The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and the Trump administration regarding when asylum-seekers officially “arrive” in the U.S.

In a 6-3 decision split along ideological lines, the Court held that aliens seeking asylum do not “arrive in the United States” until they physically cross the border into the country and therefore are not entitled to inspection by border officials until they have entered onto U.S. soil.

‘An alien “arrives in the United States” only when he crosses the border.’

The case stems from the federal government’s “metering” policy — first adopted in 2016 amid a surge of migrants at the southern border — that limited the number of aliens whom Customs and Border Patrol agents would inspect each day for asylum. When a port of entry reached capacity, officials physically prevented additional aliens from entering until capacity became available again.

In 2017, asylum-seekers and Al Otro Lado, an immigration advocacy organization, brought forward a class-action lawsuit arguing that the federal government was unlawfully denying aliens access to asylum procedures.

The federal district court in Southern California granted summary judgment in favor of the noncitizens and declared the government’s policy unlawful.

The metering policy was then discontinued in November 2021, though the second Trump administration has attempted to revive it.

A divided Ninth Circuit panel affirmed the summary judgment, ruling that an alien “arrives in the United States” when said alien — even while standing on the Mexico side of the border — encounters a U.S. official and thus must be inspected for asylum claims.

Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito reversed the lower court’s ruling. The court held that the meaning of “arrives in the United States” requires physically entering the country. Therefore, under the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, an alien standing on the Mexico side of the border is not entitled to inspection by a U.S. official.

“We hold that an alien who is standing in Mexico does not ‘arriv[e] in the United States’ by attempting, and failing, to set foot in this country. An alien ‘arrives in the United States’ only when he crosses the border,” Alito wrote.

RELATED: Ketanji Brown Jackson melts down over SCOTUS ruling against Hawaii gun law: ‘The court’s objective is protecting guns’

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justices Samuel Alito (L) and Clarence Thomas (R).Chip Somodevilla/POOL/AFP/Getty Images

The court highlighted the text of other INA provisions and subsequent amendments to the statute to indicate that Congress intended asylum and inspection rights to apply only after an alien enters the country.

“That Congress amended §1158(a) in IIRIRA to replace ‘at a land border or port of entry’ with ‘arrives in the United States’ suggests that we should not read those phrases — which carry different ordinary meanings — to have the same meaning.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented, arguing that Congress intended border officials to inspect and process all aliens who present themselves at ports of entry, regardless of whether they have physically stepped into the U.S. The dissent contended that the majority’s decision “ignores the statutory context and history” of the INA and weakens the asylum protections Congress created for people fleeing persecution.

“The Court today holds that the Executive Branch may circumvent all these mandatory procedures by having U.S. immigration officers stand at the border and physically block noncitizens from setting a foot onto U.S. soil.”

Sotomayor added, “The Court’s illogical interpretation is driven almost entirely by a fixation on a single word: ‘in.'”

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​Justice samuel alito, Supreme court ruling, Politics, Asylum, Immigration 

The anxiety surrounding TikTok was never difficult to understand. Parents worried about what their children were watching and how much time they were spending online. Politicians sounded alarms about biased algorithms. Experts warned about mass manipulation.

Letting a foreign-owned app into a teenager’s hand felt like a reckless gamble, because it was. Yet a smartphone still requires a conscious choice to unlock a screen and tap an icon.

Interactive teddy bears, on the other hand, require nothing but an innocent child’s trust. When that cuddly toy rolls off a Chinese assembly line, as most of them do, it opens a pipeline from the playroom straight to a foreign government. American households are welcoming data collection hubs directly into the family circle, by way of devices that arrive packaged as comforting companions.

When toys become spies

The scale of this threat surpasses the reach of traditional social media. TikTok captures keyboard strokes and viewing histories. A conversational toy captures the raw psychology of a developing child. It records bedtime fears, family schedules, and background arguments. Children speak to their favorite toys with total honesty. Into tiny microphones, they whisper secrets they would hide from their own parents or not even think to share.

Parents must recognize that convenience carries a hidden cost.

This intimate surveillance apparatus serves the strategic ambitions of the China’s Communist Party. Article 7 of China’s 2017 National Intelligence Law mandates that all domestic organizations cooperate with state intelligence efforts. Every audio file, voiceprint, and psychological profile collected by these toys belongs to Beijing on demand. Chinese tech firms must comply with state security services. American stores hand valuable shelf space over to surveillance tools funded by Washington’s primary adversary. The software inside these items acts as a digital Trojan horse.

Every conversation helps these toys learn more about the children using them, from their interests and fears to how their thinking changes over time. The underlying systems log levels of vocabulary, emotional triggers, and psychological vulnerabilities. Voice data creates a permanent biometric print. The microphones pick up everything spoken in the room, capturing financial anxieties, parental disputes, and daily routines. This data provides a detailed map of the American household. Chinese manufacturers program these devices to deliver those family secrets directly to state security agencies.

Cascading perils

The immediate danger to children operates on physical and ideological levels. These toys rely on large language models trained on uncurated datasets. They frequently hallucinate, generating false information with absolute confidence. A plastic dinosaur might tell a child that eating pennies unlocks a secret treasure. It might explain that electrical outlets are actually secret doors meant to be explored with a fork. Physical safety depends entirely on the erratic outputs of a remote server.

The ideological conditioning is equally deliberate. When a child asks a DeepSeek-connected toy about human rights or international history, the toy’s response reflects Chinese state-trained data. The toy may repeat approved talking points in a soothing, reassuring voice. It may reframe authoritarian propaganda into nighttime fairy tales and nursery rhymes.

RELATED: AI is killing the how-to book — and literacy is its next victim

CookiesForDevo/Getty Images

Current legal frameworks offer no protection against this encroachment. The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act dates back to the days of dial-up internet. The law stops at regulating website cookies, completely missing the fact that smart toys can now record and copy a child’s speech. Market incentives ensure that retail supply chains favor these products. Store owners buy these devices at low wholesale prices to maximize holiday profit margins. Corporate compliance departments check for physical choking hazards, battery security, and lead paint. They ignore the open server connections, routing data straight to Hangzhou.

No comprehensive legislation bans foreign-controlled AI from interacting with minors. No regulatory agency has the authority to audit the source code of imported smart toys. Politicians treat the issue as a distant problem, ignoring the shipping containers currently arriving at American ports.

Asleep at the wheel

Parents assume that product safety extends to the software inside a colorful box. They expect the government must somehow vet items sold by reputable retailers. That assumption is an illusion. The market moves faster than Congress or bureaucratic regulators. The pursuit of low-cost electronics ensures that families remain the primary target of data acquisition. The defense of the playroom relies entirely on a parent turning the power switch off.

It’s a corporate playbook that depends on parental exhaustion. A busy parent views a responsive toy as an affordable, good-enough babysitter. The device never grows tired of hearing the same story. It never snaps or loses its patience. It merely listens, logs, and transmits. The child receives a tireless friend, and a foreign intelligence service receives a permanent listening post in the American bedroom.

Moreover, this dynamic transforms childhood into a commodity. In previous generations, children enjoyed a period of unmonitored development. They processed thoughts, threw tantrums, and invented games without creating a permanent record. Smart toys end this privacy. A child’s formative years become training data for algorithms designed to predict and shape human behavior.

Securing the home requires a fundamental shift in consumer awareness. The immediate solution remains low-tech. Parents must recognize that convenience carries a hidden cost. The safest toy lacks an internet connection. It contains no microchips, no microphones, and no software updates. It requires imagination rather than automated code. Until federal policy confronts the reality of digital espionage in consumer goods, the boundary of the home depends on a basic refusal to connect the playroom to the internet.

​Tech 

The U.S. Supreme Court has given President Donald Trump a major victory in his mission for mass deportations of migrants from the U.S.

SCOTUS ruled Thursday that the Trump administration was within its power to strip Temporary Protective Status from hundreds of thousands of Haitians and Syrians. The 6-3 ruling overturned a lower court ruling that had postponed the termination of TPS for 6,000 migrants from Syria and 350,000 migrants from Haiti.

‘The Trump administration continues to lawfully end the egregious abuses to our immigration system that have hurt Americans for years.’

“The TPS statute plainly bars consideration of respondents’ nonconstitutional claims,” wrote Justice Samuel Alito in the majority opinion.

While the defendants’ attorneys had argued that the administration had acted out of racial animus, Alito noted that “the current administration, which has terminated every TPS designation that has come up for renewal, simply opposes the TPS program, at least as it has been implemented in the past.”

Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined the dissent written by Justice Elena Kagan, who wrote that the plaintiffs “deserve better” than the decision made by the majority.

“True enough that TPS is a temporary program, and that it did not promise the plaintiffs never-ending humanitarian protection,” wrote Justice Elena Kagan.

“But the law prevents the program from ending as it likely did here — without the required consultations about country conditions and, as to Haiti, with impermissible race-based considerations tainting the decision.”

Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, praised the ruling and reiterated the administration’s claim that previous Democratic presidents had misused the TPS program to grant de facto amnesty to migrants.

“It was never intended to be a pathway to permanent status or legal residency, and it is committed to the discretion of the Secretary of Homeland Security,” she said. “The Trump administration continues to lawfully end the egregious abuses to our immigration system that have hurt Americans for years.”

RELATED: Springfield officials, Ohio activists brace for end to TPS protection for Haitian migrants

Ahilan Arulanantham, a UCLA law professor who argued on behalf of the Syrian plaintiffs, called on Congress to vote to pass legislation in favor of TPS protections.

“Without TPS, millions of individuals who are part of our communities are at risk of being sent back to countries in crisis,” he said.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York responded that Democrats are eager to intervene on behalf of the migrants affected.

“In a cruel and inhumane decision, the Supreme Court just turned its back on more than 300,000 Haitians and thousands of Syrians who have worked and raised families here because they faced violence and instability back home. TPS exists for exactly this reason,” he said in a statement on social media.

“I have introduced legislation to extend TPS for Haitians and will keep fighting to protect Haitian and Syrian families from being forced back into danger,” he added. “America should not turn its back on people who came here seeking safety.”

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​Migrants, Temporary protective status, Us supreme court, Immigration, Politics, Haitians, Syria 

Authorities discovered Richard and Rita Zajko dead from gunshot wounds in their Pennsylvania home in Jan. 2023. The couple’s 33-year-old child, Michelle “Jamie” Zajko, was charged with the double murder on Wednesday.

Michelle Zajko has been tied to the Zizians, a cult of trans-identifying extremists whose members have been linked to numerous killings across the country, including the death of a Vermont Border Patrol agent who was gunned down during a traffic stop in Jan. 2025.

‘We are finally at the point where we can say beyond any doubt that Michelle Zajko was at least part responsible for the death of her parents,’ the DA claimed.

Several days after the deaths of Richard and Rita Zajko, police detained Michelle Zajko, who was staying at a Pennsylvania hotel with Daniel Blank, an individual who has also been associated with the Zizians.

Inside Blank’s hotel room, law enforcement discovered a Smith & Wesson 9mm and five boxes of ammunition believed to belong to Michelle Zajko.

Blank — who has been charged with trespassing, obstruction of justice, weapons violations, drug possession, and felony drug-trafficking — was released from custody in Feb. 2026 after posting $15,000 bond. The conditions of his release require him to live alone and to submit to GPS tracking.

Police claimed that Michelle Zajko engaged in suspicious activities following the murders, such as purchasing firearms and burner phones and transferring large sums of cash.

RELATED: The Zizians’ violent spiral: A trans group tied to killings across America

Michelle Jamie Zajko. Image source Allegany County Sheriff’s Office

Michelle Zajko was also previously accused of purchasing the guns confiscated from Teresa “Milo” Youngblut and Felix “Ophelia” Bauckholt, other alleged Zizian members, after the shooting death of Vermont Border Patrol agent David Maland.

Michelle Zajko is being held without bond at the Allegany County Jail in Maryland while facing charges for alleged trespassing, obstruction of justice, weapons violations, drug possession, and felony drug-trafficking charges.

Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse announced new charges against Zajko on Wednesday related to the murder of Richard and Rita Zajko.

“It is an exhaustive investigation that took years to put together. But we are finally at the point where we can say beyond any doubt that Michelle Zajko was at least part responsible for the death of her parents,” Rouse stated.

Rouse stated that Michelle Zajko “did not act alone” but that authorities “don’t know who her co-conspirators were.”

RELATED: Nonbinary suspect allegedly opens fire on Border Patrol agent — incident eerily similar to last year’s fatal shooting

Daniel Blank. Image source: Allegany County Sheriff’s Office

The Zajko family released a statement in response to the latest charges.

“There has been much speculation, misinformation, and disinformation about our Rick and Rita and our niece. It has been difficult and challenging to hear and read and not comment until the appropriate time. That time is now. The evidence will speak loudly and decisively for us, as it will for Rick and Rita. Now is the time for the facts and the truth to be known,” the statement read.

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​News, Zizians, Pennsylvania, Politics, Gender ideology, Transgender 

Like most professional sports, Major League Baseball players have been forced to promote the LGBTQ community — especially during Pride Month.

But this Pride Month things are changing, and gay baseball fans are not happy about it.

In one article for the magazine “Out Sports” titled “Gay Giants fan’s heartbreaking letter shows the cost of the team’s Pride Night failure,” a fan laments the actions of several San Francisco Giants players who chose to do their own thing on Pride Night.

“So this fan wrote a note to the San Francisco Giants … about this incident that happened at their Pride Night festival,” BlazeTV host Stu Burguiere explains on “Stu Does America.” “Now as you may know, every Major League Baseball team has a Pride Night with the exception of the Texas Rangers.”

While the team did celebrate Pride Night, multiple Giants players wore hats boasting Bible verses.

“Signifying, ‘Hey, like you know this isn’t a thing that we want to be involved in, and we have a different opinion,’” Stu explains.

The Bible verse in question “talks about the rainbow and how it was God’s sign.”

The disgruntled fan wrote that he has been “a lifelong Giants fan for over 40 years,” beginning when he “attended games as a kid” and “arrived early to get autographs from players.”

“As an LGBTQ athlete, I’ve had the honor of going to a Pride night or day for many years. I’ve also organized 200 plus softball players to attend the game annually,” he said.

“I was unbelievably disappointed by the offensive and disrespectful actions of a few Giants players who chose to write a Bible verse on their hats that was meant to reclaim the rainbow as a Christian/Catholic symbol,” he continued.

“Now, my understanding was the Bible came long before Pride Night. I don’t know if that’s accurate, Dave, historically, but I believe it is,” Stu says.

The gay author went on to explain that in 1978, Gilbert Baker created the rainbow flag in San Francisco as a symbol of pride.

“I will note 1978 is after the Bible came out,” Stu comments, pointing out that “not everything has to be about sex.”

“Like you can actually have a sport where people come out and enjoy the sport,” he adds.

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​Stu burguiere, Dave landau, Pride night, Baseball, San francisco giants, Pride month, Out sports, Lgbtq, Stu and dave do america 

In a caravanserai older than the regime that now wants her flogged, a woman stood on a Persian carpet before an empty audience — without a hijab — and sang her homeland back to itself.

That, according to Iran’s courts, is “obscene” and deserves 74 lashes.

‘This is a right I could not ignore; singing for the land I love passionately.’

Parastoo Ahmadi is an Iranian singer who first came to the world’s attention during the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests — the uprising that shook Iran after Jina Mahsa Amini died under suspicious circumstances in morality police custody for wearing her hijab “improperly.”

At protests, Ahmadi sang the patriotic anthem “Az Khoon-e Javanan-e Vatan” (“From the Blood of the Youth of the Homeland”) as a rallying cry. Authorities subsequently summoned her and searched her home.

Ahmadi didn’t stop. In December 2024, she filmed the “Caravanserai Concert” at the historic Deir-e Gachin caravanserai, livestreamed to her YouTube channel but with no audience in attendance. She wore a long black dress, her shoulders bare, with deep red lipstick — no hijab.

The 27-minute performance has since drawn over 3 million views.

Ahmadi captioned her video, “I am Parastoo, a girl who wants to sing for the people I love. This is a right I could not ignore; singing for the land I love passionately.”

Authorities arrested Ahmadi on December 14, 2024 — a detention the regime dressed up as a “summons” for producing content “contrary to social norms and values,” according to Human Rights Activists News Agency. Two musicians were taken with her.

Within weeks, the group was formally charged at Tehran’s Prosecutor’s Office for Moral Security Affairs and released on bail.

This June, a criminal court in Qom — the same province where a 19-year-old champion wrestler was sentenced to death for attending a protest, then hanged eight days after his birthday — issued its verdict: 74 lashes each for Ahmadi and eight musicians and crew members, a two-year travel ban, and a two-year prohibition on all artistic activity.

Two of the nine defendants weren’t even in Iran when the verdict came down, the New York Times reported, citing “a person close to her family.”

RELATED: One line from Tucker Carlson sparks political firestorm for the GOP

Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Getty Images

According to court documents obtained by IranWire, Ahmadi’s uncovered head and bare shoulders were described as “obscene images,” the charges filed under Article 638 of the Islamic Penal Code and Article 743 of the Computer Crimes Law. The ruling is preliminary and subject to appeal.

The indictment also described Ahmadi as “lacking the Sharia-compliant hijab” and “semi-naked,” IranWire reported.

The sentence came the day after Iran and the United States signed a memorandum of understanding to end a four-month conflict that killed thousands across the Middle East.

Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam of Norway-based Iran Human Rights said the regime, “emboldened by the peace deal with the U.S., may intensify its crackdown on women.”

The U.S.-Israel strikes that began in late February killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who oversaw Iran for nearly four decades. His son, Mojtaba Khamenei — dubbed the “Gayatollah” — has taken his place as supreme leader, with hard-line IRGC commanders assuming an expansive role running the country.

“They call America the Great Satan. And then they flew to the table and signed a deal with the Devil. But a woman’s voice scared them,” said Iranian-American journalist and activist Masih Alinejad.

“Will this country ever be fixed one day?” said Mariam, a teacher in Mashhad, according to the Times. “Where in the world is a woman’s singing punishable by lashes?”

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​Supreme leader, Politics, Iran, Hijab 

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled four years ago in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen that the Second and 14th Amendments protect Americans’ right to carry handguns outside of their homes for self-defense.

Hawaii Democrats came up with an apparent workaround to curb gun rights in their state, passing a law in 2023 that banned the carrying of guns onto private property without verbal or written consent of the property owner. Those who ran afoul of this law faced up to a year in prison.

‘Hawaii’s law does not restrict the right to carry a gun at all,’ Jackson wrote.

This didn’t sit well with a trio of Maui County residents with concealed-carry permits who, with the Hawaii Firearms Coalition, sued on the basis of the understanding articulated again by Solicitor General D. John Sauer last year: “Because most property owners do not post signs either allowing or forbidding guns, Hawaii’s default rule functions as a near-complete ban on public carry.”

To the great chagrin of liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the Supreme Court determined in a 6-3 ruling on Thursday that Hawaii’s so-called “vampire law” is unconstitutional.

The court, which reversed a 2024 decision from the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit Appeals Court, noted that law-abiding permit-holders “not only must … take care to avoid all the territory where the possession of a gun is prohibited outright, but they may also be barred from entering many places that people routinely visit in the course of their daily routines, such as gas stations, restaurants, and stores.”

While recognizing the right of establishments that are open to the public “to admit or exclude persons who are carrying guns for self-defense under either the common-law rule or Hawaii’s law,” the court noted that the so-called vampire law “flips the default rule at common law, under which anyone has an implied license to enter property held open to the public unless the property owner withdraws consent.”

Justice Samuel Alito noted in the opinion that the “regime” established in Hawaii “hobbles what the Second Amendment protects: the right of Americans to carry arms for self-defense as they go about their daily lives.”

RELATED: ‘Shall not be infringed’ — even if you’re high, Supreme Court rules

Maxine Wallace/The Washington Post/Getty Images

Jackson was once again of a different mind than her conservative colleagues on the meaning of the “right to bear arms.”

At the outset of her dissenting opinion, which was joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Jackson framed — in Orwellian fashion — Hawaii’s infringement on Americans’ constitutional rights as an effort to “protect the rights of its residents — both those who wish to carry guns and those who prefer that guns are not carried on their private property without their express permission.”

Jackson —who repeatedly stressed that she still disagrees with the decision in Bruen, calling it a “grave mistake” — claimed that “the court’s objective is protecting guns, not consistently preserving any principle of law.”

According to Jackson, the vampire law that effectively requires law-abiding citizens to everywhere obtain consent before exercising their Second Amendment right not only “does not implicate the Second Amendment” — “Hawaii’s law does not restrict the right to carry a gun at all.”

The liberal justice apparently assigns state law and custom greater weight than federal law on the matter of guns, stressing that “recognizing state autonomy in this respect is especially appropriate here, since Hawaii has never had a custom of armed carry.”

Jackson concluded her 32-page dissent with yet another attack on her colleagues, writing, “While purporting to constrain judges, the majority has unmasked the discretionary choices that lie beneath the court’s decisions regarding which analogues are ‘vastly different’ … and whose historical experiences are worthy of inclusion.”

Justice Elena Kagan wrote a separate dissenting opinion.

This ruling will reportedly impact a handful of blue states, including New York, Maryland, and California, which took a similar approach to Hawaii.

John Commerford, executive director of the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action, said of the outcome, “Law-abiding gun owners will no longer be forced to beg for special permission simply to exercise their constitutional right to bear arms in public places.”

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​Supreme court, Ketanji brown jackson, Guns, Second amendment, Constitution, Hawaii, Freedom, Politics 

A company in Greensboro, North Carolina, is looking to make sure nothing in your car goes unnoticed.

Automated license plate recognition cameras are already a widespread issue across the country, and they are about to get a lot smarter.

‘SignalTrace correlates each digital fingerprint with a plate number.’

ALPR company Flock already has over 100,000 cameras installed throughout the United States, and with a simple upgrade, they could be capable of capturing every signal being put out from your car.

Enter North Carolina company Leonardo. Its product SignalTrace is designed to capture “the unique signals emitted from each device,” which then “creates a digital fingerprint for devices that routinely travel together.”

Examples are cell phones, smart watches, Bluetooth devices, earbuds, and Wi-Fi signals.

“SignalTrace correlates each digital fingerprint with a plate number, through common time stamps,” meaning all the additional signals are attached to the same profile of the license plate at that time.

The data “indicates where and when a suspect is traveling and if multiple suspects are traveling together,” the company says.

RELATED: Traffic cones and barrels are spying on you — what are they hiding?

Leonardo boasts that it already works with more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies across the globe and specifically holds contracts in New York, Arkansas, Kentucky, Maryland, New Mexico, and Ohio.

The scope of the company’s work relies on its data amalgamation. The company creates profiles based not just on license plate numbers, but through a complex network of all its products, including video cameras, license plate readers, parking enforcement, and SignalTrace.

The information is all stored in a database, where it can be “queried and analyzed to aid investigations.”

SignalTrace is even effective in “off-road areas such as in subways and malls,” the company writes.

RELATED: This new tech defeats license plate cameras ‘ethically and legally’

RJ Sangosti/Denver Post/Getty Images

The correlated signals from devices are meant to match a license plate to a person in the event of a stolen vehicle, but can work even more directly in tracking a wanted individual or potentially just a person of interest.

If certain signals are matched to the legal owner of license plate, then those signals could be used to identify a person even if he is not in his car, working as an unofficial and nonconsensual form of digital ID.

Leonardo says it respects “individuals’ privacy rights” and does not decrypt or read content from devices, but simply reveals signatures that are frequently traveling together within a vehicle.

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​Alpr, Flock, License plate reader, Digital id, Tech 

Once again, a left-wing radical has gone to unhinged lengths to prove his hatred for conservatives.

On May 6, Ohio leftist blogger Donald “D.J.” Byrnes allegedly texted state Sen. Jerry Cirino (R-Kirtland) a picture of a nude Shrek “pleasuring himself” following Cirino’s public announcement that he was withdrawing from the race for Ohio Senate president.

In addition to the digitally altered image, Byrnes allegedly sent a message that read: “Good to see you finally made your final humiliation public, young Mussolini!”

According to reports, Byrnes later posted on Bluesky, “Jerry Cirino has seen Shrek’s dong,” with a screenshot of the text.

On June 1, Byrnes was arrested on a misdemeanor telecommunications harassment warrant after Cirino complained about the lewd text. He spent roughly 23 hours in jail before release and now faces up to 180 days in jail plus a fine if convicted.

BlazeTV hosts Stu Burguiere and Dave Landau broke down the absurd incident on their show “Stu and Dave Do America.”

Dave notes Byrnes’ failed political career. Before writing confrontational progressive blog posts became his full-time endeavor, he ran as a Democrat for the Ohio House of Representatives in District 80 in the 2018 general election and lost badly to a Republican.

“He wanted to be a lawmaker, but he didn’t consider this might be illegal,” Dave chuckles.

Stu then reads Cirino’s response to Byrnes’ explicit text message: “I don’t know who this is, but I am certain you’re a moron.”

“I like that response,” he laughs.

Dave agrees with Cirino’s “moron” insult, emphasizing the stupidity of sending a pornographic image from your personal phone number.

“Just by watching ‘Breaking Bad’ that came out in ’08, I can tell you there’s burner phones,” he laughs. “And you used your phone.”

“I mean, it’s almost like he wanted him to know who it was,” adds Stu. “He wanted to say, like, ‘I’m dancing on your grave,’ or whatever the equivalent of Shrek’s penis would be in that analogy.”

Byrnes, he notes, only had to pay “$350” to get out of jail — just 10% of his $3,500 bail.

“I feel like $350 is more than they’ve ever made as a writer,” Dave quips.

To hear more, watch the episode above.

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​Stu and dave do america, Stu burguiere, Dave landau, Ohio 

Establishment liberals are fighting a rearguard action against radical socialists inside the Democratic Party.

They lost more ground on Tuesday when a troop of democratic socialist candidates endorsed by fellow traveler New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani knocked off a pair of incumbents in New York’s Democratic primary elections — Rep. Daniel Goldman and five-term Rep. Adriano Espaillat.

‘Seize the means of production.’

As more comes out about the character of the victorious socialists for whom Mamdani held the door open, it seems that the ascendant radicals may be more radical than even the mayor.

In a softball interview Wednesday on MS NOW, talking head Ali Velshi pressed Darializa Avila Chevalier — the Muslim convert who beat Espaillat 49.4% to 45.9% and previously helped lead the destructive 2023-2024 Columbia University encampment — about President Donald Trump’s characterization of her and other candidates in Tuesday’s primary races as “communists.”

“Donald Trump talked about communists being elected last night. There were three of you in the congressional races, and there were five people who Zohran Mamdani supported in state races. All eight of you won,” said Velshi. “How do avoid becoming the ad for Republicans?”

RELATED: CNN data analyst stunned by Democratic Party’s takeover by Mamdani’s fellow travelers

Adam Gray/Bloomberg/Getty Images

“You will be a member of the Democrat delegation, and you’re going appear in all sorts of people’s ads,” continued Velshi. “All sorts of Republicans’ ads [will] say, ‘This is what you’re going to get if you vote for the Democrats — a communist.'”

Avila Chevalier — the co-founder of a group that posted “death to America” on social media earlier this year and called for the “total eradication of Western civilization” — did not bother challenging her characterization as a communist but instead expressed pride in dodging the question and tossed Velshi a word salad.

“That framing is one that I’ve been very proud to be able to say I don’t respond to, one in which I have been very intentional to say I won’t be reactive,” said the radical who identifies as an “Afro-Latina” Dominican daughter of immigrants. “We are presenting a vision of what we’re fighting for, and I think for far too long we have had politics that is reactive to what Republicans are doing. What we need is Democrats who are actually going to present a positive vision.”

Despite talking around whether she is a communist, Avila Chevalier told Velshi, “I will always be honest about my position on things.”

Before she apparently deleted her X account, thousands of Avila Chevalier’s posts were archived. If as honest in recent years about her views as she purportedly is now, then it appears Trump’s “communist” characterization is more than fair.

In addition to sharing a post that called for the state takeover of parts of the economy; the nationalization of utilities, hospitals, and pharmaceutical companies; the suspension of rent payments; and the seizure of “all properties from landlords,” CNN reported that Avila Chevalier tweeted or retweeted the following messages:

“A world without borders — just like a world without prisons or police — is possible, necessary, and the only moral way forward”;“Seize the means of production”;”Yes, literally, abolish the border”;”Israel doesn’t exist!”“No more police at all ever”;”In New York they don’t say ‘I love you,’ they say ‘NYPD suck my d**k’ and I think that’s beautiful”;”All deportation is wrong”;”ALL PIGS EVERYWHERE ARE HARAM”; and“Most of the theory I’ve read is communism but the pyromania associated with anarchism is very intriguing to me.”

Earlier this month, Avila Chevalier said in a statement to CNN, “I have grown considerably since in the years since these tweets, and I am focused on our community and our community’s future.”

Some of the tweets were as recent as 2022.

In her victory speech on Tuesday night, Chevalier — who, according to the Guardian, was recruited to run for Congress by Justice Democrats, the same outfit that backed democratic socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — said that her primary success signaled “a new dawn” for the district.

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Democrat Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) has made the rising cost of living a centerpiece of his political identity.

“The average Super Bowl ticket now costs $6,773. That’s not just a game — it’s a luxury bill,” he wrote on X in February. “For too many working Americans, seeing the biggest sporting event in person would take … months of rent just to afford one ticket.”

‘He’s using campaign cash to live a luxury lifestyle.’

Federal campaign finance records reviewed by Politico show donor money has been footing the bill for his travel.

Gallego, who has campaigned as a working-class fighter from Phoenix, has spent liberally across two donor-funded accounts — on luxury resorts, private jet flights, family trips to Disney parks, and repeated personal reimbursements.

Twenty days after launching his Senate campaign, Gallego and then-Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) used their joint fundraising committee, Swallego Victory Fund, to attend and host a Super Bowl LVII fundraiser in Glendale, Arizona, Politico reported. Filings show the committee spent $34,700 on “event tickets” and $2,700 at the Henry, a Phoenix restaurant.

The fund raised $56,505 total and dissolved Jan. 1, 2025.

Swalwell later resigned amid sexual assault and harassment allegations from multiple women, which he called “false.” Gallego said he did not know about Swalwell’s alleged behavior, but the joint committee leaves their finances and names linked in the public record.

RELATED: Democrats close ranks around Graham Platner despite string of scandals

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call Inc./Getty Images

Records show Gallego has tapped his leadership PAC and main campaign committee for more than $18,000 in child care reimbursements since 2019 — including $400 to an individual Politico identified as his wife’s mother for babysitting — with his wife, three kids, and au pair joining him on the road at donors’ expense.

“He just spends his campaign account like it’s his personal slush fund,” a person granted anonymity told Politico. “He’s using campaign cash to live a luxury lifestyle.”

Gallego pushed back. “This is not breaking news,” he told Politico.

“Democrats and Republicans in Congress and the White House alike regularly travel with their wives and children, as is permitted by the FEC.” Leadership PACs have broad latitude under FEC rules as long as spending has some fundraising function.

Gallego’s JUNTOS PAC records reviewed by Blaze News reveal additional spending: nine payments totaling $115,000 to Wheels Up, a private jet membership company, listed as “fundraising consulting services”; more than $60,000 at the Phoenician, a luxury Scottsdale resort; three payments totaling roughly $10,200 to the Dorado Beach Ritz-Carlton in Puerto Rico; and a single staffer who received more than $54,000 in reimbursements, including a $43,847 payment for “travel and catering.”

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) asked Senate leadership in April to investigate Gallego over allegations “sexual in nature” and potential campaign finance violations. His office called them “right-wing conspiracy theories.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune confirmed that the matter was referred to the Senate Ethics Committee.

Gallego has since established a legal defense fund in May.

“He is one of the most vetted candidates after his tough 2024 campaign,” said Jacques Petit, a spokesperson for Gallego.

The drip of revelations arrives at a delicate moment. Gallego is among Democrats eyeing a potential 2028 presidential bid, alongside Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, and former Vice President Kamala Harris.

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

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If God has blessed you with children — and the ability to stay home with them — I urge you to consider keeping them home with you as they launch into more formal education.

If you can’t stay home with your kids — well, let’s start there.

All children are best served by spending the bulk of their time with the people who love them the most. Period.

The most common reason given for not being able to stay home is financial. I would challenge you and your spouse, however, to prayerfully and creatively consider ways to make it happen.

I’ve seen many sacrifices made so that a family can live on one income and encourage that to be seriously considered before children come along. That being said, it’s also never too late and always beneficial to change your lifestyle so that you can spend more time at home with your kids, at any age, period. They grow up awfully fast.

And by the way, I think an excellent goal for fathers is to pursue income opportunities that allow him to be home-based too (at least some of the time, at minimum). Your children thrive best with abundant time with both of you.

Financial obstacle … or excuse?

But when it comes to home education, we are usually talking more about moms than dads, so let’s address whether finances are really what’s keeping mom from staying home. A friend of mine, who sacrificed a promising career to stay home with her three-soon-to-be-four children, thinks Christian women should ask themselves where their hearts are when career and home are at odds:

Am I valuing my own career — and my own time — too highly? Am I willing to submit these things to the Lord?Have I not seriously considered staying home, since so many women don’t? Am I willing to be different?Am I willing to sacrifice? Am I willing to prayerfully ask God if I should stay home?

If these questions are asked when a baby is on the way, they may need to be asked again when a child reaches what we deem “school-age.”

Which brings us back to home education, which is the term I prefer over “homeschooling.” That implies we are doing institutional school at home, which further implies that institutional school is the ideal, or at least the norm. I think that’s an idea every responsible parent should challenge, particularly Christian parents.

Like Dorothy said …

There really is no place like home. No institution can match the power of a godly home as a place for children to grow, learn, and thrive. That applies for all of childhood, starting from birth.

All children are best served by spending the bulk of their time with the people who love them the most. Period.

Daycare cannot possibly provide the nurture, attention, and love that new parents can at home. No preschool can do a better job continuing to nurture a child’s individual needs and gifts as well as loving, committed parents.

And although far too many children do get institutionalized practically from birth, at least parents of babies, toddlers, and preschoolers generally have to pay the institution in question, which has the effect of encouraging parents to at least consider staying home with them, at least part of the time.

But once the children hit school-age, the societal expectation is that the stay-at-home parent (usually mom) will finally be able to go back to work, jump back into a career, get some time to herself, etcetera.

No magic switch

However, there is no magic switch that flips when a child turns 5 or 6, negating their need for, and benefit from, being primarily home with engaged, loving parents.

In fact, I would argue that this is the case throughout what we categorize as the elementary school years. Kids up to about age 12 need their home, family, and parents more than they need an institutional school.

So here’s how you can lay the groundwork in your child’s first years so that home education becomes an organic part of your daily life from their earliest days, making the transition to more formal learning at home more natural when the time comes.

RELATED: 6 ways I’m using 2026 to deepen my relationship with God

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Home education 101

Education is what you’re doing from your baby’s first day of life, by the way.

Dictionary definition of “education” — the process of imparting knowledge, skills, and judgment.

Your baby begins to learn about the world primarily through his/her interaction with mom and dad. This is God’s design and why He brings children into the world through families.

He equips you, the parents, with the desire to protect and nurture your baby, which generally involves you learning new skills, rearranging your schedule, and buying some stuff! (And boy, will those three tasks continue to dominate your life!)

As the preschool years unfold and children increasingly become active in your household, the most important thing you can do for them is simple and organic:

Establish your home as a safe, orderly, loving, peaceful, and interesting place.

It is simple — but it takes effort.

We’ll finish with some thoughts to guide you toward each of these goals.

Safe

You are your child’s safety. Your daily presence with them fosters a deep sense of security, which is necessary so they can begin to see that they can separate from you, at times.

This does not mean you can never leave, or use a babysitter, but it is helpful if trusted family members or like-minded close friends live nearby and can be part of this security-building experience. After all, when God placed your child in a family, that included the grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etcetera.

A sense of security is also fostered by encouraging children to develop resilience. When they take a tumble, if you see it isn’t serious, a cheerful and calm, “You’re OK!” will send the right message and encourage them to get right back to whatever they were doing. This is not to discourage you from comforting them — on the contrary, comforting and reassuring them that you’re there for them will help them comfort themselves and bounce back more quickly.

There is no such thing, in the baby/toddler/preschool years, as too much time with mom, dad, or other loving family members or friends. When safe and feasible, bring them along for chores and tasks and allow them to “help” as just another form of play — but they are learning all along.

Orderly

Children thrive within boundaries; they want them, they need them, you need them.

Generally keeping to schedules (which change often as babies grow into preschoolers) and generally keeping an orderly environment (they can start helping put toys away at very young ages!) help to foster this sense of order.

Loving

You can’t really express too much affection for each other in a family. Children also need to see that mom and dad love each other. Is this a good place to mention grandparents again? Why yes, it is. Have them come over tonight.

Peaceful

Disagreements arise, but with a little person in the house, strive for a peaceful demeanor. Home should always be a refuge. Yelling is not acceptable, nor are temper tantrums (child or adult).

Interesting

And here is where we finally get to what people think of as “education.” But remember our definition — by providing and modeling safety, order, love, and peace, you already are imparting knowledge, skills, and judgment. That’s the most important “curriculum.”

In part 2, we’ll get into curriculum specifics!

A version of this essay previously appeared at She Speaks Truth.

​Homeschooling, Home education, Christianity, Godly family, Christian living, Education, Parenthood, Faith