of transparency reduces speculation and stops the “How many ballots are still out there?” spiral that frustrates voters across the country.

RELATED: The common-sense case for nationalizing US elections

Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

My team and I — joined by state senators, representatives, and county officials — met with Florida’s secretary of state to discuss how Arizona could adopt similar reforms. I hope Democrats and county officials will join this effort. Election integrity, transparency, efficiency, and certainty shouldn’t be partisan. Too often, they have turned into a Republican-versus-Democrat fight, with the left resisting reforms that would give voters more confidence in the process.

Consider a bill my Republican colleagues and I pushed in 2023 and again in 2025. It required voters who held on to their mailed ballots until the Friday before Election Day to meet the same voter ID requirements as other voters when dropping those ballots off. The bill would also have reduced the burden of signature verification on hundreds of thousands of ballots — one major reason Arizona results can take days, even weeks.

Both times, it passed the legislature on party-line votes and Governor Katie Hobbs (D) vetoed it. Her veto message offered little justification, claiming only that the bill didn’t “meaningfully address the real challenges facing Arizona voters.”

That pattern has repeated. Even with growing support for faster election-night results — including an unlikely endorsement from a columnist at one of Arizona’s major newspapers — the governor and her allies have refused to consider reforms that would deliver timely results and clearer transparency.

Arizona voters deserve better than delays and uncertainty. If the governor won’t work with the legislature on meaningful reforms, we will take this directly to the voters in the November general election. If Democrats won’t fix what’s broken, Arizonans will.

Republicans in the Arizona legislature have reintroduced bills to reform our system. We should tailor solutions to Arizona, but nobody should fear mirroring a model that works. Florida proves that speed and integrity can coexist.

Election integrity, transparency, and timely results aren’t red or blue issues. They’re American issues. Arizona has an opportunity — and an obligation — to deliver results voters can trust, on election night.

​Arizona, Elections, Voting by mail, Election day, Katie hobbs, Republicans, Democrats, Opinion & analysis 

Imagine an Iranian warship minding its own business in the Indian Ocean, when, out of nowhere, a mean and abusive American submarine appears and starts launching torpedoes for no reason except sheer cruelty. At least, that’s how one professor I recently encountered retold the story. In his telling, the United States isn’t merely mistaken or imprudent. It’s the villain in a cartoon morality play, cast forever as the bully.

Others insist that President Trump’s actions toward Iran can only be explained by domestic political distraction — specifically, an alleged effort to divert attention from the Epstein files. Their reasoning runs like this: Trump once speculated that Barack Obama might attack Iran for political reasons. Therefore — through a piece of logic that would embarrass a first-year philosophy student — Trump must now be doing precisely that himself.

We believe — correctly — that free speech requires tolerating ideas that are foolish, offensive, or absurd. But the First Amendment does not require taxpayers to finance those ideas.

The pattern keeps repeating. In January, a handful of progressive philosophers of religion flooded social media to denounce ICE based on fake reports. American Christians, they declared, must allow unrestricted immigration as a requirement of loving their neighbor. Point out that the passages they cite presuppose conversion to the faith, and the conversation pivots quickly from political lecturing to hostility toward Christian scripture itself.

My own social media was full of posts by progressive philosophers repeating Democrat talking points. One notable example is philosopher Eleonore Stump, who reposted fake stories about Liam Ramos, fake images of ICE shootings, and emotional pleas disconnected from reality and rooted in what is now called suicidal empathy.

It would make a perfectly acceptable comedy routine if it weren’t so serious — and so sad.

Why professors hate America

Why are so many American professors so anti-American?

They live in a country that pays them well to teach their particular flavors of Marxist progressivism. They enjoy robust constitutional protections for speech and inquiry. They’re free to invent theories so eccentric that they wouldn’t survive a staff meeting at a moderately sensible insurance company.

And yet they hate America.

The late philosopher Roger Scruton coined a useful word for this condition: oikophobia — the fear or hatred of one’s own home.

Spend 10 minutes browsing faculty social media — especially in the humanities — and you’ll meet it. In their telling, virtually any other country can do no wrong, while the United States can do nothing right.

RELATED: Do they hate Trump — or do they just hate America?

Photo by Joseph Prezioso / AFP via Getty Images

The logic of learned helplessness

They lament how the “benevolent” ruler of Venezuela was removed by the bullying United States. If they concede he was a tyrant, they pivot to a different objection: Are we supposed to go around removing every tyrant in the world?

Consider the move. Because a nation cannot eliminate all evil everywhere, it must refrain from opposing evil anywhere.

It’s a curious moral theory — and it tends to apply only when America, or a conservative administration, acts. In their personal lives and domestic politics, these same professors preach incrementalism. Don’t let the perfect become the enemy of the good. Progress, they assure us, comes in steps.

But when Donald Trump — or conservative America generally — is behind an action, oikophobia kicks in and the reasoning faculty abruptly shuts down.

TDS as a virtue

Recently, James Carville, a sometime professor of political science at Tulane University and a political consultant to various governments abroad, publicly took the Lord’s name in vain by asking God not for national unity or wisdom but for more Trump derangement syndrome. He cheerfully admitted he hates Trump and wants to hate him more.

That’s more than just political spite. It’s a descent into madness, wrapped in a violation of the third commandment.

This posture has become standard in fields such as political science and the humanities. It feels less like argument than a kind of intellectual surrender — what the apostle Paul describes in Romans 1 as being given over to a “debased mind.”

When intellectuals lose the capacity for judgment, the results don’t stay confined to faculty lounges. They spill into institutions, into students, into culture — and into policy.

Why are we paying for this?

The strangest feature of this situation is that we keep employing these people — often with public funds.

Professors at private universities are one thing. Private institutions can hire whomever they please. But many of the loudest performances come from state universities, where salaries are paid by taxpayers.

Americans have tolerated this out of respect for the First Amendment. We believe — correctly — that free speech requires tolerating ideas that are foolish, offensive, or absurd.

But the First Amendment does not require taxpayers to finance those ideas.

Allowing someone to speak differs from obligating the public to underwrite his lectures.

From oikophobia to self-hatred

Oikophobia rarely appears in isolation. It grows out of something deeper — what you might call autophobia: a kind of self-hatred.

Professors who despise their country often despise the civilization that produced it — and, eventually, even themselves. You can see the self-contempt in the ideas they teach: young people urged to reject their own bodies, treat biological reality as an inconvenience, and even mutilate themselves in pursuit of identities constructed from will alone.

Civilizations that teach their children to hate themselves don’t flourish for long.

RELATED: My court fight over DEI at Arizona State isn’t culture-war noise

Photo by Robert Alexander/Getty Images

The post-Christian academy

Another pattern shows up if you spend enough time around these professors: Many were raised in some form of Christianity and later rejected it.

Occasionally they will speak of Jesus as one teacher among many. More often they reject him outright. That rejection isn’t incidental. It’s seed corn. It grows into the rest of the hostility.

The America they prefer is an America stripped of its Christian foundations — an America dissolved into a global moral neutrality where Western civilization stays perpetually on trial and every other tradition receives the presumption of innocence.

In their view, just as America can do nothing right, Christians can do nothing right either.

Meanwhile, almost any spiritual alternative — no matter how strange or historically troubling — earns enthusiastic approval. “Who are you to judge?” becomes the only commandment they reliably enforce.

I recall one professor raised in a conservative Baptist home who later converted to what she proudly called “hedonic atheism.” She recounted — with real excitement — paying to sit on the dirt floor of a shaman’s tent and ingest hallucinogenic mushrooms to “open the doors of perception to other dimensions.”

Christianity: rejected. Mushrooms with a witch doctor: enlightenment.

The simple solution

Future historians may look back at this era with bewilderment. They’ll ask how a prosperous civilization came to subsidize an entire class of intellectuals devoted to explaining why that civilization was uniquely wicked.

Has anything like it happened before?

Perhaps.

But most civilizations eventually discovered a simple solution. They stopped paying for it.

​State schools, Trump, Tds, Roger scruton, Oikophobia, Patriotism, Democrats, Public universities, Opinion & analysis 

Leaving trash in your car might seem like a personal problem.

In Hilton Head, South Carolina, it can now bring fines of up to $500 — or even 30 days in jail.

Governments routinely regulate safety equipment, emissions standards, and parking behavior. Regulating how clean the inside of a car must be moves into far less settled territory.

A new local ordinance allows authorities to penalize situations where garbage inside a vehicle could provide food or shelter for rats. What might sound like an odd local rule has sparked a broader question about government authority, vague enforcement standards, and whether similar laws could eventually spread to larger cities already struggling with rodent infestations.

Rat’s nest

The ordinance took effect February 1 as part of the town’s effort to control a growing rat problem. Hilton Head’s municipal code places vehicles under the same sanitation rules that apply to buildings, treating them as potential environments where rodents could find food or shelter.

The rule appears in a section addressing “conditions affording food or harborage for rats.” Under the ordinance, it is unlawful to allow garbage or rubbish to accumulate in any building, vehicle, or surrounding area if it could provide food or shelter for rodents.

For drivers, the penalties are significant. Violations can bring fines of up to $500, jail time of up to 30 days, or both. Each day the violation continues can count as a separate offense, meaning penalties could quickly multiply.

The ordinance is framed as a public health measure. Garbage accumulation can attract rodents, and Hilton Head’s code treats vehicles the same way it treats buildings if trash creates conditions that could support infestations.

The challenge is how broadly that standard could be applied.

RELATED: Per-mile driving taxes: The latest way to punish those who drive the most?

Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

A little litter?

The law does not define how much trash qualifies as “accumulating garbage,” nor does it spell out how enforcement officers should determine whether a vehicle could realistically attract rodents. A few empty coffee cups or fast-food wrappers might look harmless to one person but like a sanitation problem to another.

In practice, enforcement would likely occur in situations where trash is visible from outside the vehicle or discovered during other routine enforcement actions, such as parking violations or abandoned-vehicle inspections. The ordinance itself provides little guidance on how those decisions should be made.

Pest control

That ambiguity raises a broader question.

If a local government can regulate the interior condition of a private vehicle in the name of pest control, how far does that authority extend?

Cities like New York and Los Angeles already struggle with well-documented rat infestations. New York City alone spends tens of millions of dollars annually on rodent mitigation, expanding sanitation enforcement and imposing stricter trash-handling rules.

In cities under pressure to show results, the temptation to expand enforcement tools is real. If Hilton Head’s ordinance survives legal scrutiny, other municipalities dealing with rodent problems could see it as a model.

Test case

That possibility raises an uncomfortable policy question.

Vehicles are private property, even when parked on public streets. Governments routinely regulate safety equipment, emissions standards, and parking behavior. Regulating how clean the inside of a car must be moves into far less settled territory.

There are also practical questions the ordinance does not answer.

Would a car parked temporarily on a street face the same scrutiny as a vehicle abandoned for weeks? Could a citation be issued immediately, or would drivers first be given an opportunity to correct the problem?

For now, motorists in Hilton Head are the test case.

But drivers elsewhere — especially in cities already battling rat infestations — should pay attention. Regulations often start small, aimed at solving a specific problem in a specific place. Over time, those rules can expand in ways few people originally anticipated.

And when government authority moves into new territory, it rarely retreats on its own.

​Hilton head, Lifestyle, Rats, Law, Messy cars, Privacy, Align cars 

Two Florida teenagers arrested on charges of alleged murder were allegedly caught on video laughing and giggling to each other about their plot from a police cruiser.

Isabelle Valdez, 15, and Lois Lippert, 14, were arrested on Jan. 23 after police received a tip about their alleged plan to resurrect the Sandy Hook elementary school killer by murdering a schoolmate.

‘I thought I was going to get sent to the [expletive] psych ward. That’s why I was so excited about everything.’

The video shows Valdez making jokes and Lippert laughing despite the very serious allegations that were made against them by the Altamonte Springs Police Department.

Valdez identifies as a transgender person and goes by the name “Jimmy,” according to court records.

After police contacted school officials about the tip, Valdez was questioned by the vice principal of Lake Brantley High School in Altamonte Springs. She allegedly admitted to the murder plot and handed over a backpack with a knife, gloves, trash bags, and wipes.

Valdez said that she heard voices in her head telling her to kill the victim in order to resurrect Adam Lanza, who murdered his mother, 20 grade-school students, and others before committing suicide in 2012.

In the police video released to the public, they joke about wearing makeup for a mugshot.

“I was going to do my makeup this morning for the mugshot, but I couldn’t find anything,” Valdez said. “It’s over.”

“Yeah, it’s over. It doesn’t matter if you look good or not,” Lippert replied.

“Why are you touching me with your butt?” Valdez said in another reported interaction.

“This is such a bonding experience! I love it!” Lippert said.

At another part, Valdez said, “I thought I was going to get sent to the [expletive] psych ward. That’s why I was so excited about everything.”

They also talk about the blood pact to bring back Lanza as well as their speculation about who snitched on them. Prosecutors said the teens planned to slit a student’s throat in the bathroom and then drink his blood.

“I don’t feel guilty for my actions,” Valdez said in the recording.

Prosecutors showed the video at a hearing to oppose bail for the pair, and a judge agreed. The two will stay in jail while the case progresses.

RELATED: Activists want food delivery man to be charged with hate crime after lethal shooting over ‘misgendering’ of transgender woman

The mother of the teenager who was allegedly targeted in the murder plot said it has crushed their sense of security.

“I was destroyed, and I still am. It is never going to be the same,” the mother told WFTV-TV. “When you read the report and how planned out it was … it is very hard. I have broken down a lot. I still break down at work. I still have fear.”

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​Trans-identifying murder suspect, Isabelle "jimmy" valdez murder plot, Adam lanza resurrection plot, Crime, Lois lippert murder plot 

The war in Iran has entered its second week, and the Trump administration is fighting on two fronts: the physical battlefield and the narrative one.

Most Americans expected U.S. firepower to dominate, and it has. Seven American service members have died so far, but Iran has suffered far heavier losses in lives and materiel. Even those surprised by the damage Iran managed to inflict on U.S. allies can see the basic reality: Tehran is outmatched. The real question was never whether the United States had superior force. The question was whether the administration could sustain support long enough to translate force into victory.

Trump built a foreign policy around brief, decisive action in America’s interest. He should stick with it — and finish this war — while the window for narrative victory remains open.

That challenge matters more for Trump than for most modern presidents. He was never an isolationist. His second-term foreign policy has relied on limited but highly effective strikes rather than long occupations. He has projected power through single bombing runs and midnight raids, then exited before the mission metastasized into a nation-building project. Skeptics of foreign intervention grumbled, then quieted down when operations stayed brisk, competent, and contained.

That becomes more difficult when “contained” turns into weeks and potentially months.

“Boots on the ground” has become the clearest public marker of commitment. If the conflict remains primarily air and naval, most voters will still read it as limited engagement. Costs will rise and gas prices will sting, but casualties will likely remain comparatively low. A sharp show of force followed by a clear exit would keep the war from becoming a long-term liability. Whether he intended it or not, Trump has likely gambled the remainder of his term on avoiding that trip wire.

The Iranians know it. So does the administration.

That’s why Tehran keeps daring Washington to deploy ground troops. Iran’s leaders don’t believe they can beat American infantry in a straight fight. They’re betting the war loses support the moment U.S. ground forces start taking steady casualties.

George W. Bush enjoyed a powerful rally-around-the-flag boost after 9/11, and his administration spent months building a public case for war. Trump has no comparable national trauma to unify the country, and his administration did not spend much time laying out the necessity of this war before it began. That means his narrative window of victory is narrower by default — and it can close fast.

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth appears to understand the dynamic, but he also understands a basic rule: You don’t win wars by announcing what you will not do. If the administration takes ground troops off the table, it tells Tehran that patience equals victory — that holding out long enough will force America to go home.

So Hegseth keeps the option alive. Practically, that means he keeps getting dragged into briefings where he must say ground deployments remain possible. The media treats that as the headline. Anxiety rises. “Boots on the ground” starts to feel inevitable, even when it remains only a contingency. The administration takes a beating in the public mind with every news cycle.

RELATED: America First can’t survive an Iran quagmire

Blaze News Illustration

Wars have always had a narrative battle, but the pace has changed. News doesn’t arrive weeks later in a paper or even once a night on television. It hits phones all day, in an endless stream of micro-skirmishes designed to create dread and exhaustion.

No one really doubts U.S. military superiority. Iraq and Afghanistan proved that military superiority is not enough. America toppled regimes quickly, then watched “mission accomplished” become a punch line for years of occupation and nation-building.

Trump hinted recently that operations in Iran are nearly complete. If true, that’s the right direction. The old supreme leader is dead, along with many key figures, and the new supreme leader already may have been gravely injured. Iran’s naval and air capacity has been degraded. Tehran has isolated itself further by striking a range of U.S. allies. Trump could declare meaningful victory now and begin drawing down forces, preserving the very pattern that kept his base — skeptical of intervention — largely onside: quick, effective strikes with limited U.S. casualties.

Trump has also said Israel will have a say in when the war ends. It shouldn’t.

The United States is sovereign. It is also the senior partner in a conflict Israel could not possibly execute alone. The administration has already acknowledged that Israel’s decision to strike materially reshaped U.S. war planning. That is a mistake not to repeat. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made clear that long-term regime change is Israel’s goal. If Israel wants that objective, it should secure it on its own terms.

Trump built a foreign policy around brief, decisive action in America’s interest. He should stick with it — and finish this war — while the window for narrative victory remains open.

​Opinion & analysis, Iran, Donald trump, Information warfare, Media bias, Boots on the ground, Air power, Strait of hormuz, Oil, Energy, China, Terrorism, Narrative, Pete hegseth 

Detroit Police, responding to a report of the explosion of a pipe bomb, said they found a person dead by electrocution and another who was injured.

They later determined that the man and woman had been allegedly trying to steal copper wiring from an abandoned school building before the shocking incident.

‘These wires can be live, lot of voltage, thousands of watts going through there, and this is what could very well happen to you.’

Police responded at around 3 p.m. to the report of a bomb explosion at Brainard Street and 3rd Avenue near Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

They transported the injured person to a hospital but did not release whether the woman or the man was the deceased person they found.

Authorities are working to notify the family of the two people.

Detroit Police Deputy Chief Franklin Hayes warned about the risks of utility theft from the scene of the death.

“For those that may be thinking about the very, very dangerous decision of utility theft, to steal copper wire, this is what happens,” Hayes said.

“These wires can be live, lot of voltage, thousands of watts going through there, and this is what could very well happen to you if you decide to … make the decision to steal,” he added.

RELATED: Man electrocuted to death after being pushed onto subway tracks in downtown Baltimore, police say: ‘That’s evil, that’s totally evil’

The U.S. Dept. of Energy estimates that copper theft costs U.S. businesses as much as $1 billion per year and is on the rise.

One study found that there were about 32,000 instances of copper theft between 2010 and 2012 alone.

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​Cooper theft death, Detroit electrocution, Utility theft death, Man electrocuted to death, Crime 

Police are investigating a possible hate crime incident on the UC Irvine campus in California after a black student was allegedly attacked by five white teens on e-bikes.

The alleged altercation occurred on Feb. 27 at the university’s Arroyo Vista Housing complex, according to the UC Irvine Police Department.

‘Since the incident, the victim has been placed on bed rest and has returned home because he no longer feels safe remaining on campus.’

The Black Student Union released a statement recounting the events of the alleged attack.

According to the statement, the white teens falsely claimed that the student spat on them after a school event and then chased after him on their e-bikes as he rode a scooter.

They allegedly shouted racial slurs against the student until one of them rode his e-bike into him.

“The situation escalated when one of the juveniles of the group attempted to ram the victim off the road,” reads the statement from the Black Student Union. “Using the front of his bike tire, he struck the back of the victim’s scooter and part of his leg. This resulted in torn skin, bruising, and an infection of the victim’s ankle.”

The teens let up the chase after the student ran into the Rosa Parks House and called police, the student union said.

“Since the incident, the victim has been placed on bed rest and has returned home because he no longer feels safe remaining on campus,” the group added.

The teens scattered after the incident, but an officer was able to detain a suspect at a parking structure. Police described one suspect as a teen between 16 and 17 years old and another who is 14 years old.

RELATED: White couple recounts vicious racist attack police call a hate crime

The student union demanded that school officials take action to ensure the safety of black students on campus.

“Incidents like this cannot be tolerated, and they will continue to occur if the administration fails to respond with urgency and accountability,” it added.

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​Uc irvine race crime, Hate crime california university, Black student union uc irvine, 5 white teens on ebikes, Politics 

While the newly crowned mayor of New York City has done his best to distance himself from association with radical Islamists, an examination of his wife’s social media activity revealed that she herself may hold slightly more radical beliefs.

Rama Duwaji, a Syrian-American activist who married Mamdani in 2025, allegedly liked multiple Instagram posts cheering on Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 assault.

“She apparently … has [allegedly] liked a post that referred to the October 7 rapes as a hoax,” “Pat Gray Unleashed” executive producer Keith Malinak tells BlazeTV host Pat Gray and co-host Jeff Fisher.

But when Mamdani was questioned on his wife’s social media activity, he didn’t appear to be concerned.

“This is an off-topic question. I’d like to know what your reaction was to the article in the Jewish Insider that was posted about your wife’s social media activity, and what I’m wondering is, you know, you’re an elected official; she is not. Is it anybody’s business? And is it fair to question you about it?” a reporter asked Mamdani.

“You know, my wife is the love of my life, and she’s also a private person who has held no formal position on my campaign or in my city hall. I, however, was elected to represent all eight and a half million people in this city,” Mamdani answered.

“And I believe that it’s my responsibility because of that role to answer any questions about my thoughts and my policies and my decisions,” he added.

“I love how the reporter who’s asking him the question tried to give him the out on the question,” Gray says.

“Let’s face it, this is an anti-American couple,” Gray says, “who just happens to be in a really important position.”

Want more from Pat Gray?

To enjoy more of Pat’s biting analysis and signature wit as he restores common sense to a senseless world, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Pat gray unleashed, Pat gray, The blaze, Blazetv, Blaze news, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Mamdani, Zohran mamdani, Zohran mamdani’s wife, Rama duwaji, October 7th, Hamas attacks, Israel, Anti-semitism, Radical islam, Zohran mamdani islam 

Actress Rachel Zegler says that her race is a consistent issue when being cast for major movie roles.

Whether it was Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” or Disney’s “Snow White,” Zegler says she’s received criticism for not being enough of either ethnicity of the roles she has played.

‘When you’re two things, you’re simultaneously nothing.’

While many would argue that Zegler’s constant criticisms of the traditional “Snow White” story — like calling Prince Charming a “stalker” — were the main drivers of the movie’s failure, Zegler says it is her refusal to “assimilate” that causes viewers discomfort.

Skin deep

In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar, she implied that she was told she was not white enough for “Snow White” and not Puerto Rican enough to play Maria in “West Side Story.”

“I was told I wasn’t enough of one thing for ‘West Side Story’ and too much of another for ‘Snow White,'” she said.

Zegler called it a “confusing time” in her early twenties, despite being only 25 years old now, and played to her Colombian background; she was born in New Jersey, with Colombian and Polish parents.

“I grew up proud of being Colombian — eating the food, wearing the dresses, drinking the coffee, doing all the things that were so intrinsic to who I was as a kid and who I am as an adult,” Zegler said.

However, the actress then claimed that being biracial is actually what gets her overlooked.

RELATED: Comic calls out Peter Dinklage: ‘You were in the most offensive movie to little people ever made’

Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Comfort zone

“I do think there’s an argument to be made that, in the public eye at least, when you’re two things, you’re simultaneously nothing,” she added. “But I refuse to assimilate for anybody else’s comfort.”

While Zegler seemingly takes issue when it comes to audiences or studios noticing her ethnicity, she has certainly focused on her Colombian background a lot as a cause for celebration.

She told People in 2021 that she grew up in a “very Colombian American household” and loved being “surrounded by the biggest amount of Latinos I’ve ever been surrounded by” while filming “West Side Story.”

At the same time, she claimed that studio executives “kept calling to ask if I was legit,” in reference to being Colombian.

It was strange to have “a bunch of white executives have you prove your identity to them,” she told the L.A. Times in 2025.

RELATED: Woke ‘Snow White’ remake lost way more money than you could ever imagine

Photo by Jesse Grant/Getty Images for 20th Century Studios

Race rhapsody

In 2023, she joined forces with fellow Disney princess Halle Bailey to once again bask in the joy of being around certain races. She called it “beautiful” when Bailey remarked on working with an “all-black” cast, before calling her role as “Snow White” a “huge moment” for those who share her ethnicity.

Despite her recent interviewer purposely trying to pull her into a political debate, Zegler was described as not being willing to discuss politics but still acknowledged, according to the writer, that what’s happening in the United States is “very difficult to witness in real time.”

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​Align, Race politics, Woke, Snow white, Disney, Movies, Film, Entertainment 

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) broke ranks with her longtime colleague, retiring Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), by endorsing a rival candidate over Hoyer’s handpicked successor, marking a potential final clash in their complex alliance.

Pelosi and Hoyer first crossed paths as Capitol Hill interns in the 1960s. Hoyer was elected to Congress in 1981 and Pelosi in 1987. By the late 1990s, the two began vying for leadership roles, with Pelosi defeating Hoyer in 2001 to become the House minority whip.

‘I’m beyond honored to have her support in this campaign.’

Despite previously heaping praise on Pelosi, Hoyer suggested that he would have won if Pelosi “hadn’t been a woman or from California.”

“Gender and geography in this case were overwhelming. C’est la guerre,” he said.

In 2006, Pelosi snubbed Hoyer by backing his opponent for majority leader, but Hoyer won despite her lack of support.

Hoyer then spent two decades as one of the highest-ranking House Democrats, second only to Pelosi.

RELATED: Nancy Pelosi announces retirement after nearly 4 decades in Congress

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Hoyer, 86, announced his retirement in January as a representative for Maryland’s 5th Congressional District after serving 23 terms. He endorsed his former campaign manager Adrian Boafo as his successor.

Instead of announcing her support for Boafo in the packed congressional race, Pelosi seized the opportunity to use her endorsement to seemingly pay back former U.S. Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn, who was credited with protecting her on Jan. 6, 2021.

Pelosi announced her endorsement of Dunn on Wednesday, stating, “My friend Harry Dunn is a true American hero and exactly the right person to represent Maryland in Congress.”

She claimed that he “bravely defended our democracy from Donald Trump’s violent MAGA mob. Since then, Harry’s been called to do everything he can to protect Marylanders and all Americans from extremists like Donald Trump.”

“Few leaders have done more to defend our democracy and stand up to Donald Trump than Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi,” Dunn stated in reaction to Pelosi’s endorsement. “Her leadership helped deliver historic progress for the American people. I’m beyond honored to have her support in this campaign.”

Pelosi, who has also announced her retirement, will end her term in January 2027. She previously backed Dunn in his failed 2024 congressional run for Maryland’s 3rd District.

RELATED: Harry Dunn’s account of January 6 does not add up. At all.

Harry Dunn, Nancy Pelosi. Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Dunn gained prominence for his testimony about defending the Capitol on Jan. 6. However, a Blaze News investigation found that Dunn gave false and conflicting statements on the witness stand concerning his interaction with a group of Oath Keepers. His testimony ultimately led to their imprisonment.

Dunn, who has since retired from the U.S. Capitol Police, has used his platform since Jan. 6 to publish a memoir, run for political office, and establish a political action committee named Dunn’s Democracy Defenders, which aims to fund Democrat candidates to defeat President Donald Trump, who Dunn has claimed is a threat to democracy.

“The outrageous truth is that Dunn’s lies are easily disprovable by anyone who examines the evidence. Far from the hero he portrays himself to be, when he was not hiding on January 6, 2021, Dunn was needlessly and recklessly screaming at and otherwise confronting protesters who posed no threat to him, violating official protocols and procedures. Other officers repeatedly had to intervene to calm him down,” Blaze News investigative reporter Steve Baker wrote in a 2023 analysis of Dunn’s account of Jan. 6.

“It is unfortunate that the media is celebrating the many lies in Dunn’s book, but the real tragedy is that this unstable man’s testimony in a federal trial was instrumental in the conviction and sentencing of several Americans to years in federal prison,” Baker added.

Maryland’s congressional primary race is scheduled for June 23, and the general election is November 3.

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An actress who starred in one of Quentin Tarantino’s biggest films says his writing is “creepy.”

Rosanna Arquette, 66, is taking issue with “Pulp Fiction” more than 30 years after its release, telling the press that she is “over” how Tarantino includes the use of the N-word in his scripts.

‘Do you feel this way now? Very possibly.’

In an interview published by the Times on Saturday, Arquette said that while “Pulp Fiction” is a great piece of cinema, aspects of Tarantino’s writing should not be considered art.

“It’s iconic, a great film on a lot of levels,” she began. “But personally I am over the use of the N-word — I hate it. I cannot stand that he [Tarantino] has been given a hall pass. It’s not art, it’s just racist and creepy.”

Q’s A

The strong critique garnered near-immediate response from Tarantino, who wrote a letter to Arquette on Monday taking shots at her for showing a lack of “class” and “honor.”

“I hope the publicity you’re getting from 132 different media outlets writing your name and printing your picture was worth disrespecting me and a film I remember quite clearly you were thrilled to be a part of?” Tarantino recalled.

RELATED: Satan struts at Paris Fashion Week — here are the 3 most demonic designers

Photo by Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images for TCM

“Do you feel this way now? Very possibly. But after I gave you a job, and you took the money, to trash it for what I suspect is very cynical reasons, shows a decided lack of class, no less honor,” the director continued.

“There is supposed to be an esprit de corps between artistic colleagues. But it would appear the objective was accomplished,” Tarantino concluded.

The letter, published by Variety, ended simply with “Congratulations” before the sign-off “Q.”

No ‘Fiction’ friction

Strangely enough, Arquette had reunited with “Pulp Fiction” cast members as recently as April 2024 for a 30th anniversary screening at the TCL Chinese Theatre without issue.

Regarding Tarantino’s use of the racial slur, Samuel L. Jackson, who has starred in six of his films, has repeatedly defended the director’s dialogue choices. Not only has Jackson said, “There’s no dishonesty in anything that [Quentin] writes or how people talk, feel, or speak [in his movies],” but he also stood up for his colleague by comparing him to other art forms.

“When you have a song that says N-word in it 300 times, nobody says s**t,” he said in 2019.

RELATED: ‘Juvenile war porn’: Halo voice actor wants out of Trump administration hype video

Photo by Ernesto Ruscio/WireImage

Sour taste

Arquette played “Jody” in “Pulp Fiction,” the wife of heroin dealer Lance. She told the Times that she is still sour about the movie because she was denied a box-office percentage.

“I’m the only person who didn’t get a back end [a share of the takings]. Everybody made money except me,” she said, blaming producer Harvey Weinstein rather than Tarantino.

Arquette was one of Weinstein’s original accusers of sexual coercion.

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Last year, Republican Reps. Andy Ogles (Tenn.) and Randy Fine (Fla.) urged the Department of Justice to investigate and pursue denaturalization of Zohran Mamdani over unsubstantiated claims that he misrepresented or concealed material facts on his 2018 naturalization application.

While the DOJ never publicly responded to the letters, BlazeTV host Liz Wheeler thinks an investigation is warranted.

“I’m going to make the case for you that Zohran Mamdani may not be a valid U.S. citizen,” she says.

On this episode of “The Liz Wheeler Show,” Liz dives into the nitty-gritty of Mamdani’s naturalization application, the federal law that allows revocation of citizenship obtained through fraud or concealment, and the specific evidence she believes proves he may have lied in order to obtain citizenship.

Liz begins by citing federal law 8 U.S.C. § 1451: “If naturalized citizenship is ‘illegally procured or procured by concealment of a material fact or by willful misrepresentation,’ then it is the responsibility of the United States government to instigate denaturalization proceedings.”

“What, if you omitted that fact, would constitute a willful misrepresentation?” she asks.

Liz then displays the blank Application for Naturalization (Form N-400) used between 2016 and 2019 — the version Zohran Mamdani would have completed in 2017 — and reads aloud two questions she claims he might have answered dishonestly:

1. “Have you ever been a member of or in any way associated (either directly or indirectly) with: A, the Communist Party, B, any other totalitarian party, or C, a terrorist organization?”

2. “Have you ever lied to any U.S. government officials to gain entry or admission into the United States or to gain immigration benefits while in the United States?”

Liz argues that three key pieces of evidence could make Mamdani’s naturalized citizenship eligible for denaturalization: his 2017 public praise of the U.S.-designated terrorist group the Holy Land Five, his “direct association with communist Roy Singham’s groups like the Party for Socialism and Liberation,” and his longstanding membership in the Democrat Socialists of America, which Liz says “seek a totalitarian government … through violence.”

“So the option here is binary,” she says. “Either the application that he submitted was fraudulent, or the approval of the application … was fraudulent.”

To hear Liz’s full in-depth breakdown of Mamdani’s disturbing history, watch the episode above.

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Police departments in California have been warned that Iran may be seeking to strike the West Coast with drones as the U.S.-Israeli strikes continue in Iran.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation issued the alert at the end of February, according to an ABC News report.

‘As of early February 2026, Iran allegedly aspired to conduct a surprise attack using unmanned aerial vehicles.’

“We recently acquired information that as of early February 2026, Iran allegedly aspired to conduct a surprise attack using unmanned aerial vehicles from an unidentified vessel off the coast of the United State Homeland, specifically against unspecified targets in California, in the event that the U.S. conducted strikes against Iran,” the alert reads.

If Iran has been planning these drone strikes since “early February 2026,” then those plans predate the U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran, which began in late February.

“We have no additional information on the timing, method, target, or perpetrators of this alleged attack,” the FBI added.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office offered a brief statement about the report.

“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is actively working with state, local, and federal security officials to protect our communities,” the statement reads.

The Pentagon has confirmed that the U.S. is deploying suicide drones against Iran patterned after drones used against Ukraine and supplied to Russia by Iran.

“These low-cost drones, modeled after Iran’s Shahed drones, are now delivering American-made retribution,” reads a statement from U.S. Central Command.

After Iran began using those drones against U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf, military leaders requested assistance from Ukraine to counteract the drones, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

RELATED: ‘American-made retribution’: US ‘suicide drones’ deployed against Iran are based on tech from Iranian drones used in Ukraine

When reporters questioned President Donald Trump on Wednesday about whether he was concerned about possible Iranian strikes on U.S. soil, he downplayed the threat.

“No, I’m not,” he responded.

The attacks against Iran have led to a spike in oil prices in the U.S., which threatens to damage Republicans’ chances in the midterms to hold on to control of Congress.

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Former NBA player Jalen Rose has made some bold claims — that salary caps in professional sports and restrictions preventing athletes from entering leagues straight out of high school are a “residue of slavery.”

“The only sports that have salary caps are black led, first off. So that’s basketball and football. Those [are] the only sports with salary caps. Baseball, golf, NASCAR, tennis, you can keep naming. … That’s the first thing,” Rose explained on “Joe and Jada Unfiltered.”

“The second thing is they have no after-high-school restriction. And so that’s a residue of slavery, is because we’re going to get money off of you for multiple years for free,” he adds.

“A residue of slavery is probably Jalen Rose’s IQ at this point. That’s probably the residue of slavery that he’s referring to here,” BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock tells Steve Kim and Jay Skapinac on “Fearless.”

“It just drives me crazy that sports conversation is this stupid, this racialized. The National Hockey League has the harshest salary cap in all of sports. The top players probably making $7, $8, $9 million dollars. NFL players making $40, $50, $60 million dollars,” he adds.

“So here’s the other thing. When he brings up tennis and golf, guys, if I’m not mistaken, aren’t those guys’ winnings really their salary cap? Like if you win 10 tournaments, you’re probably going to get more than a guy that finishes in 18th place. That’s just the last time I checked,” Kim chimes in.

“It’s probably my whiteness, guys, coming through here, but I just really resent the implications that slavery is somehow tied into guys making multimillion-dollar generational wealth to play a game for a couple months a year for like 10 years of their life,” Skapinac adds.

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The president has announced a massive deal to open the first oil refinery in the U.S. in 50 years in order to seek energy “dominance.”

President Donald Trump said in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday that the refinery would be built in Brownsville, Texas, and bring thousands of jobs to the region.

‘This is what AMERICAN ENERGY DOMINANCE looks like. AMERICA FIRST, ALWAYS!’

“THIS IS A HISTORIC $300 BILLION DOLLAR DEAL — THE BIGGEST IN U.S. HISTORY, A MASSIVE WIN for American Workers, Energy, and the GREAT People of South Texas!” he wrote. “Thank you to our partners in India, and their largest privately held Energy Company, Reliance, for this tremendous Investment.”

He credited the streamlining of permits and lowering taxes under his “America First” agenda for attracting investments to the U.S.

“A new Refinery at the Port of Brownsville, will fuel U.S. Markets, strengthen our National Security, boost American Energy production, deliver Billions of Dollars in Economic impact, and will be THE CLEANEST REFINERY IN THE WORLD,” he added.

The refinery is being developed by America First Refining and will be designed to process shale oil.

“The United States has a surplus of light shale oil but a shortage of refining capacity designed to process it,” said America First Refining president Trey Griggs.

RELATED: ‘BEWARE!’ Trump threatens Iran with violence ‘never seen before’ over reported mines in Strait of Hormuz

“This is what AMERICAN ENERGY DOMINANCE looks like. AMERICA FIRST, ALWAYS!” Trump concluded.

The announcement came after oil prices spiked folllowing the military strikes on Iran by the U.S. and Israel. Crude oil jumped to nearly $120 a barrel on Monday but has dropped to $84 since then.

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Stabbing suspects are seen laughing and smiling on surveillance video apparently after they ganged up on a lone victim in a Maryland mall restroom.

Montgomery County Police in a Monday news release said a male victim around noon Feb. 4 entered the Wheaton Mall in the 11100 block of Veirs Mill Road and went to a restroom.

‘And you wonder why I need a 30-round magazine?’

While inside the restroom, police said seven suspects armed with knives approached him, assaulted him, and stabbed him in the arm before leaving the scene.

The victim suffered non-life-threatening injuries and received medical treatment at an area hospital, police said.

Police said they are looking for five unknown Hispanic juvenile males and two unknown black juvenile males; authorities are calling the incident a first-degree assault.

Police released video below showing surveillance clips of the suspects in the mall. One clip shows the suspects entering a restroom and then running out of the restroom and down a hallway. A subsequent clip shows some of the suspects smiling and laughing as they walk down what appears to be the same hallway.

RELATED: Blaze News original: 19 nauseating times cowardly thugs ganged up on — and savagely beat up — lone victims

Police said those with information regarding the suspects or this crime are asked to visit the Crime Solvers of Montgomery County website at www.crimesolversmcmd.org and click on the “www.p3tips.com” link at the top of the page or call 1-866-411-8477.

Police added that a reward of up to $10,000 is being offered for information that leads to the suspects’ arrest, and tips may remain anonymous.

A number of commenters under WJLA-TV’s Facebook post about the incident posted rather pointed reactions:

“They won’t be smiling for long,” one user declared.”This is why I go NOWHERE without my legal semi-automatic hole puncher,” another commenter said. “This story would have read very different[ly] with a few obituaries and some shiny personalized bracelets for the rest. Sharing is caring.””And this is why I stay strapped,” another user noted.”And you wonder why I need a 30-round magazine?” another commenter offered.”That’s why we carry our guns and MUST use them at times like this … stopping threats, teaching lessons to filthy criminals, [deterring] crime, and protecting ourselves,” another user said. “It’s time We The People make it like the good [old] days.””That’s when you draw your pistol and tell them about the lack of wisdom in bringing a knife to a gunfight,” another commenter stated.

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A movement in Washington state to pass a new tax on millionaires may have persuaded billionaire Howard Schultz to abandon his decades-long residence in Seattle.

Schultz has lived in Seattle for four decades and headed the Starbucks corporation as it grew into a global brand.

‘We will be forever grateful for the memories made in Seattle and the relationships built along the way.’

On Tuesday Schultz posted an announcement on LinkedIn that he was leaving rainy Seattle for sunnier climes in Florida.

“We have moved to Miami for our next adventure together. We are enjoying the sunshine of South Florida and its allure to our kids on the East Coast as they raise families of their own,” he wrote in the post.

“We will be forever grateful for the memories made in Seattle and the relationships built along the way,” he added.

Schultz did not cite the new tax proposal, but it was aimed straight at wealthy individuals like him. The millionaire tax would strip another 10% of personal earnings over a million dollars on top of the state’s already heavy tax burden.

The state House already passed the tax proposal, and it is likely to pass the Senate as well.

Schultz paid $44 million for a five-bedroom penthouse with an ocean view and 5,500 square feet that includes a rooftop terrace.

He wrote that he had hopes Washington state would “remain a place for business and entrepreneurship to thrive, creating essential opportunity for those in Seattle and the surrounding areas.”

Had he stayed, his resulting tax bill under the new proposal could have cost him tens of millions of dollars.

RELATED: Director Steven Spielberg abandons California as debate over billionaire tax heats up

Democrats in California have been pushing a similar tax proposal, and the wealthy have been abandoning the state in anticipation that the proposal will pass soon.

Among those who have already left the state is legendary director Steven Spielberg, who did not mention the proposal but skedaddled from the state just ahead of the deadline set in the motion.

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What was supposed to be a solemn farewell quickly turned political.

Despite a direct request from Rev. Jesse Jackson Jr. asking mourners to leave politics out of the funeral service for his father, several high-profile Democrats used the occasion to deliver pointed political remarks.

“Over the weekend, they decided to hijack the funeral service for Reverend Jesse Jackson to push their radical ideologies. Now you’re probably thinking, well, Jesse Jackson was very, very political. Jesse Jackson was very radical,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales comments.

“According to his son, that was the last thing that he wanted. So let’s back up a bit. Several weeks ago, after Jesse Jackson had passed, his son Jesse Jackson Jr. warned people not to bring politics to his funeral service,” she says.

“Do not bring your politics out of respect to Reverend Jesse Jackson and the life that he lived to these homegoing services. Come respectful, and come to say thank you. But these homegoing services are welcome to all: Democrat, Republican, liberal, and conservative, right-wing, left-wing,” his son announced.

“Because his life is broad enough to cover the full spectrum of what it means to be an American. We only ask people to come and be respectful in the context of the extraordinary life that he lived,” he added.

“Seems very clear, a very clear and polite warning from Jesse Jackson Jr. But you guys are going to be shocked to hear, Democrats didn’t care,” Gonzales comments, before playing a clip of former President Barack Obama from the funeral.

“Each day we wake up to some new assault on our democratic institutions. Another setback to the idea of the rule of law. Each day we’re told by those in high office to fear each other and to turn on each other and that some Americans count more than others,” Obama said.

“And that some don’t even count at all. Everywhere we see greed and bigotry being celebrated, and bullying and mockery masquerading as strength. We see science and expertise denigrated while ignorance and dishonesty and cruelty and corruption are reaping untold rewards every single day,” he continued.

But Obama wasn’t the only one.

Kamala Harris also took the stage at Jackson’s funeral to ignore his son’s pleas.

“So let me just say, I predicted a lot about what’s happening right now,” Harris said, laughing.

Former President Joe Biden also joined in — though his contribution was mostly unintelligible.

“I’ve forgotten how much I enjoyed watching these clips, and honestly, I enjoy them much more that he’s not president because it was terrifying when he was president,” Gonzales comments.

However, Jesse Jackson’s son did not enjoy their speeches as much as Gonzales did.

“I listened for several hours of three United States presidents who do not know Jesse Jackson. He maintained a tense relationship with the political order. Not because the presidents were white or black, but the demands of our message,” Jackson said in response.

“The demands of speaking for the least of these, those who were disinherited, the damned, the dispossessed, the disrespected. Demanded not Democratic or Republican solutions, but demanded a consistent prophetic voice,” he added.

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President Donald Trump, committed to toppling Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie (R), is traveling on Wednesday to the congressman’s district to support his Republican challenger Ed Gallrein at Hebron’s Verst Logistics packaging facility.

Bad blood

Massie first drew the president’s ire in a big way in 2020 when he delayed Trump’s $2 trillion COVID relief package.

Although the antagonism between the two men apparently subsided — Trump endorsed Massie in 2022 and characterized him as a “first-rate Defender of the Constitution” — their detente proved short-lived.

It certainly did not help that Massie backed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in the 2024 Republican presidential primary; voted against Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act; criticized the president over his administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files; and publicly opposed the current and previous U.S. military actions against Iran; or that the president, in turn, branded Massie’s Trump-voting wife a “Radical Left ‘flamethrower'” and repeatedly called for the congressman’s removal both from office and the GOP.

Trump allies are also behind the political action committee that has spent over $1 million on anti-Massie ads in Massie’s 4th congressional district.

Trump’s champion

On Tuesday, Trump once again identified his champion in the campaign to unseat Massie: Ed Gallrein, a farmer and Navy SEAL combat veteran whose website notes that he’s “fighting for President Trump’s and the Republican Party’s America First Agenda.”

‘Trump fans in KY-4 and across the entire Commonwealth also support my work.’

While Trump originally endorsed Gallrein in October, the candidate officially filed to run on Tuesday.

After saying that Massie — a lawmaker with a 86.53% lifetime Turning Point Action score and a 90.74% score this Congress — is the “Worst ‘Republican’ Congressman we have had in many years,” Trump stated that “the person that will help us do the job, and do it right, is Navy SEAL, Army Ranger, Fifth Generation Kentucky Farmer, and American Hero, Captain Ed Gallrein, a true Patriot.”

RELATED: Trump holds off on Texas Senate endorsement to pressure GOP to deliver on ‘No. 1 priority’ legislation: Report

Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP via Getty Images

Trump urged individuals thinking about running against Massie to “rally behind Captain Ed Gallrein, the Candidate who is, far and away, best positioned to DEFEAT Third Rate Congressman Thomas Massie.”

The president noted in a separate post hours before making the trip to Kentucky, “Massie, who is running against a great American Patriot in the Kentucky Primary, will hopefully lose BIG.”

Blaze News reached out to Massie’s office for comment but did not receive a response by deadline.

Massie claimed in an X post ahead of Trump’s visit that interlopers may discover “Trump fans in KY-4 and across the entire Commonwealth [who] also support my work in the Epstein files, reigning in spending, ending forever wars, draining the swamp, and food freedom!”

The congressman also released an attack ad this week, amplified by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), that portrays Gallrein as a fair-weather friend who abandoned Trump and left the GOP just after the president secured the Republican nomination in 2016.

The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that the voter registration cards referenced by Massie indicate that Gallrein changed his voter registration from Republican to independent on May 18, 2016 — around the same time Trump won the GOP nomination.

Gallrein reportedly registered as a Republican again in June 2021, when he decided to launch his unsuccessful campaign for the Kentucky Senate.

Gallrein’s spokeswoman Alexandra Wilkes told the Enquirer that Massie, not Trump, prompted his flight from the Republican Party.

“Ed briefly changed registration out of frustration with the broken system Congressman Massie created in his district, which hurt the Republican Party, and he is proud to stand with President Trump and true conservative Republicans,” said Wilkes.

As of midday Wednesday, the prediction market Kalshi put Massie’s chance of securing the Republican nomination at 58% and Gallrein’s chance at 43%.

Massie faced two challengers in the 2024 GOP primary for Kentucky’s 4th congressional district and secured 75.9% of the vote. He went on to net 99.6% of the vote in the general election.

The primary election takes place on May 19.

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The FBI Field Office in New York produced myriad documents pertaining to its criminal probe into child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Attorney General Pam Bondi suggested in a Feb. 17, 2025, letter to FBI Director Kash Patel that “thousands of pages of documents related to the investigation and indictment of Epstein” were stored on site there.

Some of these documents were allegedly compromised in a hack years before the Department of Justice began publishing the heavily redacted Epstein files.

Reuters’ source suggested that the hack appears to have been executed by a ‘cybercriminal’ rather than a foreign government.

The bureau revealed in 2023 that it was investigating a hack of its computer network, which it characterized as an “isolated incident that has been contained.”

Multiple sources briefed on the matter told CNN at the time that FBI officials suspected the incident involved a bureau computer system used in the investigations of images of child sexual exploitation.

Reuters, citing a source familiar with the matter and recently published DOJ documents, reported on Wednesday that the hack entailed a foreign actor’s targeting of files related to the FBI’s investigation of Epstein.

The hack reportedly took place after a server at the New York FBI office’s Child Exploitation Forensic Lab was allegedly left exposed by Special Agent Aaron Spivack, who did not return Reuters’ numerous requests for comment but has previously issued a voluminous statement on the matter.

RELATED: ‘The mistake I made’: Bill Gates reportedly admits to affairs with Russians, apologizes for Epstein fallout

Photo by Joe Schildhorn/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

Among the Epstein files released by the Department of Justice in recent months is a 2024 statement from Spivack in which he addresses the allegations that he “improperly stored digital evidence at his residence”; “improperly handled, documented, and stored digital evidence and failed to secure [child sexual abuse material] within policy, resulting in a cyber intrusion”; and “exceeded the limits of his authority by contracting an outside company to develop computer software on behalf of the FBI.”

Spivack — who apparently participated in the Epstein investigation — stated that the cyber “intrusion” happened on Feb. 12, 2023.

After logging into his computer to find a .txt file indicating that his network had been compromised, Spivack claimed that he ran an anti-virus sweep, which identified a potential threat. He said that he was unable, however, to remove the threat, as his “administrative privileges had been removed.”

Spivack notified some of his colleagues, attempting to rectify the issue, then noticed that the main server was down, that other servers were malfunctioning, and that “the folders that contain our data was missing.”

According to Spivack’s timeline, he and others later noticed “strange IP activity that took place [on Feb. 12] from two IP addresses.”

“The activity included combing through certain files pertaining to the Epstein investigation,” stated Spivack.

It’s unclear what particular files were accessed and whether they were downloaded, reported Reuters.

By 5 p.m. on Feb. 13, 2023, Spivack said, “we realized we were hacked.”

The FBI reiterated that the “cyber incident” was an “isolated one” and said in a statement obtained by Reuters that “the FBI restricted access to the malicious actor and rectified the network. The investigation remains ongoing, so we do not have further comments to provide at this time.”

The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

Reuters’ source suggested:

that the hack appears to have been executed by a “cybercriminal” rather than a foreign government; that the hacker did not appear to realize he or she had hacked a law enforcement server; and that the hacker expressed revulsion at the presence of child sexual abuse images on the device and threatened to turn its owner over to the FBI.

The hacker — whom the FBI allegedly spoke to on video chat but was unable to identify or locate — may have acted alone, but Jon Lindsay, an associate professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Cybersecurity and Privacy, suggested that the hack demonstrates the files’ potential intelligence value.

“Who wouldn’t be going after the Epstein files if you’re the Russians or somebody interested in kompromat?” Lindsay told Reuters. “If foreign intelligence agencies are not thinking seriously about the Epstein files as a target, then I would be shocked.”

Reuters indicated it was unable to “establish the result of the bureau’s internal investigation” regarding Spivack or connect with FBI agents identified in the documents as being involved in the investigation.

Spivack stressed in his 2024 statement, “I have rescued more exploited children than anyone in the NYFO and in most of the Bureau. All I wanted to do was to better the Bureau. I did not know how to do everything right, but I always did the right thing and everything I did was with good intentions. I love this job. I was not reckless.”

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