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‘Neither artificial nor intelligent’: Physicist Lawrence Krauss casts doubt on AI’s capabilities

Theoretical physicist and cosmologist Lawrence Krauss says artificial intelligence is great at producing hype, but he isn’t completely sold on its alleged potential.

Krauss is a renowned scientist who has taught at Arizona State University, at Yale University, and on other faculties, and recently lamented how diversity, equity, and inclusion has stifled scientific progression and, more generally, scientific excellence.

In an interview with Blaze News, Krauss commented on the perception that AI will spawn a global reckoning and what he sees as the true concerns about the emerging technology.

‘You’re gonna displace a lot of people’s jobs, and that wealth is gonna go into one place.’

Getting to the truth means “one has to cut through the hype,” Krauss said about AI. “Every new development has risks and benefits. And we have to think carefully about what those are.”

The scientist continued, “I’m not as concerned as some people are, but partly because I think that AI is neither artificial nor intelligent at this point, and I think we’re a long way from artificial general intelligence.”

While most AI chat bots “beautifully regurgitate” information found online, Krauss described, they still are not representative of a sentient intelligence. Still, Krauss said he has real concerns about AI, but they are more in regard to the average worker than they are about AI taking over the world.

RELATED: Rice University offers ‘Afrochemistry’ course to address ‘inequities in chemistry’ and ‘understand black life’

Lawrence Krauss, July 2025. Image by Blaze News.

While AI may not be on the cusp of world domination, Krauss said that what he does worry about is wealth becoming concentrated in such a way that a select few companies can dominate their sectors by utilizing AI “light-years ahead” of their competition.

“You’re gonna displace a lot of people’s jobs, and that wealth is gonna go into one place,” he explained.

The physicist claimed that in a perfect world, AI would do menial tasks and free up humanity’s time to expand their horizons and increase productivity and wealth where it matters.

“If it was somehow spread so people benefited from that development, it’d be fine,” Krauss stated. “But I suspect what’s gonna happen is — and we already see it happening — is that mega-wealthy individuals and companies will develop … AIs that allow them to access a huge amount of resources and wealth.”

Not recognizing this could displace many workers and cause “huge dislocations of society,” Krauss added. “That could be a problem.”

RELATED: AI faces death by a thousand state regulations

Bill Gates speaks about Microsoft Copilot AI in Redmond, Washington, US, on Friday, April 4, 2025. Photographer: David Ryder/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Krauss stressed that literacy in emerging technology is about as important as teaching critical thinking skills. Drawing from his battles with DEI in academic settings, Krauss said it was paramount to “teach people how to search critically and question what they see” while looking broadly at a myriad of sources.

“You know, it used to be we teach some facts in schools, but facts aren’t as important as the ability to think critically and be able to tell the wheat from the chaff.”

Concluding that there’s a lot of good and a lot of bad whenever a new technology captivates society, if you can’t tell the difference between truth and fiction, “you’re in trouble,” Krauss said.

Krauss’ latest book, “The War on Science: Thirty-Nine Renowned Scientists and Scholars Speak Out About Current Threats to Free Speech, Open Inquiry, and the Scientific Process,” is now available.

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Trump is listening: Finding out what Ghislaine Maxwell knows

The Department of Justice has suddenly appeared to be making some serious headway in the Epstein case, as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has taken the time to interview Epstein’s convicted associate, Ghislaine Maxwell.

“Justice demands courage. For the first time, the Department of Justice is reaching out to Ghislaine Maxwell to ask: What do you know?” Blanche wrote in a post on X.

Despite the positive optics, BlazeTV host Liz Wheeler hasn’t totally forgiven the DOJ just yet.

“How do we even react to this? How about someone ask Attorney General Pam Bondi, ‘How exactly did you conclude that there was no client list, no blackmail operation, and that Epstein definitively committed suicide with the Department of Justice having never ever spoken to Ghislaine Maxwell?” Wheeler asks on “The Liz Wheeler Show.”

“You might be wondering, ‘Why is Liz not happy about this development that the Department of Justice is actually going to pursue an interview with Ghislaine Maxwell,’ who, by the way, is the only person serving in prison for anything related to Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes against children,” she continues.

While it’s taken far too long for progress to be made, Wheeler is “grateful” that the DOJ seems to have heard concerns like her own.

“Your voices, they make a difference,” Wheeler says. “And I feel like when those of us in President Trump’s base or just those of us as American citizens, as voters, when we raise our voices and let our opinions be known, sometimes it feels like we’re just shouting into the void.”

“And I want to assure you as someone who is both part of the base and standing beside you, but someone who also has a view into the inside, you are not shouting into the void,” she continues, adding, “President Trump is listening to his base.”

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Trump’s CIA director has bad news for Hillary Clinton regarding alleged ‘treasonous conspiracy’

President Donald Trump acknowledged on Friday that former President Barack Obama is likely to dodge accountability for his role in the Russian collusion hoax on account of the U.S. Supreme Court’s July 1, 2024, immunity for official acts ruling in Trump v. United States.

Trump suggested, however, that the high court’s ruling “doesn’t help the people around him at all” — an allusion to those Obama cabalists who hatched, then perpetuated the Russian collusion hoax on the American people.

The FBI has, for instance, launched a criminal investigation into ex-CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey for perjury and potentially other crimes related to the Trump-Russia hoax. Former DNI James Clapper indicated he would “lawyer up” after Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard referred damning documents detailing the genesis of the hoax’s manufacture under Obama to the Department of Justice.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe hinted Sunday that twice-failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton might also face the music over her apparent hand in what Gabbard has referred to as an alleged “treasonous conspiracy.”

Quick recap

Ratcliffe ordered a review in May of the “procedures and analytic tradecraft employed” when drafting the January 2017 intelligence Community Assessment, a document created at Obama’s urging that served as the cornerstone of the Russian collusion hoax and set the stage for arrests, impeachments, and years of politically expedient smears.

Late last month, Ratcliffe released the findings of that review, noting that there were “multiple procedural anomalies” in the production of the January 2017 ICA, including “a highly compressed production timeline, stringent compartmentation, and excessive involvement of agency heads.”

RELATED: Declassified report: Obama’s FBI failed to search key evidence in Clinton email probe

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images

The memo noted further that the Obama administration sacrificed analytical soundness in the interest of “narrative consistency.”

More has since been revealed about the genesis of the hoax thanks in part to Gabbard’s publication of a damning House Intelligence Committee majority staff report.

The previously classified House report confirmed that: the ICA was a work of fiction drawn up by the Obama administration with the aim of kneecapping the democratically elected Republican president; credible evidence available in January 2017 contradicted the narrative advanced in the ICA; and that contrary to Brennan’s suggestion in public and sworn testimonies, the Steele dossier — a political opposition research report paid for in part by the Clinton campaign — was included in the ICA.

Clinton might take another tumble

Ratcliffe suggested on Sunday that additional documents link Clinton to the development of the Russian collusion hoax.

“Part of what came out last week was about how John Brennan, Clapper, Comey, they all pushed the known-fake Steele dossier into intelligence community assessments and as the basis for Crossfire Hurricane and all that,” he told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo. “But what hasn’t come out yet, and what’s going to come out, is the underlying intelligence that I have spent the last few months making recommendations about final declassification — and sent that to the Department of Justice. That will come out in the John Durham report classified annex.”

‘US intelligence intercepted Russian intelligence talking about a Hillary Clinton plan.’

The first Trump DOJ authorized federal prosecutor John Durham in 2019 to explore the origins of Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI’s investigation into the supposed Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

RELATED: If no one goes to jail, the coup was a success

Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images

Durham, who was elevated to special counsel in December 2020, found that:

the FBI utilized “raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence” to open the investigation into the Trump campaign but did not follow the same standard when approaching alleged election interference in relation to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign;the FBI “did not and could not corroborate any of the substantive allegations” made in the Steele dossier of lurid accusations against then-candidate Donald Trump; “neither U.S. nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation”; andthe FBI used the unvetted and unverified Steele reports just days after their receipt “to support probable cause in the FBI’s FISA applications targeting [Carter] Page, a U.S. citizen who, for a period of time, had been an adviser to Trump.”

While a 306-page unclassified report detailing these and other conclusions was released in May 2023, there was a 29-page classified appendix that the public never saw.

A White House source confirmed to Blaze News that “the CIA is declassifying that report in the name of transparency.”

The CIA director told Bartiromo, “In the summer of 2016, U.S. intelligence intercepted Russian intelligence talking about a Hillary Clinton plan — a Hillary Clinton plan to falsely accuse Donald Trump of Russia collusion; to vilify and smear him with what would become known infamously as the Steele dossier.”

‘They conspired against the American people.’

“This intelligence was so explosive that John Brennan briefed President Obama, Vice President Biden, Jim Clapper, James Comey, the entire national security team, telling them about this Hillary Clinton plan,” said Ratcliffe. “That was in August of 2016 and yet it wasn’t until more than four years later, in October of 2020, when I found after an exhaustive search John Brennan’s handwritten notes and the underlying intelligence behind it that revealed exactly what happened.”

Rather than expose the “Clinton plan,” which is taken up at length in the Durham report, the Obama administration apparently used it as a framework.

RELATED: Over target: Panicked liberal media attacks Gabbard’s ‘treasonous conspiracy’ claim

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Citing notes from Brennan, which Ratcliffe declassified in 2020 while serving as DNI, the Durham report indicated that intelligence agencies “obtained insight into Russian intelligence analysis alleging that U.S presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin and the Russians’ hacking of the Democratic National Committee.”

The report emphasized the Clinton plan intelligence was relevant for two reasons:

“first, the Clinton plan intelligence itself and on its face arguably suggested that private actors affiliated with the Clinton campaign were seeking in 2016 to promote a false or exaggerated narrative to the public and to U.S. government agencies about Trump’s possible ties to Russia”; and second, “the Clinton plan intelligence had potential bearing on the reliability and credibility” on the materials provided and funded by the Clinton campaign and/or the DNC used by the FBI when seeking FISA warrants and taking other investigative steps.

According to the Durham report, there was no evidence that the FBI disclosed the contents of the Clinton plan intelligence to the attorneys working on the FISA matters related to Crossfire Hurricane, to the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, or to numerous individuals working on the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.

Ratcliffe indicated on Sunday that the declassified Durham report appendix will show that “part of this was a Hillary Clinton plan but part of it was an FBI plan to be an accelerant to that fake Steele dossier, to those fake Russia collusion claims by pouring oil on the fire, by amplifying the lie and burying the truth of what Hillary Clinton was up to.”

The CIA director noted on Sunday that Clinton, like Brennan and Comey, testified on the subject under oath in recent years, and that “much of that testimony is, frankly, completely inconsistent with what our underlying intelligence that is about to be declassified in the Durham Annex, what that reflects.”

Ratcliffe hinted at legal consequences for Clinton, noting, “Pam Bondi does have a strike force. It is a different Department of Justice, a different FBI, and an opportunity to look at how these people really did conspire to run a hoax, a fraud on the American people and against Donald Trump’s presidency.”

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

“There is no doubt in my mind that the people that we just talked about conspired. They conspired against President Trump. They conspired against the American people,” added Ratcliffe.

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Black Twitter celebrates the passing of Hulk Hogan, Jason Whitlock calls out reverse racism

On July 24, legendary professional wrestler Hulk Hogan died after suffering a cardiac arrest. Reactions to his death have been mixed, with some mourning the loss of an American icon and others cheering the death of an unabashed racist.

Those in the latter group continue to point to a 2007 sex tape leaked in 2015 where Hogan made racially charged comments, repeatedly using the N-word and admitting that he was a “little racist.”

“I mean, I’d rather if she [Hogan’s daughter Brooke] was going to f**k some n*****, I’d rather have her marry an 8-foot-tall n***** worth a hundred million dollars! Like a basketball player! I guess we’re all a little racist,” he said in the leaked footage, which culminated in a lawsuit in which Hogan successfully sued Gawker Media for invasion of privacy.

The racist remarks, however, led to WWE terminating Hogan’s contract and removing him from their Hall of Fame, although he was reinstated in 2018 after issuing apologies and undergoing sensitivity training.

While many have forgiven Hogan for his past comments, “Black Twitter,” says Jason Whitlock, has not.

“They went after Hulk Hogan and trashed him over the [2007] racial rant,” he says.

The fact that Hogan used the forbidden N-word permanently “cancels him” in the eyes of many black people, Jason says, but this mindset, he argues, is just reverse racism.

“If racism or alleged racism or saying the N-word canceled people, virtually all of us would be canceled, and a probably higher percentage of black people would be canceled than white people,” he says. “And that’s not me saying white people are better than black people. That’s me saying the reality is that black people are so comfortable with their anti-white racism.”

“We say it, we use it, we go on national TV and say things that white people would never be allowed to say,” he continues. “We’ve built a society, a culture where black people can be incredibly racist without any consequences, whereas white people cannot be, and Hulk Hogan [is] a prime example of this.”

Several media outlets covering Hogan’s death have claimed that his legacy was destroyed by his 2007 comments and that he will be remembered not as a wrestling and pop culture icon but as a racist. A recent Andscape article claimed that “Hulk Hogan is a self-admitted racist who was caught on tape using the N-word freely on multiple occasions. … When that is part of your legacy, it becomes singularly defining. As a result, Hulk Hogan died being known a racist who also became famous as a professional wrestler.”

“If that’s the standard,” Jason says, “then I guess [my dad is] singularly defined as a racist,” but “my father was much more than that, and Hulk Hogan — much more than that.”

This toxic ideology that a singular mistake or shortcoming defines who a person is (especially a white person) has “led to this racial divide that we have in America,” he says.

Jason notes that he was born in 1967 — a time when race relations “were headed in a positive direction” — but “since the invention of social media, since the takeover of Twitter and the town square, since we all went woke, race relations have been going the opposite direction.”

To hear more of his commentary and analysis, watch the video above.

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Project 2025 architect to challenge Lindsey Graham in 2026 Senate race

As the 2026 midterms loom, some career Republican politicians are facing primary challenges for their long-held positions. Lindsey Graham, who has represented South Carolina in the Senate for four terms, is facing an increasingly crowded field of challengers as he seeks re-election for a fifth term.

Paul Dans, who is known as the architect of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, will reportedly be announcing his bid for Graham’s Senate seat later this week. While Trump has publicly distanced himself from the 1,000-page policy proposal for the new administration, critics and supporters alike have noted that there is a good degree of overlap between Project 2025 and his own “Agenda 47.”

‘If you look at where the chokepoint is, it’s the United States Senate. That’s the headwaters of the swamp.’

Any Republican primary challenge to oust Graham will likely be a steep uphill battle. Trump gave Graham his blessing in a July 9 Truth Social post wishing him a happy birthday, featuring an image of the two of them on the golf course: “I hope everyone in the Great State of South Carolina will help LINDSEY have a BIG WIN in his Re-Election bid next year.”

RELATED: Project 2025 director steps down from Heritage Foundation after pressure from Trump campaign

Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

Graham has faced his share of criticism from Republicans. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) has even called Graham “the ideological twin of Liz Cheney” in the past, showing his frustration with Trump’s support for Graham.

“What we’ve done with Project 2025 is really change the game in terms of closing the door on the progressive era,” Dans said in an AP interview. ”If you look at where the chokepoint is, it’s the United States Senate. That’s the headwaters of the swamp.”

“It’s time to show [Graham] the door,” he added in the interview.

Alongside Dans, former South Carolina Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer announced his campaign for Graham’s Senate seat earlier this month as well as Mark Lynch, who was the first to announce his challenge in February. Both are challenging the incumbent in his primary. Democrat Annie Andrews has also announced her campaign for the seat.

Dans will reportedly be announcing his campaign bid on Wednesday at a prayer breakfast and kickoff event at a Charleston venue.

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Why an Epstein special investigator is a disastrously stupid idea

A small but influential group of Republican politicians and influencers spent the month calling for Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint a special counsel to investigate the Jeffrey Epstein case. They say it’s all in the name of transparency and getting answers. But no special counsel will give them satisfaction. They’re falling into the same trap the Grand Old Party fell into eight years ago. And they’ll end up just as disappointed if they get their wish.

The attorney general appoints special counsels in accordance with a 1999 law seeking to rein in earlier “independent counsels.” Over the course of July, Republican Reps. Lauren Boebert (Colo.), Tim Burchett (Tenn.), Eric Burlison (Mo.), Anna Paulina Luna (Fla.), Scott Perry (Penn.), and Nancy Mace (S.C.) all said one is needed. Mace is expected to announce a run for governor of South Carolina later today. Former White House official Steve Bannon and MAGA activist Laura Loomer joined in their calls.

At this stage, the Epstein story has morphed into something more than a theory. It’s a belief system. And like any belief system, it doesn’t bend easily to facts or ambiguity.

Technically, special counsels answer to the attorney general. Theoretically, they can even be fired for exceeding their authority or failing in their duties. In reality, though, it’s difficult to imagine an attorney general firing a special counsel for just about any reason. Famous recent examples include Robert Mueller, appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein after Attorney General Jeff Sessions was tricked into recusing himself from the Russia hoax, and John Durham, appointed by Attorney General Bill Barr.

There’s a key difference between the two. Durham was appointed to investigate political opponents inside the government or recently inside the government who had abused their powers; Mueller for the White House to investigate itself.

We know how Mueller played out. Republicans were tricked by Democrats and their media allies into thinking all they needed was a little “transparency.” What resulted was a years-long witch hunt that failed to make anything better when it was over and only fed into the seemingly unending Russia news cycle.

And why would a special counsel be needed in this case anyway? The whole point of a special counsel is for the administration to investigate itself when it cannot be trusted to do so. In Mueller’s case, the White House wouldn’t have wanted to expose the crimes supposedly committed. In Durham’s case, the Justice Department couldn’t be trusted to investigate its own malfeasance.

Who can’t be trusted here? Jeffrey Epstein is an outside suspect, zero credible evidence exists that President Trump was involved in statutory rape or was blackmailed, and the Justice Department was entirely capable of conducting this investigation. People just didn’t like the answers.

Suppose the administration caves and names a special counsel to quiet the scandal. That move won’t bury the story — it will extend it. The special counsel will operate with near-total independence, and firing that person would trigger a political firestorm that makes the president look guilty. Instead of resolution, the White House would invite a fresh round of headlines and headaches.

What exactly do we expect a new investigation to find? That a secret cabal of international spies really existed — and that neither Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel, nor Deputy Director Dan Bongino had the authority or means to expose it?

Or maybe the review returns the same disappointing answer the Justice Department gave the first time: no master list of clients. No slam-dunk blackmail evidence. Just a compiled roster of hundreds — possibly thousands — who visited Epstein’s notorious island or crossed paths with him. Many committed no crimes. Others can’t be prosecuted. All risk getting smeared publicly with no way to defend themselves.

The Trump administration’s first misstep came when it raised public expectations. Once that happened, officials had no choice but to present findings. Those findings turned out to be a huge letdown — but realistically, nothing short of declaring, “Jeffrey Epstein ran a blackmail ring with U.S. and Israeli intelligence, was finally arrested for it, and then murdered in prison,” would have satisfied the public.

But what if they couldn’t prove that? What if that isn’t what happened?

At this stage, the Epstein story has morphed into something more than a theory. It’s a belief system. And like any belief system, it doesn’t bend easily to facts or ambiguity. The White House now faces an impossible task: telling true believers that the smoking gun doesn’t exist. A special counsel won’t solve that problem. It might make it worse.

Instead, it would drag this true-crime, high-drama political saga out even further. No special counsel wraps up his investigation in under a year, so while Democrats and their friends in the press have finally seized on an issue that hurts Trump, they’ll get to keep it going far longer.

Appointing a special counsel guarantees one of two outcomes for Republicans: Either they head into the midterms with an open investigation clouding the race, or it wraps just in time to blow up again before Election Day. That’s not transparency — it’s political malpractice. And not the kind committed out of necessity, but to placate a base that won’t accept anything short of perp walks this investigation will never deliver.

Have you heard the one about the Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorist who dies and goes to heaven? God tells him, “You can ask me one question.”

“Who killed President John F. Kennedy?” the man eagerly replies.

“It was Lee Harvey Oswald,” the Lord answers, “and he acted alone.”

“This,” the man responds, “goes higher up than I thought.”

The Epstein case has loomed over Washington for six years — ever since his arrest at a New Jersey airport in July 2019. That’s an eternity in political time and helps explain the obsession with the scandal’s lurid, unresolved details.

But political news cycles move fast. Just 18 months ago, Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis were still warming up for a primary fight against Donald Trump. Joe Biden was coasting in the West Wing. That moment feels like a different era — just as today’s headlines will fade in 18 months.

Unless the White House triggers a special counsel.

That move would freeze the current scandal in amber, hand ammunition to partisan media, and betray the president’s allies — while appeasing no one. We’ve seen this play out before. Let’s not do it again.

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Trump comes out on top with EU tariffs deal, proving haters wrong and leaving some Europeans stunned

President Donald Trump set to work in April on radically transforming how trade is conducted internationally, unveiling a sweeping list of new tariffs targeting scores of nations — friendly and adversarial nations alike — that have long imposed higher fees on the U.S. than the U.S. has placed on them in return.

Trump has in the months since received a lot of flak from liberals at home and abroad over this campaign to end the trend of foreign nations ripping off America. There have, for instance, been legal challenges, condemnations by Democrats and even some Republicans, threats of retaliation, and constant media chatter about economic doom.

‘It’s a big deal. It’s a huge deal. It will bring stability.’

Trump has, however, surmounted the opposition, proven the haters wrong, and repeatedly come out on top.

The president’s latest victory — announced in the ancestral homeland of his mother just days after striking a favorable trade agreement with Japan — is likely his most consequential to date.

Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen jointly announced in Turnberry, Scotland, on Sunday that they struck a deal.

Per the terms of the agreement, the EU will buy $750 billion worth of energy over the next three years; invest $600 billion in the U.S. in addition to what it is already investing; open member countries to tariff-free American exports; and purchase “a vast amount” of American military equipment at a value that has yet to be determined.

RELATED: Trump says he’s considering ‘a little rebate’ for Americans from tariff revenue

Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images

The U.S. will, in return, impose a 15% import tariff on most European goods — half of the rate Trump planned to impose on Aug. 1 in the event the deal fell through and 12.5% less than the tariff currently imposed on European automotive exports to the United States.

“I think it’s great that we made a deal today instead of playing games,” Trump told von der Leyen.

“I think it’s the biggest deal ever made. Thank you very much.”

Von der Leyen, who in 2021 claimed that Trump’s first term may have “permanently damaged” democracy, said, “We have a trade deal between the two largest economies in the world. It’s a big deal. It’s a huge deal. It will bring stability. It will bring predictability that’s very important for our businesses on both sides of the Atlantic.”

RELATED: Business spending reaches near 30-year high under Trump: ‘It’s the real deal’

— (@)

Von der Leyen later noted that Trump is “a tough negotiator, but he is also a dealmaker.”

While von der Leyen said that the 15% tariff might be a “challenge for some,” she emphasized that the deal ensures continued access to the American market while Europe simultaneously diversifies to other regions of the world and taps new markets.

‘It is a dark day.’

“The European Union is going to open its 20 Trillion dollar market and completely accept our auto and industrial standards for the first time ever,” noted Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

“Today is a historic day for U.S. trade and will strengthen our relationship with the European Union for decades to come.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent praised Trump, stating that the president “is the world’s great negotiator, and the American people are the beneficiaries.”

A number of national leaders from the 27 EU member states who will have to sign off on the deal expressed optimism, including Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who said she considered it a “positive.” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz welcomed the agreement, noting in a statement, “It is good that Europe and the U.S. have agreed and avoid unnecessary escalation in transatlantic trade relations.”

Others weren’t so keen.

French Prime Minister François Bayrou suggested on X that “it is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples, brought together to affirm their common values and to defend their common interests, resigns itself to submission.”

“It is obvious to me that this is not an agreement,” said Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. “It wasn’t a deal that President Donald Trump made with Ursula von der Leyen — it was Trump eating von der Leyen for breakfast. This is what happened.”

Orbán suggested that Trump’s deal with the United Kingdom was far better and that von der Leyen was a “featherweight,” reported Euractiv.

Trump has now secured critical trade deals with China, Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, Britain, and Vietnam.

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Trump nukes Biden’s broadband gimmick, saving taxpayers billions

President Trump has consistently applied one simple litmus test to any government program: Does it work?

If so — a rare occurrence — he keeps it. If not, he either ends it or reforms it. Intentions, noble or otherwise, count for nothing. Execution is everything.

For Americans, this is good news. For bureaucrats who enjoy wasting taxpayer dollars while pretending to serve the public, it’s a nightmare.

From zero to nowhere

If you need an example, just look at the Trump administration’s recent decision to overhaul the Biden administration’s ill-conceived Broadband Equity and Development program. As with anything with the word “equity” in the name, this program was a rat’s nest of inefficiency and corruption hiding beneath the rock of good intentions.

Democrats’ strategy has always been cronyism, not competition.

The program, launched in 2021, promised to provide $42 billion in subsidies to expand broadband internet in underdeveloped areas. This sounds good in theory, especially for rural voters who historically have voted for President Trump.

How many people did this program actually connect to the internet? Zero — yet another example of a government program that failed to execute on its lofty goals, wasting taxpayer dollars in the process.

The reasons for this failure are multifaceted. First, the program was burdened with woke mandates and entrenched political favoritism. Instead of targeting the most effective solution for rural areas, it prioritized fiber — literally the least efficient internet technology for rural residents — which can cost more than $100,000 per household. This made it impractical for rural America, where the internet infrastructure is desperately needed.

Meanwhile, the best solution — satellite internet, which can cost just a few hundred dollars per receiver — was passed over. Why would the Biden administration prioritize the more expensive, inefficient option? Simple: The fiber industry is aligned with pro-amnesty and diversity, equity, and inclusion agendas. The industry’s political ties to leftist causes won them a sweetheart deal at the expense of taxpayers and genuine competition.

The Trump administration took one look at this deal and decided enough was enough. It has since restored fair competition and saved taxpayer dollars. In the words of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, the administration’s new reforms will ensure the BEAD program “will deliver high-speed internet access efficiently on a technology-neutral basis, and at the right price.”

Screaming cronies

Predictably, the Democrats cried foul. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) led the charge, conveniently throwing out her anti-corporate bona fides and becoming the fiber industry’s best friend. She signed on to a letter with 21 House Democrats making the allegation that “any objective assessment of the technologies available to provide broadband would conclude that fiber optic technology far exceeds any other in its capability to provide future-proof speeds and network capacity.”

This claim is absurd — and not merely because most of the signatories are from big cities, completely ignorant as to what works in rural America.

RELATED: Wi-Fi is winning — so why is Congress still stuck in the 1990s?

Photo by Shutthiphong Chandaeng via Getty Images

Don’t just take my word for it. Listen to Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), or anyone who isn’t blinded by political favoritism or corporate cronyism.

Ocasio-Cortez’s letter is also a complete non sequitur. It would be one thing if the program had been destroyed — but it hasn’t. It’s simply been reformed to allow every potential internet provider to compete, unhinged by political agenda and favoritism. That’s it.

Trump restores the free market

If fiber and broadband really are superior, they should have no trouble winning in a fair competition. But they won’t, because their strategy has always been cronyism, not competition.

President Trump saw through that playbook, and with any luck, red states will follow suit. Only then will these industries be forced to wave the red flag, which has been their banner all along: the red flag of communist cronyism.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Broadband, Internet, Fiber internet, Bead program, Broadband waste, Brendan carr, Trump administration, Aoc, Alexandria ocasio-cortez, Ted cruz, Big tech, Donald trump 

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How California’s inevitable FUEL CRISIS could affect YOU

California Democrats are shocked that they can’t find a buyer for a refinery, after running the previous refinery out of town with their policies.

“They’re scrambling because they have driven all of the refineries out of business in California. They’ve got so much regulation and more regulation coming. They haven’t built a new refinery in California for decades,” BlazeTV host Glenn Beck explains, noting that the Phillips 66 and Valero refineries are closing.

“They can’t find a buyer. Well, I wonder why, California. I mean, who would want to do that? Who would want to buy a refinery in California where they’re constantly trying to put you out of business?” Glenn asks.

“Who’s going to make the gas?”

“It’s already $8 a gallon because it has to be a special blend. They have all of these things that are only for California. So these refineries are making the special blend for California. You lose two refineries, two in the state of California,” he continues

And while most Americans are not in California, that doesn’t mean we won’t be affected.

“There’s going to be a gas shortage everywhere else,” Glenn warns.

“You’re going to see $10-, $12-gallon gasoline in California because they will have to pay for it. They will have to pay for the refining somewhere else.”

“And they still don’t get it. They still don’t get it. They’re still adding more EPA laws, more laws about gasoline in California and refining in California. Two refineries are about to shut down. And these people wonder why,” he adds.

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Mike Collins launches campaign to flip key swing state Senate seat

Republican Rep. Mike Collins of Georgia formally threw his hat into the race with hopes of flipping a Senate seat in the key swing state.

Collins announced his Senate bid to unseat Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia on Monday, pledging to “deliver on President Trump’s America first agenda.”

‘Put the people of Georgia back in the driver’s seat.’

“We need a senator who works for Georgia, not the California crazies or the New York nut jobs,” Collins said in his campaign announcement. “I don’t know who Jon Ossoff really works for, but it sure as heck isn’t Georgia.”

“It’s time to send a trucker to the U.S. Senate to steamroll the radical left, deliver on President Trump’s America first agenda, and put the people of Georgia back in the driver’s seat,” Collins added.

As Collins noted, he previously started a trucking company in the early 1990s with his wife that grew to employ over 100 Georgians, according to his congressional website.

RELATED: EPA moves to slash Obama-era gas can regulations: ‘VENT THE DARN CAN’

Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

A key accomplishment Collins noted was his landmark legislation known as the Laken Riley Act, which became the first bill Trump signed into law during his second term. The bill was named after Laken Riley, a 22-year-old student who was murdered by an illegal alien in February 2024 on the University of Georgia campus right in Collins’ district.

The law now requires illegal migrants who are charged with theft-related and violent crimes, like the one who later murdered Riley, to be detained as a preventative measure.

RELATED: Exclusive: Congress pushes bipartisan bill preventing Mexico’s ‘illegal seizure’ of American assets

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Although Collins is just months into his second term in the House, he is taking the charge to challenge Ossoff, who has served in the Senate since 2021. Collins is now the second Republican to enter the race to unseat Ossoff, joining his Republican colleague Rep. Buddy Carter of Georgia.

Both Republican candidates have touted themselves as MAGA firebrands, but neither Trump nor the National Republican Senatorial Committee has issued a formal endorsement.

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​Mike collins, Georgia, Jon ossoff, Donald trump, Buddy carter, House republicans, Senate republicans, 2026 election, 2026 primaries, Laken riley, Laken riley actt, Laken riley murder, Politics 

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AI faces death by a thousand state regulations

Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis’ recent hostility toward artificial intelligence — and his promise of regulatory action — stands in stark contrast to the Trump administration’s apparent embrace of the technology.

While President Trump celebrates multibillion-dollar private-sector investments in AI and frames it as essential in the technological race against China, DeSantis warns that AI is “very dangerous” and insists that policymakers must control it through regulation.

Limiting AI regulation to the federal level is the only way the administration can make space for a vibrant and innovative American AI industry.

As states continue to pass legislation that either conflicts with or adds tension to federal efforts, the path forward for the American AI industry grows murkier. Innovators and consumers alike deserve a unified national framework that reduces costs and legal uncertainty.

One solution, already floated during reconciliation discussions over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, would be an AI regulatory moratorium. This kind of pause could help eliminate conflicting or redundant state and federal policies, allowing Congress to actively shape a coherent regulatory landscape.

In the coming days, Trump is expected to announce a new White House AI plan, one that will likely cast the AI race as central to America’s power competition with China. The plan is also expected to reaffirm the administration’s belief that a light-touch regulatory approach is essential for U.S. dominance.

“You cannot regulate your way to winning the AI race,” AI and crypto czar David Sacks said in an interview with CNBC — a clear sign of the administration’s deregulatory approach.

States going rogue

State governments, however, are not following suit. More than 1,000 state-level AI-related bills have been introduced in 2025 alone. This wave of state legislation fosters uncertainty and risk, not only due to contradictions in the laws themselves but also because of redundancy and compliance overload.

Take, for example, SB 1213 in Pennsylvania, which outlaws the use of AI in the production of nonconsensual sexual imagery. Fine, but Congress already passed and President Trump signed the Take It Down Act earlier this year. The federal law prohibits the publication of nonconsensual imagery — including content generated with AI. Companies are now forced to navigate two separate statutes covering the same issue. For smaller AI startups, this patchwork is a regulatory nightmare.

RELATED: The AI takeover isn’t coming — it’s already here

Photo by BlackJack3D via Getty Images

With the sheer volume of state-level AI laws, this situation will only grow more dire, tackling everything from copyright and user safety to privacy and data security. Even in cases where Congress and the states agree on the policy response, creating two differing statutes leads to legal uncertainty for both consumers and businesses.

A threat to innovation

As with earlier waves of digital innovation, the spread of state-level rules threatens to undermine the Trump administration’s efforts to establish a light-touch regulatory approach. Whether state laws contradict or merely duplicate federal ones, each additional statute brings new compliance demands — and new barriers to entry.

If the Trump administration is serious about its pro-AI agenda and promoting innovation and development, it must push for an AI regulatory moratorium. Without it, states have the power to water down — or outright defeat — federal efforts to foster growth.

Limiting AI regulation to the federal level is the only way this administration can make space for a vibrant and innovative American AI industry.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Ai, Artificial intelligence, Ai moratorium, Donald trump, President donald trump, Ron desantis, Big tech, Regulations, Censorship, Complexity, States 

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SHOCKING: Oversight Committee investigating new January 6 evidence

Over four years after January 6, new evidence is still being uncovered — and a new House Oversight Committee has been assembled to investigate it.

“As of yesterday morning, we’re already looking at never-before-seen video,” BlazeTV contributor Steve Baker tells BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales on “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered.” “It’s another long-range street camera. It’s not one of the United States Capitol Police CCTV cameras.”

“And from long range at about 8:17 in the morning, we’ve counted eight Secret Service members combing that area. In other words, they’re doing their morning sweep because Kamala Harris,” he says, “was going to be in the building.”

“So they were doing their preliminary security sweep, and this is something we had not seen before,” he continues. “It’s another situation where either they were really bad at their job, because if there’s 10 of them, we can see in a camera frame in the exact area where the DNC pipe bomb was placed and they didn’t find it, then it probably wasn’t there, right?”

Baker explains that this means the pipe bomb was “placed later.”

“And that’s the reason why the FBI has never given us an unedited version of the alleged pipe bomber on the evening of January 5,” he says. “Why not just give us the 24-hour view from the DNC camera?”

“I can now say this,” he continues. “With the formation of the new committee, we may actually get the DNC’s cameras. So the answer to your question is we may solve this. Doesn’t mean that we’ll know who the pipe bomber is or was.”

“And it also doesn’t mean that we’re going to find a conspiracy just from that video.”

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Police waited more than an hour to enter assassinated Minnesota lawmaker’s home, report claims

A Minnesota newspaper’s claim that police did not enter the home of the assassinated former House speaker for more than an hour after she and her husband were shot is missing crucial details, the Brooklyn Park Police Department says.

According to the FBI, suspected assassin Vance Luther Boelter forced his way into the home of Melissa and Mark Hortman just after 3:30 a.m. on June 14, shooting Mark Hortman on his way in the door and then hunting down Melissa Hortman. Boelter was arrested 43 hours later.

‘Brooklyn Park officers acted swiftly with courage and bravery.’

The Minnesota Star Tribune, in a story published July 26, claims Brooklyn Park officers violated department policy by not entering the Hortman home for more than an hour after Boelter allegedly fired a barrage of bullets at the husband and wife.

The department said the coverage was inaccurate.

“Officers did not violate departmental policy, and in fact, they conducted a rescue of Mark Hortman in the entryway of the home approximately 2 minutes and 12 seconds after the officer-involved shooting,” said the Brooklyn Park Police Department in a July 27 statement. “With the knowledge officers had at the time, they followed training and policy by not entering the home.”

Aware that state Senator John Hoffman and his wife were gunned down in their home by a suspect impersonating a police officer 90 minutes earlier, Brooklyn Park sent officers to the Hortman home to do a welfare check. When they arrived, a man later identified as Boelter was at the front door interacting with Mark Hortman, the FBI said.

According to the FBI, Boelter parked his fake police vehicle in the driveway of the Hortman home. Allegedly wearing a hyper-realistic silicone mask and a wig, the suspect rang the doorbell and shouted, “Police! Welfare check!” Boelter shined his tactical flashlight in Mark Hortman’s face when he answered the door, the affidavit said.

“When Mr. Hortman answered the door, Boelter — shining a flashing [sic] toward Mr. Hortman’s eyes — said there had been reports of shots fired,” the FBI affidavit said. “Mr. Hortman denied knowing anything about a shooting, saying at one point, ‘Good God, I was asleep!’

RELATED: Accused Minnesota assassin: ‘If you want to save the country you have to get your hands dirty’

A confession letter the FBI said was written by Vance Boelter makes references to being trained by the U.S. military and ordered to commit murders by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz. Image via FBI

“Mr. Hortman told Boelter, who was still shining a flashlight toward him and was standing approximately six feet away from the doorway: ‘We can’t see you,’” the FBI said. “Mr. Hortman asked for Boelter’s name and badge number. Boelter did not promptly respond, but moments later he said, ‘Nelson, 286.’”

The shooter turned and fired on the responding officers, who returned fire as the assassin began shooting Mark Hortman and forcing his way inside the home, the FBI said.

‘Just to be safe, why don’t you go up and just check on the Hortmans’ house?’

A short time later, muzzle flashes visible through the front windows indicated the fatal shooting of Melissa Hortman. The FBI said the former speaker turned from the assassin and began running up the stairs, when she was shot multiple times.

Using a drone, officers realized on visual inspection that Mrs. Hortman’s wounds were already fatal, the department suggested.

“Officers utilized a drone to search the home and discovered Melissa Hortman,” the statement said. “Unfortunately, she had sustained injuries incompatible with life. Officers then entered the home to recover Melissa Hortman.”

The department said it was troubled that “non-public data is being shared outside of the investigation,” leading to mistaken conclusions.

“The timeline listed by the Minnesota Star Tribune in a recent article appears to have been generated by individuals without direct knowledge as to the facts and circumstances surrounding the morning of June 14th,” the department statement read. “The fact is, Brooklyn Park officers acted swiftly with courage and bravery in the face of grave danger.”

RELATED: Accused assassin makes ‘disgusting’ attempt to paint himself a victim over jail conditions: Sheriff

Brooklyn Park, Minn., police officer Zachary Baumtrog (left) fired at assassination suspect Vance Boelter on June 14 after being sent to the home of Melissa and Mark Hortman by Sgt. Rielly Nordan.Brooklyn Park Police Department

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension identified the officer who fired at Boelter as Zachary Baumtrog, a nine-year law-enforcement veteran.

Baumtrog and another officer were sent to the Hortman home by Brooklyn Park Police Sgt. Rielly Nordan, who was finishing his shift when he heard of the Hoffman shooting in nearby Champlin, Minn. “And as he’s walking out, he looks at a couple of officers and says, ‘Hey, just to be safe, why don’t you go up and just check on the Hortmans’ house,’” Police Chief Mark Bruley told the Star Tribune in a June 16 story.

According to a timeline assembled by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, after the assassin gunned down Mrs. Hortman as she fled, he escaped out the rear of the home. Agents found the beloved family golden retriever, Gilbert, also shot, wailing in pain in the back yard. The dog had to be euthanized due to severe wounds.

Almost immediately, Boelter began shedding his gear, including a full-head silicone mask, body armor, and two Beretta handguns — one of which he tossed into a nearby pond, police said.

The suspect left his black SUV parked in the driveway of the Hortman home. The vehicle was outfitted like a police cruiser, including an emergency light bar on the roof.

Inside, police discovered what the Star Tribune described as an “arsenal,” including at least five rifles and handguns along with a large supply of ammunition stored in magazines.

RELATED: Vance Boelter’s wife speaks out for first time since June 14 shooting rampage

A tow truck removes an abandoned Buick sedan allegedly driven by accused assassin Vance Boelter as police search the area on 301st Avenue in Belle Plaine, Minn., on June 15, 2025. Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images

They also found a notebook containing a list of at least 45 names of lawmakers, attorneys, and Planned Parenthood locations. In the pages of notebooks found in the vehicle and at a room Boelter rented in north Minneapolis, the FBI noted two quotations allegedly from Boelter.

One chilling scribbled note read:

If you want to save the country you have to get your hands dirty.

Another entry said:

Doing what most people know needs to be done, but are not willing to do it themselves.

In a few random statements made to news media who made contact with him at the Sherburne County Jail, Boelter has not given a full explanation for his alleged actions or described his motivation in what has become a crime of the century in Minnesota.

He earlier told the New York Post that his pro-life views and support for President Donald J. Trump were not motivations in the crime spree.

Boelter told Alpha News that he had carried out a secret two-year undercover investigation of the sudden and unexpected deaths of 400 Minnesotans. He did not provide more details.

He also mentioned investigating politicians with ties to Communist China, a likely reference to Democrat Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Boelter was indicted by a federal grand jury on six felony counts, including murder, attempted murder, stalking, and firearms offenses. If convicted on the murder charges, Boelter could be sentenced to death.

Boelter’s next court appearance was moved to Aug. 7 from the original date of Sept. 12. He will be arraigned and is expected to plead not guilty to all charges in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis.

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​Vance boelter, Minnesota, Melissa hortman, John hoffman, Tim walz, Politics 

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Serious people don’t sign manifestos with disappearing ink

The Information Age brought rapid technological progress and unprecedented access to knowledge. But one rule still holds true: Once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever.

Some EPA employees are now learning that the hard way.

If publicly attacking your boss gets you fired in the private sector, doing so in the executive branch should have the same consequences.

The signatories of the now-infamous “Stand Up for Science” declaration — an act of open defiance against the Trump administration — are scrambling to erase their names after their stunt blew up in their faces. The petition, framed as a principled stand, was nothing more than a petulant swipe at a duly confirmed administrator carrying out the people’s mandate.

Now, these federal workers want to duck the consequences and are trying to rewrite history.

Several employees placed on leave after signing the letter hope that removing their names from the petition will shield them from accountability. Even the union officials who likely helped draft the statement lacked the backbone to leave their signatures in place. It’s yet another reason federal employee unions clash with the idea of genuine public service.

But they’re too late.

We at Democracy Restored have preserved all 388 names tied to this attempted bureaucratic mutiny. The so-called resistance within the federal government won’t get to disappear just because their stunt failed.

Cosplaying courage

Signing a petition or manifesto should demonstrate conviction. It’s meant to show political courage and reputational risk — something closer to “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” than to anonymous internet whining. But when EPA employees try to quietly withdraw their signatures to avoid consequences, they reduce the entire effort to a farce. The petition becomes suspect, and its signers look unserious at best, cowardly at worst.

These federal workers don’t get to play both sides. They drew taxpayer salaries while inserting themselves into partisan fights, then tried to hide the evidence when the heat came. If they cared about science or the agency’s future, they wouldn’t have attempted to scrub their names. Their stunt revealed what they really wanted: to lash out at their boss — the American people — without accountability.

The “Stand Up for Science” campaign wasn’t just a case of weak knees. It was a condescending ploy by bureaucrats who think the public is too stupid to notice. They bet they’d get away with it. They lost.

In this age of performative outrage, maybe they thought their names didn’t matter. Maybe it’s enough that the letter existed, that the accommodating media publicized it, and that some guy in a bar may cite a declaration signed by hundreds of EPA employees as reason to vote against the president and his party.

They struck a blow for the revolution, with none of the messy personal blowback.

These individuals are cosplayers, seeking excitement by sticking it to the man. They are not a serious group of government officials or even serious grown-ups. An election didn’t go their way, so they’re acting out — or they were right up until the moment they realized their taxpayer-funded paychecks could be harmed.

Wiping the names from this petition illustrates that the hundreds of signatories are desperately vying for the attention and adoration of their political allies and like-minded friends. It also reveals the toxic culture of entitled partisanship that infects the public sector.

Zeldin called their bluff

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin’s action to address this matter was not only warranted, it was the correct response. By suspending the individuals who declared their intent to stand against the American people’s mandate to return scientific integrity to the federal government, Zeldin is taking the first steps to dismantle that culture.

If publicly attacking your boss gets you fired in the private sector, doing so in the executive branch should have the same consequences. Federal employees are not entitled to their jobs, and they’re certainly not entitled to perform them while extending a middle finger to the people who pay them.

RELATED: EPA moves to slash Obama-era gas can regulations: ‘VENT THE DARN CAN’

Photo by Allison Joyce / Contributor via Getty Images

In all cases like this, the exemplars should be the signers of the Declaration of Independence (or perhaps that’s too grand a comparison for the EPA letter). The signers’ lives really were at stake, their fortunes hadn’t come from cushy civil service jobs, and they understood what “sacred honor” really meant. John Hancock is the greatest example of this: Not only did he sign his name first, but he signed it large, loud, and proud so that the British knew exactly who stood against them.

Where have you gone, John Hancock? Your spirit still lingers with some, but it’s clear that, for these signatories, that torch has gone out.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Epa, Lee zeldin, Environmental protection agency, The resistance, Declaration of independence, John hancock, Revolution, Science, Politicization, Stand up for science, Cowardice, Donald trump, Democrats, Liberals 

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America’s cultural comeback: American Eagle swaps woke ads for Sydney Sweeney and Shelby GT350

Under President Donald Trump, America is undergoing an incredible transformation through his MAGA agenda that puts the country and the American people first.

But policy isn’t the only thing that’s changing. The culture is following suit. Take American Eagle Outfitters’ recent blue jeans commercial as an example. The 2025 denim advertisement features American actress Sydney Sweeney — who’s gained significant attention for her curvaceous, Marilyn Monroe-esque figure — driving a 1965 Shelby Mustang GT350.

It’s a commercial that draws on celebrity appeal and classic, nostalgic American imagery. And more importantly, it’s a return to commonsense, agenda-free marketing.

Glenn Beck and co-host Stu Burguiere compare American Eagle’s new ad to the one they pushed in 2019, which crammed a woke agenda down consumers’ throats.

The 2019 advertisement features an overweight African-American woman with purple hair whom Glenn describes as a “Lizzo-style woman.”

The Sweeney ad, in contrast, “is directly aimed at American men,” Glenn says, specifically “the kind of men that everyone has said for the last 10 years should be ashamed of themselves.”

While Stu agrees that Sweeney is certainly appealing to the typical male, the commercial, he believes, is excellent marketing because it is aimed not at men but at “the typical American woman” — the person “who’s buying the jeans.”

The ad, he says, asks women, “Don’t you want to look good for men?”

“What [American Eagle is] acknowledging there is, ‘Hey, men and women are attracted to each other,’ he says. “When you present an image of a woman who’s attractive to men, women might want to buy the products that make them also look attractive to men, and that’s okay.”

But for years, the primary goal of marketing — to sell goods and services — was supplanted by DEI, body positivity, and other progressive agendas, often at the expense of profit.

The fact that American Eagle is returning to agenda-free marketing is evidence that the cultural tides are turning.

“This ad would not have happened a few years ago,” even “just two years ago,” Glenn says.

The problem, he explains, was never that companies included diverse body types in their marketing campaigns. In fact, that’s necessary to appeal to a broad audience. The problem was that for several years, nearly all advertising was “glorifying [being] fat” — a move straight out of the progressive playbook.

What it did, Stu explains, is normalize and encourage people toward mediocrity, but that’s not what America is about. America is about excellence and “aspiring towards something.”

To hear more of Glenn and Stu’s commentary, watch the episode above.

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​The glenn beck program, Glenn beck, Sydney sweeney, American eagle, American culture, Woke propaganda, Woke marketing, Blazetv, Blaze media 

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Democrats wanted a makeover. They got Marxism and Molotov cocktails.

In February, Democratic Party operatives and elected officials met for a retreat in Virginia hosted by Third Way, a self-described center-left organization. Their goal: develop a strategy to reverse the party’s hard-left drift and reconnect with working-class voters.

They brainstormed ways to neutralize the far-left infrastructure that now defines the party. Among their key recommendations? Embrace patriotism, community, and traditional American imagery. Show up at tailgates, gun shows, local diners, and churches.

Corporate media and DC careerists will pretend these protesters don’t represent the party. They’ll try to repackage the fury in the streets as civic activism. But we won’t let them.

That plan flopped.

Democrats didn’t pivot to working-class America. They ran straight back into the arms of their radical base. By June, they had poured money and institutional support into the No Kings protests erupting nationwide.

These protests didn’t happen at tailgates or in small-town churches. They returned to the same streets torched during the Black Lives Matter riots of 2020 — angrier, louder, and even more extreme.

And the party cheered them on.

From Hillary Clinton to Chuck Schumer, Democrat leaders lined up in support. Corporate media echoed their talking points. None of them could rein in their base. More damning, none of them wanted to.

The protests weren’t fringe outbursts. In fact, they revealed the party’s core. Their rhetoric was radical. Their goals were openly anti-democratic. Many participants waved explicitly communist banners, marched under Marxist slogans, and called for the dismantling of American institutions.

That imagery — the rage, the theatrics, the ideological extremism — was exactly what February’s conference attendees feared. But it’s now the public face of the Democratic Party. The working class isn’t clamoring for more street theatrics. They want real solutions from people in power.

So we at the Oversight Project did what we do best: investigate.

We focused on a key protest organizer, a group called 50501 — short for “50 protests in 50 states for 1 movement.” Its website paints a clear picture. Placards read “Impeach the dictator,” “Impeach the bitch,” and “No one is illegal on stolen land.” Moderate? Hardly.

We compiled Instagram activity from 50501’s state chapters — 34 in total, plus Washington, D.C., and several national branches. We tracked who its social media managers followed, and what emerged was a clear pattern of associations: communist, neo-Marxist, anti-American, and foreign-aligned groups.

These protests didn’t bubble up from the grassroots. They were built from the same radical networks that have long tried to destabilize the country from within.

RELATED: Billionaire Walmart heiress funds anti-Trump chaos, backs radical ‘No Kings’ protests

Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Seventeen accounts followed nearly 20 accounts tied to the Party for Socialism and Liberation — a Marxist-Leninist group that splintered from the Workers World Party. One of its former members carried out the shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, D.C., earlier this year.

Thirty-three accounts followed Democratic Socialists of America pages. Sixteen followed Students for a Democratic Society. Twelve connected with Students for Justice in Palestine.

Many accounts also followed known foreign-aligned activist groups, including Code Pink — famous for its disruptions in congressional hearings — and the Act Now to Stop War and Racism coalition (ANSWER).

Naturally, we found ties to Antifa as well, including groups like Anti-Fascist Aktion and prominent members such as @PunkwithACamera.

We wish we had this report back in February. We would’ve printed it out and handed it to every Democrat in attendance — just to watch their faces drop as they saw what their party has become.

This is the story of the American left for the next decade: the radical tail wagging the party dog.

Corporate media and D.C. careerists will pretend these protesters don’t represent the party. They’ll try to repackage the fury in the streets as civic activism. But we won’t let them.

We’ll keep exposing the ties. We’ll name the names. And we’ll make sure every Democrat trying to rebrand ahead of 2028 wears the consequences of these alliances around their necks.

​Opinion & analysis, Oversight project, Leftism, Marxism, Socialism, The left, Democrats, Democratic party, Third way, Liberalism, Hard left ideas, Radical, No kings, Antifa, Corporate media, 50501 movement, Impeach, Tailgate, Churches, Outreach, Blue collar, Black bloc, Communism, Democratic socialists of america, Answer 

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Covid quack Collins: It’s Trump’s fault that​ Americans don’t trust authority

Now, that’s funny.

Stephen Colbert brought on former NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins to decry the public’s lack of trust in authority figures.

Taylor Sheridan lives on a sprawling Texas ranch, spends time chatting with Joe Rogan, and refuses to ignore red-state America. For that, he must be punished.

Do tell.

Dr. Collins tried to bury good science and push the lousy kind. Now, he’s warning “The Late Show’s” far-left audience about the Trump effect.

There seems to be no real penalty for saying something that’s demonstrably false. It’s just okay. No, it’s not. We have a trust deficit where because people don’t know if they can be sure somebody’s telling the truth, why should I trust that person? So we stop trusting each other most of the time, and that’s dangerous also for our future”

Well, he’s right about a dearth of trust, except he should pick up an Ikea mirror and stare at it a good, long while …

Epic win

Tickets for Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” are sold out — a year before it opens.

OK, not all tickets — just a bunch of screenings in the “Oppenheimer” director’s favorite format: 70mm Imax.

How big was demand? An hour after Imax announced it, 95% of the seats were snapped up, with some going for premium prices on eBay.

Nolan’s retelling of Homer’s ancient epic doesn’t hit theaters until July 2026. In fact, it hasn’t even wrapped production yet.

Even if you’re not a fellow Nolan fanatic, you have to admire the prudent, long-term planning on display here. The Democratic Party might consider recruiting some of these folks.

The joker

Classic rock virtue-signaling is the saddest virtue-signaling.

We saw that during the pandemic, when Neil Young pulled his music from Spotify to protest Joe Rogan’s “misinformation.” Young later returned his music to the platform when he realized no one cared about his publicity stunt.

Now, the Steve Miller Band is canceling its U.S. tour over climate change. Really.

“The combination of extreme heat, unpredictable flooding, tornadoes, hurricanes and massive forest fires make these risks for you our audience, the band and the crew unacceptable. So …

“You can blame it on the weather … The tour is cancelled.”

The show must go on? Not so much.

Cynical fans flocked to X to blame the cancellation on poor ticket sales, not Mother Nature. Even the far-left Variety hinted that slow sales could be the real culprit. They wouldn’t be the only artists facing fan disinterest. Jennifer Lopez’s latest tour got crushed by underwhelming ticket sales. So did tours by Pink, the Jonas Brothers, and Justin Timberlake.

Those acts weren’t shrewd enough to play the Al Gore Card, alas …

Taylor’s version

Taylor Sheridan lives on a sprawling Texas ranch, spends time chatting with Joe Rogan, and refuses to ignore red-state America. For that, he must be punished.

So sayeth Emmy voters, who once again snubbed his populist TV shows in the latest round of nominations. Sheridan isn’t a loud and proud conservative, but he dares to respect conservatives’ views and sometimes lets them speak.

And when they do, it tends to go viral. Consider this epic Billy Bob Thornton rant on wind turbines from Sheridan’s “Landman” TV show.

You have any idea how much diesel they have to burn to mix that much concrete or make that steel and haul this s**t out here and put it together with a 450-foot crane? You want to guess how much oil it takes to lubricate that f**king thing? Or winterize it? In its 20-year lifespan, it won’t offset the carbon footprint of making it. And don’t get me started on solar panels and the lithium in your Tesla battery.

Ouch.

No wonder Hollywood elites keep leaving him off their Emmy ballots. Countless loyal viewers and a $200 million deal with Paramount are obviously no substitute for the recognition of his industry “peers.” Here’s hoping Sheridan can muddle through all the same.

The usual suspect

This disgraced actor has nothing to hide, at least about Epstein Island.

Kevin Spacey, the two-time Oscar winner whose career collapsed during the MeToo explosion, wants Team Trump to release the Epstein files.

“Release the Epstein files. All of them. For those of us with nothing to fear, the truth can’t come soon enough. I hate to make this about me — but the media already has,” he wrote on X.

Spacey’s name has come up a time or two during Epstein news cycles, but the star insists he’s innocent.

He famously played a president on Netflix’s “House of Cards.” Now, if only former President Bill Clinton had Spacey’s confidence about the infamous Epstein list.

​Hollywood, Entertainment, Al gore, Climate change, Stephen colbert, Francis collins, Covid, Neil young, Steve miller band, Kevin spacey, Epstein files, Donald trump, Toto recall 

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EV sales are sinking — which automakers will go down with the ship?

The electric vehicle market is hitting a critical tipping point — and the mainstream media won’t talk about it.

In a no-holds-barred episode of “Car Coach Reports,” we sat down with two of the sharpest minds in the industry: Anton Wahlman, a veteran financial analyst and columnist for Seeking Alpha, and Karl Brauer, a respected automotive expert known for his data-driven insights on iSeeCars and YouTube.

Together, we pull back the curtain on what’s really happening in the EV world.

Here’s the reality: The federal EV tax credit — up to $7,500 per vehicle — expires September 30, giving automakers under 90 days to move more than 140,000 EVs currently sitting on dealer lots. That’s more than a 100-day supply of inventory, according to the National Automobile Dealers Association. And while some companies are positioned to adapt, others are dangerously overcommitted.

We break down which brands might survive the coming EV shakeout — Toyota, Ford, GM, Hyundai, BMW, Tesla, and others — and which ones are at risk of collapse once the subsidies disappear. The entire industry is being reshaped by political decisions, not consumer demand. It’s a wake-up call for car buyers and a challenge for automakers.

This isn’t about being for or against EVs — it’s about exposing the truth with no agenda.

Don’t miss this essential conversation — especially if you’re shopping for a new vehicle or wondering what comes next for the automotive world.

​Evs, Electric vehicles, Ev mandate, Honda, Tesla, Gm, Auto industry, Big beautiful bill, Ford, Audi, Align cars 

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Pandemic fallout: Study finds parents are increasingly taking a stand on vaccines

Experimental vaccines were rushed to market during the pandemic, then advertised as “safe and effective” by government officials, the establishment media, and pharmaceutical representatives. Those who said otherwise or asked too many inconvenient questions were attacked and censored. Meanwhile, affordable alternative treatments were suppressed and/or characterized by supposed experts as dangerous quackery.

This profitable private-public campaign to impose novel vaccines on the American population was not advanced merely through propaganda, the silencing of dissenting voices, and through uncompetitive practices; it also depended upon straightforward coercion.

Only 40% of parents said they plan to load their child up with all of the recommended vaccines.

For instance, the Biden administration mandated that federal employees and even military service members get the jab. Millions of other Americans across the country were also told to offer up their arms if they wanted to keep their jobs, eat in public, stay in school, or visit their loved ones.

Adding injury to insult, it was later revealed that the vaccines were not as safe or as effective as advertised.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-backed study published this month in the JAMA Network revealed that a great many American parents are no longer willing to blindly trust the medical establishment, at least not when it comes to the vaccination of their children.

According to the study, titled “Vaccination Intentions During Pregnancy and Among Parents of Young Children,” 33% of parents surveyed who have children under age 5 indicated that they intend to delay or refuse some or all government-recommended vaccines for their child.

RELATED: Smug Obama speechwriter provides damning reminder of Democrats’ intolerance for conservatives, vax-refusers

Photo by JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP via Getty Images

Only 40% of parents said they plan to load their child up with all of the recommended vaccines; 20% said they plan to delay some vaccines.

While only 4% of first-time pregnant mothers said they intend to delay or refuse all recommended vaccines, 48% expressed uncertainty about childhood vaccination.

Children’s Health Defense, which was chaired by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from 2015 to 2023, noted, “Only 37% of young and expecting parents now plan to fully vaccinate their children — a seismic shift. Why? Because when parents ask real questions about the vaccine schedule to their pediatricians, they’re met with silence or deflection.”

‘If you dig into the hepatitis B stuff that they try to give to your child when they’re born, you realize it’s to inoculate a future population of drug addicts and prostitutes, not to protect your child.’

“No answers. No informed consent. Just blind trust demanded,” continued CHD. “Parents aren’t buying it anymore.”

The study’s authors, researchers from Emory University, suggested that the remedy for this uncertainty might be interventions during pregnancy.

“Given the high decisional uncertainty during pregnancy about vaccinating children after birth, there may be value in intervening during pregnancy to proactively support families with childhood vaccination decisions,” wrote the authors.

Blaze News senior politics editor Christopher Bedford said, “I get text message requests every week on different threads — neighborhood threads, church threads, Knights of Columbus threads, political threads — from people asking, ‘Hey, where can we find a doctor who’s not going to force us to keep to the CDC regime, who’s going to let us take it at our own pace, informed as parents?’ And it’s extremely difficult.”

Bedford noted that in Northern Virginia and elsewhere, parents have taken to scouring the pages of pediatricians for signs of politicization in an effort to determine whether the doctors will “talk to you like a human being; whether they’ll let you make your decision and space it out the way that you want.”

“People are asking for what they can read, where they can learn more, because they just don’t trust the experts any more,” continued Bedford. “We’ve been lied to. The COVID vaccine, we now know, was a lie. If you dig into the hepatitis B stuff that they try to give to your child when they’re born, you realize it’s to inoculate a future population of drug addicts and prostitutes, not to protect your child. … Parents just want a practice that will listen to them, take them seriously, and not be political — and it’s wild how political it’s gotten.”

RELATED: Jab first, ask questions never: Vaccine truths your doctor won’t tell you

EKIN KIZILKAYA/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Jake Scott, a clinical associate professor of infectious diseases at Stanford University, indicated that whereas the childhood vaccine schedule contained around 11 doses protecting against seven diseases in 1986, the schedule now includes roughly 50 injections covering 16 diseases. Between 30 and 32 shots are typically required for kids to attend state schools.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who indicated during a recent congressional hearing that kids “get 69 to 92 jabs of vaccines between conception and when they are 18 years old” — a figure apparently higher than the one cited by Scott on account of certain brands requiring multiple doses — recently told Fox News host Martha MacCallum that none of the vaccines on the schedule have been safety-tested except for the COVID-19 vaccine.

“Nobody has an idea what the risk profiles are on these products, and we don’t know whether they have anything to do with the epidemic of chronic disease,” added Kennedy.

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​Vaccination, Vaccine, Covid-19, Pandemic, Medicine, Medical, Big pharma, Pharma, Vaccine schedule, Autism, Cdc, Politics 

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‘Death to Trump! Allahu Akbar!’ Man threatens to bomb plane over Scotland to ‘send message’ to Trump

A man threatened to bomb a plane full of civilians over Scotland in order to “send a message to Trump.”

President Trump was visiting Scotland and the U.K. over the weekend, where he told European nations they needed to clamp down on mass migration.

On Sunday morning, EasyJet flight EZY609 was scheduled to fly from England’s Luton Airport to Glasgow, Scotland, but was interrupted by a man threatening the plane and threatening the president.

In a viral clip on X, a man is heard saying he wants to “send a message to Trump.”

The remarks were corroborated by Scottish outlet EdinburghLive.

Then, the man threatened the plane itself before yelling an Islamic chant.

“I’m going to bomb the plane. Death to America! Death to Trump! Allahu Akbar!” the man yelled.

A witness told the Sun the man then “pushed the airline staff and was being aggressive towards them.”

“He was a big guy, about six foot, and they were these petite women,” the witness added. “When he pushed them, that’s when things changed.”

The man making the threats was then grabbed from behind and pulled down by another male passenger, as others pounced to pin the man. Video of the incident showed the accused man being handcuffed while on the airplane floor.

Passengers then allegedly took the man’s wallet to find out where he was from.

RELATED: The old-guard GOP dropped the ball for decades. Trump delivered in 6 months

The same witness told the Sun that passengers discovered the man is an Indian national who was carrying a refugee status card.

According to the passenger, the pilot soon announced that he was making an emergency landing, and the plane touched down in Glasgow around 8:20 a.m. local time.

“We received a report of a man causing a disturbance on a flight. … A 41-year-old man was arrested in connection, and further inquiries are ongoing,” a Police Scotland spokesperson told the Sun.

“At this time we believe the incident was contained and that nobody else was involved,” authorities added. “We are aware of videos circulating online, and these are being assessed by counterterrorism officers.”

An EasyJet spokesperson explained that police met the flight upon arrival in Glasgow, before they “boarded the aircraft and removed a passenger.”

At the time of the passenger’s removal, which was also captured on video, he is heard asking about his “phone and wallet” and looks behind him. One man is heard saying in response, “F**k off,” followed by several passengers bursting into laughter.

RELATED: The terrorists run Syria now — and Christians, religious minorities are paying the price

Photo by: Giovanni Mereghetti/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

The original witness said at first he thought the suspect was “joking” when he came out of the bathroom and said, “I’ve got a bomb; I’ve got a bomb.”

“I mean, it’s a weird joke,” the witness continued. “He was fighting a bit on the floor, but at this point he knew he’d f**ked up,” the witness added.

Blaze News has contacted the White House for comment on the incident but did not receive an immediate response. This article will be updated with any applicable replies.

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​News, Terrorism, Jet, Bombing, Uk, Trump, Scotland, Indian, Politics