A Pennsylvania state representative is calling out Democrats after he was kicked off the House floor for wearing patriotic clothes. Rep. Eric Davanzo showed up to work […]
President Donald Trump's controversial new intelligence chief is clearing house, and career officers warn the man swinging the axe doesn't know what he's cutting.Bill Pulte, Trump's loyal acting director of national intelligence, began notifying dozens of intelligence officials of their terminations Thursday, part of a downsizing Trump ordered when he installed Pulte at the office two weeks ago, MS NOW reported Friday. An intelligence official, who spoke anonymously citing fear of reprisal, told the outlet that leadership is targeting workers it believes are "deep state" and accused them of failing to hand up a complete picture of available intelligence.But former officials aren't buying his rationale. Several told MS NOW they had never heard of intelligence officers withholding information from their superiors. "The premise is absurd," one said. Another questioned how Pulte, who ran the federal housing agency and has no intelligence background, could reach such a conclusion within days of arriving.“I have a real question of how he would know this. This isn’t a guy who is familiar with intelligence,” a former official told the outlet. “How is he going to get to the bottom of this and rely on any information with a matter of fidelity? It would be like me taking over a hospital and firing dozens of surgeons in a matter of days.”The cuts follow Pulte's earlier removal of six political appointees who served under his predecessor, Tulsi Gabbard. His arrival has drawn alarm across party lines: he took the post without ever holding a security clearance, and he can stay in the acting role past November's midterms under federal vacancy rules. Critics note his office doesn't collect intelligence of its own, relying instead on the CIA, the NSA and more than a dozen other agencies to supply it.Democrats and some Republicans fear the purge is less about efficiency than about clearing out analysts who might resist Trump's election claims. The ODNI says it is providing "elite, apolitical intelligence that keeps America safe."
MS NOW reports voters appear to be mindful of President Donald Trump raking in millions of dollars this summer while their own air-conditioning bills are creeping out of reach of their monthly home budget.Across much of the country, the 4th of July weekend is bringing more than just fireworks. It's also bringing dangerous and potentially record-breaking heat from the Midwest all the way to the northeast with heat indexes potentially climbing well above 100 degrees.More than 160 million people in 30 states are currently under extreme heat warnings this holiday weekend, with little sign of relief from either Mother Nature or the Trump economy. In places like New York, for example, humidity can make a 100-degree day feels like 110, 115 degrees. And it is, of course, considerably more humid in many Southern red states.MS NOW reporter Moses Small marched out into the street and talked to voters fleeing high home utility bills at city cooling centers.“Yeah, it's stressful,” said New York resident Daniela Crespo. “I've been anticipating looking at the forecast, thinking about, how many days am I going to run the AC? What temperature am I going to set it at? What is this going to cost me? It definitely has been on my mind.”Crespa added, however, that even as her own monthly electric bill blows up in her face and she struggles to control it by adjusting her AC to the tip of tolerance she is markedly aware of the extreme wealth pooling out of the White House and the Trump family’s bank accounts.“I mean, I think it really distills the kind of moment we're in with the level of corruption that we're seeing at the very highest levels of government,” Crespa told Snow, speaking on Trump making $2 billion in White House related monetization schemes and crypto machinations since returning to the White House.“When it gets to this hot, families tell me they really do think about the utility bills and their bank accounts,” said Snow, “especially with the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting inflation up 4.2 percent in the past year — but within that, a 23.5 percent jump on energy costs.”Snow added that a CNBC analysis claims Americans, on average, have spent an extra almost $450 in gas and electric prices alone since Trump unilaterally kicked off his war in Iraq. Meanwhile, the money the Trump family is making while occupying the White House appears to smell with enough corruption to make Democrats competitive even in some of the reddest farm states this November. - YouTube youtu.be
Ahead of the 250th birthday of the United States, a Louisiana judge tried to clear a courtroom when a grand jury returned an indictment of a political official. Now, the state supreme court has stepped in to save her. A grand jury returned an indictment on Thursday of Republican Attorney General Liz Murrill, but less than 24 hours later, the conservative majority of the Louisiana Supreme Court stepped in to put the whole thing on hold. All four of the Republican justices voted in favor of Murrill and one Democratic one joined. The other Democrat and one Independent justice dissented. Local WWL News reported that the court issued Murrill's requested stay of the indictment, claiming that she "makes a compelling argument concerning the disturbing defects in the grand jury proceedings and in the trial court’s handling of those proceedings.”According to new allegations, Murrill used the chaos in the courtroom to claim that the special prosecutor failed to follow proper procedure in the indictment when people were removed from the courthouse. On Thursday, journalists, a producer, and a First Amendment lawyer were not only locked out but also handcuffed by court police when they tried to report on the case. James Finn, reporter for The Times-Picayune, wrote on X that "WWLTV producer Danny Montverde was placed in handcuffs by Orleans Sheriff’s Office court security officers after objecting to the closed-door nature of the proceeding."He added, "I was told I’d face contempt of court charges and threatened with cuffs if I didn’t leave the courthouse hallway. When I left the building and came back, security wouldn’t let me back in. When I questioned on what grounds, I was again threatened with handcuffs."Finn issued a follow-up report on the paper, stating that no one at the New Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office has commented on what happened. The office "has made no comment about its deputies’ conduct yesterday, incl cuffing/detaining journalist @DCMonteverde and 1A lawyer Elana Beiser for refusing to leave a taxpayer-funded courthouse. OPSO has not responded to inquiries from," Finn wrote on X. WWL TV reporter David Hammer commented on Thursday evening, "Code of Criminal Procedure Section 383 says grand jury 'indictments shall be returned into the district court in open court.” That did not happen in Judge Leon Roché’s court today and Danny was objecting on behalf of the public. @WWLTV ’s lawyer, Elana Beiser, was also detained.'"Beiser later quipped, "Nothing like a brief detention while standing up for freedom of information to celebrate Independence Day weekend.""The episode ended with combative, dueling press conferences on the courthouse steps. The special prosecutor assigned to the probe lamented that she had taken the case; defense lawyers for Attorney General Liz Murrill decried a system of 'kangaroo courts' in New Orleans," Finn wrote in his report. Murrill claimed in her court filing that there were also conflicts of interest involving Special Prosecutor Laurie White. She is currently being represented by the AG's office in a sexual harassment lawsuit. She also served as an attorney for Calvin Duncan, a central person in the case. For those reasons, Murrill claimed that it wasn't fair. The conservative majority of the Louisiana Supreme Court agreed that the case must be examined and that there are likely conflicts of interest. Everything must remain on hold until further investigation. They also agreed that Murrill is "likely to succeed in having the case dismissed and that she would suffer irreparable harm if it can move forward," said the Associated Press. “This indictment appears to turn the law on its head and flows from what appear to be extraordinary procedural defects and improprieties,” the court said in the Friday filing signed by Republican Justice Jay McCallum.“I hope this political witch hunt is not a harbinger of things to come,” she said in a statement Friday, “but I fear that it is.”Echoing President Donald Trump, Murrill claimed the matter was a "witch hunt."
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani is delivering a speech related to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence just before the Fourth of July. Mamdani is expected to speak on New York’s role in the nation’s founding over two centuries ago. The Ugandan-born U.S. citizen who won the mayoral election last […]
