Category: blaze media

Former “Top Gear” star Jeremy Clarkson had heartbreaking news for his friends during the season finale of his new show.

After leading “Top Gear” to fantastic ratings over 33 seasons between 2002 and 2022, Clarkson moved on to “Clarkson’s Farm,” a show about him running a farm in West England.

‘Where it is of no concern of anybody.’

Difficult conversation

In the final two episodes of Season 5, Clarkson revealed to his friends and co-stars Charlie Ireland and Kaleb Cooper that his recent disappearance was because he was getting tests done.

The show aired Clarkson having a difficult conversation with his mates, revealing his diagnosis: “I’ve got cancer,” Clarkson said.

Cooper appeared shocked, replying, “No.”

Clarkson offered a shrug and a “yep.” Cooper asked, “Where?”

“Where is of no concern of anybody,” Clarkson firmly stated. “I’ve known since May.”

In the later episode, however, Clarkson confirmed to his co-stars that he has prostate cancer.

RELATED: Hate-spewing Jimmy Kimmel mocks homeless Spencer Pratt with U-Haul gag

‘Fingers crossed’

As reported by Variety, Clarkson said he had “disappeared off the other week,” had had a biopsy done, and that the cancer is “aggressive,” but it’s “really early.”

He added, “I’ll have to go and have an operation, and then — the operation is in and out in no time — but your body’s out of action for a little while.”

By the final episode, Clarkson had already gone through the procedure, seemingly telling his friend that part of his prostate had been removed.

“10% of it is dead, the 10% where the cancer is,” Clarkson explained, per the BBC.

“I had the op, and just fingers crossed it’s worked; we don’t know yet.”

RELATED: ‘Farmer’ George Clooney wouldn’t last a minute with my family’s sheep

Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publishing/Getty Images

Carry on

Clarkson took to his Instagram page on Tuesday to say that the Season 5 finale was “really, really difficult,” but it was his words in the show’s last episode that displayed Clarkson’s true perseverance and classic English attitude.

The season started “with me in a hospital bed and we are at the end of Season 5 and I’m back in a hospital bed,” the 66-year-old said. He noted that if his treatment is “successful, I’ll see you for Season 6, and if it isn’t, I won’t.”

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​News, Jeremy clarkson, England, Bbc, Cancer, Entertainment 

Many on the left were disturbed by the appearance of a burning cross at a park in Chicago, but the man who claims he put it up says he is not racist and was protesting President Donald Trump.

Police released video of a man they called a person of interest after someone set up the cross and lit it on fire on June 10 at Grant Park in downtown Chicago.

‘I don’t wanna wait until he may or may not get impeached. I want him gone right now.’

Community members immediately blamed racism and hatred, and one even mentioned “the South.”

“I was horrified; I was angry!” said Rev. Michael Pfleger of the Faith Community of Saint Sabina in an interview with WGN-TV.

“This is a decades-old symbol of hate and supremacy and the Ku Klux Klan. This is their symbol,” he added.

“This is something that’s been used in the South to harm and scare black Americans, so it was very distasteful,” said Keinika Carlton, who saw the cross burning and captured it on video.

“There’s no way to explain this nicely, except it’s hate!” Pfleger added in another interview with WBBM-TV.

“A burning cross is not a prank. It is not a misunderstanding. It is one of the most recognizable symbols of racial terror in American history,” said attorney Benjamin Crump, known for representing many race-related cases.

“Hate cannot be normalized, excused, or ignored. Those responsible must be identified and held accountable,” Crump continued.

“This isn’t random vandalism. It’s a direct message of hate meant to intimidate Black people in the middle of downtown Chicago. How many more times will racists use this symbol of terror in public before it’s treated like the hate crime it is?” an anti-racism account said on social media.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation said it was also investigating the incident.

A few days later, a 21-year-old Asian man claimed to have set up the cross and said he didn’t even know it was a symbol of racism.

“I did know about this historical relevance beforehand, but I didn’t know the severity, how racially motivated it may seem from what I did,” University of Illinois Chicago senior Merlin Lu said to WMAQ-TV.

Lu said the cross was intended as a protest against Trump’s alleged Christian-nationalist supporters and the “Make America Great Again” movement and that he had put a red hat on top of the cross to try to get this message across.

“I put a red hat to signify the MAGA hat, the Make America Great Again hat,” he added. “So that was, yeah, that’s what I tied on top.”

“I don’t want to wait till his term ends,” Lu said of the president. “I don’t wanna wait until he may or may not get impeached. I want him gone right now.”

RELATED: Activists rage over racist vandalism at a Sacramento high school. The district says a black student was caught on camera committing the hoax.

Lu was asked how he came up with the idea for the burning-cross protest.

“Just it came up to my head one day,” he said. “I wanted to find something that I could do by myself, like no organization, no friends.”

WMAQ said Lu is a native of Naperville.

“He’s just scamming people,” Lu added about Trump.

“I think that’s a great reflection of how this country works right now, where money controls everything. Money has power over health care. Money has power over transportation,” he continued.

Lu said he was thinking of surrendering to the police, and WMAQ reported in an update that the police confirmed the arrest of a person of interest.

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​Burning cross, Anti-trump protest, Chicago, Race hoax, Politics 

During an interview on Monday, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that she thought former President Joe Biden’s decision to run for re-election was “a terrible miscalculation.”

The interview with New Yorker editor David Remnick covered a range of topics, including the war in Iran, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Trump administration, and the 2024 presidential election.

‘He made a terrible mistake for himself, his legacy, and for the country.’

The Democratic National Committee recently released an autopsy report on the 2024 election, which Remnick criticized for not mentioning Biden’s decision to run. Asking Clinton if Biden made a mistake by launching another candidacy, she responded, “He made a terrible mistake for himself, his legacy, and for the country.”

Clinton went on to say that if Biden had stuck to serving a single term, Democrats “would have had a real contest.”

“I believe whoever emerged from that contest, whether it was the vice president or a governor or a senator or anybody else, would’ve beaten Donald Trump.”

Despite Biden’s old age and alleged cognitive decline, Clinton claimed that before the CNN presidential debate between Biden and Trump, there was still a strong belief inside the White House that he would emerge victorious in the election. Those who attempted to convince Biden otherwise “were met with total denial” from Biden and those around him, Clinton detailed.

That denial continued even after the debate, Clinton said, with many still believing Biden’s performance to be “recoverable” regardless of the renewed push for Biden to suspend his campaign.

RELATED: VIDEO: Joe Biden interrupts Jill Biden’s book event with agonizingly awkward interaction

Clinton’s account comes only a few weeks after a CBS interview in which former first lady Jill Biden revealed that she thought her husband was experiencing a stroke while on the debate stage.

“I don’t know what happened,” she said. “As I watched it, I thought, ‘Oh, my God, he’s having a stroke.’ And it scared me to death.”

Biden ultimately dropped his bid for president in July 2024 and immediately backed then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Harris would go on to lose to Trump in the November general election, receiving 226 electoral votes to Trump’s 312.

“There was no way to convince [Biden]” to step aside “by going public,” Clinton said. “And eventually what convinced him was, you know, polling.”

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​Hillary clinton, Joe biden, Politics, Kamala harris 

A congressional hearing took a tense turn when Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas) challenged Southern Poverty Law Center President Bryan Fair over the organization’s claim that abortion restrictions are tied to white supremacy.

“Your organization said that restricting and banning abortion is a tool that the far right uses to maintain white supremacy,” Gill began, asking Fair, “Do you believe that pro-lifers are white supremacists?”

After Fair dodged the question several times, Gill asked again, “I don’t think that pro-lifers are white supremacists; do you?”

“What I think is that reproductive liberty is a right that every woman should enjoy,” Fair answered, still dodging the question.

“How many babies in the United States that are aborted are black?” Gill asked, answering himself, “About 40% of abortions nationwide are of black babies. Blacks represent about 13% of the population. Does that sound like something a white supremacist would oppose?”

“What I would say again is that SPLC supports reproductive liberty,” Fair answered.

“Calling somebody a white supremacist is a pretty serious charge, isn’t it? I would think you would be able to defend that if your organization says that. You clearly seem unable to,” Gill said.

“You’re the president of the SPLC, which labels pro-lifers as racists,” he continued. “Does your organization just hurl around epithets like that without any justification?”

BlazeTV host Pat Gray is impressed with Gill’s reasoning.

“That’s a great point by Brandon Gill, though. That needs to be brought up a lot more, because it’s so disproportionate — the number of blacks who are aborted compared to whites. And there’s plenty of whites and Hispanics and Asians being aborted.” Gray says.

“But 40% of abortions come from blacks when they’re 13% of the population,” he continues. “In New York City, and we’ve given you this stat before, there are more black children aborted than born. It’s staggering.”

Want more from Pat Gray?

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​Pat gray unleashed, Pat gray, Bryan fair, Splc, Southern poverty law center, Pro-life, Abortion, Black, White, Brandon gill 

Spencer Pratt has ended his campaign for mayor of Los Angeles, but he says his fight against the two remaining candidates is just beginning.

And we thought all we had to look forward to was an electrifying debate between Nithya Raman and incumbent Karen Bass about shade trees.

‘This is not really a Republican or Democrat issue. … It’s a commonsense, quality-of-life issue.’

Pratt hardly needs his name on the ballot to steal focus from the two Democrats. The meme magic has been particularly strong with him since he first announced his candidacy — thanks especially to behind-the-scenes creators like digital media guru Nick Ward.

‘Weekend’ warrior

Back in 2020, Ward had a killer idea capitalizing on the Trump/Biden presidential race — but he knew Hollywood wouldn’t so much as give it the time of day.

So he decided to DIY it instead.

Ward’s “Weekend at Biden’s” comedy video swiftly went viral, generating millions of views with his wacky riff on 1989’s “Weekend at Bernie’s.” The clip shows Joe Biden’s advisers attempting to trick the country into thinking he’s still very much alive.

Last month, Ward found inspiration in a battle just as contentious as that presidential match-up: the tight L.A. mayoral race between incumbent Karen Bass and reality show star-turned-candidate Spencer Pratt.

The clip spoofs director Ridley Scott’s classic Apple ad from 1984 featuring a “Big Brother”-style threat. Here, it’s Mayor Bass as Big Sister, telling her bedraggled citizens not to believe their eyes and ears.

“There is no reason to change mayors. Our city is fine,” the dystopian Bass asserts. “There is no homelessness. There is no fire damage. There is no crime.”

“No one’s buying it,” Ward said of Bass’ attempt to spin the truth during her re-election campaign.

He says Californians know it’s “not normal to see a threat on the side of the road and tell your nervous system to ignore it.”

Hammer time

The clip retains the iconic female athlete throwing a hammer into the projection, a figure emblematic of the frustrations felt across Los Angeles. “It speaks to a lot of Los Angeles moms, people who want to feel safe,” Ward said.

The clip was quickly picked up by actor James Woods (5.3 million followers on X), generating hundreds of thousands of views in addition to the eyeballs shared from Ward’s account, @Weekend_Bidens.

“The cat gets out of the bag. … You have no control in a way,” he said of the clip’s early adoption. “I’m walking around South Beach. … Within an hour or two it had gone up to 30K or 50K views.”

Ward made the video independently of Pratt’s campaign, but he makes no bones about his intentions.

“This is not really a Republican or Democrat issue. … It’s a commonsense, quality-of-life issue,” Ward tells Blaze Media Lifestyle of his Pratt support.

RELATED: Hate-spewing Jimmy Kimmel mocks homeless Spencer Pratt with U-Haul gag

Dimitrios Kambouris/Randy Holmes/Getty Images

Truth in comedy

Ward may be building a brand as a go-to political satirist, but he spent his college days honing his improv comedy chops. Now, he’s tapping into the digital world’s viral reach as well as what AI can offer those challenging the media’s groupthink.

He understands the power of humor, something late-night comedians have attempted to marshal for some time. Except the Kimmels and Stewarts of the world are working at a disadvantage, as he sees it.

“I think one of the issues with the left, so to speak, is that they can’t really be funny,” he said. “Comedy is about truth. … They’re not telling the truth.”

“Someone like Gavin Newsom tries to be funny, but it comes off very off-key,” he added.

Since most mainstream comedy platforms lean to the left, that’s given creators like him an opening.

“In some ways there’s been an artificially suppressed supply with that. There is a lot of demand,” he said.

The best satirical clips “speak about what’s unspoken, touching on something you’re not supposed to touch.” It’s one reason he hasn’t had to dig in his pocket for his latest clip’s promotion. It’s being shared organically.

There’s a method to his viral video madness, one that others have understood for ages.

“Leading with comedy is so great. Culture comes before politics,” he said, adding that there’s “a lot to laugh about in California” today.

AI auteur

Ward began making viral video content in 2020, and he didn’t have the wonders of AI at the time. He worked with a professional visual effects team without access to ChatGPT or Grok.

“I used to be so frustrated with stock images and being so limited,” he said. Now, with AI, “I can still do the whole editing process but just make myself the assets and be specific about it.”

The technology still has some hiccups. He notes how AI videos may degrade over time, forcing him to work in shorter segments.

“You try to change one thing, and [the onscreen character] may grow an extra arm or leg,” he said. “I have a few tips and tricks I use. Shorter is better.”

Ward isn’t hiding his partisan approach, but he also hopes his videos do more than ding the Bass campaign.

“I like making dialogue happen between people who aren’t necessarily talking to each other or hearing each other,” he said of his clips. “It’s an opportunity to bring people back into the conversation.”

​Ai, Chatgpt, Gavin newsom, Karen bass, Los angeles, Ridley scott, Spencer pratt, Viral video, Nick ward, Campaign, Lifestyle, Weekend at bernies, Toto recall 

Seven days after Maine’s June primary election, questions are emerging about the handling of ranked-choice voting results after reporting issues surfaced in several communities across the state, raising concerns about transparency, chain of custody procedures, and public confidence in the vote-counting process.

The Maine Wire began investigating the irregularities after receiving tips early Tuesday morning alleging problems with election results being processed by the Maine Secretary of State’s Office during the ongoing ranked-choice voting tabulation.

Bellows has still offered no clear public explanation. No timeline. No findings. No corrective action.

The first report involved the City of Biddeford, where election results appeared to be missing from the state’s ranked-choice voting count.

Seeking answers, we traveled to Biddeford City Hall and met with Interim City Clerk Crystal Morin and Communications Director Danica Lamontagne.

According to city officials, the election results were not missing. Instead, they explained that the city had inadvertently sent the wrong flash drive to the Secretary of State’s Office following Election Day.

Officials said the flash drive that was originally sent contained local election results rather than the state election results required for the ranked-choice tabulation process.

City officials further confirmed that investigators from the Secretary of State’s Office later traveled to Biddeford, retrieved the correct flash drive, and transported it to Augusta.

The incident raises several questions, including why it took seven days to discover that the incorrect flash drive had been submitted and what chain-of-custody procedures were in place to ensure the correct flash drive remained secure during that period.

Questions also remain regarding how the error was identified and whether any additional safeguards exist to prevent similar issues in future elections.

RELATED: ‘Some noncitizens’ on the voter rolls: Maine secretary of state resists efforts for election transparency

Shenna Bellows. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Portland Press Herald/Getty Images

Biddeford was not the only municipality where election-related issues emerged.

The Maine Wire also confirmed with officials in the City of Bath that there was a delay involving election results submitted to the Secretary of State’s Office.

Bath City Clerk Diane Barnes confirmed that a delay occurred but said the results were ultimately delivered to Augusta. No explanation was provided regarding the nature of the delay or what caused it.

Meanwhile, officials in the Town of Bowdoinham confirmed that issues arose with ballot scanning following Election Day.

Town officials said ballots needed to be rescanned. However, rather than conducting the rescanning process locally, the ballots were picked up by Maine State Police and transported to Augusta, where the Secretary of State’s Office would conduct the rescanning.

The situation raises additional questions about the verification process used by local election officials and whether municipal clerks were able to independently confirm the election results before ballots were transferred to state officials for rescanning.

Despite reports of issues in multiple communities, Secretary of State Shenna Bellows (D) has not publicly addressed the incidents as of Tuesday afternoon.

No public statement has been issued explaining the Biddeford flash drive error, the reported delay in Bath, or the ballot rescanning issue in Bowdoinham.

Bellows has become something of an infamous secretary of state. In 2024, she attempted to meddle in an election when she tried to remove President Donald Trump from Maine’s 2024 primary ballot, a unilateral move that plunged the state into legal chaos before being ultimately overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Later, 250 absentee ballots surfaced in Newburgh inside an Amazon package. Bellows has still offered no clear public explanation. No timeline. No findings. No corrective action.

This story was originally published at the Maine Wire. You can read more here.

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​Maine, Election, Shenna bellows, Politics 

Spencer Pratt may have lost his election, but he’s making it clear that he’s not going anywhere.

“Democrats were hoping once they stole the election from Spencer Pratt that he would just, you know, hang his head in shame and walk away. That would be the end of Spencer Pratt. They hoped that they could just essentially kill his budding political career,” BlazeTV host Liz Wheeler says on “The Liz Wheeler Show.”

“They did not kill his political career, and he is just getting started,” she adds, before playing Pratt’s latest video — which is somehow even more powerful than his campaign ads.

“The campaign portion of my mission to save Los Angeles is coming to a close, and I’m moving on to the next, more interesting phase,” Pratt began.

“I’ve spent a lot of time slaying everybody. I’ve ridiculed everyone on the roster. And I just want to say from the bottom of my heart, I’d like to take the chance to apologize to absolutely nobody. You think you can get rid of me that easily?” he asked.

“I know a lot of dim-witted jerks thought I was in this for a grift, that I was going to roll up and leave town if I didn’t get into City Hall,” he continued.

“Hey, morons, I didn’t get in this for political power. I got in this to expose this corrupt machine, and nothing has changed. You enjoy your worthless meetings in City Hall,” he added.

Pratt went on to declare “war,” explaining that he no longer has to “worry about offending CNN viewers.”

“I don’t have campaign laws hamstringing me now. It’s war. It’s zero hour for Los Angeles. Angelenos are now stuck with two morons responsible for all their problems. And they have to choose between dumb and dumber,” he said.

“That’s not a choice,” he continued. “That’s the machine protecting the machine. And now every problem that plagues Los Angeles because of these two corrupt communists is going to accelerate, and the city will tumble headlong into the abyss.”

Pratt also explained that major developers, hotels, business owners, and entrepreneurs have been reaching out to say they’re leaving town.

“You have no idea how bad things are about to get for this city,” he said.

Pratt even floated that he has “some recordings” of one of the mayoral candidates “doing and saying something that would make her resign in shame.”

“I was saving it for the general election. Go ahead and pick your demon, certify your choice, and then you get to see it,” he said. “So Karen, Nithya, ask yourself: Is it possible that one of your employees may have a recording of you doing or saying something that would force you to resign in disgrace?”

“We’re flipping the script. I want all of you awake at night sweating and worried about 5:00 a.m., when the FBI blazers bust in the door, breaking open your office, because I assure you, they’re coming. You think your election was going to stop me?” he asked. “If you want to stop me, you’re going to have to … kill me.”

Wheeler loved Pratt’s ad, commenting, “That is one of the best political ads that I have ever seen.”

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​Liz wheeler, Spencer pratt, Los angeles, Mayoral election, Angelinos, Nithya raman, Karen bass, California, The liz wheeler show 

An intruder allegedly forced his way into a Florida home over the weekend, threatened a mother and her children, and refused to leave — but the victim also had her gun at the ready.

Investigators said Michael McDonald, 33, entered the Palm Coast home around 1:50 p.m. Sunday after opening the garage and banging on windows, WOFL-TV reported.

‘I wasn’t trying to kill anyone. I was trying to get him out to where my kids and I were safe in my house.’

Courtney Price told Flagler County Sheriff’s Office deputies that McDonald demanded money, threatened her family, and continued advancing after she warned him that she was armed, the station said.

Authorities told WOFL that Price repeatedly ordered him to leave and warned she would shoot. When McDonald continued advancing toward her, Price fired one shot, striking him in the arm, authorities told the station.

“I did what I had to do to protect my children and myself,” Price told WOFL, which added that she knew McDonald through his sister.

“I panicked and got my gun,” Price added to the station, “and that was my first time using it.”

Price told WOFL she warned McDonald that she would shoot if he didn’t leave — and she said he continued moving toward her.

“He said, ‘I don’t care … shoot me,'” Price recalled to the station.

With that, she fired a single shot, WOFL said.

RELATED: Home invasion suspect comes face-to-face with gun-toting homeowner — who is more than ready for him

“I wasn’t trying to kill anyone,” Price told the station. “I was trying to get him out to where my kids and I were safe in my house.”

McDonald fled the scene in a silver Kia SUV, and deputies later located the vehicle at AdventHealth Hospital, where they conducted a felony traffic stop and detained him, WOFL reported. McDonald was treated for non-life-threatening injuries, the station added.

RELATED: Armed crooks allegedly enter home in middle of night, but homeowner is prepared — and opens fire

Image source: Flagler County (Fla.) Sheriff’s Office

Price and her children were not injured, WOFL said.

Flagler County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Joseph Barile told the station that this incident illustrates why Florida’s self-defense laws exist.

“She’s in her own home, and someone comes in uninvited, refuses to leave, advances toward her, is aggressive toward [her] and her kids,” Barile noted to WOFL, adding that “she even goes a step further, saying she’s going to shoot … and he still doesn’t leave — she had a right to defend herself, and she did.”

Authorities told the station that Price acted lawfully under Florida’s Stand Your Ground law and was protecting herself and her two children.

McDonald was charged with burglary with assault and was being held in custody, WOFL reported, adding that officials said the suspect has an extensive criminal history that includes grand theft and robbery offenses.

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​Arrest, Crime thwarted, Florida, Home invasion, Homeowner shoots intruder, Intruder, Police, Wounded, Guns, Gun rights, Self-defense, Crime, Second amendment 

Messaging application company Signal is calling out the United Kingdom over its plans to implement age verification that the government says will “protect” children.

As part of a new policy that would ban social media for those in the U.K. under 16 years old, the government has also announced plans to force companies to infiltrate the phone libraries of every youngster — and soon every person within its jurisdiction who fails to upload ID.

‘Children deserve to be safe, protected, and nurtured. They do not deserve surveillance.’

Such is the shocking scope and speed of the latest amendment to the country’s Online Safety Act. Just last week, embattled and unpopular Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced content detection and blocking would only be turned by age verification check, a process that in practice requires universal ID submission and/or face scanning in order to use your phone in an ordinary fashion.

An official government website details that the sitting Labour Party plans to force “Big Tech companies like Apple and Google” to activate built-in features or implement technical solutions to “detect and block nude images for children.”

This must take effect within the next three months for smartphones and tablets, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said.

To implement these changes — which the government said would “prevent predators” from exploiting victims — anyone refusing to submit to the ID system would be unable to “take, share, or view nude content.”

Civil rights advocates and privacy-forward apps responded with outrage, warning that the measures would begin a rapid process of total national registry and surveillance.

Representatives from the Signal app responded by threatening to withdraw entirely from the U.K. market unless major changes are made.

“Children deserve to be safe, protected, and nurtured. They do not deserve surveillance,” Signal said in a press release.

“The U.K. government’s demand that all content on all devices sold or used in the UK be scanned on the presumption of nudity, using a dystopian combination of age verification and content scanning, will not safeguard children. It endangers us all,” they added.

RELATED: Livid judge cancels trial and busts lawyers for faking briefs with AI — on both sides

After describing the U.K. government’s demand as a dystopian phone scanning operation, the company then warned such policies would lead to the government wielding its powers as a method of censorship and surveillance under the guise of what officials might consider to be “threats” or “harmful content.”

“Wherever it runs, including the ‘camera’ itself once it is in place on U.K. devices — its scope will be defined by the whims and proscriptions of the government to detect nudity today and political speech tomorrow,” Signal warned.

Of course, social media companies came at the policy change from a different angle, saying that pushing teens off their platforms would only lead to less safety.

RELATED: The backlash against AI reveals it’s a terrible scapegoat

Thomas Trutschel/Photothek/Getty Images

“Blanket bans push kids out of such curated, supervised, beneficial experiences and towards anonymous, less safe services,” a YouTube spokesperson told CNBC.

A Meta spokesperson told the outlet that bans risk isolating teenagers from online communities and information, which would send them to unregulated alternatives.

Other restrictions in the U.K. include blocking livestream and communication with strangers for those under 16 and a consideration for online curfews overnight.

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​News, United kingdom, Social media, Signal, Digital id, Tech 

For years, discussion of the U.S.-funded biological laboratories in Ukraine was dismissed by critics as little more than a Russian talking point.

Now, newly declassified documents released by Tulsi Gabbard confirm it’s real — but that’s not stopping establishment voices from calling her a propagandist.

“Tulsi comes out, what was it, Friday, and she releases, she declassifies slides of these documents about U.S.-funded bio labs in Ukraine and beyond. Over 40 labs, hundreds of millions, dangerous pathogens, anthrax, plague, ebola,” Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck explains.

“And now it’s a Russian conspiracy theory that those exist,” he says.

“Does it make common sense to you if we have anthrax and ebola sitting in a laboratory in Ukraine that is currently at war with Russia? Do you think it’s a good idea or should we just go take a flamethrower and burn all of those dangerous pathogens out of those buildings?” he asks.

“Why do we have them sitting there in these bio labs that are in a war zone? Now, look at the loudest people shouting about this. The ones who are saying, ‘You know, she’s a conspiracy theorist,’” he continues, pointing out that these people include “embedded Ukraine correspondents, strong advocates to send more money to Ukraine in Congress, and defense analysts that are tied to the status quo.”

These, Glenn says, are “the same people clutching their pearls over the new DNI chief. They don’t like what she did with Ukraine.”

“They’re framing this whole thing as Kremlin propaganda,” he explains. “Like Tulsi Gabbard is now working for the Kremlin. Have you ever noticed when outsiders get close to auditing foreign entanglements, surveillance powers, risky overseas labs, the defenses go nuclear?”

“All of a sudden, it’s got to be stopped. It’s the worst problem ever. They just go crazy. To me, it feels like fear of exposure,” he continues, adding, “And maybe not all of them, but somewhere, somebody in that web is applying enormous pressure.”

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​Anthrax, Bio labs, Blaze media, Conspiracy theorist, Deep state, Ebola, Glenn beck, Plague, Russia, Tulsi gabbard, Ukraine, The glenn beck program 

Word is now out that many popular “smart” TV brands, including LG and Samsung, allow for third-party apps on their devices. These apps usually contain a Software Development Kit that runs constantly in the background once the app is downloaded. When your TV is plugged in, connected to WiFi, and idle, the SKU is made available to others.

The setup allows — if you can believe it — for the selling of access into genuine home IPs, like yours. Simply stated: You pay for the television, the internet connection, and the house in which it is all arrayed and sustained; they use your possessions while you’re not looking and profit heavily.

Look for terms: proxy, SKD, opt-out.

Believe it or not, they would really prefer you not look more closely into this situation.

When your TV becomes their computer

Perhaps it’s merely the latest confirmation that mainstream digital American life operates on an ethos oscillating between the poles “use this to rot your brain” and “something-for-nothing favoring us.” But given that so few are aware that their very own idle internet-connected televisions are being scraped, proxied, and used as free equipment for others’ profit, this one really strikes close to home.

And who’s buying? Customers for this secretive access include, you guessed it, data-harvesting operations for AI firms and other large businesses that presumably harvest and manage their own type of market data analysis.

Israeli-owned company Bright Data (formerly Luminati) runs the scheme by paying makers of various free games, apps, and screensavers a monthly fee derived from the number of users who installed their apps. Bright Data boldly lists “API Scraper Pricing” in its drop-down menu. It’s merely the latest step down in the hierarchy of mercantile ethics: A few years ago, court documents revealed that Meta used Bright Data despite decrying its practices and actually sued Bright Data despite using its services.

But it’s all perfectly legal insofar as you accept the terms and conditions. According to data security investigators at Includesecurity.com, buried in the near-universally ignored small print is a statement of consent to allow Bright Data to use your TV and IP address to download things from the internet in exchange for something like a free or ad-free app experience. Even X lost its own lawsuit against Bright Data on the face of the law.

RELATED: Livid judge cancels trial and busts lawyers for faking briefs with AI — on both sides

Melina Mara/Washington Post/Getty Images; Grok/xAI

You’re wondering, but why? Why would anybody go to such lengths? Why is it not illegal to abscond with the paid-for resources of individuals and families, unbeknownst to them?

The secret life of scrapers

Well, much of the world’s data is accessible only through the massive server farms known as data centers. Huge operators such as Amazon AWS, Google, and so forth hang their reputations on the security and control they can exercise over their enormous data flows. They’re highly competent at turning away scrapers: legions of bots and digital creepy-crawlies programmed to act like parasites, inserting into data tranches and harvesting the morsels there that their designers seek out. Often their designers are commercial actors or governments acting by proxy. Sometimes it’s an AI firm bent on feeding its models ever more specific and “authentic” data. Authentic because it’s more useful in mimicking or simulating human beings.

So from residential proxy IPs, AI harvesters can insert into positions to scrape the precise form of information they require to keep elaborating AIs in pre-training, agent grounding, and search capacity. AI firms need fresh content in a way rather analogous to the vampire’s need for warm blood. It’s not negotiable. That’s why it’s not discussed, and why Bright Data is rewarded in the market for its labyrinthine infiltration, cloaking, and re-marketing capacities.

No one quite seems to be sure why one little-known firm gets the virtual monopoly on this scam-like meta-market. Would we be a little out of our lanes to notice that Israeli software organizations, with well-understood and documented ties to the CIA, NSA, and GCHQ, seem to play central parts in an inordinate number of such specifically located operations?

Basic hygiene

So what can you do about Bright Data and similar outfits? It starts with the simple if annoying fact that, yes, you should actually read the fine print. Check the various apps you’ve installed on your devices. Look for terms: proxy, SKD, opt-out. And be ready for the next iteration of the scheme, which will certainly still require your authenticity and human input, but will likely be buried even deeper in the digital subterrain.

​Tech, Smart tv, Ai, Bright data, Security 

Republican voters in Georgia have showed up to the polls to officially agree with the president’s recommendation.

More than 700,000 votes decided the Georgia Republican Senate runoff on Tuesday, with the victory going to the Trump-endorsed favorite.

‘Now it’s time to get to work.’

Sitting U.S. Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) received a detailed endorsement from President Trump just two days before the election, when he called Collins a “Highly Respected Congressman who has been with me from the very beginning,” in a post on Truth Social.

Collins won the runoff with about 56% of the vote against fellow Republican Derek Dooley — a former football coach for the University of Tennessee Volunteers — despite Dooley outperforming Collins in the counties surrounding Atlanta, including Fulton County, where the capital city is located.

Collins’ victory was by nearly the same margin that separated the two during the May primary. At that time Collins finished with nearly 41% of the vote, while Dooley had about 30%, according to CBS News. This time, Dooley finished 11 points behind Collins again, garnering nearly 45% in the head-to-head vote, per The Hill.

RELATED: Early red flag for GOP? Democrats rack up massive Q1 fundraising hauls

Collins has long been considered the favorite in the election as a MAGA-style Republican and led polls ahead of the primary by an average of 11.5 points. However, polls had him with just a two-point advantage over Dooley ahead of the runoff election in June.

Collins now heads to the November general election against Democrat Sen. Jon Ossoff. Ossoff went unopposed in the Democratic primary, having held his office since 2021.

Collins reacted to his victory with a post on X, saying he is “honored” to be the Republican nominee.

“Now it’s time to get to work, defeat Jon Ossoff, and take this seat back for the people of this state. Hammer Down!” Collins wrote.

RELATED: ‘Friend’ of President Trump advances to Georgia Republican Senate primary runoff

Jason Allen/Getty Images

Trump had previously endorsed Collins ahead of the primary, as well, calling Collins his “friend” while adding that he likes him “a lot.”

On Sunday, the president assured voters that Collins would work hard to “Grow the Economy, Cut Taxes and Regulations, Promote MADE IN THE U.S.A., Champion American Energy DOMINANCE,” and more.

Collins reaffirmed his immigration stance in a post on runoff Election Day, stating that “America wasn’t built by people who chose the easy path. It was built by patriots who worked hard, took risks, and never gave up.”

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​Jon ossoff, News, Mike collins, Georgia, Republicans, 2026 midterms, Politics 

A Democrat-aligned lawfare outfit filed a lawsuit on behalf of a pair of anti-Trump protesters earlier this month in the hope of shutting down the UFC Freedom 250 event on the White House South Lawn last Sunday.

Evidently, the Public Integrity Project and activist plaintiffs were not the only ones keen to rain on President Donald Trump’s parade.

‘The landscape has changed.’

The FBI announced on Tuesday that an alleged assassination plot targeting the UFC event was uncovered on June 10 and ultimately thwarted thanks to a timely phone call from a concerned mother and the rapid action of local and federal law enforcement agencies.

Five men have been charged in the alleged plot to assassinate “high value targets” at the UFC event: Tycen C. Proper, 19, of Danville, Ohio; Bryan Omar Roa, 24, of Calimesa, California; Michael Alan Thomas 32, of Pinon Hills, California; Daniel K. Eskridge, 32, of Kidder, Missouri; and Abraham Hermosillo Alvarez, 31, of Omaha, Nebraska.

According to the Justice Department, the suspects’ plan consisted of two parts: First, they would use explosive drones in and around the event to prompt an evacuation; and second, they would deploy snipers to assassinate specific individuals within the fleeing crowd. In addition to the estimated 4,300 people present for the invite-only event on the South Lawn, there were roughly 85,000 additional people gathered nearby during the back-to-back fights.

One of the suspects, Michael Thomas, allegedly discussed the four “tiers” of this anti-government plot: the first being the gunmen on the ground; the second being the drivers and drone operators; the third being logistical suppliers; and the fourth being social media suppliers.

In addition to allegedly advocating for jail breaks for surviving tier 1 members in the aftermath of the planned attack, Thomas allegedly underscored the need for suspects to train for “gorilla [sic] style warfare.”

Another suspect, Daniel Eskridge, allegedly proposed that they form “5 teams of 3 each team consisting of 1 sniper, 1 tier one operator as support/ look out, [and] one drone operator.”

RELATED: James Comey-style ‘threat’ against Trump apparently etched into National Mall grass

Screenshots of messages and maps on a suspect’s phone and a photo of another suspect’s equipment. Justice Department.

Another suspect, Alvarez, allegedly suggested that snipers could escape to the Potomac River after taking their shots and identified an old church in Nebraska as a potential safe house.

Multiple federal complaints filed in relation to the case across the country allege that Tycen C. Proper told investigators that the ball got rolling on the plan around March. While there were apparently more individuals involved in the discussions at the outset — roughly 19 — Proper allegedly claimed that the more serious plotters migrated their conversations to an encrypted chat app.

The FBI alleged beyond amassing firearms, ammunition, and tactical gear at his Ohio home, Proper identified multiple targets, including multiple members of Congress and business executives.

According to an affidavit submitted with Proper’s complaint, the Ohio suspect proposed the following lawmakers as targets: Republican Senators Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.), Jim Justice (W.Va.), and Shelley Moore Capito (W.Va.), and Republican Representatives for West Virginia Carol Miller and Riley Moore.

The targets were allegedly chosen in part because of their perceived coziness with the Israeli lobby.

Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Elon Musk’s names were also allegedly floated as targets in the suspects’ conversations.

The affidavit indicates that the alleged plot — the purpose of which was to “jumpstart” a revolution in the United States — was foiled thanks to the vigilance of Proper’s mother, who called law enforcement on the evening of June 10, expressing concerns about her son’s recent conduct, including his firearm purchases and communications online.

The Knox County Sheriff’s Office and Danville Police Department arrived 20 minutes later and soon learned from Proper’s father that the teen, who lived at home, was allegedly planning “recons” with individuals he met online; planning to leave to meet up with those individuals on the weekend of June 13; had spent roughly $3,000 of his graduation money to purchase camping gear, firearms, ammunition, plate carriers, and food; and had quit his job recently in preparation for his big excursion.

The following day, the Knox County Sheriff’s Office got the FBI involved.

If convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, each of the defendants faces a maximum of life in prison and a $250,000 fine. They each face an additional five years in prison apiece if convicted of conspiracy to commit violence on the White House grounds.

“The FBI, our law enforcement partners and our U.S. attorneys did what they do every day to make America safe through quick response and vigilance in investigating, disrupting, and dismantling this alleged plan before it could be carried out,” said acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

“Protecting the president of the United States and the White House grounds is priority number one for the U.S. Secret Service,” said U.S. Secret Service Director Sean Curran. “The landscape has changed, and as a result we have seen a dramatic rise in threats against our protectees.”

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​Assassination, Murder, Donald trump, 250, Ufc, Republican, Marsha blackburn, Sniper, Drone, Attack, Plot, Fbi, Doj, Arrest, Politics 

Four years after the Dobbs decision, the pro-life movement faces a sobering crossroads. The end of Roe v. Wade was a historic victory. But abortion remains the leading cause of death in the United States, and the most vulnerable among us are still denied the basic human right to life.

Dobbs held that the people’s representatives at every level of government may pass laws protecting unborn children. That includes national leaders. Half the states have enacted pro-life laws since Dobbs, yet abortions have gone up, not down. A “states-only” strategy does not merely fail. It abandons unborn children in blue states to the same logic that once treated fundamental human rights as a local question.

We must extend equal protection and the right to life to all Americans, in every state, no matter how small.

As America marks its 250th anniversary, the pro-life movement and the Republican Party must move beyond half-measures. They should embrace national leadership for the right to life.

A national minimum standard — whether tied to a baby’s detectable heartbeat or the point at which a baby can feel pain — would not replace stronger state pro-life laws. It would set a floor for the whole country, including blue states, while allowing pro-life states to protect life more aggressively.

The Democratic Party has made abortion with no limits its de facto position. But public opinion is not with them. Only 10% of voters support abortion until birth. Fifteen states allow abortion at any point in pregnancy, including the seventh, eighth, and ninth months. The United States is one of only eight countries that allow all-trimester abortion, a list that includes China and Vietnam.

This is not hypothetical. Second- and third-trimester abortions happen in blue states. Babies who can feel pain and survive outside the womb are being killed.

In Washington, D.C., the bodies of five full-term babies were found in medical waste boxes outside the Washington Surgi-Clinic abortion facility. They are now known as the D.C. Five. Several abortion businesses openly advertise third-trimester abortions, including the DuPont Clinic in Washington, D.C.; RISE Collective in Colorado; Partners in Abortion Care in Maryland; and Hope Clinic in Illinois.

Planned Parenthood performs late-term abortions as well, and women have died alongside unborn children. An 18-year-old girl in Colorado died last year after a late-term abortion at a Planned Parenthood facility. According to her family, Fort Collins Planned Parenthood did not call an ambulance immediately and specifically requested no sirens on the way to the hospital.

RELATED: The judgment behind the abortion numbers

DREW ANGERER/AFP/Getty Images

The other side has a national strategy, and it is no secret. If Democrats gain power, they will try to pass the so-called Women’s Health Protection Act. That bill would block states from enforcing pro-life laws and push the country beyond the Roe status quo. In practice, it would make abortion available at any time, for any reason, in all 50 states. Almost every elected Democrat in Congress has voted for the bill, and party leaders have committed to eliminating the filibuster to pass it.

A leave-it-to-the-states strategy will not stop them. No great human rights cause in American history has been won that way. The GOP must commit to pro-life action at the national level.

The first step is to elect leaders who believe unborn children deserve protection no matter where they live. Those leaders must pledge to help America turn the page on its ugly chapter of late-term abortion. Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America is beginning that work by dedicating $160 million in 2026 and 2028 to elect candidates who will take pro-life action nationally.

After the midterms, the pro-life movement must rally around a presidential candidate who will take up this fight and fiercely defend mothers and their unborn children. That leader must act on the consensus of the American people and sign the most ambitious national protection for life possible.

On America’s 250th anniversary, we should remember that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution inspired great human rights triumphs, including the abolition of slavery and women’s suffrage. With 1.1 million Americans losing their lives to abortion every year, this is the moment to confront the greatest human rights violation of our time.

We must extend equal protection and the right to life to all Americans, in every state, no matter how small.

​Dobbs v. jackson women’s health organization, Abortion, Democrats, Planned parenthood, Gop, Midterms, Opinion & analysis, Pro-life, Full-term abortions 

The Justice Department has announced indictments against more than a dozen members of Direct Action Minnesota, a group dedicated to opposing federal immigration enforcement.

In a media briefing Tuesday, U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen claimed the Antifa-related organization members had “violently” opposed immigration law enforcement.

He identified a Direct Action Minnesota subgroup called the Black Cat Workers Collective, which he accused of utilizing, advocating, and promoting ‘militant tactics and violence.’

“Today, a federal indictment was unsealed charging 15 defendants with conspiracy to impede or injure federal officers and other charges related to efforts of two Minneapolis-based Antifa groups that violently opposed the enforcement of federal law in our state,” Rosen said.

Some of the members faced additional charges, including making interstate threats, interstate stalking, assault on a federal officer, destruction of government property, and solicitation to commit a crime of violence.

Rosen accused Direct Action Minnesota of training its members in the “aggressive use of shields against law enforcement, surveillance, operational planning, and rapid mobilization against law enforcement actions.”

He identified a Direct Action Minnesota subgroup called the Black Cat Workers Collective, which he accused of utilizing, advocating, and promoting “militant tactics and violence.”

Some of the members infiltrated peaceful protests against the Whipple Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility and blockaded federal operations on at least two occasions, according to Rosen.

The evidence included video from 37-year-old Kyle Wagner, who allegedly made explicit threats of violence against ICE members and called them Nazis. Wagner was arrested in February at his Minneapolis apartment.

“We want to know who they are. We will identify every single one of them and we will prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. If it has to be done at the barrel of a gun, then let us have a little f**king fun,” Wagner allegedly wrote.

“This is where ICE has come to die,” he added.

In one of the videos of Wagner’s arrest, he wore a shirt reading, “I AM ANTIFA.”

Only 12 of the 15 indicted were in custody, and three others are being sought.

Direct Action Minnesota did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

RELATED: ‘This is where ICE has come to die’: Self-identified Antifa member arrested for threats against federal agents, DOJ says

The DHS lashed out at the framing of the indictments by CBS News, which noted that no actual acts of violence against federal officers were cited by Rosen.

“These violent rioters weren’t charged for ‘opposing immigration enforcement’ — they were charged because they violently obstructed and assaulted law enforcement agents and destroyed government property. Why is the media excusing violence?” the agency asked Tuesday on social media.

In St. Paul on Tuesday afternoon, activists outraged over the charges against the Direct Action Minnesota defendants held a rally outside the federal courthouse. Some allegedly refused to shut the courthouse doors and chanted, “Drop the charges, drop them now,” according to KSTP.

One participant told the outlet: “We tried to get into the courthouse to pack the court.”

In response, law enforcement apparently sprayed some type of orange-colored chemical on crowds gathered by the doors.

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​Justice department, Politics, Antifa, Conspiracy, Ice 

Part of what makes Fitbit Air so good is the new Google Health app. Google Health is a complete overhaul of the original Fitbit app, taking Fitbit’s core features and expanding on them with a new design. Plus, paid users get a nifty AI upgrade that provides clarity to their data, and it can even help users get in better shape. Here are my thoughts after testing the app for two full weeks.

Now, a quick disclaimer before we dive too deep — many users didn’t like the new Google Health app when it first launched, and some even reported several pretty egregious bugs with missing data, unfinished UI elements, and clutter. From what I can tell, iPhone users had more trouble getting the app to work properly than Android users, signaling a possible development issue between platforms. Personally, I tested the app on my Google Pixel 10 Pro XL, and it was mostly bug-free.

Most data in the app is collected automatically.

There are two experiences you’ll find in the Google Health app. Free users get access to all the tracking features you’d expect in a fitness band, including everything we covered in the Fitbit Air review. There is also a subscription option called Google Health Premium (available as an add-on for all users and included for free on all Google AI Pro and AI Ultra accounts), which unlocks a Gemini-powered AI coach that looks through your data, builds custom fitness plans, and serves as a personal trainer through your fitness journey. Before you raise the red flag on privacy, Google states that it is “committed to not use Fitbit users’ health and wellness data for Google Ads. The Fitbit app is now the Google Health app, and we’ll continue to keep this commitment.”

Take that as you will.

Screenshots by Zach Laidlaw/Google Health app

The good

Information tabs: At first glance, Google Health is packed with information. The “Today” view offers quick glances at customizable tiles that show useful data like steps, sleep, heart rate, readiness score, etc. The “Fitness” tab shows a running list of weekly activities, as well as cardio and fitness metrics that highlight your overall heart health and output for the day. The “Sleep” tab provides neat daily graphs of your sleep quality from the previous night, along with a sleep score that tells you how rested you are. Finally, if you want even more information, check the “Health” tab for an entire wall of everything your fitness tracker knows about you. There’s a lot.

Google Health Coach: Like having your own personal trainer, the AI-powered Google Health Coach is great at building workout plans and tuning them based on how your body reacts and recovers. Coach looks at your data every morning, measuring yesterday’s activity against last night’s sleep quality to determine how hard you can push today. Coach is also flexible, so if your body isn’t responding well to the current plan, it can use your data and feedback to make a new one. The coolest part is that Coach is always available to chat about anything related to your health, whether it’s exercise routines, diet, illnesses, mental health, etc. Although Coach is powered by Gemini, all health data and conversations stay within the Google Health app; the main Gemini app doesn’t have access to this information.

Food log: If you’ve ever used a food tracking app to watch your calories and maybe lose some weight, you’ll know that the worst part is logging the data by hand. If you spring for the AI plan, Coach makes food logging more accessible with a new photo feature that lets you take a picture of your food, describe what it is, and it’ll log the calories for you. That said, accuracy was a mixed bag during testing, with some foods marked accurately while others were tens to hundreds of calories off. Your mileage will vary depending on the foods you eat, but at the very least, this feature has made me more conscious of my food choices over the last two weeks.

Interoperability: Since Google Health is replacing the Fitbit app, it has to work across platforms. It’s currently available for Android and iPhone, and it can track health metrics directly from existing Fitbit devices, the new Google Fitbit Air, and Google Pixel watches. For iPhone users, it even has the ability to pull health data from Apple Watch via the Apple Health app and analyze it in the Google Health app.

Screenshots by Zach Laidlaw/Google Health app

The bad

Clutter: While the app provides a lot of health data, the user interface is busier than I’d like. The Health tab in particular is just a wall of information that’s sometimes more daunting than informative, especially when searching for a specific metric among the mess. Google needs to overhaul the layout and allow users to group data together into organized sections — heart, activity, sleep, energy input and output, etc.

Manual data: Most data in the app is collected automatically via a fitness tracker, but manual data is a different story. You can input things like weight, body temperature, glucose levels, food, and water intake by hand, but you’re out of luck if you want to add medical information. You’ll have to connect Google Health to your medical provider or upload blood tests to log your allergies, medications, blood pressure, health conditions, procedures, and more. There should be a way to log everything by hand without turning over your medical records, but that currently isn’t an option.

Google Health Coach: I like Coach a lot (as you can see above), but it also has some issues. For instance, it doesn’t always listen. On my initial setup, I told it about my health ailments, including a year-old arm injury that only bothers me on occasion. For a week after that, it repeatedly asked me how my arm was doing after workouts — even ones that didn’t involve my arms at all — despite telling it to stop. On a couple of occasions, it also misread the metrics in my app and built an activity plan based on incorrect data. As it turns out, Coach can and will hallucinate just like any other AI. Finally, Coach adds to the clutter by leaving walls of AI-generated text everywhere throughout the app. I would prefer if Coach lived only in one section of Google Health, but right now, you can find it spread around every single tab, adding to the chaos.

The shady

Privacy: Lastly, there’s the massive elephant in the room. Google is a data hog. Its entire business model is built on gathering as much information as possible and monetizing it through ads. This is how it offers so many “free” products and services. Ultimately, to get the most out of the new Google Health app (and Fitbit Air hardware), you have to turn over a lot of very personal data, and whether or not you trust Google with your health is something only you can decide for yourself.

For what it’s worth, Google promised not to use customer health data for ad targeting and other “Don’t be evil” things. In the EU, it’s even legally blocked from monetizing this data, but there’s a time limit in place. The ban only lasts for 10 years from Google’s Fitbit acquisition in 2020. With only 4 years left, Google can legally monetize health data at the turn of the decade. The only question is: Will it? Google would face a massive PR nightmare if it decided to cash in on its users’ trust in its products, but that hasn’t stopped it before. As for what Google will do about all the information contained in Google Health, I guess we’ll find out … in 2030.

​Tech, Google health, Fitbit, Ai 

An immigrant was sentenced to 291 years in prison after being convicted for raping seven women, some of whom he found on Muslim dating websites.

St. Louis County Circuit Judge Ellen Ribaudo sentenced 30-year-old Yahya Maly to spend the rest of his life in the Missouri Department of Corrections.

‘I’ve been here 19 years, and I’ve never seen a sentence like this.’

Maly expressed no remorse and continued to maintain his innocence while claiming that the case was a setup.

Prosecutors said Maly used the name “John” to lure women to his apartment on Log Trail Drive in Ballwin, where he sexually assaulted them. The crimes began in February 2023 and continued for two years until February 2025 when he was arrested.

The seven women Maly raped testified at trial, and two of them were present at his sentencing.

One of the women said she was raped by Maly after he forced her into his apartment, and then later she returned to his apartment, where he raped her again, according to prosecutors.

Another woman told prosecutors he forced her into numerous sexual acts while he kept her at his apartment for seven hours.

One woman who was Muslim testified that he took her hijab without her consent and claimed she was his wife in order to rape her. He told her she needed to perform her “wifely duties” or risk going to hell.

“I was confused,” she testified. “This felt like the weirdest misunderstanding ever.”

She claims that she was raped by Maly twice and decided to return a third time in order to kill him. He raped her a third time.

“Life felt like it was already over,” she said.

A jury recommended 319 years in prison for Maly, but the judge decided on a slightly shorter sentence.

“I’ve been here 19 years, and I’ve never seen a sentence like this,” St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Melissa Price Smith said after Maly was sentenced.

Maly is an immigrant from Finland and became a naturalized U.S. citizen. He was studying at the Logan Chiropractic College when he was arrested.

RELATED: ‘You are an absolute monster’: Teen sentenced to 35 years for ‘sadistic and evil’ serial rapes

“I was actually thinking about not coming into it because of just putting my energy out there. Then I knew I had to be brave enough and then come out and actually be able to have this closure within this as well. So, it was very important for me,” said one victim, who wished to remain anonymous.

“These women are no longer victims of Yahya Maly or anyone,” Price Smith continued. “Justice has been served, and I am so proud of these amazing women.”

An attorney for the convicted rapist released a brief statement.

“Mr. Maly maintains a firm belief in his innocence and intends to appeal his conviction,” he said in part.

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​Dating websites, Hijab, Immigrant crime, Muslim, Serial rapist, Crime 

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services may have just signaled the beginning of the end for one of California’s most aggressive Medicaid financing schemes.

In late May, CMS proposed a rule that would limit many Medicaid payment arrangements to Medicare-equivalent reimbursement levels while targeting the financing mechanisms that shift excessive costs onto federal taxpayers.

The more states spend, the more federal money they receive.

The proposal specifically highlights intergovernmental transfers and similar arrangements that have allowed states to inflate federal reimbursement claims.

This rule comes as California health officials are asking CMS to approve a set of pending state plan amendments that would further expand reimbursement arrangements built around intergovernmental transfers — the very type of financing mechanism now facing increased scrutiny from federal regulators.

For years, states have exploited these loopholes in Medicaid’s financing rules to draw down more money from Washington. CMS now appears ready to put some limits on that practice.

Vice President JD Vance and CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz deserve credit for cracking down on these kinds of abuses. Vance said the administration is withholding $1.3 billion in Medicaid reimbursements from California because the state does “not take Medicaid fraud very seriously.”

Oz warned that states have exploited “the cracks and crevices” between state and federal systems — describing California as a member of the “varsity team” of fraud alongside Massachusetts and New York.

The proposed rule makes the fate of California’s pending SPAs clear: They cannot survive. Approving them would directly contradict a rule CMS has already put forward, expanding the exact reimbursement scheme the agency has identified as a threat to Medicaid program integrity.

The only question now is whether CMS will formalize what its own rulemaking has already decided.

At the center of the IGT problem is Medicaid’s open-ended reimbursement structure. States spend money, and the federal government reimburses a percentage of those expenditures. Public entities recycle funds through multiple agencies to trigger larger federal Medicaid matching payments.

The more states spend, the more federal money they receive.

These arrangements may technically comply with federal rules, but they function as financial engineering schemes rather than legitimate health care financing. Medicaid was designed to fund health care for vulnerable Americans, not maximize revenue for governments and health care bureaucracies.

California’s ambulance reimbursement system provides a textbook example of the kind of payment arrangement CMS now appears determined to rein in.

RELATED: Trump’s next bill needs tax relief with teeth

Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Under current rules, a public fire district can hold an emergency medical services franchise while subcontracting the actual ambulance operations to a private company.

Even though the private contractor performs the transport itself, the public entity can still bill Medi-Cal at the elevated IGT reimbursement rate — around $1,168 per transport in 2024, with a proposed increase to nearly $1,600.

If that same private ambulance provider billed Medi-Cal directly, that $1,600 would become roughly $339 under the standard fee schedule.

Federal taxpayers are therefore paying nearly five times the normal reimbursement rate for operationally identical services, simply because the billing structure has been routed through a government intermediary eligible for enhanced federal matching funds. For ACA expansion enrollees, a large share of Medi-Cal, Washington covers 90% of that already inflated cost.

The fire district keeps the difference between the inflated Medi-Cal reimbursement and the private contractor’s actual operating payment. Taxpayers finance the excess.

Unlike these existing payment arrangements that may eventually be required to conform to the new federal standards, California’s pending ambulance SPAs have not yet been approved. Federal regulators should not authorize an expansion of a reimbursement model they have already identified as inconsistent with Medicaid’s future direction.

CMS has now made clear that payment arrangements built around inflated reimbursement rates, intergovernmental transfers, and excessive federal matching dollars are no longer business as usual. States have been put on notice.

California’s pending ambulance SPAs should be among the first tests of whether the agency intends to enforce the principles it has now announced. If CMS truly believes Medicaid exists to fund patient care rather than reimbursement gamesmanship, these proposals should not survive review.

​Jd vance, Medicare, Medicaid fraud, Mehmet oz, California, Medi-cal, Spas, State spending, Cms, Fraud, Fraud crackdown, Opinion & analysis 

It is a bad time to fly. Willie Walsh, head of the International Air Transport Association, drove home the point this week when he warned that “war-related disruptions in the Middle East and rising fuel costs have shifted the outlook for airlines to the worse.”

Walsh pointed to the recent closure of Spirit Airlines, America’s most iconic budget carrier, and warned that more airlines could suffer the same fate if current trends continue. That means fewer choices for fliers and higher prices at the airport.

Before Democrats demand that courts second-guess another antitrust settlement, they should reckon with the consequences of the last one they cheered.

But blaming the state of air travel solely on the Iran war is far too convenient. Airlines are also struggling because overzealous regulators and left-wing antitrust activists decided they knew better than the market.

Three years ago, Spirit had a plan to survive. It struck a merger agreement with JetBlue, another economy carrier, to create a new, globally scaled affordable airline. The Justice Department joined six states and the District of Columbia to file an antitrust lawsuit blocking the deal.

In early 2024, a federal judge sided with the Biden administration and blocked the merger. Biden officials and congressional Democrats cheered. Without JetBlue’s capital, Spirit’s struggles mounted. The airline filed for bankruptcy and earlier this year shut its doors.

Now many of the same officials who applauded the court order that killed Spirit are trying to shift blame to President Trump. The American people should not buy it, especially given what those same Biden officials said at the time.

Then-Attorney General Merrick Garland called the judge’s ruling “a victory for tens of millions of travelers who would have faced higher fares and fewer choices had the proposed merger between JetBlue and Spirit been allowed to move forward.”

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) took to X to declare, “I’ve warned for months that a @JetBlue-@SpiritAirlines merger would have led to fewer flights and higher fares. @JusticeATR and @USDOT were right to stand up for consumers and fight against runaway airline consolidation. This is a Biden win for flyers!”

Pete Buttigieg, Biden’s transportation secretary, openly bragged about siding with the Justice Department and helping prevent the merger in the name of protecting “low fares” and “competition.”

The reality looks very different now.

Spirit’s shutdown was the first complete closure of a major U.S. carrier in 25 years. It was caused directly by the same actions the Biden administration once boasted about.

Travelers lost a low-cost option. Spirit’s more than 11,000 employees saw their lives upended. And Spirit’s disappearance will deepen the coming travel recession. The airline placed downward pressure on fares for years. Without it, prices are rising.

RELATED: Dear airlines, please stop pitching your credit cards at 33,000 feet

Kevin Carter/Getty Images

Travelers now face fewer choices at the airport. The remaining choices tend to be pricier, more consolidated carriers that no doubt welcomed Spirit’s demise.

One might hope antitrust enforcers would learn the obvious lesson: Bigger does not always mean worse. Sometimes mergers preserve competition. Sometimes they lower out-of-pocket costs for consumers. Sometimes blocking a merger kills the very competitor regulators claim to protect.

Unfortunately, many Democrats refuse to accept that reality.

Some of the same members of Congress and state attorneys general who supported blocking the Spirit-JetBlue merger now want courts to use the Tunney Act to second-guess other Trump administration antitrust decisions. The Tunney Act gives courts a limited role in reviewing antitrust settlements negotiated by the Justice Department. Democrats now want judges to stretch that role and challenge straightforward Trump settlements, including one merger backed by the intelligence community on national security grounds.

Historically, courts have deferred to the executive branch’s enforcement decisions. Democrats now want judges to intervene because they do not like the Trump administration’s policy choices.

Perhaps they should look in the mirror first.

Competition policy should protect consumers. It should not exist to punish private commerce, indulge ideological hostility to business, or let socialist antitrust activists pretend they can manage markets better than the people actually operating in them.

Spirit Airlines offers a painful lesson. The Biden administration, Elizabeth Warren, and other antitrust crusaders celebrated the decision that prevented Spirit from joining forces with JetBlue. Today, Spirit is gone, more than 11,000 workers have paid the price, and travelers have fewer choices at the airport.

Before Democrats demand that courts second-guess another antitrust settlement, they should reckon with the consequences of the last one they cheered.

​Spirit airlines, Democrats, Air travel, Elizabeth warren, Merrick garland, Antitrust, Biden administration, Airline industry, Jetblue, Opinion & analysis 

As expected, President Trump’s White House UFC celebration sent liberals into meltdown mode, with the women of “The View” hysterically calling the event a “desecration” of the White House.

“We are talking terminal cases of Trump derangement syndrome all across the country with the libs,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales says before playing a clip of the angry hosts.

“I don’t know how MMA or cage fighting is emblematic of our country,” Sunny Hostin said to the rest of the panel. “I just don’t understand how that sort of reflects American culture.”

“This doesn’t feel like a sport. This feels like you’re trying to show us who we’re supposed to be,” Whoopi Goldberg chimed in, before Ana Navarro added that it was evidence of the “continued desecration of the White House.”

“They’re concerned about the desecration of the White House because they believe that the White House should be respected, is what I’m hearing,” Gonzales says, pointing out that under the Biden administration, they had no issues with Biden essentially turning the White House into a Pride flag.

“You guys are prancing trannies around on the White House lawn. You want to talk about desecrating the White House? Give me a break,” she continues. “How about Joe Biden desecrating Easter Sunday, calling it Trans Visibility Day and hosting the event at the White House?”

Gonzales illustrates her point with a clip of a transgender woman on the White House lawn, pulling down his shirt to flash his fake breasts to the camera.

“That’s what happened on the White House lawn under Joe Biden’s tenure,” she says. “I’m not going to be lectured by these people. I’m not going to listen to these people claim that they care about desecration of the White House because it’s just such an esteemed place.”

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

To enjoy more of Sara’s no-holds-barred takes on news and culture, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Biden administration, Sara gonzales, The view, Ufc, White house, Whoopi goldberg, Joe biden, Sunny hostin, Ana navarro, Sara gonzales unfiltered