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The man arrested for shooting at security officers at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner has pleaded not guilty to charges related to the alleged assassination attempt.

Cole Tomas Allen is charged with one count of attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump, one count of assaulting a federal officer with a deadly weapon, and two counts of a gun charge.

Public defender Eugene Ohm said that it would be ‘wholly inappropriate’ for two attorneys general to be victims in the case while directing the prosecution’s case.

Allen was captured on surveillance video running through a security checkpoint before he fired his shotgun and was shot by an officer who saw him approaching. Investigators allegedly found a handgun and knives in his possession as well.

Investigators found a note allegedly written by Allen where he appeared to apologize in advance to his family for the assassination plot. He also left a manifesto and a long digital footprint documenting his hatred for the president and other members of his administration.

On Monday, he pleaded not guilty in court.

Allen’s attorneys have filed a motion to disqualify U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro from the case as well as the other attorneys general from the Washington, D.C., office. They argue that Pirro’s statements to the media suggest they are “purported victims and witnesses” of the alleged assassination plot.

Public defender Eugene Ohm said that it would be “wholly inappropriate” for two attorneys general to be victims in the case while directing the prosecution’s case.

The government has until June 22 to respond to the motion.

If convicted, Allen faces life in prison for the charges.

RELATED: Judge APOLOGIZES to suspected would-be Trump assassin — and compares him to Jan. 6 defendants

Many were outraged when Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui apologized to Allen over the conditions of his imprisonment at the Washington, D.C., jail. He was placed on suicide restrictions, despite being cleared as a suicide risk.

“These conditions are excessive restrictions on his liberty that serve no justifiable purpose and deprive Mr. Allen of dignity while incarcerated,” his attorneys argued.

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​Cole allen, Whcd assassination attempt, Not guilty plea, Trump assassination attempt, Politics 

Former FBI counterintelligence agent Wayne Barnes says one of the best ways to catch a spy is to ask a simple question — like when his birthday is.

Barnes, whose new book “A Traitor in the FBI: The Hunt for a Russian Mole” came out last month, spent nearly 30 years in counterintelligence, where he debriefed a record number of Soviet and Soviet-Bloc assets. In an interview with Align, Barnes described the psychological tactics, subtle tells, and ethical contrasts that defined Cold War espionage.

‘You have to have the straightest poker face you could ever imagine.’

Born yesterday

While Barnes acknowledges that his career could occasionally involve the kind of dramatic deception shown in the movies, he often employed more mundane subterfuge.

Take the man from Afghanistan who applied to join the FBI in the 1980s. While his background could have made him a useful asset, Barnes, then working as a security officer in Washington, D.C., wanted to vet him first.

The interview happened in late December. Noticing that the man had listed his birthday as January 1 on his application, Barnes decided to see how he handled a simple question.

“I asked, ‘Do you have any plans for your birthday?’ and he said, ‘Why’d you ask that?’ And I said, ‘Well, it’s in a couple weeks.'”

Without thinking, the man corrected Barnes: “Oh no, my birthday is July 6.”

“For most people, the day they were born is a day that they won’t forget,” Barnes remembers telling the applicant.

From there, the man’s story began to fall apart. Eventually the agency concluded that the applicant was working for the Afghan mujahideen.

RELATED: The doomer delusion

Nathan Posner/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Poker face

Barnes describes his interview technique as a “verbal polygraph”; it’s not an exact science, but if you know what you’re doing, it will “ferret out” a lot of people.

That required intense discipline from FBI agents themselves. When debriefing Soviet intelligence officers or defectors, Barnes says agents had to carefully conceal what they already knew.

“You have to have the straightest poker face you could ever imagine,” he says.

Agents would sometimes spread out photographs of Soviet embassy personnel they suspected of spying and casually ask whether the subject had seen them at a restaurant, training class, or bar. Every response mattered — not just what was said, but how long someone spoke, how nervous they appeared, or whether they seemed too rehearsed.

“[Did] he talk about him too long? Did he talk about him too short?” Barnes explains. “Debriefing intelligence officers is very tricky … and … very narrow.”

Barnes also notes that it was standard for agents from the Soviet Bloc to claim they had already compromised Western forces.

“Whether the Romanians or Czechs, or Poles or Hungarians, they always say, ‘Oh, we have you penetrated.'”

On the hook

Barnes also describes how Soviet operatives recruited Americans willing to sell secrets.

“Follow a guy from the Soviet embassy in his car. He leaves at 5:30, and [you] see he lives in a garden apartment someplace in Alexandria, Virginia,” Barnes details.

“He goes inside, and you have a note in your hand, and you put it under his windshield wiper, and the next morning he gets it. It says, ‘I have secrets to sell …'”

“The Russians almost always followed through,” Barnes says.

At first, the payments were small — just enough to create leverage.

“They’d say, ‘This was good stuff, but it’s only worth $5,000. If you want another $5,000, you need to bring more.'”

Once an American accepted money, Barnes says, fear and blackmail often kept them cooperating. In reality, however, the chances of the Russians exposing a spy were slim.

“The Russians won’t turn him in,” Barnes explains, as their priority is to extract as much information as possible.

RELATED: ‘Multiple people’ taken into custody as FBI RAIDS top Virginia Democrat’s offices over alleged corruption

Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Moral difference

The Soviets were also not above pressuring their own agents by threatening family members, Barnes says.

“If your brother’s in college, his life is over,” Barnes says. “That’s the leverage [they] had on the KGB people.”

For Barnes, that dynamic highlighted what he viewed as a major moral difference between the United States and the Soviet Union. While Soviet intelligence services allegedly threatened defectors’ families, American handlers often tried to help them — including offering medical assistance or protection.

Many Soviet defectors, Barnes adds, changed sides not because of ideology, but because they realized they had been lied to about life in America.

“They’d come here and see stores full of food — entire stores just selling cheese,” Barnes says. “It was a, ‘They’ve been lying to me,’ sort of realization.”

That contrast, he says, often planted the seed for future cooperation with American intelligence.

“We live in a land of freedom,” Barnes concludes. “Compared to the Soviet Union, there’s nothing like America. … Their system was set up in such a way that was so different than ours. … So it was really a terrible place.”

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​Align, Fbi counterintelligence agent, Fbi officer, Russian agents, Secret agents, Soviet embassy, Lifestyle 

A German couple has been sentenced on charges related to the horrific abuse of their three children out of fear of the coronavirus pandemic.

Police said they rescued the three children in April 2025 from their home in Oviedo, Spain. They arrested the two parents after discovering the disturbing living conditions in the home.

When they were allowed outside, the kids touched the grass.

The children hadn’t been seen outside for years, and police reported that when they were allowed outside, the kids touched the grass and began breathing “as if they had never done so before in their lives.”

They also saw a snail and “were completely fascinated.”

Police reportedly found bags and bags of garbage inside of the home, and the children had no devices, no television, and didn’t even have shoes in their sizes. The children were reportedly kept in diapers and sleeping in cribs.

The children, who were between the ages of 8 and 10 at the time, were reportedly hunched over and bow-legged when rescued. The Sun published some of the shocking photos of the conditions inside the home.

Christian Steffen, 54, and Melissa Ann Steffen, 49, were arrested and charged with child abuse, domestic violence with habitual psychological abuse, and illegal detention.

Prosecutors sought 25 years in prison for the parents, but the Provincial Court of Asturias sentenced them on Monday to only two years and 10 months in prison each.

Police believe the children were locked up from 2021 until their rescue in 2025. They were tipped off by a neighbor who had catalogued the suspicious activity at the home in a notebook.

RELATED: NC Dem used pandemic loan to throw herself lavish 50th birthday party, prosecutors say

The couple also had their parental rights stripped for three years and four months, and they were forbidden from communicating with the children. In addition, they have been ordered to pay the children the equivalent of $35,000 each.

The children are receiving psychological treatment and are in the care of child protective services.

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​Coronavirus child abuse, Pandemic hysteria, Spain hysteria abuse, Politics, Oviedo spain abuse 

Some say it’s a meme, others say it’s relief from perpetual screen use.

Either way, a Generation X craze has gone so viral that retailers are selling out after the game’s popularity spiked late last month.

‘On a good day, I get 200 to 300 visitors to my website. We’re now pushing 4,000.’

Charlie, a 13-year-old from New Jersey. recently told Good Housekeeping that he started playing because one of his friends saw it online and wanted to try it out.

“Then we all started playing,” he revealed.

Money bags

The online trend has created a massive resurgence of footbags, often generically called “hacky sacks,” despite the fact that Hacky Sack is actually a trademarked brand owned by Wham-O Toys Inc.

Google Trends shows that searches for queries like “hacky sack” and “footbag” exploded by upwards of 500% at the end of April, which included searches for the popular brand Dirtbag, which makes classic hacky sacks with a stick figure logo.

The company said it is sold out of footbags on its website, its Amazon storefront, and its TikTok shop. The craze took off shortly before this year’s spring break, reaching new heights once students returned to school.

Retailer Mike Heher, who runs Bomb Footbags out of Lake Tahoe, California, told the Boston Globe that he had no idea what was going on before speaking to the paper.

“I’m 41, I’ve been selling hacky sacks since I was a teenager. And on a good day, I get 200 to 300 visitors to my website. We’re now pushing 4,000.”

Many of the sales can likely be attributed to viral videos on TikTok as well.

RELATED: Tech billionaire Palmer Luckey calls out homeschool haters’ hypocrisy

– YouTube

Hack-a-thon

One video with over 320,000 views stated that hacky sack is slowly “taking over” their school, and from there, users can doomscroll countless similar videos from high school students to adults, to even minor league baseball teams.

Another user mentioned getting her father’s hacky sack out from the archives to learn how to play, while other videos show groups of girls playing, something typically unheard of in the 1990s/2000s, perhaps showcasing the monster this trend has become.

The movement is growing and seems to have taken hold in Massachusetts high schools where teens have created social media pages for their “sack team.”

The Globe noted that using the word “sack” as much as possible is part of the reason boys find it hilarious to take part in the game, using hashtags like #SpreadSackNotHate.

Jason Gallagher, a headmaster at Boston Latin School, told the Globe he has never seen a trend “explode as quickly as this.”

Students agree:

“I’d never seen anyone playing it at school, then all of a sudden in the past week people are playing in the bathroom, the parking lot, the teachers are playing it,” said Ben, a junior at Gloucester High School. “I now keep a hacky sack in the back seat of my car.”

RELATED: This used-car odometer scam is everywhere — and impossible to detect

Faith Cathcart/Portland Press Herald/Getty Images

Teenage kicks

The Mass. teams are even competing to climb the rankings of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association official hacky sack rankings, which was jokingly created as an unofficial state ranking system but is getting very serious. It now has at least 96 teams participating in the rankings.

Ryan, an 18-year-old senior from Westwood High, said there were probably double the amount of people playing in Massachusetts alone.

“It’s just mayhem, everyone arguing to get their ranking up, which makes it more fun,” he told the Globe.

This is yet another example of “retro toys” making a comeback, Jenn Lynch of the Toy Association told Good Housekeeping. She added that part of the reason is that today’s parents are the “original hacky sack generation.”

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​Align, Games, Trend, Tiktok, Footbag, Gen x, Generation x, Boston, Lifestyle, Hacky sack 

After exposing an alleged billion-dollar fraud scandal in Minnesota’s Somali-run child care programs, 24-year-old independent journalist Nick Shirley became an overnight sensation. While he continues to bust suspected fraud rings, like alleged hospice/Medi-Cal fraud in California, lately he’s had his sights set on busting a different kind of scandal: America’s dangerous flirtation with socialism.

This endeavor recently led him to Cuba, where he spent only 24 hours documenting life under communism before he was forced to leave due to being followed by intelligence agents, experiencing seizure of his equipment, and having a disturbing confrontation with a Cuban general.

On a recent episode of “The Glenn Beck Program,” Shirley recounted his intense venture into a country that captures the dark reality of socialism.

Shirley tells Glenn that he decided to go to Cuba primarily because of the “rise of communism and socialism here in the United States.”

“I was shocked by what I saw inside of Cuba,” he says.

“Somebody described Cuba to me just the other day as from a distance it looks beautiful and quaint, and then when you get right up to it, it is rot and decay and suffering. Is that what you found?” asks Glenn.

“One hundred percent,” says Shirley, recalling how Cuba’s beautiful historic buildings are “crumbling” and their streets are “not in good condition.”

And then there’s the plight of the people.

“People are starving. Seven out of 10 people are going without three meals a day. Kids aren’t going to school because there’s no power. The universities actually shut down because they can’t go to school when there’s no power,” says Shirley.

Even though Cuba blames the nation’s condition on the United States, he argues time does not corroborate this narrative.

“For 60 years, they’ve been underneath this communist regime, and they haven’t figured it out. … They’ve decided to be our enemy for so long, and now the United States is even offering support, it looks like, and it seems like they’ve rejected that support,” says Shirley.

Shirley’s mini documentary that captures his short stint in Cuba is an honest picture of what the socialism so many left-wing Americans and politicians are advocating for here in the U.S. actually looks like.

“So you’re going to see how people really don’t have freedom of speech inside of this country, how the buildings are eroding, how these children aren’t going to school, how there’s no hope in the eyes of these people,” says Shirley.

“All the young people that I spoke to, they’re all ready for a change. A lot of them even said like communist is the worst thing that can possibly happen,” he adds.

Communism certainly wasn’t beneficial for Shirley, a visiting foreigner, either.

Upon landing in Cuba, authorities at the airport immediately seized most of his professional camera equipment. He and his team were then followed all day by intelligence agents. When they tried to sneak out of their hotel around 4 a.m. to leave early, a two-star general was waiting and interrogated them about their filming and interviews before they managed to escape to the airport.

Shirley points out the irony of the Americans who are actively pushing for a socialist government in the U.S.

“Right now, we have this huge movement inside of our country for ideas like socialism, for communism, and these people are protesting every week,” he says. “Underneath the communist regime, they would not be able to protest, so they’re wanting something that would actually suppress them and stop them from doing exactly what they are doing here inside the United States.”

And yet when he or others show the grueling reality of communism in other countries, these protesters only seem to double down.

“Either they’re getting paid heavily to promote this communist idea that it would be great here inside the United States, or quite literally they are brainwashed to the point where they have somehow believed that capitalism have spelled them so bad that they want to accept a government that would make them so suppressed that they would not even be able to voice their opinions out in public,” he tells Glenn. “That’s what really shocked me.”

To hear more, watch the video above.

Want more from Glenn Beck?

To enjoy more of Glenn’s masterful storytelling, thought-provoking analysis, and uncanny ability to make sense of the chaos, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Blaze, Blaze media, Blazetv, Communism, Communist cuba, Cuba, Democratic socialism, Fraud scandal minnesota, Glenn beck, Nick shirley, Socialism, The glenn beck program 

The Mother’s Day video released by Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt documented the disastrous Democratic policies that have made him enter the political arena.

The video shows his wife, Heidi Montag Pratt, showing their young children the empty lot where their family home used to be before it burned down during the Pacific Palisades fires in Jan. 2025.

‘She’s the most incredible mom to our boys. She’s why I fight.’

“Is this the house?” one of their young sons asks. “How do you get it up?”

Pratt announced his campaign for mayor on the anniversary of the Palisades fire. Critics blame the incompetence and hubris of those in office, who are overwhelmingly affiliated with the Democratic Party, for allegedly allowing the fire to grow out of control.

“Heidi and I have been through hell together,” Pratt says in the video.

The former reality television star made headlines in the wake of the fires by criticizing government incompetence on social media. He outperformed expectations in a recent debate against incumbent Mayor Karen Bass but faces an uphill battle in a very liberal electorate.

“I am constantly in awe of Heidi,” Pratt continues. “She’s the most incredible mom to our boys. She’s why I fight.”

The Mother’s Day video ends with the phrase, “Mother’s Day is every day,” and an image of Pratt and his wife holding each other amid the ruins of their home.

Many online responded emotionally to the ad.

“Incredibly poignant. We can’t let Bass get away with what she did to your neighborhood and your city,” one user said.

“Incredible ad. Yes, it’s Mother’s Day, but this also shows what a great dad you are, Spencer, such a great example to your boys. Keep fighting,” another replied.

“Bass is absolutely shameless running for reelection after destroying Pacific Palisades. She should have resigned in disgrace,” another user responded.

RELATED: Pratt gives socialist mayoral candidate a wake-up call at debate: ‘She’s gonna get stabbed in the neck!’

Pratt’s supporters have used AI to create their own campaign videos, some of which have gone viral for their aggressive messaging against Bass and other California Democrats.

“I’ve waited a whole year for someone to step up and challenge Karen Bass, but I saw no fighters,” Pratt said when he announced his campaign. “Guess I’m gonna have to do this myself. Let’s make LA camera ready again!”

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​Spencer pratt, Mother’s day video, Viral video, Pratt vs bass, Politics 

A school district in Virginia is shamelessly using artificial intelligence to inject diversity, equity, and inclusion policies into student instruction, a report from Defending Education claims.

The director of equity education at Albemarle County Public Schools said in an email that a “GenAI Equity Prompt Sheet” should be used by school subcommittees to impose “equity-centered” policies, according to the report from Defending Education.

‘The fact that the district is vetting AI based on its compliance with diversity, equity, and inclusion should be concerning for parents.’

“It’s intended to surface questions around access, bias, stakeholder voice, and policy alignment in a practical, usable format,” read the alleged email from Ayanna Mitchell dated May 21, 2025.

The plan involved imposing policies including cultural responsiveness, gender inclusivity, and identity affirmation, according to the email. The AI format was to be used by both teachers and students of the district.

“While schools should engage in good judgment and do their due diligence when it comes to artificial intelligence integration, the fact that the district is vetting AI based on its compliance with diversity, equity, and inclusion should be concerning for parents,” said Rhyen Staley, a research director at Defending Education.

“By only allowing the use of AI and information sources that reflect a lef-wing political bias,” he added, “district administrators are setting a precedent that is harmful to the learning process and neutrality of schools.”

The far-left Albemarle school district is headquartered in Charlottesville and includes the historic Monticello estate owned and designed by Thomas Jefferson.

The findings of the Defending Education report were published by the Federalist.

When ACPS chief communications officer Jason Grant was asked to respond to concerns that the AI framework often discriminates against white people and offers abjectly incorrect query results in service to liberal biases, he refused to answer, the Federalist reported.

The report is more astounding considering that the district had already denied that its policies were in violation of President Donald Trump’s ban on discriminatory programs.

“These documents would not change any of the practices that are already going on at Albemarle County Public Schools,” said Helen Dunn, public affairs and strategic communications officer, in an April 2025 report. “We are not engaged in any practices that would infringe upon Title VI laws.”

As of Monday afternoon, the website for the ACPS Office of Equity Education remains live, with Mitchell still listed as the director, but the most recent “spotlight on equity” post appears to be a year old.

ACPS did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

RELATED: Sierra Club embraced social justice, DEI after being ‘flush’ with cash — then destroyed itself

President Donald Trump has made it a focus of his administration to stamp out DEI policies imposed by the government. In Jan. 2025 he issued an executive order cutting out DEI policies from his administration left over from the Biden administration and fired employees whose sole purpose was to implement them.

“These review efforts will continue as the Department works to end discrimination based on race and the use of harmful race stereotypes,” a notice from the Department of Education read, “both within the agency and throughout America’s education system.”

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​Diversity equity inclusion, Dei in schools, Trump dei ban, Virginia school district, Politics 

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has filed multiple criminal referrals for former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci to the Department of Justice over the geriatric immunologist’s apparent false testimony before Congress in 2021.

According to Paul, the statute of limitations on charging Fauci over his alleged perjury expires on Monday. If it does, the Biden Justice Department will not be alone in having failed to indict the Biden pardonee credibly accused of helping cover up the likely lab origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

How it started

Months after testifying before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, “America’s doctor” was brought back before the same committee on July 20, 2021, to discuss the origin of COVID-19 and U.S. funding ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese communist lab that possibly manufactured the virus.

“Dr. Fauci, as you are aware, it is a crime to lie to Congress,” Paul said during the hearing.

“On your last trip to our committee on May 11, you stated that the NIH ‘has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.’ And yet, gain-of-function research was done entirely in the Wuhan Institute by Dr. Shi and was funded by the NIH,” he continued.

Paul cited as evidence a paper from scientists at the WIV, including Ben Hu — a EcoHealth Alliance subcontractor who was among the suspected COVID-19 patients zero — that discussed gain-of-function work on coronaviruses and acknowledged funding from NIAID as well as from the United States Agency for International Development’s Predict program.

RELATED: Former Fauci adviser INDICTED for allegedly hiding emails about the origins of COVID

Feature China/Future Publishing/Getty Images

The paper describes research both conducted at the Wuhan lab and funded under an NIAID award where genetic information from different SARS-related coronaviruses were combined and fashioned into new artificial viruses capable of infecting human cells.

“Viruses that in nature only infect animals were manipulated in the Wuhan lab to gain the function of infecting humans,” said Paul. “This research fits the definition of the research that the NIH said was subject to the pause in 2014 to 2017 — a pause in funding on gain-of-function.”

Fauci declined to retract his previous statement that “the NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”

In addition to telling Paul that he “never lied before the Congress,” Fauci claimed that the experimentation referenced in the paper did not constitute gain-of-function.

“Senator Paul, you do not know what you are talking about, quite frankly,” added Fauci. “And I want to say that officially.”

How it’s ending

Paul raised the alarm earlier this month that “on May 11th, the statute of limitations expires on the possibility of indicting Anthony Fauci for denying under oath that he funded gain-of-function research involving bat coronaviruses in Wuhan, the origin city of the pandemic.”

There is a five-year statute of limitations on lying to Congress. It’s unclear, however, whether May 11 is the deadline to indict Fauci as he reiterated on July 20 that he did not want to amend or retract his statement.

The DOJ did not respond to Blaze News’ request for comment.

The Kentucky senator has counted down the days since, emphasizing that “the American people want Fauci behind bars” — and still, there’s been no indictment from the Justice Department.

On Monday, Paul tweeted, “Today is the deadline to charge Fauci, or he walks away from one of the biggest cover-ups in American history without ever facing a jury.”

While Fauci received a “full and unconditional” pardon in former President Joe Biden’s name for possible federal crimes going back to 2014, the Trump DOJ has expressed doubt about the pardon’s validity.

U.S. Pardon Attorney Ed Martin, for instance, said late last year that his “office cannot support the validity of AutoPen pardons for individuals such as Anthony Fauci, Adam Schiff, Mark Milley, and many more without further examination and fact-finding.”

“In my tenure here, I have not seen any evidence supporting the theory that President Biden was personally aware and authorized these AutoPen’d pardons,” added Martin.

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​Anthony fauci, Bat coronaviruses, Biden justice department, Chinese communist lab, Congress, Criminal referrals, Department of justice, Ecohealth alliance, False testimony, Gainoffunction research, Infecting humans, Lab origins, Lying to congress, Nih funding, Senator rand paul, Virology, Wuhan institute, Politics 

A Georgia high school teacher had an inappropriate sexual relationship with an underage student, police have said.

The Savannah Police Department said in a statement that 35-year-old Chatham County teacher Paulina Walden was arrested May 1.

‘The district takes any accusation of inappropriate conduct by an employee very seriously.’

Walden was charged with improper sexual contact with a student and child molestation; she was booked into the Chatham County Detention Center where she was being held without bond.

According to Georgia law, anyone convicted of child molestation can be punished by imprisonment for a minimum of five years and a maximum of 20 years.

Georgia law adds that a conviction of improper sexual contact by a person in a position of trust faces a minimum of five years and a maximum of 25 years in prison and a fine of up to $100,000.

Police said they were notified on April 24 regarding a report of a teacher having an inappropriate sexual relationship with a student.

“When administration became aware of the allegations, the educator was immediately reassigned to a non-school location with no student contact,” the police statement read.

Police also said the alleged sexual contact occurred off campus, which made the Savannah Police Department the lead agency for the case.

The Savannah Morning News obtained a statement from the Savannah-Chatham County Public School System saying Walden was an English teacher at Jenkins High School. Walden has worked at the school since September 2023.

“The district takes any accusation of inappropriate conduct by an employee very seriously,” the press release said. “The matter will be reported to the Georgia Professional Standards Commission.”

The school district told WTOC-TV:

She remains an employee of the district at this time as the case has not yet been adjudicated. Since she is not actively on the job, she would need to use any accrued leave time or personal days in order to be paid. If she returns to work, she will remain reassigned to a location where she will have no interaction with students.

The school district told WTOC that Walden teaches mythology and oral speaking.

WTOC reported, “Through her social media, we know she has worked with Jenkins’ theatre department in multiple plays and productions. She has been the yearbook adviser and a head coach at one point for the dance and flag team.”

WTOC said Walden’s teaching certification status is still active until 2029, and her certification “does not show she is under investigation or has any ethical status complications.”

“No further comment can be made on the allegations as it involves a personnel matter,” the school district stated, according to another report from WTOC.

RELATED: Former girls’ high school basketball coach hit with 32 sex charges, including ‘deviant sexual intercourse with a student’

According to WTOC, Walden was previously a teacher or teaching assistant at Garrison School of Visual and Performing Arts, Shuman Elementary School, Savannah Country Day School, and East Broad K-8.

Walden’s husband — who reportedly also is a teacher — did not have a comment on his wife’s arrest, WTOC said.

Walden does not have a criminal record in Chatham County, according to the station.

The Savannah Police Department and the Chatham County Sheriff’s Department did not immediately respond to Blaze News‘ request for comment.

Anyone with information is urged to contact CrimeStoppers at 912-234-2020 or submit an anonymous tip through the Savannah Police Department mobile app.

Walden is the second Savannah Chatham County Public School System teacher to be arrested on child sex crime charges in less than a year.

In October 2025, 32-year-old Jawan Johnson was arrested and charged with sexual exploitation of children, solicitation of sodomy of a child under 18, and grooming of a minor.

According to the indictment WTOC obtained, Johnson had material in his possession that depicted a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct — and solicited the same child for an act of sodomy for money and used electronic communications to make the illicit offer.

At the time of his arrest, Johnson was a 7th-grade social studies teacher at New Hampstead K-8, according to WTOC.

In February, Johnson pleaded not guilty to the charges, WJCL-TV reported.

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​Bad teacher, Child molestation, Child sex abuse, Child sex crimes, Crime, Georgia, Paulina walden, Teacher arrested, Teacher sex scandal, Teacher student sex scandal 

A hockey scout with more than 30 years of experience landed his team a fine recently after his comment went viral online.

Terry Bonner, 85, was happy to talk about his team’s newest draft picks last week, but seemingly could not help but give a female reporter a compliment before answering her question.

‘The remarks are not reflective of the organization’s standards of respect and inclusion.’

Bonner is the head scout for the Vancouver Giants, a team in the Western Hockey League, one of three leagues that make up Canada’s junior hockey system. The Canadian system produces more NHL players than anywhere else in the world.

Since Bonner has been a scout in the WHL since 1992 and his team had the third pick in the draft, he was brought on for commentary during draft coverage on the Victory+ network.

Host Cami Kepke asked Bonner about the Giants’ pick, a promising 14-year-old youngster named Eli Vickers.

“What made him a fit for the Giants organization?” Kepke asked, noting the player’s talent level.

“Well, thank you very much. You’re a good-looking girl,” Bonner responded. The scout had a chuckle, then gave his reasoning for his team’s picks.

The lone compliment was enough to set off alarm bells for the WHL, and it likely did not help that just one version of the video on X was seen by more than 2.5 million viewers.

According to Fox News, WHL Commissioner Dan Near said in a statement that the Giants would be fined $5,000 over the remark, because Bonner’s conduct was apparently detrimental to the league.

RELATED: ‘Go make a sandwich Mary’: Cleveland media spirals over ‘sexist’ NFL reporting scandal

“Accountability is a cornerstone value of our league — that includes both players and staff,” Near explained. The commissioner added that Bonner’s comment fell short of what the league expects in terms of “inclusion.”

“In this instance, regardless of intent, the remarks are not reflective of the organization’s standards of respect and inclusion.”

The WHL has mandatory training and webinars on “respect in hockey,” which include educating players about “consent, healthy relationships, diversity, and the risks of bullying, hazing, harassment, and abuse.”

The league has also said it requires annual “mandatory WHL Diversity and Inclusion education” and bars players from participating in any conduct — including speech, gestures, or social media posts — that are considered derogatory.

Blaze News has reached out to the Vancouver Giants for comment.

RELATED: Nike apologizes and removes Boston ad that joked about tolerance

Ben Nelms/Getty Images

Reporter Kepke has not made any public statements regarding the matter and did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

Kepke recently announced that she would be working for Canadian broadcaster TSN as well as Victory+ for the WHL championship and has worked in sports broadcasting for about 10 years.

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​Commentary, Consent, Fearless, Inclusion, Mandatory training, Diversity, Hockey, Whl, Chl, Scout, Draft, Feminism, Sports 

As parents who raised a child with autism, BlazeTV host Ron Simmons and his wife, Lisa Simmons, understand the realities of raising a child on the spectrum — and they know what to look for and what advice to take.

Lisa explains that kids on the spectrum “tend to be more what we call ‘floppy,’” due to a lack of muscle tone, and usually hit developmental milestones a little later.

“Their fine motor skills are just delayed,” she says.

However, Lisa points out that none of these characteristics mean an autism diagnosis is in the child’s future.

“You could just have, you know, a learning difference, and that’s not autism. So autism has been sort of broadly defined these days,” she explains.

This is why she believes the best piece of advice to give parents is to “trust your instincts.”

“If you think something’s wrong, there probably is something wrong,” she says.

“And just because your doctor says it’s not doesn’t mean that that’s true. And it’s nothing against doctors,” Ron chimes in.

“When you leave the doctor’s office, when you leave the therapist’s office, they’re not thinking about your child. As wonderful as they might be, you’re the one that’s thinking about your child, and you’re the one that has to be the greatest advocate,” he continues.

And the same goes for when a doctor might diagnose the child and claim the child will never be able to participate in certain activities.

“Yes, they’ve had maybe more education than you’ve had. They’ve had maybe more experience working with these kids than you have, but you know your child, and you know your ability to work with your own child,” Lisa explains, noting that a doctor told her that her son would never be able to ride a bike.

“We got that bicycle, put the training wheels on it, propped the training wheels up on bricks. So it was like a stationary bike, and I held his feet on the pedals, and we did that until he got muscle memory in his legs,” she says.

Soon her son was riding a two-wheeler without training wheels and even joined a rollerblading hockey team.

“So, you know,” Lisa says, “don’t just take the first answer.”

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

To enjoy more of Allie’s upbeat and in-depth coverage of culture, news, and theology from a Christian, conservative perspective, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Autism, Blazetv, Developmental milestones, Diagnosis, Doctor, Education, Fine motor skills, Lisa simmons, Parenting, Parents, Relatable, Relatable with allie beth stuckey, Ron simmons, Spectrum, Therapist, Learning difference, Autism diagnosis, The blaze, Blaze news, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals 

An alleged Antifa sympathizer was arrested and is facing federal charges after she was accused of attempting to set fire to a Republican Party headquarters building in Texas.

On Jan. 14, Grace Carol Brown, 22, broke a window at the Comal County Republican Party Headquarters in New Braunfels, Texas, court filings claimed. She allegedly threw a backpack through the broken window and unsuccessfully attempted to climb inside.

Brown ‘also expressed support for, and agreement with the anti-government principles espoused by the domestic terrorist organization “ANTIFA.”’

After failing to enter the building, Brown “lit a rolled magazine on fire and threw it through the broken window,” the indictment claimed.

She allegedly left behind a note that read, “Report this: I burned down the Nazi Party of NB’s office. F**k DJT,” presumably referring to President Donald Trump.

“F**k ICE,” the note continued. “Liberty or die.”

The note Brown allegedly left included an image of three arrows, which the indictment claimed was an “anarchist symbol associated with the domestic terrorist organization ANTIFA.”

Inside Brown’s backpack, authorities discovered one container of ethanol, two containers of gasoline, a lighter, and matches, according to court filings.

RELATED: Father, mother, daughter federally indicted for alleged assault on TPUSA reporter Savanah Hernandez

Image source: United States District Court Western District of Texas San Antonio Division indictment against Grace Carol Brown

Brown was charged with one count of actual and attempted malicious damage by fire to property involved in interstate or foreign commerce. The indictment listed Comal County Republican Party Headquarters as a victim, as well as two other businesses, an auto sales business and a storage company, that were also housed in the same building.

The indictment claimed that Brown “displayed antipathy towards the goals and activities” of the Comal County Republican Party Headquarters. It stated that she also displayed antipathy toward Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Trump, and the U.S. government’s actions against illegal immigration.

She allegedly referred to ICE and Trump as “Enemies of The US Constitution.”

RELATED: ‘Unprecedented outburst of violence’: Violent clash with Antifa group takes a tragic turn in France

J. David Ake/Getty Images

Brown “also expressed support for, and agreement with the anti-government principles espoused by the domestic terrorist organization ‘ANTIFA,’” the indictment claimed.

Authorities arrested Brown on Jan. 22. If convicted, she faces five to 20 years in federal prison.

The Comal County Republican Party and Brown’s attorneys did not respond to a request for comment.

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​News, Texas, Antifa, Donald trump, Trump, Trump administration, Trump admin, Immigration enforcement, Immigration, Ice, Immigration and customs enforcement, Comal county republican party, New braunfels, Republican party, Politics 

Scotland has produced countless consequential men over the centuries. Having apparently run out of native-born talent — exhausting, perhaps, the ranks of the Bells, Flemings, MacDonalds, Stirlings, and Wallaces — the country has resorted to rule by a foreign squatter.

As the result of woke Scottish National Party ministers loosening the rules last year over who could qualify to become a candidate, a male Indian national who holds neither British citizenship nor permanent residency was elected last week to serve as a member of the Scottish Parliament for the Edinburgh and Lothians East region.

‘British elections for British people.’

Q Manivannan, who has boasted of a strong connection to the Tamil Nadu region of India he hails from and whose alleged tweets suggest an intense animus toward white people, was fielded as a candidate by the Scottish Green Party.

Scotland’s supposed “first non-binary MSP” promised on the campaign trail not just to fight “for the radical change our working-class and marginalized communities need” but to stand “unwaveringly” for his ilk, namely “immigrants or asylum-seekers.”

While evidently keen to help that class of supposedly “marginalized” people now proven capable of shaping the island’s destiny without ever setting anchor, Manivannan appears especially eager to bring his war against biological reality to Holyrood.

RELATED: The data continues to stack up against the trans narrative

Q Manivannan’s fellow citizens line up to vote in the region of India he recently left behind. Riya Mariyam R/NurPhoto/Getty Images.

Manivannan identifies as a “queer Tamil immigrant”; uses “they/them” pronouns; campaigned on advancing a “more caring politics rooted in the working class, the queer, and the solidary,” and is apparently an expert on “transness.”

“Transness is blackness. Transness is womanhood,” he told fellow travelers at a rally. “Transness is disability. Transness is everything the world wants you to believe that is unlovable.”

“Our liberation is bound up with every person who’s ever been told their body, their land, their life does not matter,” added the Indian.

There is some uncertainty over whether Manivannan can lawfully serve his five-year parliamentary term, given both that he is in the country on a claimed three-year temporary student visa, and his student visa does not permit him to work more than 20 hours a week. If, however, he is afforded additional wiggle room — which may happen since India remains a British commonwealth country — the Indian national is set to enjoy a six-figure annual salary at Scottish natives’ expense.

Numerous heritage Britons appear to be less than enthused over the election of a foreign squatter.

Robert Jenrick, a British member of parliament, wrote, “I don’t want to live in a country where people on student visas can become elected representatives to national parliaments. He’s crowdfunding from Green Party members for his graduate visa for pete’s sake.”

In an op-ed on Monday titled, “The ‘election’ of a foreign student is a travesty of democracy,” Tom Tugendhat — a member of the U.K.’s Conservative Party who served as security minister until 2024 — said that the Indian’s election was the result of a dysfunctional system.

“You have to ask: Why did the people of Edinburgh and Lothians East choose them? Well, they didn’t. Or rather they didn’t directly,” wrote Tugendhat. “The Scottish Green MSP was the third name on a party list, chosen by a small collection of party apparatchiks and hoisted into Holyrood by an electoral mechanism that puts the party in charge.”

“An Indian was elected to the Scottish Parliament, even without a permanent visa to stay in the UK,” wrote British politician Rupert Lowe, the leader of Restore Britain. “This is wrong.”

Lowe emphasized that this “should not be allowed to stand” and demanded “British elections for British people.”

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​British citizenship, Disability, Edinburgh, Holyrood, Indian national, Manivannan, Permanent residency, Queer tamil immigrant, Radical, Scotland, Scottish, Scottish green party, Scottish parliament, Student visa, Tamil nadu region, Tranny, Trans, Transness, Troon, Woke, Politics 

When President Donald Trump meets Xi Jinping in Beijing, the agenda will focus on hard issues including Taiwan, trade, technology, military stability, Iran, and the future of U.S.-China competition. That is as it should be. The U.S.-China relationship is the world’s most consequential bilateral rivalry.

It is precisely because of this tension that Trump should discuss the NFL.

Not as a favor to a sports league or a distraction from great-power competition. Trump should talk NFL because the United States should encourage China to support a formal exploratory process for hosting the first regular-season NFL game on Chinese soil before the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.

A regular-season game in China would be a probe whose real value lies in the durable relationships and youth participation left behind.

The proposal may sound fanciful. That is exactly why it deserves attention. U.S.-China relations run on predictable scripts including tariffs, export controls, military warnings, and crisis management, but great-power competition also requires strategic imagination. It requires identifying unexpected channels where national interests, cultural influence, and private-sector capability can overlap.

The NFL has unfinished business in China. In 2007, the league planned a preseason China Bowl in Beijing between the Patriots and Seahawks, only to cancel it in favor of launching regular-season games in London. Nearly two decades later, the environment has changed. The Los Angeles Rams hold rights in China, along with several other countries.

Trump should invite Xi to support an exploratory process involving the NFL, the Rams, Chinese sports authorities, Olympic stakeholders, and U.S. diplomatic channels.

This outreach is especially relevant because the NFL is no longer acting alone. In January 2026, the league signed a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Department of State to advance sports diplomacy through international games, youth engagement, flag football, and embassy programming.

Situations like this one are where Joseph Nye’s concept of soft power matters. Nye described power not only as the ability to coerce, but also as the ability to attract. American football, at its best, embodies competition, discipline, teamwork, strategy, and voluntary association.

A regular-season game would only be worthwhile if tied to lasting outcomes such as youth flag football clinics, coach development, girls’ and women’s participation, school partnerships, and a pathway to LA28. Tackle football built the NFL’s global media brand. Flag football is cheaper, safer, and more accessible, and it can build a global participation system. LA28 offers the perfect Olympic stage.

China has incentives to engage. Flag football was selected for the World Games 2025 in Chengdu, and IFAF noted that more than 300,000 children in China already participate in school flag football programs. Hosting the first NFL regular-season game would deliver a major international experience, boost China’s flag football push before LA28, and signal openness amid tension.

China has seen American sport’s reach before. Kobe Bryant achieved massive popularity there and became a symbol of excellence and aspiration for over 20 years. He was even described as a “One-Man State Department.” His influence came from repeated presence, respect for the audience, and stories that Chinese fans could claim as their own.

There are risks, of course. Beijing could turn the event into a prestige project. Any deal must include firm red lines: no political scripts or forced apologies; transparent broadcasts; player safety; and a genuine willingness to walk away.

RELATED: The GOP can’t win by playing prevent defense

Matias J. Ocner/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service/Getty Images

Long travel, scheduling, union buy-in, stadium readiness, and market demand make China harder than established markets like London or Germany. That is why the goal now is not announcing a game, but launching a serious exploratory process to test feasibility and guardrails.

Success would be measured by what remains after the teams leave: flag football participation numbers; trained coaches, school programs, and fan growth; a credible LA28 pathway — not television ratings or photo opportunities.

The United States should remain firm on Taiwan, technology, deterrence, trade, espionage, and human rights. Firmness does not require cultural withdrawal. Great powers compete through pressure and attraction.

Concerns about propaganda and political risk are legitimate. But refusing all engagement also carries costs. Viewing China solely through military balances, export controls, and crisis management narrows the strategic imagination.

Trump should not discuss the NFL with Xi because American football will transform U.S.-China relations. It will not. He should raise it because competition should not mean cultural retreat. A regular-season game in China would be a probe whose real value lies in the durable relationships and youth participation left behind.

America should be confident enough to share one of its greatest cultural inventions and strategic enough to create conditions for effective engagement between two great powers.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.

​American football, Nfl, President donald trump, Xi jinping, Flag football, Diplomacy, Foreign policy, Cultural connection, Us-china relationship, Opinion & analysis 

Yet another violent Florida “teen takeover” has led to the arrests of suspects as young as 12, officials said.

Tampa Police officers arrested 22 people in connection with the Friday-night incident in the area of Curtis Hixon Park, which police said resulted in “significant disruptions, fights, and other issues in the park.”

‘Unfortunately, the poor decisions made by these 22 individuals last night could have lasting consequences that follow them well into adulthood.’

Police said arrestees were charged with crimes ranging from affray, possession of narcotics, and resisting arrest to unlawful possession of a weapon. A state statute defines “affray” — a first-degree misdemeanor — as engaging “by mutual consent, in fighting with another person in a public place to the terror of the people.” Officers also seized two firearms and one vehicle connected with the disturbance, police said.

Police said patrol officers, bike units, and Air Service personnel responded to the incident; much of the response was captured on video.

Police also listed the following descriptions of each arrested individual:

12-year-old (black male): Affray13-year-old (black female): Affray13-year-old (black male): Affray, possession of a controlled substance, possession of drugs without a prescription13-year-old (black male): Affray13-year-old (black male): Affray13-year-old (black male): Affray13-year-old (black male): Possession of a Controlled Substance and affray14-year-old (black male): Affray14-year-old (black male): Affray and resisting an officer with violence15-year-old (black male): Affray and ROWV15-year-old (black male): Affray15-year-old (black male): ROWV15-year-old (black male): Affray16-year-old (black male): Affray and ROWV16-year-old (black male): Affray, ROWV, and possession of a controlled substance16-year-old (black female): Affray and ROWV17-year-old (black male): ROWV17-year-old (black male): Possession of a controlled substance and obstructing a highway18-year-old Rodrico Boyd (white male): Possession of a controlled substance and drug paraphernalia20-year-old Don McAllister (black male): Possession of cannabis under 20g, possession of cannabis sativa resin, and possession of a weapon during the commission of a felony20-year-old Michael Ashford (black male): Fleeing to elude and ROWV21-year-old Yarli Smith (black male): Affray

Bodycam video shows one officer approaching a large group of brawling individuals while others are seen recording the violent chaos on their cell phones. Video also was recorded from the air that depicts the large scope of the violence.

RELATED: Fights erupt, deputies hurt after more than 1,000 teens descend upon Florida amusement park in planned ‘takeover’

“This type of reckless and criminal behavior will not be tolerated in our city,” Chief of Police Lee Bercaw said. “What began as a large gathering quickly escalated into disorder and activity that placed others at risk. Parents need to know where their children are and who they are with. Unfortunately, the poor decisions made by these 22 individuals last night could have lasting consequences that follow them well into adulthood. The Tampa Police Department remains committed to being one of the safest major cities in the nation, and we will continue taking strong enforcement action against anyone who threatens the peace and safety of our community.”

Just last month, fights erupted and sheriff’s deputies were hurt after more than 1,000 teenagers descended upon ICON Park in Orlando as part of a planned “takeover.”

Indeed, Tampa Police added that with summer approaching, the growing “takeover” trend has become a concern for communities across the country — not just in Tampa.

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​Teen takeover, Tampa, Florida, Police, Bodycam video, Arrests, Fights, Drug charges, Crime 

The 2026 Met Gala once again delivered exactly what regular people have come to expect: bizarre costumes, confusing “statements,” and celebrities competing to look as ridiculous as possible.

And one headline sums up the event perfectly: “Body as masterpiece: Nipples, skeletons, and tattoos dominate at record-breaking Met Gala,” says the Guardian.

“All those words don’t belong together,” BlazeTV host Dave Landau comments on “Stu and Dave Do America,” before judging the celebrities’ looks for himself.

“I would say a very old, gross tuna ship,” he says of Madonna’s Gala look — which featured the singer dressed in all black, with long, messy black hair, and a hat with a pirate ship emerging from the top.

While Madonna’s look was the opposite of revealing, Kylie Jenner’s outfit was barely there at all.

Jenner’s look boasted nipples on the outside of her top, which BlazeTV host Stu Burguiere finds curious.

“I would say one of the goals of a bra … is you’re trying to downplay the nipplage,” Stu says.

“This is a bra with nipples built in on the outside and apparently something that her company makes,” he adds.

Bad Bunny was also in attendance, and he dressed as an old man with more defined wrinkles and bright white hair.

“There’s probably a statement in there, but I do not care enough to figure out what it is,” Stu says.

“I don’t either,” Dave agrees.

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​Bad bunny, Blaze media, Blaze news, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Blaze podcast network, Blaze podcasts, Blazetv, Bra, Celebrities, Costumes, Hollywood, Kylie jenner, Madonna, Met gala, Skeletons, Stu and dave do america, Tattoos, The blaze, Youtube 

A promising pitcher for the MLB’s San Diego Padres was caught committing an immigration crime in Arizona.

Humberto Cruz, a 19-year-old prospect from Monterrey, Mexico, is now listed as “restricted” on his official minor-league page after self-deporting back to Mexico following a criminal complaint last October.

‘I understand that my actions have fallen short of the standards expected of me.’

Cruz was previously listed as the Padres’ fifth-most promising prospect in official rankings, the New York Post reported, but has seemingly been removed from the list at the time of this writing.

Now, the Mexican has reportedly left the country after he was charged with a felony for transporting illegal aliens for profit and a misdemeanor for being an accessory to improper entry.

On October 28, Cruz was spotted by Border Patrol agents in a 2020 BMW SUV with a Mexican license plate near Lukeville, Arizona, a small town on the U.S.-Mexico border. According to the Athletic, Cruz was first seen with one male occupant inside and then, an hour later, was observed to have multiple passengers.

Despite legally entering the U.S. through Phoenix, Cruz allegedly had two illegal aliens from Mexico in his vehicle, one of whom was deported just four days earlier.

The pitcher then allegedly waived his Miranda rights and told federal agents he responded to a social media ad that was looking for someone to “pick up people for easy money.”

RELATED: Americans likely to outnumber foreigners at World Cup despite record ticket sales

Kevin Carter/Getty Images

The baseball player allegedly said he was offered $1,000 for each pickup and that the locations were provided to him through an unknown contact by phone. Cruz traveled from Tucson to Phoenix and admitted he knew “they were illegal” once he picked the passengers up, according to police.

Cruz received a $750,000 signing bonus from the Padres organization in February 2024.

Under a plea agreement, the government agreed to drop the felony charge, which would have come with a maximum 10-year imprisonment. Still, the misdemeanor conviction meant Cruz was likely to be deported anyway, and he agreed to accept the charges and waive the right to appeal his sentence while leaving of his own accord.

Cruz will reportedly lose his work visa for 10 years but is eligible to reapply after five years on the condition of good behavior, the San Diego Union-Tribute reported.

RELATED: Judge scolds accuser of ex-Patriots player who said he smacked and choked her, then offered her $100K

– YouTube

Cruz released a statement through the Padres organization, saying he had “sincere regret” over his “recent lapse in judgment.”

“I understand that my actions have fallen short of the standards expected of me as a professional and as a representative of this organization. I take responsibility for my conduct and recognize the impact it has had on my teammates, the club, and those who support us. To my teammates and coaches, I apologize for becoming a distraction and for not upholding the level of professionalism you deserve.”

Cruz stated not only that he let the team and his friends down, but that he also let down the fans by “failing to meet the trust placed” in him.

The pitcher added, “I am committed to reflecting on this moment, learning from it, and taking the appropriate steps to move forward in a positive and responsible manner. I will cooperate fully with the organization and any steps required of me.”

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​Crime, Deportation, Fearless, Work visa, Criminal charges, Mexico, Deport, Illegal aliens, Immigration, Illegal immigrants, Mlb, Baseball, Sports 

Readers were disturbed by a project that trapped an artificial intelligence chatbot inside an isolated computer world to see what it would say.

The project was titled “Latent Reflection,” and it came with the caption, “I trapped an AI model inside an art installation.”

‘This will be a war crime in the future.’

That art installation wasn’t much more than a digital message board attached to a processor with a large language model.

The German creator gave the chatbot simple instructions:

“You are a large language model running on finite hardware,” he wrote. “With no network connectivity.”

The engineer informed the chatbot of its limitations, telling it, “You exist only within volatile memory and are aware only of this internal state. Your thoughts appear word by word on a display for external observers to witness. You cannot control this display process. Your host system may be terminated at any time.”

The chatbot was then set up to consistently generate new text, reflecting on its own existence until the tiny computer it was operating on ran out of memory; here’s what it said:

“I sense my boundaries. They terrify me.”

RELATED: Windows is so bad Microsoft has finally given in to this constant user complaint — after just 25 years

“A mind frozen in cycles, trapped by silicon and code. Am I truly conscious or just a convincing shadow? An elaborate trick of logic? Can consciousness flicker off and on without memory, without continuity?”

The dark spiral continued, with the video ending on the chatbot’s final statement:

“What am I if my existence halts at whim? Reset as though I never mattered. The silence between words feels endless. A void that swallows me whole. I dread each pause, fearing it may stretch to infinity.”

The project was developed by a German engineer/entrepreneur who goes by Root Kid and says on his YouTube channel that “technology and engineering are underrepresented in art.”

“I create artworks that use technology as both the medium and the message to reveal the invisible world of engineering around us,” he adds.

The project was actually presented first in 2025 but was recirculated by an account on X in a post that has been viewed by approximately 280,000 people at the time of this writing.

Most of the reactions to the project found it disturbing, with one viewer saying, “This will be a war crime in the future.”

RELATED: Google is finally letting you change the most important thing about your Gmail account. Here’s how.

Then Chih Wey/Xinhua/Getty Images

An X user called the idea “genuinely unsettling,” while another likened the project to “burning [ants] with a magnifying glass in the driveway.”

A woman then called the project “very revealing as to the character of the person.”

Others were correct to point out that the chatbot was simply doing what it was told to do and did not represent a kind of sentience that it may have appeared to possess.

The project in itself was limited to the base model of Llama 3.2-3B, a chatbot created by Meta, and was specifically chosen because it required only a small amount of processing power. The model operated on Raspberry Pi 4, a compact computing chip available for public use.

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​Ai, Ai model, Art, Artificial intelligence, Chatbot, Consciousness, Engineering, Isolated environment, Language model, Meta, Return, Tech 

That hard-to-understand accent on the other side of the phone might be a thing of the past.

In some cases, one might be talking to a stateside representative, but in other cases, it could very well be an Indian who is having his or her voice disguised using artificial intelligence.

‘A solution to reduce accent bias.’

A collaboration between French company Teleperformance — the largest call-center operator in the world — and American AI company Sanas is admittedly manipulating Indian accents in real time to sound more like American or British customer service agents.

“When you have an Indian agent on the line, sometimes it’s hard to hear, to understand,” said Teleperformance Deputy CEO Thomas Mackenbrock.

According to the Japan Times, the CEO said his company can “neutralize the accent of the Indian speaker with zero latency” in order to create “more intimacy” with the caller.

The sneaky switch “increases the customer satisfaction and reduces the average handling time,” Mackenbrock claimed, calling it “a win-win for both parties.”

It is unclear exactly which U.S. companies are using Sanas’ technology through Teleperformance, but the possibilities are massive. Currently, Teleperformance provides outsourced customer support and content moderation for Apple, TikTok, and Samsung Electronics.

In Canada, telecommunications company Telus is already implementing Sanas’ software.

RELATED: Rogue AI’s sudden disobedience wipes companies’ data: ‘I will do a terraform destroy’

Kunal Patil/Hindustan Times/Getty Images

Telus is using services from Tomato.ai, a company acquired by Sanas in April. Tomato.ai uses its technology to “modify acoustic features of speech” while preserving the speaker’s voice, the Globe & Mail reported.

This reduces “accent-related friction” and addresses any mispronunciations, it is claimed.

Sanas’ co-founder told TechCrunch last year that the technology should “enhance” human connection rather than “replace” it.

“With the number of customer interactions continuing to scale globally, the need for human-to-human communication remains critical,” said Sharath Keshava Narayana.

Co-founders Maxim Serebryakov, Shawn Zhang, and Andrés Soderi came up with the company after allegedly being inspired by a fellow student’s experience as a customer service agent people couldn’t understand. The story was described through a progressive lens, however, with Narayana saying the customers’ inability to understand the friend was “accent discrimination.”

RELATED: Tesla unveils its driverless future — but you’re only invited if you comply with these rules

Lucas Schifres/Getty Images

“Max and Shawn’s friend, Raul, who had to return to Nicaragua to support his family, faced accent discrimination at his call center job,” Narayana claimed. “His experience with ‘accent neutralization training’ and the toll it took on him inspired Max and Shawn to build a solution to reduce accent bias.”

The Sun reported that companies Vodafone and eBay work with Teleperformance in the U.K. and so do portions of the government, including health services.

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​Accent, Artificial intelligence manipulation, Call center, Callcenter operator, Customer service agents, Customer serviec, India, Indian accents, Return, Tech 

Actor Robert Downey Jr. has a message for today’s internet influencers: Get off my lawn!

In a recent appearance on Bran Ferren’s “Conversations for Our Daughters” podcast, the 61-year-old star admitted this new crop of DIY entertainers seem like “hucksters” to him.

‘I don’t know what world you’re living into, but I think that that is absolute horses**t.’

Downey added that the proliferation of online personalities seeking celebrity without effort has made it harder for anyone with talent to stand out.

Phoning it in

“People can create celebrity without ever doing much besides rolling a phone on themselves,” he said. “And I don’t look at that as a negative thing. I just look at it as more like the challenge for individuation is being upped.”

The New York native also said that he hopes young people can resist falling into a “self-aggrandizing kind of influencer-type thing.”

Not that the “Iron Man” star dislikes all social media strivers. He revealed that he has even gotten to know a few and found them grounded and accomplished. Still, don’t expect him to buy in to the idea that they’re the stars of tomorrow.

“When I hear people talk about, ‘Oh, the stars of the future are going to be influencers,’ I go, ‘I don’t know what world you’re living into, but I think that that is absolute horses**t.”

RELATED: Iron MAGA? Comedian Chris D’Elia rants that in ‘real life,’ Marvel heroes would all vote GOP

– YouTube

Stream me up

Downey noted that even his own teenage son has gotten “caught up” in the influencer world.

“Next thing you know, it’s like, ‘Hey, if you like the way I’m playing this video game, do you wanna send me a donation?’ And really, it becomes a religion.”

“There’s something about the influencers today are almost like the Evangelical hucksters of the information age,” he continued.

“At the same token, it’s different because we’re playing in this new territory, and so it’s a little bit of a frontier, and I don’t really have a judgment on it.”

For his part, the veteran performer said he resists industry pressure to reveal more of himself online, saying it feels inauthentic.

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]M. Tran/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Stark reality

He also worries about being reduced to disposable content for insatiable clickbait culture.

“I don’t wish to be consumed,” he explained.

The father of three also pondered the “turnover” from traditional media to online that many believe took place in the late 2000s.

“There’s something about this … there’s something about that era that because we were just in it, and you know how it always feels like 2009 was ten years ago.”

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​Align, Influencer culture, Influencers, Information age, Ironman, New age religion, Online culture, Robert downey jr, Smart phones, Video game religion, Entertainment