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The Archdiocese of Chicago announced last week that Cardinal Blase Cupich will give Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin (Ill.) a lifetime achievement award on Nov. 3.

The prospect that a prince of the Holy See will pay honors to a radical pro-abortion activist has prompted significant backlash from prominent Catholic leaders.

‘This decision risks causing grave scandal, confusing the faithful about the Church’s unequivocal teaching on the sanctity of human life.’

According to Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America’s national pro-life scorecard, Durbin, a self-identified Catholic, gets a failing grade for routinely voting in support of virtually limitless abortion.

Durbin voted, for instance, in January against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which would require health care practitioners to save babies who survive attempted abortions. He has also voted against legislation that would have criminalized abortions for unborn babies 20 weeks along or older; against adding status-quo Hyde Amendment protections to COVID relief funds; against a bill that would prohibit partial-birth abortion; and for legislation expressing support for protecting access to abortions after the Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs decision.

In case there was any doubt about his indefatigable support for abortion, Durbin stated on the third anniversary of the Dobbs ruling in June that “this fight is far from over” and that he plans to keep fighting for mothers’ legal ability to snuff out the lives growing within them.

RELATED: Attacks against American Catholics and churches are out of control

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Image

Concerning abortion, the church holds that abortion is a grave moral sin — the procurement of which incurs an automatic excommunication — and that political leaders have a responsibility to protect the unborn.

“The Catechism of the Catholic Church” clearly states:

“Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception” (2270);”Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law” (2271); “Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life” (2272); and “The inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the state; they belong to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his origin” (2273).

For decades, Durbin has been barred from receiving communion in the Catholic diocese where he grew up on account of his radical pro-abortion activism.

Bishop Thomas Paprocki of the Diocese of Springfield, who has long upheld the prohibition, said in a 2018 statement, “Because his voting record in support of abortion over many years constitutes ‘obstinate persistence in manifest grave sin,’ the determination continues that Sen. Durbin is not to be admitted to Holy Communion until he repents of this sin. This provision is intended not to punish, but to bring about a change of heart. Sen. Durbin was once pro-life.”

Despite Durbin’s long-standing efforts to advance policies diametrically opposed to the moral teaching of the Catholic Church, the Archdiocese of Chicago noted in its announcement for the Nov. 3 “Keep Hope Alive Benefit,” subtitled “Light in the Darkness,” that Durbin will receive a lifetime achievement award for his work with immigrants.

The plan is for Cardinal Cupich to give the award to Durbin on behalf of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office of Human Dignity and Solidarity.

Blaze News has reached out both to the Archdiocese of Chicago and to Durbin’s office for comment.

RELATED: Man posted a message in a private Catholic group chat — then the FBI came knocking

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone. Photo by Franco Origlia/Getty Images.

Illinois Right to Life President Mary Kate Zander was among the first to condemn the planned honors for the abortion activist, stating, “The Church emphasizes that human beings are integrated persons and that we cannot live in spiritual harmony if we are denying even one aspect of the truth of the faith.”

“Presenting Dick Durbin with an award — and from the Office of Human Dignity, no less — is an explicitly inconsistent and un-Catholic choice by Cardinal Cupich,” continued Zander.

“Our shepherds are supposed to proclaim Jesus’ teaching that all human life is sacred,” Dr. Mary Elizabeth Keen of the Catholic Medical Association’s Illinois chapter told CatholicVote. “Senator Durbin has spent his career eliminating protections for the most vulnerable members of the human family.”

Bishop Paprocki said in a statement to the Pillar that he was shocked to learn of the archdiocese’s plans to give Durbin an award.

“Given Senator Durbin’s long and consistent record of supporting legal abortion — including opposing legislation to protect children who survive failed abortions — this decision risks causing grave scandal, confusing the faithful about the Church’s unequivocal teaching on the sanctity of human life,” continued Paprocki. “Honoring a public figure who has actively worked to expand and entrench the right to end innocent human life in the womb undermines the very concept of human dignity and solidarity that the award purports to uphold.”

Bishop Paprocki noted further that such an award might violate the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ guidance that “the Catholic community and Catholic institutions should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles.”

The guidance adds that “they should not be given awards, honors, or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.”

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of the Archdiocese of San Francisco indicated on Sunday that he stands in solidarity with Bishop Paprocki in urging Cardinal Cupich to reconsider giving Durbin the award.

“Bishop Paprocki, who is Senator Dick Durbin’s bishop, has expressed shock that the Archdiocese plans to honor Senator Durbin who, although a self-professed Catholic, supports access to abortion so radically that he has even opposed legislation to protect babies born after an attempted abortion,” wrote Archbishop Cordileone. “Bishop Paprocki is correct that both clarity and unity are at risk. I hope this will be a clarion call to all members of the Body of Christ to speak out to make clear the grave evil that is the taking of innocent human life.”

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​Faith, Catholic, Catholic church, Cupich, Cardinal blase cupich, Dick durbin, Durbi, Abortion, Radical, Lgbtq, Leftist, Democratic, Durbin, Chicago, Illinois, Paprocki, Cordileone, Christian, Politics 

Witness statements from a lethal shooting at a country club in New Hampshire point to a political motivation for the suspect, but police deny evidence of a “hate-based” impulse for the attack.

Hunter Nadeau, 23, walked into the Sky Meadow Country Club in Nashua with a handgun and opened fire on the patrons, according to prosecutors. Three people were shot, and one man, identified as 59-year-old Robert Steven DeCesare, was killed.

‘I would say that the evidence leads us to believe this was more likely Mr. Nadeau was simply trying to make a number of statements to create chaos in the moment.’

A wedding reception was under way when Nadeau allegedly shot at patrons and workers. The suspect fled the scene and was arrested in a neighborhood nearby.

Police said that Nadeau previously had been employed at the country club but had not worked there for a year.

Some of the witnesses said the suspect yelled phrases like, “Free Palestine!” but officials rejected the suspicion that he was motivated by hatred.

“We don’t have any evidence at this time that Mr. Nadeau was motivated by hate-based motivation,” said New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella. “In fact, I would say that the evidence leads us to believe this was more likely Mr. Nadeau was simply trying to make a number of statements to create chaos in the moment.”

“We’re aware of statements that were reported that he made. The circumstances, whether he actually made them, under what circumstances he made them, are being investigated,” said Senior Assistant Attorney General Peter Hinckley.

RELATED: Michigan Dem renounces DSA over support of terror attack: ‘There is no place for moral equivocation’

Nadeau was charged with one count of second-degree murder, but Formella’s office said additional charges are likely.

“There’s one single charge. The defendant was charged with that because under New Hampshire state law, under that single charge that’s a no-bail charge,” Hinckley said. “We understand and realize there are additional victims. We anticipate there will be additional charges that both relate to those victims who have not been named yet as well as the murder victim.”

Witnesses said DeCesare was shot when he stepped in between the shooter and his family to save them.

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An excessive-force lawsuit by a pardoned former Jan. 6 defendant who was allegedly twice blasted in the face with pepper spray by a guard in the District of Columbia jail will proceed toward trial, a federal district court judge ruled on Sept. 19.

Judge Jia M. Cobb rejected a motion from lawyers for Crystal Lancaster to dismiss the excessive-force lawsuit brought against her and the District of Columbia by Ronald Colton McAbee of Unionville, Tenn.

The judge dismissed the District of Columbia as a defendant, saying McAbee’s claims of municipal liability in the case “are too conclusory for the court to allow those claims to go forward.”

‘I pray that the truth will prevail.’

Citing several U.S. Court of Appeals precedents, Judge Cobb said, “No officer confronting a person who was 1) subdued by officers, (2) had his hands behind his back, (3) was compliant, and (4) was not engaged in any threatening or assaultive conduct could possibly think it would be reasonable to spray that person in his face with a chemical agent.”

“Accordingly, McAbee’s excessive force claims can proceed against Lancaster,” she wrote in a 19-page memorandum opinion and order.

The pepper-spray incident occurred at about 9:45 a.m. on Sept. 5, 2022. McAbee left his cell in the C2B pod at the D.C. Central Treatment Facility to walk to a nearby medical cart to obtain his prescription medications. Witnesses said then-Lt. Lancaster shouted at McAbee to put on a COVID-19 mask.

After McAbee took his medication, the lawsuit alleges Lancaster sprayed him with oleoresin capsicum — a harsh chemical irritant sometimes referred to as pepper spray or pepper gel. After McAbee’s hands were cuffed behind his back, Lancaster allegedly fired another blast of OC spray in his face.

RELATED: Jan. 6 defendant Colt McAbee on presidential pardon: ‘Best day of my life other than my wedding’

Ronald Colton McAbee is struck in the head by a riot stick wielded by a Metropolitan Police officer at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Metropolitan Police Department bodycam/Sarah McAbee

Sarah McAbee said her husband suffered painful aftereffects over the next several days. Even after he was allowed a brief shower, the residue on McAbee’s skin reactivated, causing a painful burning sensation. He was put into a shower with warm water, which she said was like jumping into a hot tub after a third-degree sunburn.

Sarah McAbee told Blaze News that after the spray incident, her husband was put into solitary confinement and not given access to clean clothes or a thorough decontamination for three days.

Judge Cobb allowed the lawsuit to proceed on the two counts of alleged excessive force, saying the second instance of pepper spray to McAbee’s face is a stronger candidate as a violation of constitutional rights.

“It is clear, however, that the Due Process Clause protects a pretrial detainee from the use of excessive force that amounts to punishment,” the judge wrote.

Judge Cobb deferred ruling on which clause — the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment or the Fourth Amendment — applies to each of McAbee’s allegations. She asked both sides to prepare briefs on the issue.

The litmus tests for excessive force are “substantially similar” under both the Fourth Amendment and the 14th Amendment, Judge Cobb wrote.

“Both tests focus on objective reasonableness and direct lower courts to consider factors in assessing reasonableness, including ‘the relationship between the need for the use of force and the amount of force used, the extent of the plaintiff’s injury; any effort made by the officer to temper or to limit the amount of force, the severity of the security problem at issue; the threat reasonably perceived by the officer and whether the plaintiff was actively resisting,” Cobb wrote.

Judge Cobb said she will “allow McAbee’s claims that Lancaster used unconstitutionally excessive force against him.” McAbee “has pled a plausible excessive force claim against Lancaster.”

Judge Cobb rejected Lancaster’s claim of qualified immunity, saying the affirmative defense that shields officers from liability applies only if the conduct in question “does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional law.”

McAbee told Blaze News he was encouraged by the judge’s ruling.

“I think it’s very exciting and telling that maybe we can go through with this case in D.C., where there is a bias against people like me,” he said.

“In reality this is about right vs. wrong. Going forward will bring justice and closure,” McAbee said. “I pray that the truth will prevail and the people that orchestrated this years-long delay and attack on me are put to justice, whatever that may look like.”

The District of Columbia Department of Corrections defied demands from U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) that security camera footage and Lancaster’s bodycam footage be released to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary. Eventually Nehls was allowed to watch the video at the DOC offices but did not receive a copy.

Now McAbee will have opportunities to obtain the video as the case proceeds to the discovery phase.

RELATED: Tennessee sheriff’s deputy became a January 6 trophy in a lie-filled ‘manifest injustice’

Colt McAbee on his way home after a pardon from President Trump. Photo courtesy of Sarah McAbee

McAbee was prosecuted by the Biden Department of Justice for alleged actions on Jan. 6 at the U.S. Capitol. Despite bodycam and other video showing he never assaulted Metropolitan Police Department Officer Andrew Wayte, a jury found him guilty of that count and six other criminal charges.

The case was marred by lies, manipulated evidence, and a possibly tainted jury to such a degree that defense attorney and former veteran DOJ prosecutor William Shipley called the result a “manifest injustice.”

McAbee was sentenced in late February 2024 to 70 months in prison. He was serving that sentence at the Federal Medical Center in Rochester, Minn., when President Donald J. Trump signed a pardon declaration that set him free after 1,252 days in government custody.

He walked out of FMC Rochester into minus-18-degree weather and into the arms of his wife, Sarah. “Best day of my life other than my wedding,” he told Blaze News at the time.

McAbee appealed his conviction in March 2024. On March 17, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated his criminal conviction and remanded the case to the district court, which dismissed it as moot.

Blaze News reached out to the District of Columbia Office of Attorney General for comment on Judge Cobb’s opinion.

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​Jan. 6, January 6, Excessive force, Metropolitan police department, Crystal lancaster, Ronald colton mcabee, Politics 

Yesterday at the NFL Cardinals’ State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, roughly 100,000 people gathered for Charlie Kirk’s memorial service. Worship was led by some of the biggest names in the Christian music industry, including Phil Wickham, Brandon Lake, Kari Jobe, and Chris Tomlin. Speakers included high profile names from conservative media, like Tucker Carlson, Benny Johnson, and Jack Posobiec, as well as several Trump administration officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, and President Donald Trump, among others.

But the crowning jewel of the service was the hauntingly beautiful address delivered by Charlie’s widow and the new CEO for Turning Point USA, Erika Kirk, who publicly forgave her husband’s murderer in a display of incredible grace and commitment to Jesus’ command to forgive our enemies.

Glenn Beck was present for this event, which was nothing less than a faith-drenched Christian revival. On today’s episode of “The Glenn Beck Program,” he shared his experience being in the stadium with 100,000 others and the undeniable presence of the Holy Spirit.

Glenn describes the event as “miraculous.” In the first hour, which was a worship service, it was evident that the Holy Spirit was heavy in the stadium. Glenn feared, however, that once the worship ended and the speeches began, its beautiful presence might be “chased out by politics.”

But that’s the opposite of what happened. Every speaker who took the stage proclaimed the gospel, honored Charlie Kirk’s steadfast devotion to Jesus Christ, or centered their remarks on the Christian faith that anchored his life and mission.

“This is what I’ve been praying for for 30 years,” says Glenn.

“I’ve never witnessed anything like it.”

While he anticipated the event to be centered around faith, he had no idea to what level that would be true. More than a memorial service, “it was an altar call,” he says, describing how people were standing up to signify their desire to follow Jesus.

“I think it is the greatest revival moment of my lifetime,” Glenn says, likening the event to the Billy Graham revivals he used to watch with his grandmother.

He calls Erika’s stunning act of forgiveness “one of the most amazing things ever.”

Stu Burguiere, Glenn’s co-host, agrees, adding that her choice to forgive will have far-reaching impacts on the secular world.

“Think of the vision the average, secular, urban reader of the New York Times gets of Christians: They’re evil, they’re hateful, they don’t like people who look different than them … and then when you see [Erika], who just lost her husband, who lost the father of her children, forgive in that moment” — that will show the truth about “who Christians are” and perhaps even convince them to join the faith, he says.

“Amen to that,” says Glenn.

To hear the full details of Glenn’s experience at Charlie Kirk’s memorial service, watch the episode above.

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Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show will return to the broadcast airwaves after he was suspended for just a few days for comments about Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer.

The decision was announced on Monday by Disney, the parent company to the ABC television network. ABC had indefinitely suspended Kimmel’s show after objections from Sinclair Broadcast Group, the largest owner of ABC stations, as well as Nexstar.

‘We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.’

“Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country,” read the statement from Disney.

“It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive,” the company added. “We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.”

Kimmel had suggested that the alleged shooter was a Trump supporter in an aside during his monologue on Sept. 15. Within two days, his show was taken off the air.

“The MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said. “In between the finger-pointing, there was grieving.”

RELATED: Democrats open congressional investigation into cancellation of Jimmy Kimmel’s show

Nexstar Media Group then said it was pulling Kimmel’s show from the stations it owns, and Sinclair made a similar announcement.

“Nexstar strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk and will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets,” said the company in a statement Wednesday.

Blaze News has reached out to both Nexstar and the Sinclair Broadcast Group for comment.

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Police in Florida used a PIT maneuver to stop a driver heading the wrong way on Interstate 4 on Sept. 13, Tampa Police said, adding that the motorist was traveling westbound in the eastbound lanes.

Bodycam video shows what happened after the vehicle was brought to a stop.

Things head farther south after the officer asks her how many drinks she’s had that evening — and then conducts a field sobriety test. Not good. Not good at all.

One officer is seen with his gun drawn at the driver-side window and ordering the motorist to exit the vehicle from the passenger-side door.

RELATED: Democrat mayor slapped with DUI, child endangerment charges after allegedly crazy St. Patrick’s Day ride home with toddler

Image source: Tampa (Fla.) Police bodycam video screenshot

“Do you realize that you’re going the wrong way on the interstate?” an officer is heard asking a female, whose face is blurred out.

“On this interstate?” she replies incredulously.

“Yeah. Do you see all these lights coming toward us?” the officer asks.

“Yeah, I do,” she soon answers before adding quite the kicker. “Babe, I do.”

As the cop continues trying to convince her she was driving the wrong way, the female digs herself deeper in a hole: “This one? This car? This car? Are you serious?”

Soon the female is in tears explaining to an officer that her husband was driving her home — despite the fact that video appears to show that she was, in fact, behind the wheel after the PIT maneuver.

RELATED: ‘How much have you had to drink tonight, Wally?’ Former police chief dragged from car, arrested for DUI in wild bodycam video

Image source: Tampa (Fla.) Police bodycam video screenshot

“What do you mean? You were driving home,” the cop tells her. “You were just driving.”

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no,” she replies while slurring her words, trying to explain that she was in the passenger seat.

The cop yells out to a fellow officer to check if anyone else is in the car.

Sure enough: no husband. No other humans, in fact.

Things head farther south after the officer asks her how many drinks she’s had that evening — and then conducts a field sobriety test. Not good. Not good at all.

RELATED: Florida Hooters waitress caught on body cam video seemingly trying to flirt her way out of DUI stop — but cop isn’t having it

Image source: Tampa (Fla.) Police bodycam video screenshot

Finally, she’s handcuffed and told she’s under arrest for DUI.

Police said the driver’s breath alcohol content was measured at .199 and .202, both more than double the legal limit of 0.08.

Police said there were no reported injuries to any officers, Florida Highway Patrol troopers, or other motorists.

RELATED: Police bodycam video shows Florida man offering cops alcohol during car chase that ends with suspect getting tased

Commenters on the video that police posted to Facebook were rather unsympathetic to the female. Here’s a small sample.

“My husband was driving!! Anyone else in the car? Nooooo!!” one commenter recounted.”Oh my gosh! She’s throwing her husband under the bus, and he’s NOT EVEN THERE!” another commenter observed.”Yikes. They drive among us.Two drinks — always two,” another commenter wrote. “Long Island Iced Tea, perhaps?””I love seeing a precise and successful PIT when necessary, great job TPD and FHP!” another commenter stated. “God only knows how many lives you saved that night. Prayers and please stay safe out there.”

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​Dui, Drunk driving, Florida, Woman, Husband, Woman claimed husband driving car, Husband not in car, Arrest, Tampa police, Florida highway patrol, Bodycam video, Dashcam video, Crime 

The Trump administration revealed additional details on Monday regarding the deal to save TikTok, ensuring the app’s safety and security for over 170 million American users.

A senior White House official explained that the administration and China had reached an agreement to transfer TikTok’s U.S. operations into a new joint venture based in the U.S., with Americans comprising the majority of the app’s investors, owners, and board of directors.

‘This deal means that TikTok will be majority owned by Americans in the United States.’

The U.S. government will not take equity in the joint venture. President Donald Trump would like the app’s investors to be patriotic, the official remarked, adding that the administration hopes those appointed to the board will have a background in cybersecurity and national security.

As required by law, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, will not hold more than 20% of the app’s stock.

With this deal, Oracle will serve as TikTok’s security provider, managing how the app is updated and how data is stored. The official noted that all American data is currently stored, and will continue to be stored, in the U.S. on Oracle’s system.

China will provide a copy of the app’s content recommendation algorithm to the U.S. joint venture system for inspection, operation, and monitoring.

RELATED: TikTok is finally coming home

Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Trump is expected to sign an executive order later this week that will declare the terms of the agreement.

The White House official highlighted the importance of the administration’s efforts to save TikTok, noting that doing so would protect jobs and enable American businesses to continue using the app for promotional purposes.

The official stated that the administration is confident that China approved the terms of the deal during a meeting last week in Madrid, Spain.

RELATED: Exclusive: India train bagpiper banned from TikTok speaks out: ‘Can we be proud of our past?’

Photo by Emmanuel Wong/Getty Images

Trump stated on Friday that he had “a great call with [Chinese] President Xi [Jinping],” adding that he had approved the deal.

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed on Saturday that the White House was “100% confident” that it had reached a deal with China.

“Now that deal just needs to be signed, and the president’s team is working with their Chinese counterparts to do just that,” Leavitt told Fox News. “This deal means that TikTok will be majority owned by Americans in the United States. There will be seven seats on the board that controls the app in the United States, and six of those seats will be Americans.”

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There is a certain shimmer to the language of the new war, the gloss of the corporate campus laid over the battlefield. We read of a “target factory” employed by the Israel Defense Forces in the Gaza Strip, an AI system named Habsora, or “the Gospel.” This system does not command armies; it “produces targets at a fast pace,” accelerating the selection of what to bomb from 50 targets a year to 100 a day. The locution is precise and anodyne, suggesting a process scrubbed of human friction, of the messy, fallible business of judgment. It suggests an assembly line. This is the new aesthetic of conflict, in which the fog of war is not so much pierced as managed and optimized by an algorithm’s unblinking gaze.

The idea of the automaton in battle is not new. The thread runs from the trip-wire crossbows of ancient China to the V-1 flying bomb, a ghost that has haunted the martial imagination for centuries. In the 1970s, the Soviets developed a computer model, VRYAN, to predict an American nuclear strike, a primitive attempt to render the apocalypse foreseeable, calculable. We have always sought to mechanize decision, to delegate the hardest choices to something other than ourselves. What seems different now is the speed and scale of that delegation. The machine is no longer just a calculator in a distant bunker; it is a partner and a hunter.

The risk is not that the machines will take over in some cinematic rebellion, but something quieter and more insidious.

Consider the Turkish Kargu-2 quadcopter, a drone that a UN report suggests, in 2020, “hunted down” retreating fighters in Libya without a human in the loop. The phrase itself is unnervingly animate, verging on the biological. Or consider the swarm, that most organic of metaphors, now applied to networked drones that communicate and decide collectively, overwhelming defenses through distributed intelligence. The Israel Defense Forces deployed the first true combat swarm in 2021, a flock of small drones that dynamically allocated tasks among themselves to find and fix rocket launch sites. The human role was to set the mission, wind the clock, and let it run. The actual fighting, the infinitesimal decisions of who looks where, who guides what, was left to the logic of the swarm.

The theorists, in their cool, measured way, call this “centaur” warfighting: human intuition riding atop machine precision. The distinction echoes the ancient Greeks, the difference between techne, or craft skill, and phronesis, the ability to judge well. We are told that the machine possesses the first in abundance but is innocent of the second. An AI can win a simulated dogfight 5-0 against a seasoned human pilot, as a DARPA program demonstrated, but it cannot understand why the fight is happening. It can identify a camouflaged tank from 30,000 feet, but it cannot weigh the political cost of its destruction.

The tacit promise is that the human, the centaur’s head, will supply this missing wisdom. Yet the very structure of the system, so much more like a Minotaur, seems to diminish that possibility. When the kill chain is compressed from hours to seconds, when a targeting solution is served up by an algorithm that has fused petabytes of data, the space for dissent, for the second thought, for the intrusion of human doubt, narrows to a sliver. The momentum is with the mechanism. To question its recommendation is to introduce friction into a system designed to eliminate it. We hear of so-called automation bias, the tendency to over-trust the machine, but this is not merely a psychological tic. It is the logical consequence of a system that presents its conclusions with an authority no human analyst could muster.

RELATED: Gaza flotilla with Greta Thunberg says they were attacked by drone bomb — video appears to show embarrassing culprit

Photo by NurPhoto / Contributor via Getty Images

A peculiar cultural dissonance attends this shift. In the West, particularly in the United States, the turn to the algorithm is driven by a deep aversion to casualties — our own, that is. Drones and robots are presented as a humane choice, a way to project force without risk, to engage in conflict while remaining mostly untouched by it. The warrior ethos, with its valorization of courage and sacrifice, is quietly reconfigured. The new hero is not the fighter ace but the operator in a desert container, or perhaps the coder in camouflage, the new warrior-geek whose decisive contribution is an efficient piece of software.

This drive for sterile, risk-free conflict creates a demand for the very systems that distance us from what Clausewitz called the “visceral gravity of lethal choice.” The pilot of an F-16 feels the aircraft shudder when a missile is released. The drone operator feels a different kind of strain, a more remote and abstracted stress. The commander who approves a target generated by “the Gospel” is another step removed. The algorithm provides the solution; the human provides the authorization. The division of labor is a diffusion of responsibility. If a mistake is made, a wedding party misidentified as an enemy convoy, where does the culpability lie? In the code? In the data it was trained on? In the officer who trusted it? The chain of agency dissolves into a network diagram.

We are assured that these new systems are merely tools, that they are not changing the fundamental nature of war, which remains a contest of human wills. One must wonder. When conflict is waged at the speed of light, when battles are algorithmic duels between competing swarms, when victory is determined by the side with the superior data processing, does it not become something else? Something less a human drama than a systems check, a violent audit? The risk is not that the machines will take over in some cinematic rebellion, but something quieter and more insidious: that in our quest to perfect the instruments of war, we will render it meaningless, a spectacle of automated destruction from which we are numbly estranged. “The Gospel” will generate its targets, the swarm will execute its logic, and we will be left to watch.

​Tech 

Conservative CNN commentator Scott Jennings fired back at Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas over what he called a “malicious smear” against Charlie Kirk, whose memorial was held Sunday.

Crockett said minority members of Congress mostly voted against a motion to honor the life and legacy of Kirk, based on their opinion that the slain conservative activist made racist statements against people of color.

‘I hear people say we need to come together and both sides need to turn down the rhetoric, a lot of people saying that need to look inward right now.’

“When I saw the no votes, they were only two Caucasians. For the most part, the only people that voted no were people of color,” Crockett said to CNN, “because the rhetoric that Charlie Kirk continuously put out there was rhetoric that specifically targeted people of color. And so it is unfortunate that even our colleagues could not see how harmful his rhetoric was, specifically to us.”

Jennings was asked to comment on Crockett’s accusations, and he thoroughly disagreed.

“Well, she’s lying. I mean, Charlie Kirk targeted nobody,” Jennings replied.

“He was not racist in any way. I’ve listened to hours and hours and hours and hours of Charlie Kirk debates and talks and have been with Charlie Kirk and did events with Charlie Kirk and knew Charlie Kirk. There wasn’t a racist bone in his body,” he added.

“To say that he was continuously targeting people of color is nothing but a malicious smear on the very day that people are remembering Charlie and he’s going to be laid to rest. And so I think we need to combine the no votes on the resolution, and then you look at the leading Democratic voices like Ilhan Omar and Jasmine Crockett who have gone out to smear Charlie before he’s even had his funeral,” Jennings said.

RELATED: Scott Jennings obliterates liberal spin on Kirk’s suspected assassin: ‘The evidence here is overwhelming!’

“When I hear people say we need to come together and both sides need to turn down the rhetoric, a lot of people saying that need to look inward right now,” Jennings continued. “I was shocked at that — well, I guess I shouldn’t say I was shocked by her, but I was a little stunned by it, by what happened this morning.”

He reiterated the point when he posted video of his response to his social media account.

“It’s a day of mourning for millions of Americans. For a hateful few — it’s a day for division, race baiting & slander of a man who did nothing but engage in good faith debate and civil discourse,” Jennings wrote.

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President Trump has rightly demanded accountability from Attorney General Pam Bondi for her “safety dance” tenure at the Department of Justice. That same spirit of accountability, however, must also apply to the president himself — and one of his judicial nominees simply will not do.

Rebecca Taibleson, nominated for the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, donated to ActBlue, Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign, and Kamala Harris’ 2015 Senate run. She is 42 years old. If confirmed, she could shape precedent against conservatives for decades. So why is he nominating her?

If we will not get serious now, with the blood of a martyr fresh on the ground, then we never will.

This pick occurred before Charlie Kirk’s assassination. In its aftermath, it looks even worse in the shadow of what appears to be more transgender-inspired mayhem. The American Family Association notes that Taibleson has supported groups that promote transgender ideology and was married by a rabbi known for the same.

At a time when transgender-inspired violence has spilled blood in the streets, why reward someone who aligns with its cultural enablers?

The problem runs deeper than one nomination. Taibleson’s record reflects a broader crisis: a culture that has embraced a godless void and passed it to the next generation. Charlie Kirk offered a different path: “Get married, have children, build a legacy, pass down your values, pursue the eternal, seek true joy.” Taibleson’s worldview instead represents the seedbed that celebrates the demonic and mocks the eternal.

We cannot keep lying to ourselves as conservatives, believing we can compromise on fundamental truths and still win on technical ground like law or medicine. COVID and the transgender movement exposed what happens when “experts” cut themselves off from God. They justify usurpations of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the name of juvenile feelings. Taibleson’s credentials suggest she would stand with them.

My thoughts for Charlie’s widow and children do not permit me to soften the point. Decades of half-measures and triangulation have only led to more disorder, more ruin. The slippery slope of compromise is undefeated — and at the bottom lies a pool of blood.

RELATED: Concrete action the feds, states, and citizenry can take right now to stop the madness

Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images

Look around. In the wake of Kirk’s assassination, have you once thought that the solution to America’s collapse rests with judges like Taibleson? The answer is obvious. Universities, media, and even parts of the legal profession are filled with elites who mock God and demand compliance. They do not offer solutions. They multiply the problem.

C.S. Lewis reminded us that when you realize you are far off course, the responsible action is to turn back and begin again in the right direction. “The man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.” Taibleson does not mark the right direction. She is the kind of figure who burns the map with a smile.

No more rewards for those who despise the truth. If we will not get serious now, with the blood of a martyr fresh on the ground, then we never will.

​Opinion & analysis, Donald trump, Pam bondi, Accountability, Charlie kirk, Justice department, Transgender agenda, Federal judge, Rebecca taibleson, Seventh circuit court, Actblue, Joe biden, Godless, C.s. lewis, Martyrdom 

The murder of Ukrainian immigrant Iryna Zarutska by a man wielding nothing but a knife is a story that “Steve Deace Show” executive producer Aaron McIntire believes “broke containment” — leading to the mass show of respect that followed for Charlie Kirk.

“The left couldn’t wait to get off of that story,” he says. “Well, we got off of that story with the bullet through the neck of the most prominent conservative influencer and voice in this country. And that story could not be contained either.”

Human beings, McIntire explains, are not “wired to see what we saw multiple times last week.”

“Now I just think because of everything that we saw last week that penetrated the normie water table to the extent that it did … those people are either going to side with us or they’re going to say nothing at all and not push against us,” he says.

“And I’ll just say this. I would bet my house; I would bet Matt’s house without his permission, Steve’s house without his permission, Todd’s house without his permission. I would bet all of our houses that this is a movement,” he adds.

While some might believe the response to Charlie Kirk’s assassination is purely “an emotional moment,” McIntire truly believes it is not.

And BlazeTV host Steve Deace agrees, chiming in, “Well said.”

But Deace believes the right does need to keep the momentum going, as well as watch out for what could derail it, in order to keep the movement strong.

“The number-one thing the right needs to do, is, after Charlie is laid to rest, not destroy itself over Israel and the Jews and anti-Semitism. And I think there are some people that are going to try to take advantage of not having someone of Charlie’s intelligence and the magnitude of his platform that could play a buffer between these two sides and maybe try to exacerbate this debate to an existential level,” Deace explains.

“And so I think that we need to make sure we don’t immediately come out of this with all this unity and momentum and then immediately step on a rake and destroy one another with this,” he says. “It’ll be a generational mistake.”

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Democrats closed schools unnecessarily during COVID. Five years later, test scores continue to plummet. And now, unions and their allies oppose school choice with even greater intensity than ever.

This hostility toward parental choice has been the Democrat stance for decades, but since 2019 the consequences have become unmistakable. The numbers are in, and they are damning.

Red states emphasized learning; blue states kowtowed to union demands.

The first National Assessment of Educational Progress report since the pandemic shows American high-school seniors graduating in 2024 performed worse than their 2019 peers in both math and reading.

Seniors scoring at or above the “proficient” level dropped from 37% to 35% in reading and from 24% to 22% in math. The number of seniors failing even “basic” math climbed from 40% to 45%, while those below the basic reading level rose from 30% to 32%.

As The 74, an education-focused outlet, reported: COVID “took a bite out of already declining basic skills” and left seniors “reading and doing math worse than any senior class of the past generation.”

The class of 2024 spent nearly four years under lockdowns, masks, remote learning, and chronic absenteeism. By March 25, 2020, every public school in the country was closed, locking out 50.8 million students.

Stephen Macedo and Frances Lee, in “In Covid’s Wake: How Our Politics Failed Us,” described these closures as “the most extensive and lengthy disruption to education in history.”

Unions kept classrooms shut

What Macedo and Lee underplay is the role of the American Federation of Teachers and its president, Randi Weingarten.

The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic concluded in its final report that many schools “remained closed because of AFT and Ms. Weingarten’s political interference” in the Biden administration’s reopening guidance.

That interference persisted despite mounting evidence that children were at low risk for serious illness and transmitted the virus less than adults. Early reports from Iceland and even the World Health Organization’s initial findings from Wuhan confirmed as much.

Instead of leading America’s schools back to normal operations, the AFT insisted that closures remain the default. The result: The U.S. more closely resembled developing nations than its advanced democratic peers.

The establishment’s response

Faced with the lowest test scores in a generation, the education establishment has not offered reform. Instead, it calls for more unions.

The 74 reported earlier this month that school administrator unions have expanded since COVID, with 11 new locals across eight states. It also noted strikes and strike threats in Washington state and Philadelphia, along with lawsuits from teachers’ unions trying to block school voucher programs as unconstitutional.

In short, the very groups that prolonged school closures now demand more money and more power, while students pay the price.

Spending more, learning less

The U.S. spent $15,500 per student in 2019 (adjusted to 2021 dollars), 38% more than the OECD average, while delivering worse outcomes. Yet unions still fight to preserve their monopoly and to block competition from private or charter schools.

But school choice is breaking through. As of May 2025, 35 states offer some form of private school choice program, most with more than one. Of those states, 27 voted for Trump in 2024. Among the 15 states without school choice, 11 voted for Harris.

The pattern is clear: The longest lockdowns happened in blue states, where Democratic leaders sided with unions over students.

RELATED: Stop blaming schools — the crisis starts in America’s homes

ljubaphoto via iStock/Getty Images

Federalism’s hard lesson

Macedo and Lee note that “lengthier school closures had strong political support in Democratic-leaning jurisdictions.” The Sunlight Policy Center of New Jersey measured the impact:

Red states (that voted for Trump in 2020) provided in-person instruction for 74.5% of the 2020-21 school year, while blue states (that voted for Biden) only provided in-person instruction for 37.6% of the time. Put another way, children in red states got 134 days of in-person instruction versus 68 days for blue state children. The bottom line: Red state kids got almost twice the number of in-person days than blue state kids during the school year. That’s an enormous difference in learning.

The bottom line: Red states emphasized learning; blue states kowtowed to union demands.

The takeaway

American seniors may be falling behind in math and reading, but the country has gained a civics lesson: Federalism matters. Where unions dictate policy, students suffer. Where parents have choices, students have opportunities.

The fight for school choice isn’t only about better scores. It’s about protecting families from the kind of educational malpractice that wrecked a generation of learning.

​Opinion & analysis, Covid-19, School choice, School closures, Learning loss, Naep, Reading, Math, Standardized test, Skills gap, Coronavirus pandemic, Congress, National assessment of educational progress, American federation of teachers, Aft, Randi weingarten, Lockdowns, Masks, Strikes, Constitution, Lawsuits, Red states, Blue states, Sunlight policy center, Federalism 

On Friday, President Trump signed a proclamation entitled “Restriction of Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers,” to many people’s excitement. However, the White House subsequently issued a clarification that appears to frustrate many people’s expectations about the order, leading to outcries of confusion over the weekend.

The order detailed the White House’s plan to impose a $100,000 fee on H-1B visa applications — a much heavier financial burden on the employer than the previous total of roughly $10,000 in fees, as Blaze News previously reported. It was expected that this new fee would shift hiring incentives back toward American workers rather than imported foreign labor, primarily from India, through visa programs.

‘The problem is that he missed the ones that already entered. … No more half measures.’

However, confusion over the announcement spread when a clip emerged of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, standing next to President Trump in the Oval Office, repeatedly saying that the new $100,000 fee would apply annually to H-1B visa holders.

“$100,000 per year,” Lutnick emphasized.

RELATED: American jobs first: Hefty new H-1B visa fee will likely curb legal immigration, especially from India

Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

According to the White House’s clarification, the $100,000 fee is a one-time fee that applies only to new H-1B visa applications. It also does not prevent any current visa holder from traveling in or out of the United States.

The White House’s clarification described this proclamation as “an important, initial, and incremental step to reform the H-1B visa program to curb abuses and protect American workers.”

The comments under White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s post about the clarification were overwhelmingly negative.

“The problem is that he missed the ones that already entered. Trump campaigned on sending them all back. Now it’s time to SEND THEM ALL BACK. No more half measures,” journalist August Takala quipped.

While the clarification was likely prompted by mixed messaging from members of the administration, more clarification may be necessary to understand why the measures against the fraud and abuse of the H-1B visas are not more stringent.

“President Trump promised to put American workers first, and this commonsense action does just that by discouraging companies from spamming the system and driving down American wages. It also gives certainty to American businesses who actually want to bring high-skilled workers to our great country but have been trampled on by abuses of the system,” White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers told Blaze News.

“The text of the Proclamation is very clear and it is unfortunate that uninformed reporters and corporate lawyers attempted to sow chaos and confusion. Americans have another reason to celebrate unprecedented action by President Trump to protect Americans from cheap, foreign labor.”

Blaze News contacted the commerce secretary’s press office but did not receive a response before publication.

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​Politics, Press secretary karoline leavitt, Commerce secretary howard lutnick, H-1b visas, Indians, H-1b visa fraud, White house, Trump, President donald trump 

People from across the globe gathered in Arizona on Sunday to honor the life of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. Attendees listened to heartfelt speeches from those closest to him, including his wife, Erika Kirk.

During a memorial event hosted at the Arizona Cardinals’ State Farm Stadium in Glendale, the crowd erupted with applause when Mrs. Kirk shared a powerful message to her late husband’s alleged assassin.

‘I think that she’s built very different, and I think that’s because of Jesus Christ.’

“Charlie passionately wanted to reach and save the lost boys of the West — the young men who feel like they have no direction, no purpose, no faith, and no reason to live. … He wanted to save young men just like the one who took his life,” she stated, referring to suspected assassin Tyler Robinson.

“I forgive him.”

Attendees shared their reactions to her speech with Blaze News after the event concluded.

“She was very humble and courageous when she should be torn and upset. It made me bawl; it made me cry my eyes out that she forgave that young man. And that’s what we need to do — forgive him,” one man stated. “Others that have that kind of hate, we’ve just got to shower them with love moving forward for Charlie’s honor.”

One woman described Mrs. Kirk’s speech as “heartfelt” and “raw.”

“I felt as though I could feel that emotion. Not only through her, but Charlie’s legacy and what’s going to happen for our future, not only for this nation, but for Jesus Christ,” she said. “I feel motivated, and I also feel more [motivated] to pray for this nation.”

RELATED: ‘I forgive him’: Erika Kirk’s powerful message to Charlie’s alleged assassin

Image source: Blaze Media

A woman who attended with her sister stated that Mrs. Kirk’s speech made them feel “empowered.”

“We have also lost our dad, and so we know the pain, and we feel really sympathetic for her,” she stated. “It gave us a newfound strength because Lord knows we were not as strong as she was during that whole time. And I can’t believe for her to have the courage to forgive someone, 11 days after they murdered your husband, is something that I would spend the rest of my life trying to get over.”

“We give her the biggest blessings, encouragement, and we’re so happy to watch her and support her,” she added.

“The amount of strength that it took to actually forgive, I was reflecting on it in my own life,” one man stated after the event. “I give her just the ultimate praise and credit for it.”

“I want to get to a point where I can forgive people for their actions. It’s tough when you know what kind of evil’s really out there,” he added. “I’m really proud of her. I pray for her to have the strength that she needs. I think she has it. I think that she’s built very different, and I think that’s because of Jesus Christ.”

RELATED: ‘Charlie brought the truth’: Vance, RFK Jr., and Trump Jr. honor Charlie Kirk’s fight and passion

Image source: Blaze Media

“I was fighting tears the whole time,” another attendee told Blaze News.

A man who attended the memorial with his wife stated that it feels like a new era in American life.

“It really is a turning point for everybody,” he said. “It’s bringing people back to Christ. That’s what we need in this country.”

BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey reacted to Sunday’s speeches in a post on X.

“There was a big contrast between Erika’s forgiveness speech and [White House Deputy Chief of Staff] Stephen Miller’s ‘destroy our enemies’ speech. Exactly as it should be. It is our job to forgive, not the government’s. Christians give grace; the government wields the sword (Romans 13). We turn the other cheek; the government punishes evil,” Stuckey wrote.

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A male is claiming he’s the former Texas State University student who was forced out of the college last week after getting caught on video mocking Charlie Kirk’s assassination during a vigil for the slain Christian conservative activist — and he’s begging for money on GoFundMe.

In the video, the student is first seen in the crowd saying, “Charlie Kirk got it in the neck!” before slapping the right side of his neck, pretending to convulse, and uttering a number of words that had to be bleeped out of the clip. Some observers are heard laughing at the student.

‘Complaining that he was expelled for his words, while mocking a man that was murdered for his words. Grow up, take responsibility, and try and be a good human being.’

Seconds later, the student walked up to the front of the crowd to an elevated position under a statue and announced to those gathered in front of him, “My name is Charlie Kirk,” before again slapping the right side of his neck and falling to the ground. As the student walked back into the crowd, he spit on the ground near others and is heard saying in an unredacted video, “F**k that [N-word].”

Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott reacted on X to video of the mocking student by writing, “Hey, Texas State. This conduct is not accepted at our schools. Expel this student immediately. Mocking assassination[s] must have consequences.”

RELATED: ‘I don’t want your salvation! I want you to f**king die!’ Student prayer vigil for Charlie Kirk hit with ‘pure evil’

The school issued a statement Tuesday from President Kelly Damphousse saying, “The university has identified the student in the disturbing video from Monday’s event. I will not tolerate behavior that mocks, trivializes, or promotes violence on our campuses. It is antithetical to our TXST values. The individual is no longer a student at TXST.”

Two days later, an individual who identified himself as Devion Canty Jr. launched a GoFundMe campaign to “help me cover the costs of pursuing my education elsewhere or taking the necessary steps to return to Texas State.”

More from the GoFundMe description:

Recently, I faced a situation where I had to choose between immediate expulsion or withdrawing from the university. I made the decision to withdraw — not because I wanted to leave, but for my own safety and the well-being of the campus community.

Unfortunately, the only public narrative out there is that I am an ‘out-of-control, disrespectful young Black man.’ In reality, I am a passionate student who made a mistake in the heat of the moment after being repeatedly disrespected — spit on, called racial slurs, and witnessing women being cursed at and pushed around. I spoke up, and while I recognize my actions weren’t perfect, I did not harm anyone.

As of Monday morning, Canty’s GoFundMe has generated nearly $25,000 in donations; the goal was $15,000.

In addition, Texas State’s Black Men United advertised Canty’s GoFundMe campaign on Instagram and added the following statement:

Please support with whatever you can our brother in his fight to return to Texas State University. He was arbitrarily forced to withdraw under pressure from the governor of the state and the many threats to his life. The administration in a completely unprofessional and unprecedented manner presented him with a ‘Mafia’-style option of withdraw or be expelled. Mr. Canty earned his way into this university and deserved better treatment and due process from the university. We demand not only that he is allowed to return as a student but that the students who spewed racial vitriol at him at the statues are expelled immediately as they are the TRUE danger to this campus!

Several commenters didn’t exactly see it that way:

“Well, you now know what accountability is. You CHOSE to behave this way and mock the murder of a God-fearing man, who stood up for everyone in this country. I hope you have learned a valuable lesson. What you did on campus was disgusting,” one commenter wrote. “IF this had happened to a family member or friend of YOURS, you would be disgusted that someone would mock their murder the way you did. I pray that God opens your eyes and heart that Charlie’s wife is a WIDOW at age 31. Has two babies ages 3 and 1 years old. Charlie would have happily spoken with you, encouraged YOU to be a better young man and human.””Complaining that he was expelled for his words, while mocking a man that was murdered for his words,” another commenter added. “Grow up, take responsibility, and try and be a good human being.””There a PO Box to send flowers?” another commenter quipped.”‘I felt like I had no choice but to leave for my safety’ now help me raise money to return to the same college I felt unsafe at,” another commenter said. “What a clown.”

As readers of Blaze News likely already know, an unhinged Texas Tech student was expelled after getting caught on video mocking and accosting a Charlie Kirk supporter. She then allegedly unleashed physical attacks and was soon arrested and charged with assault.

RELATED: Major college fires worker after posts celebrating Charlie Kirk’s assassination. It’s just the tip of ugly leftist iceberg.

What’s more, New York University’s College Republicans organized a vigil following Kirk’s assassination and were met with hostility, including protesters who got physical with vigil attendees and one guitar player who — after club President Ryan Leonard said he’d pray for his salvation — blurted out a demented song: “I don’t want your salvation! I want you to f**king die! We’re not gonna give you a second chance, even when you beg for it, on your knees, begging and pleading!”

Here’s the clip, which is used with permission from @nyurepublicans on X. Content warning: Language:

— (@)

“To interrupt a solemn vigil full of grieving young people who were trying to honor the life of an inspiration and mentor they looked up to is pure evil, and we will not let them intimidate us into silence,” Leonard later said in a statement. “We will go even harder to honor the life and legacy of Charlie Kirk.”

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President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that he is designating “ANTIFA, A SICK, DANGEROUS, RADICAL LEFT DISASTER, AS A MAJOR TERRORIST ORGANIZATION.”

The president noted further that he will strongly recommend that those caught funding this decentralized anarcho-communist militant group be “thoroughly investigated in accordance with the highest legal standards and practices.”

Trump’s renewed interest in cracking down on leftist terrorists has inspired some political leaders across the Atlantic to follow suit.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who years ago passed a series of “Stop Soros” laws criminalizing the promotion and support of illegal immigration, noted on Friday, “We will take steps to designate Antifa as a terrorist organization in Hungary. They’ve attacked peaceful people in the streets, leaving some severely injured, then have the audacity to scold us from the European Parliament. This is unacceptable.”

‘Alignment with the United States — the world’s leading actor in the fight against terrorism — is indispensable.’

Orbán was referring to the February 2023 attacks in which Antifa thugs, primarily from Germany, descended on Budapest and targeted numerous individuals who supposedly looked like members of the hard right.

While several of the leftist thugs responsible for the savage attacks were able to flee the country and avoid extradition, Italian national Ilaria Salis was captured by local police.

Salis dodged accountability because of her subsequent election as a member of the European Parliament in the Greens and Left Alliance. On Tuesday, the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs will reportedly decide whether to waive Salis’ political immunity and thereby enable Hungary to reopen her criminal case.

RELATED: Media tries to protect Antifa with tired al-Qaeda talking points

AMY OSBORNE/AFP via Getty Images

Orbán expressed gratitude to Trump “for taking the lead, calling them what they are: terrorists.”

Péter Szijjártó, the Hungarian minister of foreign affairs, sent a letter on Saturday to Kaja Kallas, vice president of the European Commission, stressing that “the Antifa movement constitutes a grave threat to the security of the citizens of the European Union and its Member Sates. It is therefore our shared responsibility to strengthen our collective response.”

Citing Trump’s recognition of Antifa’s terroristic nature, Szijjártó stressed that “Hungary is convinced that on an issue of such significance[,] alignment with the United States — the world’s leading actor in the fight against terrorism — is indispensable.”

Szijjártó urged the European Union to follow Trump’s example by adding Antifa to the EU list of terrorist organizations and by imposing “the necessary restrictive measures on groups and individuals connected to it.”

There have been other attempts in recent years to put Antifa on the EU terrorist list, but there appears to be greater momentum behind the initiative this time around.

Last week in the Netherlands, the Dutch parliament passed a motion requesting that the government recognize Antifa as a terrorist organization.

The motion, co-sponsored by Geert Wilders, chairman of the Party for Freedom, apparently noted that Antifa thugs “are also active in our country, threatening politicians, disrupting meetings, intimidating students and journalists, and not shying away from using violence.”

Dutch politician Thierry Baudet, the leader of the right-leaning Forum for Democracy party, stated, “Enough is enough! The violent and criminal terrorist organisation that is Antifa, with chapters all over the world, will finally be OUTLAWED in the Netherlands. This is just the beginning.”

Kyle Shideler, director and senior analyst at the Center for Security Policy, recently told Blaze News editor in chief Matthew Peterson on “Blaze News: The Mandate” that the optimal way forward for the Trump administration to effectively crack down on Antifa at home is to designate foreign Antifa groups as terrorists, link them to international Antifa networks, then target U.S.-based groups connected to the network.

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​Antifa, Anti-fascist, Leftism, Leftist, Terrorist, Terrorism, Hungary, Netherlands, Dutch, Donald trump, Crackdown, Law, Law enforcement, Politics 

In 2009, Glenn Beck was threatened by billionaire powerbroker George Soros.

“Your boss is hurting my boss, and it will end,” one of Soros’ goons told Joel Cheatwood, who at the time served as the founding chief content officer at the Blaze.

“And when Joel said, ‘No, I don’t think that’s going to end. I know my boss, and I don’t think he’s going to stop,’ [Soros’ man] said, ‘I don’t think you understand. He is going to stop, and you should just let your boss know that the ship is about to sail,”’ Glenn recalls.

But it’s what came next that is perhaps most unnerving. The henchman added, “Everything that is needed is on board, and everyone’s getting onto the boat, and it’s about to set sail, and you do not want to be left on the dock, but it’s setting sail, and it’s going to leave, and your boss and you people are not going to be on it.”

Today, 16 years later, that cryptic omen is now manifesting before our very eyes.

France’s government just collapsed earlier this month when former Prime Minister François Bayrou lost a confidence vote in the National Assembly over his proposed austerity budget to tackle the country’s ballooning debt and rising borrowing costs.

Predictably, the mainstream media is circulating the narrative that France’s financial predicament is the result of decades of deficit spending, COVID-era bailouts, and rising interest costs. But the truth couldn’t be more obvious: This the Cloward-Piven plan on full display.

France’s welfare system has been intentionally overwhelmed in order to collapse the system, and the country’s record migrant numbers have been a critical step in this process.

“What’s happening with France here is exactly what happened in New York City — what Cloward and Piven did in New York City back in the ’70s,” says Glenn’s head researcher Jason Buttrill.

France’s current financial crisis was “the point” of the nation’s open borders agenda, says Glenn — and so is the anarchy that’s on the horizon. Now that the country is forced to make significant cuts to its social welfare programs, those migrants and far-left extremists aren’t likely to sit idly by.

“When you stop paying them for not working, when all of a sudden all of that goes away, do you think they’re going to be happy about it? Do you think they’re going to not light the streets on fire?” Glenn asks.

But America would be ignorant to look at France’s situation as anything other than a mirror. “We are all on the verge of collapse, and nobody’s recognizing it,” Glenn says.

Like France and the U.K., which has begun “arresting children for wearing T-shirts with the English flag on it,” the United States is also contending with the crime, anti-American movements, and financial strain of the Biden regime’s mass illegal immigration agenda.

“If we don’t wake up soon, [America’s collapse] is going to happen because the entire West is going to collapse,” Glenn cautions.

And that’s what Soros meant when he said the ship is ready: The West has been intentionally teed up to fall into unspeakable darkness.

Glenn warns: “If this socialism thing goes, America, we’re about to see one of the darkest predictions that I have made come true … and that is: If America goes dark with the powers that we have, the technology that we have, the ability that we have, we will make the Nazis look like rookies.”

To hear more, watch the video above.

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Record executive Damon Dash went scorched-earth on a radio show this week and defended President Trump over what he called “ridiculous” and “dumb” commentary.

Dash was the co-founder of Roc-A-Fella Records with Jay-Z. The company launched their careers and was known as a pioneering independent label.

‘Why you think they keep you here? They want y’all to make us dumb!’

Recent reports that claimed that Dash filed for bankruptcy and is strapped for cash sparked several contentious debates when he appeared on “The Breakfast Club” this week.

The Power 105.1 program is known predominantly for its flamboyant host Lenard McKelvey, aka Charlamagne tha God, who was not shy about repeatedly calling Dash “broke” and claiming he is lying about having his assets in order.

When the bankruptcy was brought up, Dash defended himself by saying, “Do you know how many times Donald Trump filed?”

“Oh, a lot,” Charlamagne replied. “He’s known as a terrible businessman.”

Shocked, Dash responded, “He’s the president!”

Still, Charlamagne asserted, “He still is known as a terrible businessman. Actually, a con man.”

Dash then asked the host, “Do you know how confidently dumb you sound?”

Dumbfounded, the mogul continued. “You’re saying it’s bad — he went bankrupt six times. He’s a billionaire, and he’s the president.”

RELATED: Charlamagne shocks audience with admission about ‘that damn COVID shot’

The host pushed forward with the notion that the president is indeed a “terrible businessman and con artist,” but Dash was not having it.

Adamant about clearing his and the president’s name on the matter, Dash said he wanted to “go back to how ridiculous” he felt the host was being.

“The president filed for bankruptcy eight times, still a billionaire. He’s saying he’s a bad businessman. You’re just not that smart.”

Charlamagne and Dash battled for control of the interview’s narrative throughout, with the radio personality continuously calling into question the businessman’s claims, which were predominantly about how he has protected unseen wealth and assets by putting them under other names and businesses.

Some of Dash’s most pointed comments were aimed at Charlamagne’s job, which has kept him cooped up in a radio studio most days for years.

“You’ve missed the whole world,” Dash claimed.

RELATED: The market fired Jimmy Kimmel

Damon Dash and Jay-Z at the Grammys in 2002. Photo by Ray Mickshaw/WireImage

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. And you’re saying it confidently,” Dash said. “And you’re in an algorithm where people actually believe you.”

Dash then put the nail in the coffin, calling the team of broadcasters a tool for the establishment.

“Why you think they keep you here? They want y’all to make us dumb!”

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​Rap, Align, Hip hop, Charlamagne tha god, Damon dash, Jay-z, Trump, Radio, Power 105.1, New york, Entertainment 

Madi Prewett Troutt is known by most of the country for her stint on “The Bachelor” — which began with her friends submitting her name without her approval.

“I was 23 years old living in Alabama, and I was going through Bible college at the time,” Troutt tells BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey on “Relatable.”

“I’m hanging out with these girls. I come over, and they’re all watching ‘The Bachelor.’ I immediately start judging them, Allie. I’m going to be really honest with you, I started judging them, and I was like, ‘You guys, we have to turn this off, why are we watching this show?’ And I had never watched it before,” Troutt explains.

“I just knew it was reality TV. So I was like, ‘OK, this is probably trash.’ … They make a joke: ‘You should go on the show, you would be great on the show,’” she continues.

Troutt shrugged them off as they “laughed in the corner,” but then months later, she got a call from a random number.

It was “The Bachelor,” and they wanted her on the show.

While Troutt was ready to turn it down, her mother told her to “pray about it,” and that’s when she began considering it — though she believed God would tell her no.

“And over the course of a couple of months, ironically, I kept feeling a pull to say yes,” she says.

“I hadn’t really watched an episode before, maybe one or two after I said yes to kind of prep for it and went in with just an open mind, open hands, thinking, ‘I’m here to share the gospel with the girls on the show,’” she explains.

“Looking back, I so see how the Lord has used it and even grown me so much in my faith and dependence in Him. And it’s truly crazy the opportunities and moments that I had even behind the scenes filming the show with producers and with the girls to get to just talk about Jesus,” she tells Stuckey.

“They would see me reading my Bible. They would see me, you know, praying and not gossiping and not dressing a certain way and not drinking and these things and would be curious about it and just would ask questions. And it just was really cool in a culture of there being such compromise and competition to just say, ‘Hey, I know who I am in Christ, and I’m not here to, you know, steal a rose from you or anything like that,’” she says.

Toward the end of the show, the remaining few girls are asked to stay the night at the bachelor’s fantasy suite, where there’s an implication of sexual impurity. Troutt refused to partake in it and explained to the bachelor that she was saving herself for marriage.

“I think it was really cool how the Lord used that and then when it aired, you know, getting to take a stand for Jesus and for my purity,” she says.

“I just remember being so prayerful about it because I was like, I know a lot of people are going to be watching this who aren’t believers,” she continues, adding, “And I don’t want to come across as judgmental at all, but I also know my values and my convictions that I’m unwilling to compromise in.”

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.

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The world is cutting cords at every opportunity. Wireless has become the default. Faster, cheaper, and more convenient beats wired every time. Consumers know it. Industry knows it. Government, as usual, lags far behind.

Americans used a record 132 trillion megabytes of wireless data in 2024. That follows 100 trillion in 2023, 74 trillion in 2022, and 53 trillion in 2021. The trajectory isn’t slowing. Artificial intelligence alone will accelerate demand.

Cutting cords makes life easier. Cutting government waste would, too.

Why the stampede to wireless? Because the technology now outpaces wired service. Fifth-generation networks can deliver speeds 20 times faster than 4G LTE. Sixth generation promises to be up to 100 times faster still.

Consumers are responding. More than one million Americans cut the cord on cable internet in 2024. Less than half of all cord-cutters now rely on cable providers for home service. The trend is irreversible.

Even cable companies acknowledge it when they install Wi-Fi routers after stringing fiber into a home. Wireless is the product people actually use.

Government’s fiber fetish

Everyone is adapting — except government. Because government is just that stupid.

State officials still funnel billions into fiber even as private-sector wireless has already done the job.

Barack Obama himself declared victory in 2015: 98% of Americans connected to high-speed wireless. At the time, average speeds were 10 Mbps. Today, average wireless speeds reach 155 Mbps — more than 15 times faster. The private market delivered that progress.

RELATED: Trump nukes Biden’s broadband gimmick, saving taxpayers billions

imagedepotpro via iStock/Getty Images

Yet in 2025, states like Louisiana and Virginia plan to spend 80% of their federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program dollars on fiber. That program carries a $42.5 billion price tag. Fiber may be reliable in limited contexts, but it is costly and slow to deploy. Starlink has flagged projects with per-household connection costs exceeding $10,000. That’s not infrastructure — it’s idiocy.

The mismanagement is staggering. The BEAD program, launched in 2021, has yet to connect a single person. By late 2024, the score was still zero. Another year has passed, and states remain bogged down in bids and bureaucracy. Meanwhile, nearly every American has been online for a decade.

The market already won

Wireless continues to do the work. It connects homes, cars, and devices at ever-increasing speeds. The private sector solved the access problem years ago. The government now wastes hundreds of billions pretending to fix a problem that no longer exists.

That money buys ribbon-cuttings, not results. It funds reports and grants, not connections. It props up a fiber fetish that ignores how people live and work.

The pattern is clear: When consumers get to choose, they choose wireless. When politicians get to spend, they throw billions at fiber networks no one needs.

The market has spoken. Government refuses to listen. Cutting cords makes life easier. Cutting government waste would, too.

​Opinion & analysis, Fiber internet, Barack obama, Joe biden, Wireless, Internet, Bead program, Diversity equity inclusion, Government waste, Taxes, Government spending, Infrastructure, Boondoggle