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The right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany — often abbreviated AFD for its German name, Alternative für Deutschland — has grown increasingly popular since its founding in 2013 by free-market economists keen to strengthen German sovereignty.

Despite a concerted suppression campaign by the liberal German establishment, which has attempted to ban and criminalize the AFD outright, the right-leaning party came in second place in Germany’s national elections earlier this year, doubling the vote share it previously won in 2021.

The AFD is hoping for continued success in the local elections scheduled for Sept. 14 in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

‘The alternative is too frightening to contemplate seriously.’

The trouble is that its candidates keep dying.

On Sunday, Alice Weidel, the federal co-chairwoman of the AFD, confirmed the report from the German public broadcaster WDR that four candidates — Stefan Berendes, 59; Wolfgang Seitz, 59; Ralph Lange, 66; and Wolfgang Klinger, 71 — had “died suddenly and unexpectedly.”

Stefan Homburg, professor emeritus of economics at the University of Hannover, said on X that the cluster of deaths were “statistically almost impossible” — a claim that elicited concern from former Trump adviser Elon Musk, who noted a day earlier that “either Germany votes AFD or it is the end of Germany.”

The early and mail-in ballots cast for the dead candidates have reportedly been invalidated.

RELATED: Rule by the people? Not anymore in the Western world

Photo by Maryam Majd/Getty Images

The AFD regional association in North Rhine-Westphalia revealed that as of Monday, there were at least another two confirmed deaths of its politicians, reported Politico.

“In my view, it’s statistically striking and currently difficult to explain,” said AFD deputy federal chairman Stephan Brandner. “I have never heard in my life that politicians of a party die in such a short period of time before an election.”

German police suggested that while investigations are ongoing, there is no evidence of foul play.

Days after the Politico report, another AFD candidate, Hans-Joachim Kind, reportedly perished, making a total of at least seven dead AFD candidates just days ahead of the local elections.

Blaze News has reached out to the AFD and to Weidel for comment.

Suspicions online regarding the deaths have been fueled in part by the efforts of German establishmentarians — whose agenda and power is threatened by the AFD — and leftist activists to crush the party.

RELATED: Musk asks: ‘Why are they allowing the rape of Europe?’ — then vows to do something about it in the UK

AFD co-chairwoman Alice Weidel. Photo by SOEREN STACHE/POOL/AFP via Getty Images.

After designating the AFD as a potential extremist organization in 2021, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency placed the party and its federal members under surveillance, tapping their phones and monitoring their movements.

In May, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a spy agency, officially classified the AFD as a “proven right-wing extremist organization” — a brazen attempt to neutralize the opposition party. That classification has, however, been placed on pause pending the result of a court appeal.

Last year was an especially bad year for institutional attacks on the AFD: An administrative court disarmed party members, barring them from owning firearms; leftist activists succeeded in having the party de-banked; and an AFD politician, Marie-Thérèse Kaiser, was convicted of a hate crime for sharing government statistics about the disproportionate number of gang rapes committed by immigrants, specifically Afghan nationals.

Attacks on the AFD have also taken the form of violence.

Prior to the AFD securing 15.9% of the German vote in last year’s European parliamentary elections, a leftist who was tearing down an AFD candidate’s campaign posters allegedly stabbed AFD’s spokesman for Mannheim, Heinrich Koch, with a carpet knife.

Rod Dreher, a senior fellow at the Danube Institute in Budapest, noted, “What is the likelihood that four candidates and two reserve candidates of the same political party, in the same region, would drop dead suddenly, within 13 days of each other — and just before local elections?”

“It must be hoped that the unfortunate and statistically unlikely deaths of four politicians from a party the German government is considering outlawing were nothing more than a fluke,” continued Dreher. “The alternative is too frightening to contemplate seriously.”

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​Afd, Alternative for germany, Germany, Death, Establishment, Europe, Berlin, Elon musk, Right leaning, Conspiracy, Alternative fur deutschland, Alice weidel, Politics 

Writer/director Erik Bork summoned the late Rodney King with his newest film.

It’s called “The Elephant in the Room,” although the subtitle could easily have been, “Can’t We All Just Get Along?”

‘It made it a bigger challenge. How do you make a romantic comedy when you have that in the middle of it?’

The rom-com stars Alyssa Limperis and Sean Kleier (“Wedding Season”) as a couple staring down a near-impossible divide. She’s a dyed-in-the-wool progressive, and he voted for Donald Trump.

Twice.

Can this romance survive a very 21st-century fissure? Even more important, can a modern-day filmmaker treat conservatives fairly in a politically charged project?

Splitsville

Bork, who co-wrote “Band of Brothers” and “From the Earth to the Moon,” started worrying about the state of the union back in 2016. That, of course, marked the rise of Donald J. Trump as a political force.

The Hollywood hyphenate realized a divided nation could be fodder for a different kind of romantic comedy. Instead of fretting over dresses or ways to lose a guy, a couple could squabble about politics.

“I was starting to be convinced that polarization was a key issue in our society, maybe the key issue,” Bork tells Align. “It made me want to explore it.”

And he had a little help along the way.

RELATED: Chat brats: ABC makes ‘The View’ hosts take back Trump trash talk

Lou Rocco/Getty Images

Likeable lovebirds

A pair of emerging groups — Bridge Entertainment Labs and the Civic Health Project — counseled Bork on how to make the script less polarizing and more believable. “Elephant” marks Bridge Entertainment Labs’ first foray into pop-culture fare.

“In a romantic comedy, you have to like both of the people. … Can they be both likeable and believable to both sides was a key mission,” he says. That took multiple drafts to ensure that audiences didn’t hate either lovebird.

His small cast also shared their perspectives before the cameras began to roll. Bork credits them for adding their insights to the project.

“They had thoughts and questions and concerns. … Some were playing characters very different from them. … The [film’s] ending was the result of that conversation, that negotiation,” he says.

Affection insurrection

“The Elephant in the Room” is set just before the events of Jan. 6, 2021, one of the most heated political moments in recent memory.

“It was the most dramatic thing,” he says. “It made it a bigger challenge. How do you make a romantic comedy when you have that in the middle of it?”

It’s easy to point a finger at the cultural forces pitting American against American these days. Bork singles out news outlets and politicians who “keep us polarized and make us assume the people on the other side are the most extreme, lockstep version of what we imagine them to be.”

Bork told a story with specific themes ripped from today’s headlines, but he tried not to make a rom-com equivalent of a white paper.

“I want people to enjoy the story, a comedic and heartfelt experience, and have the other stuff be secondary, but the other stuff is important to me,” he says. “It’s not a documentary, and I’m not a social change agent. There’s no call to action.”

Wrong-com?

That said, he hopes the film lets viewers empathize with those who voted the “wrong” way last November.

“It’s about humanizing your interactions with people and having some generosity and curiosity about each other,” he said.

And he knows that can be a tall task.

“Yeah, it’d be nice to get along better, but they’re terrible. They’re stupid and evil,” he said, imagining what some might say about his film’s larger themes.

Bork can’t speak for Hollywood in general, an industry dominated by left-leaning views and an unofficial blacklist against some right-leaning artists. He can share some early screening reactions, which gave him hope about the film’s impact.

He knows plenty of Americans would enter the film with their arms ideologically crossed. He’s seen it up close.

“This is the wrong time for this … a movie that humanizes a Trump supporter,” as he puts it. For some viewers, though, the central love story won them over.

“But I’ve had people watch the movie who I know basically have that feeling … then when they watch it, [they say] ‘this was great and we need this, even though it doesn’t change my view of that man,’” meaning the 45th and 47th president, of course.

Making “The Elephant in the Room” gave Bork a fresh perspective, too. The left-leaning director says working with the aforementioned nonprofits let him examine his beliefs and news feeds.

“I’m trying to notice if I’m in an echo chamber,” he said, “and if I’m consuming things that the whole point is to get me angry or depressed.

“I try to go issue by issue [now] … and be curious to understand, which I wasn’t before as much,” he adds.

​Movies, Culture, Entertainment, Erik bork, The elephant in the room, Hollywood, Rom-com, Trump, Align interview 

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has released over 33,000 pages of Epstein-related records that were provided by the U.S. Department of Justice — but Americans have been conditioned to wonder if this is real transparency or just D.C. political theater.

The same uncertainty applies to apparent meetings taking place behind closed doors that may be uncovering more information about the predators involved.

“Speaker Mike Johnson and Oversight Chairman James Comer actually quietly pulled something together that you almost never see. It’s been a rare bipartisan closed-door meeting,” BlazeTV host Jill Savage explains on “Blaze News: The Mandate.”

“They had six women who survived Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse, and for at least two of them, it was the first time that they had ever spoken out,” she says, noting that Johnson called the meeting both “heartbreaking” and “infuriating.”

According to Johnson, some of the women had been “groomed” for over 30 years.

“There’s so much that’s happening behind closed doors, and we still just don’t know. Are we going to get the transparency that we want, or is this more of the actual political theater?” Savage asks.

“There’s not much new, but what is new is that, you know, we’re told that these women have provided names of additional persons of interest, so that is interesting. Who are those people? Will that come out? Will we talk about that? I don’t know,” BlazeTV host Matthew Peterson says.

“We also have about a thousand pages … that are new, flight logs from him flying out of the country. But what we don’t have so far is actual names, and that’s what most people want,” he continues.

Blaze media senior politics editor and D.C. correspondent Christopher Bedford isn’t too pleased with how long it’s taken for them to interview these women in the first place.

“It’s the kind of attention that Congress probably should have paid to this from the very beginning, which is bringing in victims, having closed-door meetings, which, you know, are more serious than open-door meetings,” Bedford says.

“Open-door meetings are theater for MSNBC, CNN, and Fox,” he continues. “They’re not real. There aren’t real questions. It’s just, ‘Let me see how many points I can get. Let me see how many points I can put on the board.’ … But closed-door sessions are much more serious.”

Want more from ‘Blaze News: The Mandate’?

To enjoy more provocative opinions, expert analysis, and breaking stories you won’t see anywhere else, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Video phone, Video, Upload, Camera phone, Free, Sharing, Youtube.com, Blaze news i the mandate, Blaze news tonight, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Blazetv, Jeffrey epstein, Epstein victims, Epstein list, Oversight committee, Epstein files, 33k epstein pages, Department of justice, Ghislaine maxwell, Blaze news the mandate 

A simple move by the Trump administration means every former White House employee will be seeing the president sooner or later.

With just a few clicks, Trump’s team implemented a genius joke that will last at least until the end of his term and immediately struck a nerve with a member of the previous administration.

‘One of the great trolls of all time.’

On the job posting and career networking site LinkedIn, the administration changed the White House’s profile picture to President Trump’s official 2025 portrait, which was revealed in June.

That means any former employee who lists the White House under his or her job experience section will now have to see Trump’s face, for better or for worse.

Most notably, this affects former President Barack Obama’s page.

First son Donald Trump Jr. pointed out the change in a trolling social media post of his own.

“Just confirmed … it’s real,” Trump Jr. said on a screenshot of Obama’s LinkedIn page. “One of the great trolls of all time … changing the White House, LinkedIn profile picture,” he wrote on Instagram.

A member of President Biden’s administration did not appear amused by the photo, though, and got into a contentious exchange over the joke with a current White House staffer.

RELATED: Disgusting: Even Tim Walz cheers false rumors of Trump’s death

“The White House is now posting on LinkedIn and made their profile picture a picture of Trump’s face,” Jeremy Edwards, former Biden spokesman, wrote on X. “Which means if you worked for the White House in the past, and it’s on your profile, people see Trump’s face.”

White House communications director Steven Cheung replied hours later, confirming the executive branch’s intention to troll former employees.

“That’s the whole point, dummy. Trolololololol,” Cheung wrote.

Edwards did not take the remark kindly and lashed out at Cheung’s appearance.

“Thanks for the explainer, dumba**. I guess I should just be grateful that it’s not your face I have to see whenever I open the app,” his X post read. “Appreciate you looking out for us!”

RELATED: Trump admin expands ICE detention space into notorious state prison

Trump’s photo caused even more news after a reporter from the Daily Caller asked him about presidential portraits going on display in the Rose Garden.

When asked if he would include a picture of President Biden, Trump replied, “Isn’t that an interesting question.”

“And I’ll listen to you, too,” Trump told the reporter. “It’s a decision I have to make. We put up a picture of the autopen.”

After reporter Reagan Reese called the idea “hilarious,” Trump later added:

“I gotta do it. … It’s going up in about two weeks, because — it’s all being prepared.”

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​Politics, Trump, Troll, Trump administration, Social media, Biden, Donald trump, Linkedin, White hosue, News 

Police bodycam video shows the moment children and parents watched in shock as a Florida man dressed in a Chuck E. Cheese mascot costume was arrested.

The Tallahassee Police Department recently released bodycam video of the eye-opening July 23 arrest.

‘Would y’all put Mickey Mouse in handcuffs?’

Police bodycam footage shows officers marching into a Chuck E. Cheese restaurant in Tallahassee.

“We’re gonna detain the mouse,” an officer is heard telling a fellow cop on video as they enter the pizza restaurant geared toward kids.

Bodycam footage shows children playing arcade games as officers walk toward an individual dressed from head to toe as the Chuck E. Cheese mouse mascot.

“Chuck E.’s a little bit busy, ma’am,” an officer tells a woman.

The officer orders the person in the mouse costume, “Chuck E., come with me. Chuck E! Chuck E! Stop resisting! You’re being detained, stop resisting! Let it go! Do not cause a scene here, sir.”

The Chuck E. Cheese mascot is handcuffed and then escorted out of the children’s restaurant as parents and kids watch in disbelief.

As one of the officers exits the restaurant, a furious woman scolds the cop for arresting the mouse mascot in front of children at the restaurant.

“I would like y’all to walk him out the door instead of traumatizing all these children seeing someone like Chuck E. Cheese get arrested,” the woman is heard saying.

She then asks, “Would y’all put Mickey Mouse in handcuffs?”

Tallahassee Police Department spokesperson Alicia Hill previously told the Tallahassee Democrat that officers had planned to escort the Chuck E. Cheese mascot from the restaurant and handcuff him outside. But police said they became nervous after the suspect resisted.

Hill explained that when officers approached the individual in the Chuck E. Cheese mascot costume, the suspect “immediately tenses up and resists, and so at this point they make the decision to put him in handcuffs” for the safety of the suspect, customers, and officers.

Hill added that it was “unfortunate” that the suspect “happened to be in a suit and in costume.”

RELATED: Wild arrest video allegedly shows lottery millionaire kicking cop in face just 1 day after claiming record jackpot

“The parents were not happy with us detaining Chuck E. Cheese,” one officer tells another cop in the clip.

The other cop responds, “Too bad.”

After police remove the costume head from the suspect’s head, exposing his face, officers attempt to search the handcuffed man for weapons. However, the suspect is still wearing the rest of the mouse costume, which makes it difficult to detect if the suspect has any weapons on him.

“I’m working, you know, I’m just doing my job,” the suspect tells cops. “What the f**k is this about?”

Police arrested 41-year-old Jermel Jones for allegedly purchasing items with someone else’s credit card.

Citing the probable cause affidavit, Fox News reported that a woman informed police that her debit card went missing June 28 and that she last recalled seeing her debit card at the Chuck E. Cheese restaurant for her child’s birthday party.

WKMG-TV reported that the woman said her debit card was used at a smoke shop, a grocery store, and a Whataburger fast-food restaurant without her knowledge or consent.

Police said officers found the stolen credit card in the suspect’s left front pocket. Jones reportedly told officers that he “never used” the debit card and denied any wrongdoing,

“Jones was also in possession of a small amount of marijuana,” the affidavit stated, according to Fox News. Jones allegedly told a police officer that he was “on the way” to getting a medical marijuana license.

According to WPEC-TV, Jones was charged with theft of a credit card, criminal use of personal identification information, and fraudulent use of a credit card totaling over $100.

Jones was released the next day on a $1,000 bond.

A Chuck E. Cheese spokesperson told People magazine, “We have taken the appropriate action concerning the subject employee.”

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​Florida crime, Florida man, Florida, Chuck e cheese, Bodycam video, Bodycam footage, Police bodycam video, Police bodycam footage, Crime, Theft of a credit card charge, Criminal use of personal identification information charge, Fraudulent use of a credit card totaling over $100 charge, Arrest, Handcuffed, Chuck e. cheese mascot, Tallahassee 

Aaron Babbitt has for more than four and a half years kept an empty memorial flag case awaiting the day he receives military honors from the U.S. Air Force for his late wife, Ashli.

“Over these years, that’s been my top priority,” Babbitt told Blaze News in an interview. “I still have that flag case sitting in my apartment right now. I always knew I was going to get it filled one way or another, especially after President Trump got re-elected.”

‘I love that they’re so upset. I find it extremely satisfying.’

On Feb. 9, 2021, now-retired Lt. Gen. Brian T. Kelly, an Air Force personnel bureaucrat, wrote to Babbitt informing him that there would be no funeral honors for the veteran gunned down by U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Leroy Byrd at 2:44 p.m. on Jan. 6.

Fifty-four months later, U.S. Air Force Under Secretary Matthew L. Lohmeier reversed that decision, telling the late senior airman’s family that she would, indeed, receive military honors.

“I am persuaded that the previous determination was incorrect,” Lohmeier wrote to Aaron Babbitt and Micki Witthoeft, Ashli’s mother. “Additionally, I would like to invite you and your family to meet me at the Pentagon to personally offer my condolences.”

The letter prompted an emotional reaction from Babbitt, himself a U.S. Marine Corps veteran.

RELATED: Feds settle multimillion-dollar lawsuit in the death of Ashli Babbitt

U.S. Air Force Under Secretary Matthew L. Lohmeier (left) on Aug. 15, 2025, reversed a February 2021 order by Lt. Gen. Brian T. Kelly to deny military funeral honors to Senior Airman Ashli Babbitt.U.S. Air Force photos

“I obviously shed tears,” he said. “My whole thing has always been fighting for Ashli’s character and making sure people know who she really was and talking back against the untruths and slander and smear job that’s been waged on her.”

Babbitt said he was not surprised to see the decision prompt some unhinged reactions.

Retired Army Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling took the low road in an op-ed published in Bill Kristol’s neocon journal the Bulwark. Hertling called the decision to grant military honors “obscene” and made the specious claim that Ashli Babbitt died trying to overturn the Constitution.

Political commentator Sarah Elizabeth “S.E.” Cupp went even farther off the ledge, likening Ashli Babbitt to two notorious serial killers. “I don’t frankly care that she served,” Cupp said on CNN. “So did David Berkowitz. So did Jeffrey Dahmer. So did Benedict Arnold.”

Cupp’s emotional meltdown further claimed that Babbitt, 35, was “ramming an American flag at a police officer in an attempt to overthrow the government.”

The problem with the statements from Hertling and Cupp is that they are predicated on lies.

Ashli Babbitt did not ram a flag at anyone. She did not riot. She certainly was not trying to “overthrow the government.” In fact, she was the only person in the crowded hallway outside the House Speaker’s Lobby who tried to stop the rioting, vandalism, and violence.

‘Ashli was begging officers to call for backup before she was shot. Officers ignored Ashli.’

When all else failed and out-of-control rioter Zachary Jordan Alam had smashed out multiple windows with a helmet, Babbitt spun him around and punched him in the nose, knocking off his glasses. That ended Alam’s violent rampage.

RELATED: Capitol Police name permanent chief hours after union slams controversial interim pick

Ashli Babbitt punches rioter Zachary Jordan Alam in the nose after he smashed out several windows in the entrance to the Speaker’s Lobby at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Babbitt was fatally shot seconds later. Blaze News graphic from Sam Montoya photograph. Used with permission.

Babbitt then tried to escape the mayhem by climbing into one of the broken-out windows. She was immediately gunned down by Byrd, lying in wait from a hidden position, out of her field of view with his finger already on the trigger of his Glock service weapon.

Byrd, who has a decades-long disciplinary record including negligence with a firearm, took 11 seconds to collect his thoughts. Then he went on Capitol Police radio and lied, claiming “shots are being fired at us” and “we’re prepared to fire back at them,” audio recordings showed.

Aaron Babbitt knows all too well how the keepers of the Jan. 6 narrative have lied about his wife from the very second Byrd emerged from his hidden position and put an end to her life.

Seeing the same people who have lied about Ashli Babbitt now clutching their pearls over her military honors brings a wry smile to Aaron Babbitt’s face.

“I love that they’re so upset,” Babbitt said. “I find it extremely satisfying.”

Letter to defense secretary

The effort to get military honors restored began in July, when Judicial Watch senior counsel Robert Sticht sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Sticht noted the nearly $5 million civil lawsuit settlement the federal government agreed to in June. He also outlined the clemency and pardon declaration issued by President Trump on Jan. 20, 2025.

“It is impossible to reconcile Gen. Kelly’s denial of military funeral honors for Ashli Babbitt’s funeral with President Trump’s grant of clemency to all individuals accused or convicted of offenses related to events at or near the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021,” Sticht wrote. “Gen. Kelly’s refusal to provide military funeral honors was part of the ‘grave national injustice’ that President Trump ended by granting clemency.”

The denial of honors “cannot be reconciled with this landmark legal settlement,” Sticht said. “Many well-documented facts now clearly show that the fatal shooting was not justified.”

Sticht outlined facts that are almost always ignored by the left. As a highly trained military police officer, Ashli Babbitt quickly realized that the crowd gathering in the hallway entrance to the Speaker’s Lobby was going to be trouble. She rebuked three U.S. Capitol Police officers standing guard at the entrance, telling them to “call f**king help!” video showed. She tried to prevent the violence.

“Ashli was begging officers to call for backup before she was shot,” Sticht wrote. “Officers ignored Ashli.”

‘You don’t even know what her actions were. So I knew it was a political hit job.’

When Babbitt decided to escape the hallway by starting to climb through a broken-out window frame, she could not see Byrd, Sticht wrote. “Ashli never saw Lt. Byrd because he was hidden from her view,” Sticht said. “She was ambushed and defenseless. Multiple witnesses at the scene yelled, ‘You just murdered her!’”

RELATED: Federal judge explodes in Ashli Babbitt court hearing as wrongful-death case slows

U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd appears to have his finger on the trigger of his service weapon while walking on the U.S. House floor as rioters break windows at the House entrance at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Photo by Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images; graphic overlay by Blaze News

Sticht suggested that if the fatal shooting was justified, there would not have been an immediate cover-up.

“The official coverup for the unlawful shooting began immediately,” Sticht wrote. “Within a minute after shooting Ashli, Lt. Byrd used his radio to communicate far and wide that he was being shot at and preparing to shoot back, which was a blatant lie he told to cover up his unjustified use of deadly force against Ashli.”

Byrd’s name was hidden from the public for nearly nine months after the shooting. He was housed in secret at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland at taxpayer expense. Byrd’s “history of dangerous and incompetent behavior involving use of deadly force, mishandling his service weapon and other misconduct” were also covered up, Sticht said.

Witthoeft did her part to secure reinstatement of her daughter’s military honors by going straight to President Trump. One day she watched the president holding a press gaggle outside the White House on live television. She waited until he was safely aboard Marine One and then called his cell phone.

Aaron Babbitt retold the story: “I called him and he answered. I was just planning on leaving a message, but he answered the phone and said, ‘Micki, I was just thinking about you. I was going to give you a call.’”

Witthoeft told the president about the letter to Hegseth and about her son-in-law’s empty flag case. “I’m going to look into that,” Trump told her, according to Aaron Babbitt. “Then I was told that it was made an actionable item by the president,” Babbitt said.

‘I still want Michael Byrd in jail for the rest of his life.’

Babbitt said he believes the original denial of military honors was a political one and not based on what Ashli actually did at the Capitol.

“It was a vicious blow while we were already down,” he said. “It was purposeful. It was calculated, because there’s no reason to do that.

“Ashli was never charged for a crime that day,” Babbitt said. “You can’t charge her posthumously. So you can’t tell me that you’re denying it based on her actions at the Capitol when, a month later, you don’t even know what her actions were. So I knew it was a political hit job.”

Military security

Ashli Babbitt enlisted in the U.S. Air Force after graduating in 2003 from El Capitan High School in Lakeside, Calif. She graduated from basic training in August 2004 at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. Her first duty station was Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks, Alaska.

She deployed at least four times in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. She worked in security forces doing convoy security operations, base entry control, force protection, personal security, and embassy security operations. She provided security for detainees at Camp Bucca Joint Operations Base in Umm Qasr, Iraq.

Camp Bucca was a brutal duty assignment. She had to guard jihadis who would gladly have cut her throat if they escaped their confines.

“It was just all detainees that they would bring in. There was CIA coming in all the time,” Aaron Babbitt said. “Black Hawks coming in, dropping people off, taking people out.

RELATED: Ashli Babbitt stood up to him — now J6er ‘Helmet Boy’ faces new charges

Senior Airman Ashli Babbitt was commended in December 2005 for boosting troop morale by Army Gen. John Abizaid (fourth from left), chairman of U.S. Central Command.Photo courtesy of Micki Witthoeft

“Lines of SUVs coming in, taking people out, bringing people in, riots,” he said. “They kill each other. They threatened to kill our forces.”

On one occasion, Ashli and another female military policewoman came upon three detainees who escaped their cells by tunneling under the fence. “They got into a hand-to-hand fistfight with three of them before the guys in the tower could run down and help them,” Aaron Babbitt said. “So it’s two females fighting three grown men.”

In Iraq in December 2005, Babbitt caught the attention of U.S. Army Gen. John P. Abizaid, the commander of U.S. Central Command. His convoy was passing through, and Gen. Abizaid noticed Babbitt holding up a cardboard Merry Christmas sign on the airfield for arriving and departing pilots and crew.

The general “was so impressed with her way of boosting troop morale that he stopped his convoy to meet and commend Ashli for her performance,” Witthoeft said. “General Abizaid commended Ashli for her hard work and excellence.”

Lawsuit settlement

The U.S. Department of Justice agreed to settle Babbitt’s $30 million wrongful-death lawsuit against the federal government for slightly less than $5 million in June 2025. President Trump was made aware that the DOJ was still defending the Capitol Police lieutenant who killed Babbitt during an interview conducted by Greg Kelly of Newsmax.

“The president said, ‘I was not aware of that. I’ll look into that,’” Aaron Babbitt said. “And I felt like at that moment, when the president says he’s going to look into something, that means all the staffers in the background just got an action item. So the whole mood kind of changed that point.”

Aaron Babbitt said he is satisfied with the settlement negotiated between the government and attorneys for Judicial Watch Inc., which represented him and his late wife’s estate in the lawsuit.

“It’s never been about money,” he said. “I have no clue about the process or what is good and what’s not, but I am satisfied. I’ve been told that that’s a pretty high number for a federal tort claim.”

RELATED: Retiring Capitol Police chief takes shots at Jan. 6 protester Ashli Babbitt, settlement of civil lawsuit

Even though she did no rioting on Jan. 6, corporate media continue to paint Ashli Babbitt as a violent person who led a mob.Blaze News graphic

Babbitt said he’s looking to see the DOJ conduct a new use-of-force investigation of Byrd, whom the government declined to prosecute for what the lawsuit called an “ambush murder.”

“I still want Michael Byrd in jail for the rest of his life,” Babbitt said.

Byrd was never subjected to questioning by internal affairs detectives. His only public comments on the shooting were made on national television to Lester Holt of NBC News. Byrd said firing his Glock at Babbitt was a “last resort,” although he admitted he could not tell if the person emerging through the broken window was male or female or in possession of any kind of weapon. Babbitt was not armed.

As for the vitriol spewed by the likes of S.E. Cupp and much of the corporate media, Aaron Babbitt said he lost the ability to be shocked long ago. He said he became desensitized amid the death threats, harassing phone calls, and the many people who emailed him photos of his dying wife on the floor outside the Speaker’s Lobby.

“I know she’s dead. I know she’s not hurting any more,” Babbitt said. “And that means more to me than anything. She’s not in any pain.

“So people, they’re awful sometimes,” he said. “It is what it is. You’ve just got to be a better person.”

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​Politics 

Our country is standing at a crossroads. Neither the world nor America’s place in it is what it was a generation ago. The unipolar moment is over. And yet, many in the Republican Party seek to claim the mantle of America First while continuing the same failed adventurism of the past.

National conservatism as a movement agrees that these people and ideas must be stopped. But we have failed to check their influence in the party largely because we have not offered an alternative that both meets the real threats to American security and balances national interest, the deterrent effect, industrial capability, and political will.

We cannot deter our adversaries if we cannot outbuild them.

I outlined a framework for what a genuine America First foreign policy would entail in an essay for the National Interest. I called for developing a doctrine that I dubbed “prioritized deterrence.” That essay was the first step toward forging a set of foreign policy principles that can unite national conservatives and set the agenda for the Republican Party for the next generation.

A key component of prioritized deterrence is industrial capacity. Deterrence depends not only on our military’s technical capability, but also on our industrial capacity — certainly in defense, but particularly in non-defense. Without factories humming, shipyards bustling, and energy production roaring, our ability to deter wanes. We cannot project strength abroad if we cannot produce strength at home.

Prioritized deterrence is not retreat. It is a recalibration. It rejects the fantasy that America can — or should — police every corner of the globe. Instead, it demands that we concretely identify our vital national interests. No more vague talk of values or entering endless nation-building campaigns. This will require open and honest debate.

The days of tarring dissenting voices as unpatriotic should be left in the rearview mirror. In fact, I recently sent a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to award Pat Buchanan the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Buchanan was right about nearly everything 20 years before anyone else realized it, including his recognition that Iraq was not aligned with our strategic national interests. We need serious voices like his in the conversation during these all-important debates.

Prioritized deterrence belongs firmly within the realist school of thought. It rests on restraint and on the quantifiable limits of a nation’s resources and people. Those limits force policymakers to rank threats to the American way of life by urgency and severity.

Deterrence depends on credibility: An aggressor must believe it will pay an unacceptable price for attacking the United States. But not every hostile nation deserves brinkmanship. National constraints and the risk of escalation demand that we focus only on the gravest threats.

Kinetic action must remain credible but reserved as a last resort. The U.S. military exists not only to fight and win wars but, more importantly, to deter them before they begin and ensure American security.

Prioritized deterrence in practice

What does a strategy that contends with these essential questions look like in practice?

Consider the 2020 strike on Qassem Soleimani. A single, precise action eliminated a key architect of Iran’s malign influence, sending a message to Tehran: Kill Americans, and you will pay. No endless wars, no nation-building, just a clear signal backed by lethal force.

Now consider Operation Midnight Hammer. President Trump authorized a precision strike that was executed flawlessly. He rejected calls to further escalate into regime change. As a result, we eliminated a key threat while managing the retaliation from Iran and successfully stepped off the escalation ladder before the region became destabilized. That’s prioritized deterrence in action.

What do these strikes have in common, other than the antagonist? In both cases, the president laid out clear, precise explanations of America’s vital national interest. He aligned the use of force with American goals, and he did so precisely with explicit acknowledgment of our constraints and limitations.

Additionally, both strikes relied on American technological supremacy: drones, stealth bombers, precision munitions, and intelligence — all products of a sophisticated industrial base. However, we cannot just rely on our qualitative military advantage as a silver bullet for deterrence. At a certain point, quantitative advantages become qualitative, which is one of the reasons China’s industrial might has made it so formidable on the world stage.

What is making us less formidable on the world stage is Ukraine. We should not be funding the war in Ukraine, and we should never have been involved in that conflict from the beginning. The proponents of prolonging this conflict seem unable or unwilling to grasp the reality that we do not have the industrial capacity to provide Ukraine with what they need — to say nothing of providing for our own needs here at home.

RELATED: Why won’t American companies build new factories here?

Photo by Kirk Wester via Getty Images

In fact, Ukraine’s defense minister has said his country needs 4 million 155-millimeter artillery shells per year and would use as many as 7 million per year if they were available.

In 2024, then-Senator JD Vance correctly noted that even after drastically ramping up production, the U.S. could still only produce 360,000 shells per year — less than one-tenth of what Ukraine supposedly needs. Vance was also doubtful of expert claims that we could produce 1.2 million rounds per year by the end of 2025. In the end, he was right, and the experts were wrong.

The Army now confirms that the U.S. is only on pace to produce 480,000 artillery shells per year. These aren’t highly sophisticated guided missiles either. Quantity, not quality, ended up winning the day.

Very simply, we must choose to put America first, as we do not currently have the capacity to both arm Ukraine and defend ourselves should the need arise.

Lagging behind

A candid assessment of our industrial capacity is that it’s lagging. The same voices that called for foreign adventurism also hollowed out our heartland and sent our manufacturing jobs overseas. We now face a new choice: Rebuild or be left to the ashes of history.

We cannot deter our adversaries if we cannot outbuild them. Our defense industrial base — shipyards, munitions factories, aerospace plants — lag significantly behind our peers, especially China. This is a far cry from the industrial base that won World War II.

The Virginia-class submarine program, for example, is crucial in countering China. Yet limited shipyard capacity, supply chain bottlenecks, and a shortage of skilled workers have created years-long delays. Chinese shipyards account for more than 50% of global commercial shipbuilding, while the U.S. makes up just 0.1%.

In 2024, a single Chinese shipbuilder constructed more commercial vessels by tonnage than the entire U.S. shipbuilding industry has since World War II. We cannot deter China in this state of industrial atrophy.

Reviving the entire industrial base

Just as critical — perhaps even more so — is the need to rebuild the U.S. industrial base as a whole, not just the defense sector. “If you want peace, prepare for war” means more than building ships. It means strengthening industry, shoring up families, and restoring the backbone of society. That creates jobs, secures supply chains, and projects strength without overextending our forces or wasting resources.

During World War II, the United States retooled civilian manufacturing almost overnight. Ford and General Motors turned out aircraft. Singer Sewing Machine Company built precision cockpit instruments. IBM produced fire-control systems for bombers. Civilian industry became the arsenal of democracy.

That capacity has withered. The COVID-19 pandemic revealed just how hollowed out our domestic base has become. America now relies on China for more than 80% of the active ingredients in pharmaceuticals. That dependence gives Beijing leverage.

Our weakness feeds China’s confidence. If defending Taiwan means empty pharmacy shelves across America, would Washington still respond? Beijing is counting on the answer. That calculation could determine whether China invades.

We need a manufacturing renaissance — steel mills, factories, foundries — because a nation that outsources its industry outsources its power.

Taiwan is indicative of another vital manufacturing sector where our capacity is lagging: the semiconductor industry. These chips power everything from smartphones to missile systems, yet the U.S. produces less than 12% of the world’s supply. Meanwhile, Taiwan’s TSMC dominates. If China invades Taiwan, our military and domestic economy will grind to a halt.

This is not theoretical; it’s a ticking time bomb, one that is tied directly to our ability to credibly deter China.

This equation must change. If America produces pharmaceuticals and semiconductors at home, adversaries lose their leverage. Deterrence grows stronger without firing a shot or putting boots on foreign soil.

I think of my home state of West Virginia, where Weirton Steel once stood as one of the largest steel producers in the world. At its peak, it employed 23,000 people.

That steel not only secured American dominance in industry, it sustained families, churches, schools, and communities. A single paycheck could buy a home and support a family. Mothers could raise children and stay active in their schools and churches because one income was enough.

The same bipartisan leaders in Washington who chased short-term gains instead of building a strong industrial base and healthy families signed Weirton Steel’s death warrant. They let China flood the U.S. market with cheap tin plate steel, and Weirton paid the price.

We begged President Joe Biden for tariff relief, but he followed the pattern of his predecessors and did nothing. The result: Weirton’s tin plate mill was idled, thousands of workers lost their jobs, and the community was gutted.

Today, only one blast furnace capable of producing tin plate steel remains in the entire United States. One.

China’s gotten the picture

Economic capacity and industrial output are critical in the defense of the nation and create a better quality of life. A strong manufacturing sector is, in itself, a strong deterrent. China understands this.

Its “Made in China 2025” plan, cited in then-Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2019 address at the National Defense University, declared:

Manufacturing is the main pillar of the national economy, the foundation of the country, the tool of transformation, and the basis of prosperity. Since the beginning of industrial civilization in the middle of the 18th century, it has been proven repeatedly by the rise and fall of world powers that without strong manufacturing, there is no national prosperity.

This is obviously true.

China now produces more than half the world’s steel, powering both its infrastructure and its military. Meanwhile, we’ve allowed our own steel industry to wither, importing from abroad while American mills rust. That failure is not only economic. It’s strategic.

We won World War II in part because we built planes, tanks, and ships faster than the Axis powers could destroy them. A robust industrial base — defense and non-defense — is a deterrent in itself. It signals to adversaries: We can outfight you, outbuild you, and outlast you.

We need a manufacturing renaissance — steel mills, factories, foundries — because a nation that outsources its industry outsources its power. Deindustrialization was a choice, a choice with disastrous consequences. We must now make the choice to rebuild and reindustrialize.

RELATED: Read it and weep: Tariffs work, and the numbers prove it

Photo by IURII KRASILNIKOV via Getty Images

Unleashing American energy

To have manufacturing dominance, we must unleash energy dominance. Factories don’t run on hope; they run on power — reliable, affordable, and abundant power. Wind and solar power are obviously not able to power anything. Thankfully, America’s superpower is the massive quantities of natural resources we have at our fingertips.

We have some of the largest proven reserves of both oil and natural gas of any nation in the world. This is a textbook example of our quantitative advantage becoming a qualitative advantage.

We have the largest proven reserve of coal in the world, nearly double the supply of the next closest country. Our energy potential is unlimited, and we must drastically ramp up our output if we want to meet the energy demands of the future economy.

Fossil fuels have long been the backbone of industrial power, and West Virginia’s coal and natural gas is its beating heart. Yet coal in particular has been under siege, not just from regulations but from corporate environmental, social, and governance policies pushed by firms like BlackRock that waged war on fossil fuels.

As state treasurer of West Virginia, I took a stand. I made West Virginia the first state in the nation to divest our tax dollars from BlackRock. I refused to let Wall Street’s agenda use our own state’s money to kill our coal industry. Today, more than a dozen states have followed our lead, rejecting ESG policies that undermine American energy dominance.

China, meanwhile, builds coal plants at a breakneck pace, powering its industrial juggernaut. They use coal to fuel their steel production while we let our own mines and mills idle. We cannot let this continue.

Thanks to President Trump, we’ve begun to change course. For the first time in my lifetime, a president took a stand for coal, signing executive orders promoting domestic coal production. But we need to go further. We must become a global juggernaut with an “all of the below” approach to energy — coal, oil, natural gas, and nuclear must power our path to energy dominance.

Prioritizing America, deterring aggressors

America cannot do everything, everywhere, all at once. We are not a nation of infinite industrial capacity, infinite goods, or infinite will. Scarcity — of materials, of capacity, of resolve — forces us to choose. Prioritized deterrence is a framework for grappling with those choices.

It is a commitment to focusing our energies, rebuilding our industrial might, and unleashing the energy to power a 21st-century industrial base. It’s a rejection of overreach in favor of strength, of focus instead of distraction.

Leaders on both sides of the aisle over the last 40 years squandered the inheritance of peace, security, and industrial might in favor of globalization and foreign adventurism. We cannot afford to continue down that path. Correcting course will require open, honest, and sometimes intense debate.

It will require serious investments from business leaders in American manufacturing and public policies that assist in this reorientation. It demands that we do more to appropriately train and equip a skilled workforce.

But we must start now. America will build again, power again, and deter again. Not everywhere, not always — but where it matters most, with a strength that none can match.

Editor’s note: This article has been adapted from a speech delivered on Tuesday, Sept. 2, to the fifth National Conservatism Conference (NatCon 5) in Washington, D.C.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Manufacturing, American manufacturing, American steel producers, America first, National security, Chips, Taiwan, China, Economy, Jobs, Industry, Coal, West virginia, Natural gas, Nuclear power, World war ii, Energy, Blackrock, Jd vance, Marco rubio, Riley moore, Ukraine, Military, Foreign policy 

Van Jones is finally saying what conservatives have argued for years: The woke era has gone too far.

“This is not gonna make me popular, but I’m not mad, because it got ridiculous. I’m an employer, and at a certain point, your Slack channel just turns into Vietnam every other day because something happened that had nothing to do with the workplace,” Jones said on CNN.

“You got to bring in all kinds of counselors and, like, this is not camp, guys. We’re trying to make money. So I enjoyed the moment for a while where we were having our reckonings about everything. We done wrecked, okay? Reckoning direct. We can move on,” he added, laughing.

“I think he’s sort of admitting this because Van Jones is pretty perceptive, and so I think he’s recognizing that … they’ve overplayed their hands, the woke folks, right? Like it’s just people are sick of it, as evidenced by Donald Trump waltzing into the White House for a second time,” Dan Andros of the “Quick Start Podcast” tells BlazeTV host Stu Burguiere on “Stu Does America.”

“This guy they rebranded as Hitler for four years. And they’re like, ‘Well, how did Hitler get in there?’ It’s like, I don’t know. Maybe because like Van said, you turned your job that you have to show up to every day, for millions of people, into this place where now they’ve got to tiptoe around every microaggression imaginable and it’s a living nightmare, and they voted against it overwhelmingly,” Andros explains.

“And they seem to continue to be doing it,” Stu agrees.

“If you say, ‘Donald Trump is Hitler,’ right, and then Hitler gets elected, you have a path to go. Your two choices are, number one, I was wrong. He’s not Hitler, and I was overexaggerating what my belief was in this guy. He’s actually not that bad. I just have a disagreement with him,” he explains.

“Or two, he is Hitler, and I live in Nazi Germany because the people around me all want Hitler.”

“I think maybe to some extent, Van Jones is choosing this way to say, ‘Look, maybe this was overexaggerated,’ where I think a lot of the people on the left, certainly on the CNN panel every single night, are saying, ‘Look, we’re just in Nazi Germany,’” he continues.

“And that is going to send them down all sorts of really bad roads for their political futures,” he adds.

Want more from Stu?

To enjoy more of Stu’s lethal wit, wisdom, and mockery, 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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Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia failed to understand one of America’s basic founding principles and instead likened it to the Iranian regime.

In a Wednesday committee hearing, Kaine insisted that our natural rights are derived from the government, not from God. Kaine went on to say that the notion that our natural rights come from the Creator is “extremely troubling” and compared it to Iran’s theocracy.

Unfortunately for Kaine, the founding fathers disagree with him.

“The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator. That’s what the Iranian government believes,” Kaine said. “It’s a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia law [sic] … and they do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their Creator.”

“The statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely troubling.”

RELATED: White House slams Massie’s Epstein bill as a ‘very hostile act’ — some Republicans sign on anyway

— (@)

Unfortunately for Kaine, the founding fathers disagree with him.

The Declaration of Independence makes very clear that our natural rights come from God and not from the government, as Kaine suggested. In the second paragraph, the Declaration states that “all men are created equal” and that “they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Prominent conservatives and politicians were quick to correct Kaine’s misunderstanding of our nation’s core values, even suggesting that he is “not fit to serve.”

“This is a remarkable moment from Tim Kaine,” the Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh said in a post on X. “He just announced that the core foundational principle of our country, affirmed in the Declaration of Independence, is ‘extremely troubling’ and ‘theocratic.’ He should be immediately removed from office. Anyone who rejects our nation’s foundational principles is obviously not fit to serve.”

RELATED: RFK Jr. makes crystal clear to the CDC mutineers: The restoration of public trust ‘won’t stop’

Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

“Our rights don’t come from government or the DNC. They come from God,” Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas said in a post on X. “[Tim Kaine], I suggest the Dems go back and read the words of our Founding Fathers.”

Kaine’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

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Kathleen Miles — a mother to 11 and grandmother to seven — lives in the northern Chicago suburb of Lake Villa but has been working in the downtown Chicago neighborhood known as the Loop for the last two decades, WGN-TV reported.

On Aug. 19, Miles told the station she was walking to a train with a co-worker along West Washington Avenue when a stranger punched her in the face. WLS-TV reported that it was a random attack.

‘It’s 2025, and he’s out. And if he had been held accountable for his actions, then I wouldn’t be sitting here with injuries.’

Miles recalled to WLS that the culprit “hit me with such force” — so much so that it knocked her out.

Given President Donald Trump’s concerns about violent crime in Chicago — and resistance to him intervening from the likes of Democrat Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker — the White House didn’t hesitate to share with Blaze News its perspective following the latest physical attack there.

“Just like President Trump has been saying, violent crime in Chicago is a serious problem. Instead of denying the problem, Democrat leaders like Pritzker should look at the tremendous success the president has had stopping violent crime in D.C. and beg the president to do the same for their cities,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told Blaze News. “Stopping violent crime shouldn’t be a partisan issue, but Democrats are making it one.”

RELATED: Thugs rob teen of his iPhone, Nike sneakers; but boy’s family finds 1 suspect — and delivers painful payback: Cops

The next thing Miles remembered was waking up in a hospital, WLS said, as her co-worker was “standing above me” and saying, “You’ve been assaulted.”

She then passed out again, WLS said, adding that she then came to and recalled her daughter saying, “Hi mama, I’m here. You’re OK.”

The colleague who was with Miles later told her that a male came between the two of them, shoved them apart, and hit her in the face, WLS reported — a punch that left Miles with several broken facial bones and a concussion.

Police told WLS that Miles was attacked by 32-year-old William Livingston. Police told Blaze News that Livingston was charged with two felony counts of aggravated battery/public place, a felony count of aggravated battery/great bodily harm, and a misdemeanor count of reckless conduct/bodily harm.

WGN said Livingston was arrested the same day of the attack. Cook County Jail records indicate Livingston was booked Aug. 21. Police told Blaze News his detention hearing also took place on Aug. 21. Jail records also indicate he’s behind bars with no bond, and his next hearing is Sept. 15.

WLS said a records search produced 13 mugshots of Livingston going back to 2012 — and that a large number of those arrests were for aggravated assault and battery of both women and police officers.

“Like, what is enough?” Miles asked WLS. “You know, what does someone have to do? Where someone, where he’s going to be, where they’re going to be held accountable.”

Here’s a brief rundown of Livingston’s violence over the last eight years, according to WLS:

In 2017, he was accused of randomly attacking two women months apart. Both cases were dropped.

In 2022, Livingston was sentenced to five years in prison after prosecutors said he punched and attempted to rob four women within 20 minutes in the Loop.

In 2023, while on parole, Livingston was arrested for hitting a woman in the face on North Michigan Avenue.

And in 2024, Livingston was sentenced to 100 days in prison after he punched a 15-year-old girl, also on North Michigan Avenue.

In regard to the 2022 attack, WGN’s video broadcast shared a mugshot of Livingston that matches a mugshot Blaze News located on the Chicago Police Department’s website for that same attack.

RELATED: 54-year-old repeat offender accused of fatally stabbing woman, 25, after first spitting on her in Chicago

William Livingston. Image source: Chicago Police

Police said Livingston was arrested at 12:26 p.m. on Feb. 8, 2022, after being identified as the individual who struck and attempted to take personal property from multiple female victims within minutes of each other. Police said Livingston was charged with four felony counts of aggravated battery/public place, two felony counts of attempted robbery, and one misdemeanor count of batter/make physical contact.

Cami Blechschmidt, a DePaul University student, described to WGN the random attacks against her and three other women that day.

“I felt a hand in my pocket, turned my head like that, and there was a man directly in front of me, and he punched me directly in the face,” Blechschmidt recounted to WGN in 2022. “We made eye contact, and like, he just had pure hate in his eyes. Just anger, pure anger.”

RELATED: Females caught on video punching, kicking, stomping restaurant waitress — reportedly after she rejected their refund demand

For Miles, enough is enough.

“It’s 2025, and he’s out,” Miles told WLS. “And if he had been held accountable for his actions, then I wouldn’t be sitting here with injuries.”

Despite the trauma she’s suffered, Miles noted to WLS that she’ll be present at Livingston’s Sept. 15 hearing at the Skokie Courthouse.

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Establishmentarians’ worst fears are being realized at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is putting Americans’ health first, challenging the failed status quo, and threatening Big Pharma’s apparent influence over the agency.

While there now appears to be a sizeable mutiny under way at the CDC, Kennedy has made one thing crystal clear: He’s not backing down.

Frustration with Kennedy has been mounting among medical establishmentarians for months.

‘Once RFK provides the other side of the story, there is no turning back for a significant portion of the country.’

There has, for instance, been a great deal of pearl-clutching over his termination of the Biden appointees on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices whose coziness with pharmaceutical companies prompted questions about their vaccine recommendations; his removal of the COVID vaccine from the CDC’s recommended vaccine schedule for healthy pregnant women and children; and his cancellation of mRNA vaccine development contracts.

This shake-up at the CDC continued last week with the White House’s ouster of Susan Monarez as director — a removal her attorneys claimed was the result of her supposed refusal “to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives and fire dedicated health experts.”

Amid Monarez’s futile fight to keep her job — she has since been replaced by Health and Human Services Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill — other CDC officials threw in the towel, including Debra Houry, the chief medical officer; Daniel Jernigan, the director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Disease; and Demetre Daskalakis, the sex-obsessed homosexual “activist physician” who showed up in public wearing bondage gear and served as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

RELATED: How Big Pharma left its mark on woke CDC vax advisory panel — and what RFK Jr. did about it

Following this changing of the guard, over 1,000 current and former HHS staff members released a letter on Wednesday demanding Kennedy’s resignation from his position as health secretary.

The Save HHS campaign’s letter, whose signatories are not publicly named but have been supposedly revealed to members of Congress, claims that Kennedy “continues to endanger the nation’s health” by:

“facilitating” the removal of Monarez; “causing the resignations” of Daskalakis and his ilk; appointing Dr. Robert Malone and other experts to ACIP who have in the past raised concerns about experimental vaccines;rescinding the Food and Drug Administration’s emergency use authorization for COVID vaccines; anddaring to say that “trusting experts is not a feature of either a science or democracy.”

The Save HHS campaign did not respond to Blaze News’ request for comment.

The Save HHS campaign indicates on its website that its partner organizations include Doctors for America, National Nurses United, and the American Public Health Organization.

The scientific advisory board of the Accountability Journalism Institute is apparently also a partner.

In its petition to remove Kennedy, the AJI’s scientific advisory board claimed that President Donald Trump’s health secretary “poses an immediate and long-term threat to the health of the American public.”

The AJI scientific advisory board’s claim appears to be a stone’s thrown from a glass house. After all, a member of the board and signatory of the petition is Peter Daszak — the disgraced British zoologist who was formally debarred along with his scandal-plagued organization EcoHealth Alliance in January by the HHS.

RELATED: RFK Jr. pulls plug on mRNA jabs because they ‘pose more risks than benefits’

Former CDC Director Susan Monarez and ex-CDC official Demetre Daskalakis. Photo (left): Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images; Photo (right): Alexi Rosenfeld/Getty Images

Blaze News senior editor Daniel Horowitz, author of “Rise of the Fourth Reich: Confronting COVID Fascism with a New Nuremberg Trial So This Never Happens Again,” noted to Blaze News, “The reason you are seeing so much mutiny against RFK Jr. is because unlike many of the Trump legal and policy changes, which can easily be changed under the next administration, CDC guidance is much more of a cultural influence straight down to individual parents and doctors.”

“For years, the industry relied on an air-tight unanimity of opinion in health care and government that every vaccine was as pure as the wind-driven snow and absolutely indispensable for every baby born in this country,” wrote Horowitz.

“Once RFK provides the other side of the story, there is no turning back for a significant portion of the country because ultimately it relies on the public confidence in vaccines,” continued Horowitz. “It’s not like immigration policies with TPS, parole, and expedited removal that the next president can just reinstate the prior policies from day one.”

Kennedy noted in an op-ed on Tuesday that while the CDC “was once the world’s most trusted guardian of public health” with a mission both clear and noble, “over the decades, bureaucratic inertia, politicized science, and mission creep have corroded that purpose and squandered public trust.”

‘The CDC must restore public trust — and that restoration has begun.’

The health secretary turned the endangerment accusation on its head, pointing out that the CDC under previous management “produced irrational policy during COVID: cloth masks on toddlers, arbitrary 6-foot distancing, boosters for healthy children, prolonged school closings, economy-crushing lockdowns, and the suppression of low-cost therapeutics in favor of experimental and ineffective drugs.”

“The toll was devastating. America is home to 4.2% of the world’s population but suffered 19% of COVID deaths,” added Kennedy.

The health secretary noted further that the “truth must no longer be ignored” about the downsides of vaccines, antibiotics, and therapeutics and that “infectious and chronic illness are linked.”

Kennedy indicated that his ACIP housecleaning and the replacement of CDC leaders who “resisted reform” were meaningful steps toward restoring trust, eliminating conflicts of interest, and curbing “bureaucratic complacency” at the agency but that there was still much work to be done.

“The CDC must restore public trust — and that restoration has begun,” wrote Kennedy. “It won’t stop until America’s public health institutions again serve the people with transparency, honesty, and integrity.”

To this end, Kennedy indicated that the agency will modernize systems, enhance scientific rigor, build infrastructure, and empower states and communities.

HHS communications director Andrew Nixon said in a statement to Blaze News, “Secretary Kennedy has been clear: The CDC has been broken for a long time. Restoring it as the world’s most trusted guardian of public health will take sustained reform and more personnel changes.”

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The LGBT political coalition is beginning to fray. Andrew Sullivan is hardly alone among LGB advocates in believing the demands of the T’s are pushing the movement too far.

While I appreciate their contributions to resisting trans tyranny, I must part company with the LGBs on one important point. I don’t believe we can roll back the trans tide without at least revisiting and probably reversing the “gay gains” in general and “gay marriage” in particular.

The successful ‘gay marriage’ movement directly contributed to the falsification of public documents, the ‘born that way’ myth, and the battering of parental rights.

Key ideas in the campaign to redefine marriage laid the groundwork for key ideas in trans activism. I was active in the marriage debate from the 2008 battle over Proposition 8 in California all the way to the Supreme Court’s redefinition of marriage in Obergefell in 2015. I remember the cavalier manner in which our arguments were dismissed at that time. Let’s revisit a few of them.

Government as arbiter of biological truth

We can start with the rewriting of public documents for ideological purposes. Trans activists claim the right to falsify their birth certificates. Many people across the political spectrum can see problems with allowing them to do so. Yet some of those same people who once promoted “gay marriage” but currently criticize transgenderism (like Andrew Sullivan) seem to forget that removing the gender requirement from marriage introduced and normalized this very process.

Some states changed marriage licenses and birth certificates. No more husband and wife, just “partner.” No more “mother” and “father,” just gender-neutral “parents.” In the state of California, “gay marriage” led to the law permitting three people to be listed on a birth certificate as legal parents.

In other words, California (and 11 other states) redefined parenthood by stealth. Before “gay marriage,” the government document known as a “birth certificate” simply recorded the biological reality of the man and the woman who contributed their genetic material to the procreation of the child. After “gay marriage,” “parenthood” becomes the creation of the state, delinked from any necessary connection between the child’s body and the bodies of the parents.

I can testify that throughout the debate over redefining marriage, few people seemed to care about this redefinition of terms.

‘Born that way’ as founding myth

The gay lobby and the campaign for gay marriage also paved the way for transgenderism by promoting the “born that way” myth. Trans rights activists claim, in all seriousness, that some people are “born in the wrong body.” Many people are rightly skeptical, realizing that this concept has literally zero foundation in any actual biological science.

However, some of these skeptics accept at face value the idea that certain people are “born gay.” The gay lobby has aggressively promoted this claim, in spite of the fact that extensive efforts to prove it have failed. In 2019, a massive study of the human genome concluded decisively that there is no “gay gene.” There is a modest genetic contribution to “gayness” (an inexact term, but that’s another whole story), comparable to the genetic component of other complex behavioral patterns.

Even prior to 2019, studies of identical twins should have ended the “born gay” idea. Identical twins, by definition, share identical genes and an identical prenatal uterine environment. By any understanding of “born gay,” the concordance rate of sexual orientation should be 100%. That is, if one identical twin is “gay,” the other should also be gay, 100% of the time. The actual number is closer to 30%.

When the T’s demand that we rewrite the foundational social institutions of civilization, based on some supposed accident of nature that they have no control over, they are following the path pioneered by the L’s and the G’s.

State ideology as wedge between parents and children

Finally, and most alarming, enacting the trans agenda has put the state at war with the natural right of parents to direct the upbringing of their children. Trump’s executive order ending federal support for the trans agenda included a long laundry list of things the U.S. Department of Education would henceforth cease doing. Nonetheless, many public schools continue to teach pro-trans propaganda to impressionable children.

Some states have redefined child abuse to include parents who refuse to sufficiently “affirm” their child’s (mis)understanding of their gender. Some states offer themselves as “sanctuary states” for children in other states whose parents fail to affirm them. Parents in Maryland had to fight, all the way to the Supreme Court, not to direct the education of their children, but simply to protect them from the egregious harm of state-sponsored indoctrination.

I‘d like to remind my former opponents in the Prop 8 debate of a prediction we made at the time: that enshrining “gay marriage” in law would lead to exposing children to pro-gay propaganda in the schools.

“No, no!” you said.

We brought up the case of David Parker in Boston, who was arrested for being too aggressive in his objections to the school reading to his son “Heather Has Two Mommies” in kindergarten. That was in 2005!

You dismissed our concerns. Nearly 20 years later, Scott Smith was arrested for disrupting a Loudoun County school board meeting. Smith’s daughter was assaulted in the girls’ restroom by a boy who said he was a girl.

Could you, just for a moment, admit that advocates of natural marriage had a point?

RELATED: ‘Children as assets’: Gay couple’s viral IVF video reveals just how far Obergefell has gone

Blaze Media/Getty Images

Facing facts

The successful “gay marriage” movement directly contributed to the falsification of public documents, the “born that way” myth, and the battering of parental rights.

As I said at the outset, I respect and appreciate the contributions of self-described gays and lesbians to resisting the pro-trans agenda. But I really urge you to rethink your earlier commitment to the pro-gay agenda. It was not the harmless “advance of freedom” we’ve all been led to believe. Sooner or later, we are all going to have to face this fact. We need to stop falsifying birth certificates, walk back the “born gay” myth, and restore parental rights. It would be great if y’all could help us out with that.

​Gay marriage, Proposition 8, The ruth institute, Obergefell v. hodges, Obergefell, Transgenderism, Trans, Born this way, Trans tyranny 

Over the holiday weekend, rumors began circulating on the left that President Donald Trump had passed away after going several days without a public appearance — but he quickly shut them down.

“NEVER FELT BETTER IN MY LIFE,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social on Aug. 31st. “Also, DC IS A CRIME FREE ZONE! President DJT.”

“The left was really excited,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales comments. “There was, like, a gleam in their eye. You know, usually they have dead eyes. I think it’s ’cause they take too many SSRIs, but they usually have the dead eyes.”

On August 30, “Donald Trump” was the number-one trending topic on X after the left began excitedly repeating that the president was nowhere to be seen.

In the trending sidebar on X, it revealed that 49,000 posts claimed that “TRUMP IS DEAD,” 17,500 posts claimed that “TRUMP DIED,” and 110,000 posts said “It Happened.”

Even Tim Walz got in on the deranged and deluded excitement.

“You get up in the morning and you doomscroll through things — although I will say this. The last few days you woke up thinking there might be news,” Walz told an audience, to laughter. “Just saying, there will be news sometime.”

“Breaking: People die,” Gonzales comments, disgusted.

“Or is that his cowardly call to violence?” BlazeTV contributor Jaco Booyens chimes in. “Because that’s what they really want. What a sick, sick human being. I don’t recall ever in this network or anyone here ever talking about wanting Joe Biden to lose his life.”

“They say the quiet parts out loud, at least,” he continues. “So let them announce themselves.”

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

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

​Sharing, Free, Camera phone, Video, Video phone, Upload, Youtube.com, Sara gonzales unfiltered, Sara gonzales, The blaze, Blazetv, Blaze news, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Trump died rumors, Leftists, Tim walz, Joe biden age, The trump administration, Jaco booyens 

If you’ve ever tried to buy tickets to a major concert or sporting event, you know the scam. You spend hours in a “virtual queue,” only to watch tickets vanish in seconds. Scalpers and bots scoop up thousands, then flip them for double or triple the price. Fans refresh their browsers over and over, while Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation, pocket the profits.

It’s a racket, and for decades the people who keep live entertainment alive — ordinary fans — have paid the price.

Fans don’t want excuses. They want a system that works for them, not one designed to funnel cash into a corporate machine while leaving families priced out.

That’s why President Trump plans to unveil a ticket reform package this month. His proposal promises to take on the corporate monopoly that dominates the industry and restore fairness to fans.

The problem is straightforward: Live Nation and Ticketmaster control roughly 70% of the ticketing and live events business — and about 80% of the primary ticketing market. According to the Justice Department, that dominance has allowed the conglomerate to dictate what fans can buy, what they must pay, and who gets access at all.

As Trump FTC Commissioner Mark Meador explained last year, “Live Nation Ticketmaster created a dominant conglomerate with an unprecedented amount of control over the live ticketing market, resulting in monopoly power it has used to entrench its position in the marketplace.”

Fans lose twice under this scheme. They pay outrageous fees when Ticketmaster sells the tickets the first time. Then they pay again when scalpers resell them — because Ticketmaster takes another cut.

Trump’s plan should target the obvious abuses by cracking down on bots that grab tickets before real people even have a chance, establishing distribution systems that treat fans fairly, and encouraging competition in a market currently controlled by one corporate behemoth.

Those reforms would finally level the playing field. But Live Nation-Ticketmaster has other ideas. The company now wants government-imposed price caps on resale tickets — a move that sounds like “reform” but would entrench its monopoly even further.

RELATED: It’s time to join the fight and expose Ticketmaster

Photo by Jack Taylor/Getty Images

Former Trump Justice Department official Brian Pandya warned that such price controls would bankrupt Ticketmaster’s smaller rivals, eliminating competition altogether. Meanwhile, the $38 billion conglomerate could take the hit, since it also profits from artist management, promotion, and the 400-plus venues it controls nationwide. Price caps would squeeze everyone else out while leaving the monopoly stronger than ever.

The better path is obvious: Open up the marketplace. Strengthen enforcement against ticket bots. Redirect regulations to protect fans, not corporations. And if necessary, break up the Live Nation-Ticketmaster monopoly entirely.

Fans don’t want excuses. They want a system that works for them, not one designed to funnel cash into a corporate machine while leaving families priced out of concerts, plays, and ball games.

Trump’s plan could finally deliver that. For once, fans might win — and the monopoly might lose.

​Opinion & analysis, Tickets, Ticketmaster, Live nation, Monopoly, Antitrust, Donald trump, Justice department, Price controls, Conglomerate, Prices 

Do you count? Does your life count?

A priest once told me that I don’t count. But later, he asked me if I coded. Because, he said, I spoke English like a coder. I bet you can count. I bet you do count. This is a safe bet, because you were made in the image of God. But also, you are a man. Or a woman. So, therefore, you cannot count the same as God. But you can count as God counted through man.

Are you ready? Do you trust yourself enough to count to 10? Let’s try it. Maybe say a prayer first, though — just to be safe.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

I wonder whether you did that right the first time. I didn’t. It took me the better part of four decades to learn this secret. Although it is widely known to any 4-year-old. You could try again. For yourself. With your fingers.

Did you do it?

It’s up to you, anon. But if you were to have done it, you could do it again at any time. Perhaps it could become a prayerful meditation. Do you know who else had ten fingers? Moses. David. Jesus. Constantine. Elizabeth I. Shakespeare. Do you, then, know them all like the back of your hand as you count?

It is simply not possible to care in a human fashion at scale.

You cannot know anything like the back of your hand when you are typing … or when you are reading on a computer screen. Try typing and reading what you type at the same time. I guarantee that you cannot closely examine the back of your hands as you type and read at the same time. Your mind is too limited. You can focus on one thing at a time.

This is the most profound digital communication I can provide to you right now, anon.

Do you get the pun? Digital. My hands typed this. You probably have two thumbs, too. This makes you human. But also, a monkey could do it. Some liar once said that monkeys with keyboards could eventually produce Shakespeare. Not even very high-IQ monkeys, banging out code to train large language models on everything that has ever been digitized, could produce anything with an ounce of the artistic worth of William Shakespeare.

Do you remember the Mayan Apocalypse? Did anything happen? (Of course it did. It was the end of the world as we know it. The end of the world actually comes every night when the sun goes down. When is the last time you saw a sunset?) The Mayans counted, too. But not just on their hands, under base 10. They also counted their toes and therefore had a base 20 calendar: 20-hour days, 20-day months, 20 of them. They were very superstitious about the end of the world, probably. At least, the Aztecs were. They would sacrifice children en masse to make sure the sun came up again the next morning.

But then the Aztecs’ prophecy was fulfilled, and Cortez annihilated them.

This was right and just. I mean, what would you have done if you were Cortez? Cortez, probably, counted on his hands, too. Just like you. He, too, wore shoes. With closed toes. Can you count to 10 on your toes? One toe at a time? Probably not. But the Mayans probably could.

RELATED: The mental health crisis is worse than you think — but the solution is obvious

Photo by Alain Jocard/Getty Images

They were grateful to Cortez for helping them exterminate the Aztecs. But then … they had to deal with the Mexicans. Poncho Villa. Not a nice hombre. And now the cartels. Not nice hombres, either. They treat men and women like they don’t count. Like they are only numbers. Little figures entered into Excel tables.

Do you work for a cartel? Probably. Most everyone is employed by a corporation.

Corporations are not people. They do not count on their hands, because they do not have hands. Sometimes they are owned by families. If so, they can be good. Very good, even, to their employees, who also have families.

Can you count the number of lives that depend on your life? You are asked to every year, by the tax man, who shall surely cometh every year until you are dead. And then he will tax you, too.

How many lives depend on yours? How many lives have you taken through your carelessness? Taken for granted? You must, necessarily, take for granted almost every human life you ever see. It is simply not possible to care in a human fashion at scale.

It has been said that humans cannot manage more than 150 relationships at once. That’s too big a number to count, really. If you are human. Which you are.

So try to count to 10 again. The 10 most important lives to you. Count on your fingers. Love each finger as though it were a loved one. If there are 10 you can love truly, you shall not suffer the fate of the Sodomites. Hopefully.

​Tech, Culture 

A comedian lands at Heathrow and finds himself met by officers as though he posed a terrorist threat. His offense? A social media joke about trans people. He’s released on bail on the condition he doesn’t post on X.

Another man prays silently outside the “safe zone” of an abortion clinic and is hauled off, given a two-year conditional discharge, and fined £9,000 (just over $12,000).

We hope Britain pulls up from its nosedive, but let’s not delude ourselves. America faces the same temptations.

A third man waves the Union Jack at a pro-Palestinian march in England — only to be arrested. Reuters quickly ran interference: not for the flag, they said, but for a “racially aggravated public order offence” and “homophobic abuse.” As if that makes it better.

And we’re still not mentioning the Islamic child-rape scandal that grows worse with every new revelation. The United States watches Britain collapse into a kind of Reformation-era persecution, this time in the name of Islam, paganism, and sexual license. Americans shake their heads, maybe reassure themselves: We fought a revolution to escape this. Charles II jailed Christians. Charles III praises Islam. And we have the First Amendment. Case closed.

Not so fast. We may be on the same road. Once you begin policing speech to protect feelings, the end point looks very much like the UK. And we have plenty of warning signs.

The university test case

Universities may be the clearest early indicator. Professors tell us every profession must “look like” society — except their own. If a field is 97% male, they call it systemic bias. But in the academy itself, where atheists and leftists dominate, they see no problem.

The numbers don’t lie. At Arizona State University, a December 2024 survey found just 19 Republicans among 544 faculty members. At the University of Arizona, only eight Republicans out of 369. Entire departments lacked a single Republican. A 2023 Harvard Crimson study found only 2.5% of Harvard faculty identify as conservative. If any other profession looked this skewed, professors would scream about bias. In their case, they call it “normal.”

And the consequences? They’ll defend freedom of speech for burning an American flag. Burn a trans flag, and suddenly you’ve committed a hate crime. That is one step removed from Graham Linehan’s arrest in the UK for an X post.

Censorship in practice

Students already know what this means. A 2022 FIRE survey found they self-censor in class. They parrot leftist slogans on gender and race, not because they believe them, but because they want the grade. We are teaching them to lie to advance. No one is being asked to confess Christ; they are being asked to confess Ibram Kendi and John Money.

I’ve seen it firsthand. At ASU’s Honors College, faculty blocked Charlie Kirk, Dennis Prager, and Robert Kiyosaki from speaking, smearing them as “white supremacists.” That label alone was enough to push the event off campus. These professors weren’t interested in argument. They wanted silence.

RELATED: Why the English flag now terrifies the regime

Blaze Media illustration

Truth vs. lies

How do they justify it? With “hate crimes.” Not crimes that incite violence, but crimes of opinion. Disagree with LGBTQ ideology? That’s hate. Straight to jail. Professors sleep well at night because we’ve accepted their framework: society divided into oppressors and oppressed. Bad outcomes aren’t the result of choices, but of systemic injustice. Victims must be coddled, even at the expense of truth.

Once you accept that, feelings erase the First Amendment.

We need a spine. Sexual sins are real and destructive. Abortion ends a life. A comedian may say this through jokes; a philosopher may say it through essays. Either way, it’s the truth. The mob can gnash its teeth, plug its ears, strip away free speech, and jail comedians, but reality doesn’t change.

We hope Britain pulls up from its nosedive, but let’s not delude ourselves. America faces the same temptations. We must pray for the end of abortion, speak plainly about the damage sexual ideology inflicts on children, and reject the false frame of “oppressors and oppressed.” The real categories are truth and lies. Choose wisely, while you still can.

​Opinion & analysis, Censorship, Free speech, First amendment, Freedom of speech, Hate speech, Hate crimes, Truth, Lies, Great britain, Prayer, Abortion, Buffer zones, Safety, Universities, Social media, Police, Diversity, Union jack, Charles iii, Islam, Graham linehan, Fire, Harvard, Arizona state university 

An 18-year-old man who was detained at the site of a lethal triple shooting at an apartment complex had killed two of the victims, according to California police.

The Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office said they were called to the Lance Apartments along El Camino Avenue in Carmichael on Sunday at about 7 a.m. over a report of bullet holes and possibly dead people.

Police did not release the identities of the three men killed and later said they were gang-related and knew each other.

When they arrived, they found three men dead from gunshot wounds at the apartment and detained one man, identified as 18-year-old Jaylen Davis. All of the men were in their twenties, and they were all found with guns next to them.

Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper criticized a low-income housing complex for delaying its investigation by not providing security video when requested. After obtaining a subpoena, police identified a witness that aided in the investigation.

Police determined that two of the men were robbing the third man at the apartment and shot him during a struggle. That man died.

Davis, who also lived at the apartment complex, then retrieved his gun and killed the two robbers. The witness interviewed by police confirmed the details relayed by Davis.

The sheriff’s office said the four men in the incident had prior felony convictions and were restricted from possessing guns.

RELATED: California couple ran over man until he was pinned under truck wheel, then pepper-sprayed him

Police said the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office would not seek homicide charges against Davis.

However, Davis is going to face charges related to the gun possession and also because he was on parole and had an ankle monitor at the time of the incident. He is not eligible for bail.

Police did not release the identities of the three men killed and later said they were gang-related and knew each other.

Sgt. Amar Gandhi told KTXL-TV that Davis would not likely face a strict punishment for the low-level offenses.

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​Sacramento apt killings, Three men shot and killed, Jaylen davis kills two men, Armed robbers killed, Crime 

Power always seeks to expand. It never halts for principles or words on paper, but only for rival powers strong enough to resist it. Those rivals must have deep roots, independent resilience, and the ability to demand loyalty. They must project sovereignty in ways the state cannot easily replicate, establishing spheres of influence that can resist government overreach without ever firing a shot.

Historically, strong communities provided this check. Their religions and folkways became the rhythms of life, passed down through generations. These beliefs drew authority from transcendent sources no earthly power could reproduce. Families built churches, schools, libraries, civic organizations, unions, and fraternities to preserve culture, transmit values, and care for members.

Communities with shared traditions can limit state commands. But diversity dissolves those limits.

Such communities formed spheres of sovereignty. They made competing demands on their members and provided services the state could not: spiritual grounding, mutual aid, a sense of identity. Membership required specific behaviors to remain in good standing, norms the state could not easily reshape. Because traditions were deeply ingrained, the state had to respect them or risk serious resistance.

Over time, these communities often accumulated wealth. Virtue and stability generated surplus capital, which supported robust institutions and provided safety nets. Their members no longer relied on government in times of need. They relied on each other. These were the kulaks — the middle class — people whose independence created natural barriers to state expansion. Not atomized “self-reliance,” but communal reliance: stability rooted in culture and habit. That is precisely why governments sought to break them.

High and low vs. the middle

The political theorist Bertrand de Jouvenel, in “On Power,” described the classic formula: high and low versus the middle. The ruling class always wants more power, but the middle class resists. The poor, being dependent and disorganized, cannot mount opposition. Only the middle class, with property, institutions, and traditions, can stand in the way. To expand power, rulers must dissolve these spheres of sovereignty.

Their method is alliance with the dependent lower classes. Sometimes this means the domestic underclass. But that group still shares culture and traditions with the middle, making it less reliable as a tool. Importing a foreign underclass works better. Immigrants lack roots in the land or its traditions. They can be counted on to side with rulers against the entrenched middle.

Mass immigration delivers cheap labor to the wealthy while creating a new political client base. The upper class benefits from gardeners and nannies. Politicians gain millions of new voters to whom they can promise state benefits.

Dependence as a weapon

Immigrant groups rarely possess cohesive culture or resilient institutions. They lack roots, leisure, or unity to resist. They depend on the ruling class for entry, employment, rights, and welfare. Many don’t speak the language. They need the state to survive — and they reward the state with loyalty. This isn’t passive dependence. To succeed, they actively require the state to expand.

To serve this new underclass, rulers pillage the middle. Kulaks are blamed for inequality. They are guilted, taxed, or coerced into surrendering what they built. That wealth is transferred to immigrants, cementing the state’s power over both. The middle grows poorer, loses property, closes institutions, and becomes more unstable. Families that once resisted government control now depend on it.

RELATED: ‘Paperwork Americans’ are not your countrymen

Blaze Media illustration

Mass immigration also erodes culture, another obstacle to power. Communities with shared traditions can limit state commands. But diversity dissolves those limits. Forced to mingle with newcomers, the shared identity frays. Cultural separation becomes taboo. Institutions that once passed on values and provided aid collapse. Charities are drained. Public spaces decay. And those who maintained them see no reason to sacrifice for strangers.

The state ensures that escape is impossible. First taboo, then law, forbids communities to separate and reform. Those who try are smeared as bigots, then prosecuted. The middle is barred from reconstituting its way of life. Virtue fades. The spheres of sovereignty are gone. Everyone becomes a rootless dependent, giving the state a blank check to expand its power.

Why immigration became policy

This is why mass immigration became a priority across Western liberal democracies. It doesn’t just dismantle barriers to state power; it builds a machine to demand more of it. Rulers gain cheap labor, grateful voters, and excuses to raid the middle. The cost is cultural dissolution, but to elites that is a feature, not a bug.

If we want an elite that serves its people rather than undermines them, we must choke off this supply of outside populations. Stop importing clients. Stop dissolving communities. Restore the middle class and the spheres of sovereignty that protect liberty. Only then can the leviathan be caged.

​Opinion & analysis, Immigration, Assimilation, Customs, Folkways, Power, Bertrand de jouvenel, Community, State, Ruling class, Middle class, Underclass, Culture, Virtue, Force, Sovereignty, Dependence, Control 

Sara Gonzales, BlazeTV host of “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered,” has long been a vocal Trump supporter, but there’s one criticism she’s always harbored: He’s “been very unwilling to question Operation Warp Speed.”

“Until now,” she exclaims.

On Monday, September 1, President Trump posted the following message on Truth Social:

“This is huge, you guys,” Sara says.

She recalls how President Trump doubled down on the success of Operation Warp Speed during his 2024 presidential campaign. For him to finally address the concerns of the millions of Americans who were unfairly “vilified” and “censored” for questioning the COVID vaccine during the pandemic is a “huge step forward,” she says.

Given Anthony Fauci’s highly suspicious pre-emptive pardon, deadly vaccine side effects like myocarditis and pericarditis, Pfizer and Moderna’s multibillion-dollar profits, and the fact that alternative treatments were buried, President Trump’s demand that vaccine companies “justify the success of their various COVID drugs” is beyond necessary.

Even though no one should oppose President Trump’s call for the truth — be it good or bad — the left is predictably up in arms. They want everyone to bury their skepticism and questions and continue pretending the vaccine was good and necessary.

Sara points to a recent New York Times hit piece titled “We Ran the C.D.C.: Kennedy Is Endangering Every American’s Health,” in which former CDC directors criticize Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s leadership at HHS, accusing him of undermining public health.

But look at the people who were shaping public health before the Trump administration took over, and it’s clear we’re in far better hands now.

Sara displays a handful of embarrassing images of one such person: Dr. Demetre Daskalakis — the former director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases — who resigned on August 28 due to irreconcilable differences with RFK Jr. In the photos, Daskalakis, a gay infectious disease physician known for his work on HIV/AIDS and the monkeypox virus, dons promiscuous leather outfits and jewels.

“This is the guy who was in charge of keeping you safe,” Sara scoffs, playing a clip of Dr. Daskalakis urging the public to “support people’s joy as opposed to calling them risky” in relation to the monkeypox virus.

Sara finds it ironic that “when it comes to dudes fornicating with each other, it’s just a good time,” but “when it comes to someone who doesn’t want to take an experimental jab … they’re not allowed to participate in society.”

“So these are the people that they want you to trust. … These are the same people, mind you, who brought you … a 42% obesity rate, a 60% chronic disease rate,” she condemns.

These are the same people who told us to “trust the science” but are now telling us to not critically examine whether or not the science actually worked — even though systematic review is a cornerstone of science.

“No f**king wonder we’re all sick,” Sara says.

To hear more of her commentary, watch the episode above.

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

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

​Sara gonzales, Sara gonzales unfiltered, Blazetv, Blaze media, Fauci, Vaccine, Covid vaccine, Covid lies, Covid 19, Donald trump, Covid-19 tyranny 

The infamous “missing minute” from the prison security video on the night of Jeffrey Epstein’s death has been filled by video released in the most recent Epstein files document dump.

The House Oversight Committee released more than 33K pages of documents from the files on Tuesday after meeting with a group of victims of the deceased billionaire financier.

The two clips released on Tuesday fill in the previously missing minute.

The “missing minute” from Aug. 10, 2019, has been cited by many as evidence of a cover-up in the case. Many have suspected that Epstein did not kill himself, as was claimed in the official report, but was killed by wealthy and famous people who were involved in his sex trafficking ring.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi had previously said the missing minute had been caused by a normal technical lapse in the footage.

“What we learned from Bureau of Prisons was every night the video is reset, and every night should have the same minute missing,” she explained.

But according to Fox News Digital, there is no missing minute, and the two clips released on Tuesday fill in the previously missing minute.

Digital forensics experts said the two clips previously had been spliced together through the use of Adobe Premiere Pro. The time stamp on the clips had also indicated the short absence and fueled conspiracy theories.

However, there is no motion on the newly discovered minute.

RELATED: Trump denies report of letter and drawing sent to Jeffrey Epstein on 50th birthday, threatens to sue WSJ

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana praised the group of six victims for coming forward and indicated that new information had come from their two-and-a-half-hour meeting.

“Some of the ladies have shared these stories publicly before, but at least two of the women had never told their stories before, one for the very first time in the room, and so there were tears in the room,” he told reporters afterward.

“There was outrage. It was both — I would describe it as heartbreaking and infuriating,” Johnson continued. “That justice has been delayed so long.”

The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News in time for publishing.

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​Epstein missing minute, Missing minute epstein tapes, Epstein files doc drop, Jeffrey epstein death, Politics