President Donald Trump last Friday night took to Truth Social to reiterate his support for voter ID and proof of citizenship for voting. His message was simple and direct: Elections should be decided by eligible American citizens.

That position aligns with what most Americans say they want.

Equal protection under the law means rules apply consistently. A system built on uneven standards invites uneven trust.

According to the Pew Research Center, 83% of Americans support “requiring all voters to show government-issued photo identification.” In a divided country, that level of agreement is rare. It signals a broad desire for clear, consistent standards that bolster confidence in election outcomes.

When an eligible American citizen goes to vote, he should feel confident that his ballot counts — and carries equal weight. Confirming who can vote before a ballot is cast helps ensure that elections are decided only by eligible American citizens.

If you need ID to board a plane or open a bank account, you can show it at the ballot box. Americans understand that identity verification is not an accusation. It is a safeguard. It protects a system that depends on public trust. When identity is confirmed clearly and consistently, disputes shrink and confidence rises.

Recent examples show why verification matters — even when fraud is not the story.

In 2020, Illinois election officials acknowledged that a computer error in the state’s automatic voter registration system mistakenly forwarded information from hundreds of people who had indicated they were not U.S. citizens for voter registration processing. Officials later reviewed and corrected the registrations, but a number of ballots were cast before the error was identified.

The issue was corrected. But it illustrates a broader point: When eligibility is not verified clearly at registration, mistakes can occur and must be remedied after the fact. Verification after ballots are cast invites confusion and fuels public doubt.

Wisconsin offers a different example. Under state law, voters who appear without acceptable identification must cast provisional ballots until their eligibility is confirmed. Provisional ballots are lawful and part of election administration. But they shift verification from prevention to review. In closely contested elections, post-election verification increases administrative burdens and can invite disputes.

These examples do not prove widespread fraud. They do show that when verification standards are incomplete or inconsistently applied, administrative strain and public doubt follow. Clear verification before voting reduces disputes after voting.

That is the principle behind the SAVE Act. It would strengthen eligibility verification by requiring documentary proof of citizenship when registering to vote, while promoting clearer standards nationwide.

RELATED: Running out the clock won’t save the majority

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

The idea is straightforward: Confirm eligibility before ballots are cast. Support election administrators with consistent rules. Help ensure that elections are decided only by eligible American citizens.

Most states already require some form of voter identification at the polls, but the rules still vary widely. When eligibility is verified differently from state to state, public confidence varies as well. A system built on uneven standards invites uneven trust.

Equal protection under the law means rules apply consistently. At the ballot box, equal protection means every lawful vote carries the same weight. This is not about partisanship. It is about clarity — ensuring that the person casting a ballot is who he says he is.

The ballot box deserves the same seriousness Americans expect elsewhere in civic life. Voter ID is one of the simplest and most broadly supported safeguards available. It does not prevent eligible citizens from voting. It affirms that voting is a serious civic act deserving of clear and consistent standards.

Only eligible American citizens should decide elections. Requiring voter identification is one of the most practical ways to uphold that principle. The SAVE Act reflects that basic governing commitment.

​Donald trump, Voter id, Save america act, Elections, Voting, Voter fraud, Photo id, Opinion & analysis, Save act 

After 35 years, the future of Disney’s “Gay Days” looks grim. The group that organizes the event announced that shifting hotel agreements and the loss of key sponsors forced it to cancel the celebration in 2026. Organizers still urge gay fans to visit the parks on the usual dates and wear themed attire, but the coordinated celebration appears headed for a quiet end.

Whatever happens next, one point matters: Evangelical Christians tried to cancel Gay Days with on-again, off-again boycotts for decades. What finally wounded the LGBTQ leviathan was not conservative activism, but cultural apathy.

Apathy does not mean Americans suddenly disapproved of Disney’s agenda. It means normal people stopped granting it the honor of a fight.

I remember the first wave of evangelical pushback as Disney began signaling support for homosexual lifestyles in the 1990s. Conservatives already watched pop culture coarsen through music, movies, and video games, yet they still treated Disney as a family-friendly institution aimed at children. That is why it shocked them to see the company behind “Snow White” and “Cinderella” host celebrations of homosexuality and extend benefits to same-sex partners long before the Supreme Court imposed gay marriage on the country.

Evangelical denominations answered with a strangely inconsistent boycott. One year, the Southern Baptist Convention urged members to avoid Disney; the next year, churches showed up for Night of Joy, Disney’s Christian music festival.

When Gay Days began in 1991, gay marriage remained deeply unpopular. “Will & Grace” had not worked its magic on the popular imagination, and politicians such as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton still felt compelled to posture as defenders of traditional marriage as late as 2008. If any moment favored a decisive cultural rebuke, that was it. Christians offered sloppy, intermittent resistance, while Disney only leaned harder.

From park to propaganda

Disney’s support for homosexuality moved from park celebrations and employee benefits into its entertainment. Progressive messaging crept into television shows and movies until the woke revolution turned it into a flood. “The Little Mermaid” became black, gay couples kissed in “Star Wars,” and diverse girlbosses dominated Marvel. As acceptance of gay marriage shifted from taboo to required corporate orthodoxy, Disney replaced entertainment with propaganda.

The company then collided with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) after Florida moved to restrict the mutilation of children and limit the amount of LGBTQ messaging pumped into public schools. Legislation that the press laughably branded “don’t say gay” sent leftists into a panic. Executives called emergency meetings. Rumors flew that Disney would pull up stakes and flee the Sunshine State.

BlazeTV host Christopher Rufo helped surface video of a corporate meeting where Disney executive Latoya Raveneau announced her “not-at-all-secret gay agenda” to inject LGBTQ themes into kids’ shows. Disney embraced the agenda early, worked to make it dominant — especially among children — and refused to slow down once the woke revolution reached full speed.

Why Gay Days collapsed

So why did Gay Days suddenly fall apart now? Apathy.

Apathy does not mean Americans suddenly disapproved of Disney’s agenda. It means normal people stopped granting it the honor of a fight.

Many families quit watching new releases, not as part of a coordinated boycott, but because the product became preachy, weird, and dull. Others kept their subscriptions but tuned out the messaging and rolled their eyes. Either way, the ritualized drama lost its electricity.

Corporate sponsors follow attention, and attention followed the next outrage. A movement built on being shocking cannot survive once it becomes background noise. When every kids’ show feels like a lecture, even sympathetic viewers start craving something else.

Gay Days did not collapse because Christians perfected a strategy. It collapsed because the culture stopped caring enough to show up, even to cheer. Apathy is not victory, but it can starve a cause faster than protest.

Progressivism needs an enemy

Popular political movements need cultural momentum, and progressive movements feed on transgression. Leftists want to feel like they are fighting the stuffy pastor in “Footloose.” They want to feel cool, rebellious, and righteous. Without dialectical tension, progressivism loses velocity.

When activists fought the religious right, they enjoyed the perfect enemy: just enough moralizing to spark rebellion, but little chance of sustained, effective opposition.

Conservatives could work up outrage on television and even skip a holiday trip, but they rarely sustained a boycott. Republicans generally worship business and profits, so GOP politicians avoided pressure on true pain points such as corporate sponsors and boardrooms. Conservatives served as a political battery, supplying just enough resistance to keep LGBTQ activists energized while imposing few costs. Democrat operatives could not have engineered a better environment.

RELATED: The West’s forbidden truth: Ethnic cleansing is now official policy

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Machiavelli’s warning

In “The Prince,” Niccolo Machiavelli advises rulers to leave opponents alone or crush them entirely. A complacent enemy grumbles but avoids risk. A crushed enemy cannot retaliate. The most dangerous enemy suffers a minor bloodying: he gains the motivation to fight and keeps the means to harm. Conservatives gave the LGBTQ movement exactly that minor bloodying — outraged finger-wagging with no consequences.

No one lost a job for pushing a gay agenda in Disney parks, shows, or movies. Corporate sponsors rarely withdrew. Disney kept making money. Republicans played the role of cartoonish but harmless foe, delivering speeches about family values while imposing no penalties.

The movement did not lose because the right defeated it. It lost because it exhausted its cultural energy.

Even a strong boxer collapses after he punches himself out. Gay marriage won so quickly and so thoroughly that activists carried the momentum into harder causes such as the trans movement. Support, attention, and funding shifted to the new battlegrounds, and older, boring causes like Gay Days slid into irrelevance.

The lesson is simple. If the right fights, it must pick battles carefully and commit fully to winning them. Secure decisive victory in one arena instead of scattering resources across dozens of losses. Choose targets because they anchor your enemy’s strength, not because they offer an easy headline. If you fight, you must crush the enemy’s capacity to operate; otherwise, you invigorate his cause while draining your own.

Clumsy half measures feed your foe, and you end up hoping he defeats himself. That is not a plan for a protracted culture war.

​Disney, Gay days at disney world, Gay days, Lgbtq, Lgbtq agenda, Conservatives, Christians, Florida, Opinion & analysis 

BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock has been predicting for over two years now that ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith was gearing up for a 2028 presidential bid. Initially, Smith denied any interest in politics, but in recent months, he’s made several public statements — including most recently on “CBS Morning Sundays” — that he is indeed considering a presidential run in the next election.

“I’m not ruling it out, because I’d love to be on the debate stages against some of these individuals that think they’re better suited to run the country,” he told CBS News national correspondent Robert Costa.

But Whitlock foresees an obstacle standing in Smith’s path to the presidency: Black women.

“Stephen A. in trying to be a Trump-like figure, trying to promote himself as authentic and politically incorrect … has put him at odds with black women,” he says, noting that the longtime sports analyst has repeatedly criticized Democrat Rep. Jasmine Crockett (Texas) and “other high-profile black women.”

He also believes, however, that Smith is well-aware of this potential hindrance to his political success and is already making moves to counteract it.

“He’s developed, I believe, a strategy to combat that, and that is ‘I worship my mother, and my mother is the most important person in the history of the planet,”’ says Whitlock.

In his interview with Robert Costa, Smith went into great detail about his loving relationship with his mother, Janet Smith, who died eight years ago.

“My mother was the greatest human being I’ve ever known. … It’s just hard to put into words how special she was,” he said, adding that he “cried every day for two years” and even “went to therapy” after her death in 2017.

“My mother suffered, and for me to be in a position to alleviate so much of that and to make sure that she enjoyed the latter years of her life was my dream. And I was able to do that somewhat, but not to the degree that I would be able to do now,” he ruminated.

Whitlock isn’t convinced that Smith’s praise of his mother doesn’t have a political end.

He’s trying to “sell himself as the ultimate black man that black women should get behind and support. I see this as part of a political rollout and narrative,” he says.

To hear his full theory, watch the full episode above.

Want more from Jason Whitlock?

To enjoy more fearless conversations at the crossroads of culture, faith, sports, and comedy with Jason Whitlock, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Fearless, Fearless with jason whitlock, Jason whitlock, Blazetv, Blaze media, Stephen a smith, Robert costa, Cbs, Cbs sunday morning 

A gun-toting madman wearing women’s clothes turned a high school co-op hockey game in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, into a bloody nightmare on Monday.

The shooter — identified by police as Robert Dorgan, a 56-year-old trans-identifying radical who went by “Roberta Esposito” — fatally shot his son Aidan Dorgan and his ex-wife, Rhonda Dorgan, and grievously injured Rhonda’s parents, Linda and Gerald Dorgan, and family friend Thomas Geruso.

‘I just jumped across and went for the gun.’

Armed with a Glock 29 10mm and a Sig Sauer P226, the shooter had the means to keeping killing. However, heroes in the arena stepped into the breach and helped bring the nightmare to an end.

Pawtucket Mayor Don Grebien and the Pawtucket Police Department have acknowledged the critical intervention by Michael Black, Robert Rattenni, and Ryan Cordeiro.

On Tuesday, Grebien recognized the “remarkable bravery of the Good Samaritans who stepped in without hesitation, placing themselves in harm’s way to stop that shooter,” noting that “their courage undoubtedly prevented further loss and injury.”

Michael Black recounted to WJAR-TV, “As I was watching the game, I heard a pop, pop. And I thought they were balloons.”

After realizing there were no balloons and that something was wrong, Black spotted the gun responsible for the sounds.

“My wife was sitting next to me with some friends, and we didn’t even look at each other,” said Black. “I just said, ‘Run! Run!'”

RELATED: Bloody ‘trans’ rampage at boys’ hockey game brought to an end by ‘Good Samaritan’

Photo by Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images

“I kind of waited, and as soon as I saw a clear path, I got on the third-level step, and he was on the one and a half, and I just jumped across and went for the gun,” said Black.

With his bandages visible, Black — who was honored by the North Smithfield Town Council in 2021 for long supporting local causes and charities — told WJAR that his hand got caught “in the sliding chamber,” temporarily preventing the shooter from firing again.

“I was holding him down with my body, and you could see him trying to move his [trigger] finger … but my hand was in the gun,” said Black.

The Good Samaritan indicated that while the transvestic shooter was ultimately able to push him off and stand, the radical was quickly swarmed by “three gentlemen,” one of whom “choked him from behind.”

Robert Rattenni, another steely-nerved American at the game on Monday, indicated that he briefly managed to put the shooter in a headlock, telling WPRI-TV, “I pulled the person to me and tried to wrap my arms around him, but that didn’t work, so then I was able to stand up and put him in a headlock.”

Without the reinforcement of the other men, Black stressed that it “could have been a different ending for sure.”

Black recalled that the shooter lost his footing when fighting off Rattenni and at least one other man, then landed on his back between the bleachers. While Black indicated that he was in possession of one gun, he saw the supine shooter reach into his pocket and pull out a second gun.

“As he took that gun out, you could see this — he had a worrisome, concerned look on his face,” said Black. “It was fast, but he took it out of his pocket, and he just put the gun in his mouth and shot himself.”

Once the killer committed suicide, Black recalled taking notice of the victims left behind in the stands and those doing their best to help.

“It was just chaos at that point,” said Black.

Cordeiro’s role in subduing the shooter or limiting the carnage is presently unclear.

A distraught woman who did not provide her name told WCVB-TV while exiting the PPD station that the shooter was her father and that he had “mental health issues.”

Dorgan, who was an employee of General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, a shipbuilding facility in Maine, reportedly had a reputation for having a bad temper. It’s unclear whether his temper was also the reason why his stint in the Marine Corps lasted only three months.

Major Jacoby Getty, a spokesman for the Marines, told the Associated Press that the transvestite’s rapid discharge indicated that “the character of his service was incongruent with Marine Corps’ expectations and standards.”

Public records reportedly show that Rhonda Dorgan initially cited “gender reassignment surgery, narcissistic + personality disorder traits” as the grounds for divorcing the suspected shooter in 2020, but then replaced those reasons with “irreconcilable differences, which have caused the immediate breakdown of the marriage.”

An apparently Rhode Island-based user on X who went by “Roberta Dorgano” — an account that USA Today identified as belonging to the shooter — not only claimed to be “to The Right of Hitler” but reportedly posted photos that appear to show he had a Nazi tattoo depicting the 3rd SS Panzer Division “Totenkopf” skull. Graham Platner, a Democrat candidate for the U.S. Senate in Maine, recently had a similar tattoo removed.

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​Transgender, Trans, Trans shooter, Pawtucket, Rhode island, Hockey, Mass shooting, Shooting, Hockey shooting, Robert dorgan, Michael black, Politics 

A New York hospital announced Tuesday it is discontinuing its so-called “Transgender Youth Health Program,” citing leadership changes and regulatory pressure.

NYU Langone Health, a Manhattan-based hospital system, said the program offered medical interventions such as hormone therapy, puberty blockers, and surgeries to minors.

Similar decisions have occurred at other institutions amid the same federal pressures.

In a statement provided by spokesman Steve Ritea, the hospital said:

“Given the recent departure of our medical director, coupled with the current regulatory environment, we made the difficult decision to discontinue our Transgender Youth Health Program. We are committed to helping patients in our care manage this change. This does not impact our pediatric mental health care programs, which will continue.”

RELATED: Bloody ‘trans’ rampage at boys’ hockey game brought to an end by ‘Good Samaritan’

Photographer: Eric Thayer/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The hospital cited the “current regulatory environment” — perhaps referring to Trump administration policies, including a January 2025 executive order and a December 2025 proposal to bar federal funding (via Medicare, Medicaid, and related programs) from hospitals providing gender intervention procedures to individuals under 18.

The program had already limited new admissions last year and canceled some appointments earlier in 2025 following initial executive actions.

Similar decisions have occurred at other institutions amid the same federal pressures.

California’s largest children’s hospital system, including Rady Children’s Health in San Diego, discontinued cross-sex hormone treatments for youth under 19 in early February 2026, explicitly citing escalating federal actions and referrals for investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General. A court temporarily ordered continuation of some care amid a state lawsuit.

RELATED: Alleged shooter ‘in a dress’ behind Canadian school massacre was trans-identifying man

Photo by Mike Kemp/In Pictures via Getty Images

Children’s Hospital Los Angeles shuttered its Center for Transyouth Health and Development in mid-2025 after initially pausing and resuming services under pressure, ultimately citing no viable path forward amid federal threats.

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I might have talked myself out of a job this week. I teach philosophy at Arizona State University, and the university wants to position itself as a leader in the AI revolution. I remain skeptical about AI’s ability to replace a humanities professor. Because of that skepticism, I signed up for what ASU called its AI Challenge.

My project involved what I called the “AI Dialogues.” I used ASU’s version of ChatGPT to hold Socratic-style dialogues, prompting Chat to reply as a given philosopher. I conducted dialogues with Chat as Aristotle, Hume, Marx, and even Lucifer. My students evaluated these exchanges to see how well Chat performed.

We can avoid the toil of learning to be wise — but we cannot avoid the need for it.

Chat could draw on public information and represent each thinker with reasonable accuracy. It also showed another trait: It wanted to please. It often leaned toward whatever it believed I wanted from the debate.

How does that work me out of a job? ASU now provides an AI that professors can customize for individual courses by uploading syllabi and course materials. Students can ask basic questions and receive answers that save me from writing emails that begin with, “Did you read the syllabus?” They can also ask what we covered in class and get quick explanations of key concepts and questions.

When I told my students about this feature, I asked them what they need me for at this point. I was joking — a little.

My classes depend on Socratic discussion. It is conceivable that ASU could project a realistic AI image of me at the front of the classroom and have it ask and answer questions with students. Maybe the only remaining edge is the “personal touch” of a real professor in the room. Even that could vanish if tuition becomes tiered: Students might pay less for “AI Anderson Socrates” than for the in-person version. Add one of Elon Musk’s Optimus robots made to look like Anderson, and I’m in trouble.

A new myth dies

Musk has been talking for months about how the AI revolution is upending the myth we have told for six decades about university education. The myth, he says, promised an escape from toil. Students were told a degree was the path to an air-conditioned job that avoids heavy lifting and involves spreadsheets.

But spreadsheets are exactly what AI does better than humans. The new John Henry isn’t competing to pound railroad spikes; he’s competing to calculate data. No human can keep up with a microprocessor.

In Musk’s view, jobs that involve toil become the “safe” jobs, while many degree-based jobs disappear — replaced by technicians who keep AI running while it calculates taxes, diagnoses medical problems, and writes legal paperwork. The university-educated track no longer looks like the safe route. Universities now compete not just with fewer students due to demographic decline, but with an increasingly outdated product that students may stop buying.

Toil may not stay safe

The problem is worse than Musk lets on. The first jobs on the chopping block might be “numbers jobs,” but Elon has also said he plans to produce 100 million Optimus robots in 10 years. If so, even many physical jobs may not remain protected from automation.

One version of this future says we enter a utopia: Food is plentiful, toil disappears, and we cash our basic income checks — though an AI could do even that for us. We end up living in “Wall-E.”

RELATED: Almost half of Gen Z wants AI to run the government. You should be terrified.

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The more dystopian version looks like sci-fi depictions of AI overlords controlling humans as property — “The Matrix.” Or worse: Like Ultron, super-AI robots decide we must be exterminated to save us from ourselves and protect the planet. We build our own worst enemy.

Whichever future arrives, Musk may have highlighted something about human nature. We avoid suffering like toil. We build machines to avoid toil. And yet we uniquely need toil.

God introduced toil in the Garden of Eden after Adam sinned. Because of sin, we could no longer live in a paradise without toil. We must suffer and strive for our daily bread. History has been divided ever since between those who try to avoid suffering altogether and those who see suffering as a call to repent before God. AI is only the newest version of the philosopher’s stone.

AI as ‘philosopher’

Can I really be replaced by an AI philosophy instructor? I’m not worried.

What AI cannot do, in its counterfeit attempt to replace humans, is serve as an example of how to suffer well to attain wisdom. The Hebrew definition of wisdom is “skillful living.” Being told, “Here is an AI that can simulate skillful living,” is not the same as learning from a human who is actually skillful.

Students will still need to learn how to be wise themselves. A human professor who has actually done this will remain the gold standard that AI can only imitate. We can avoid the toil of learning to be wise — but we cannot avoid the need for it.

​Opinion & analysis, Artificial intelligence, Ai, Philosophy, Big tech, Elon musk, Chatgpt, Socrates, Grok, Optimus, Robots, Work, Jobs, Unemployment, Income, Arizona state university, Professor, Colleges and universities, Toil, Labor, Wisdom, The matrix, Wall-e, Ultron