More than 160 troops have contracted influenza at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas in the past few weeks following Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s decision earlier this year to end mandatory flu vaccines for service members, a source familiar with the matter told The Hill on Friday. The Air Force told The Hill that the…
The luxury Boeing 747, initially valued at $400 million, arrived ahead of schedule on Friday. The jet caused controversy as one of the biggest foreign gifts ever received by the U.S. government.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche is just hours away from violating a judge's order on President Donald Trump's January 6 slush fund after thumbing his nose at it for weeks.U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema gave Blanche and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent until Friday afternoon to file sworn declarations confirming the $1.776 billion Anti-Weaponization Fund is dead.As of Friday morning, nothing had been filed.Journalist Scott MacFarlane wrote that he had been checking the court docket all morning."Crickets," MacFarlane wrote.Brinkema extended her block on the fund on June 12 after ruling that Blanche's verbal claims to Congress were insufficient. She demanded written sworn declarations from both officials.The judge noted that Trump himself said after Blanche's testimony that he wanted to move forward with the fund — comments she said carried "a lot of weight," MS NOW reported.The fund was created through a private settlement of Trump's lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service. Critics noted it could pay Jan. 6 defendants, including those convicted of assaulting police officers.Pooja Boistute, senior counsel at advocacy group Democracy Forward, said after the June 12 hearing she "honestly" did not believe Blanche and Bessent would comply."I think it will tell...a lot to the court that they have represented that they're terminating the fund, and there's no evidence to support that," Boistute said.It is not the only court where Blanche faces jeopardy. Georgetown Law professor and former senior Justice Department official Marty Lederman argued this week that a federal judge already has sufficient evidence to order a criminal contempt trial against Blanche over deportation flights that defied a court order in March 2025."While mistruths and obfuscation may be the standard playbook for the Trump-Vance administration, it is telling that they have repeatedly refused to say under oath that the Slush Fund is truly dead," said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward.If Blanche and Bessent file a sufficient declaration, the preliminary injunction will remain in place. If they don't, the court has said the case will proceed with the injunction in place.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is causing needless suffering within the military ranks by eliminating the universal flu vaccine mandate, according to a new analysis. More than 160 soldiers at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas because of a growing influenza outbreak, which may have killed at least one person in basic training, according to a new editorial from The Washington Post's editorial board. Since the new mandate was handed down in April, at least half of Air Force cadets have skipped getting the shot, and that is part of why the virus is spreading, the editorial added. "If it wasn’t already clear why Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s decision to eliminate the military’s universal flu vaccine mandate was an exceptionally bad idea, it should be now," the editors wrote. The influenza outbreak is happening at a time when the U.S. is engaged in a protracted conflict with Iran, which seems likely to start heating up after peace talks fell apart this week. Vice President JD Vance was scheduled to travel to Switzerland on Friday to sign an agreement between the U.S. and Iran that was brokered last weekend, but abruptly canceled the plans late Thursday night. The Washington Post editors also took aim at Hegseth's excuse for revising the vaccine mandate, arguing that it makes the military less war-ready. "When Hegseth announced the new vaccine policy, he claimed that 'overly broad' mandates 'only weaken our war-fighting capabilities' and stressed that his rollback would 'restore freedom and strength to our joint force,'" the editors wrote. "In reality, his apparent motive was pandering to anti-vaccine elements inside President Donald Trump’s coalition," they added. "Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a former trial lawyer who has profited from lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers, continues plotting to make it harder for people to get immunizations. Never mind that Trump himself received the flu and COVID vaccines last fall.""The secretary cannot stop seasonal diseases like the flu, but unnecessarily ruling out ways to mitigate harm only degrades military readiness," they continued.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ran a secret online search operation that effectively punished subordinates for behavior he has described as "woke."The result of what the New York Times called Hegseth's "war on diversity" had serious consequences for officers who were up for promotion.Hegseth and his top aides ordered the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps to scour the internet for photos, videos or news articles that might draw his ire, the Times reported Friday. Then his own staff ran the searches again — to make sure the branches hadn't missed anything, or tried to protect anyone.Inside the Pentagon, the flagged material was code-named "derogatory material" screening.Hegseth blocked promotions for at least 40 senior officers to general and admiral ranks this year. About half were women or members of minority groups.Officers who had spoken publicly about diversity or urged troops to get the COVID vaccine were targeted. Photos and articles posted on official Navy websites were turned into evidence against the officers they once celebrated.Rear Adm. Stephen Barnett, already a one-star admiral, was the Navy's top pick to be promoted to vice admiral and run its global base command — more experienced than any other candidate, and fresh off three years cleaning up a catastrophic fuel spill in Hawaii that sickened thousands. Hegseth passed over him anyway, selecting the Navy's third choice, after flagging Barnett's years-old remarks on the importance of diversity.Hegseth has made no secret of what he was after. At West Point last month, he told graduates that previous military leaders had been "woke and weak." He declared at the Army War College in 2025 that "DEI is dead."It was not clear whether Hegseth had the legal authority to pull names from the lists at all — Congress had entrusted that power to the service secretaries, not the defense secretary.
A Wisconsin grant program intended to benefit minority students was struck down by the state's supreme court as discriminatory on Thursday.The court relied heavily on a previous U.S. Supreme Court opinion against race-based admission programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina.'This is also a big win for taxpayers, who can now challenge many other race-based programs in state court.'The Minority Undergraduate Retention Grant Program targeted black, Hispanic, and Native American students, as well as immigrants from Cambodia, Laos, or Vietnam who migrated to the U.S. since 1975.Assistant Attorney General Charlotte Gibson argued that the state program was not restricted by the higher court order and met the standards set forth by the court.The court disagreed."The Constitution requires that every person 'must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual — not on the basis of race,'" the ruling of the court reads.During the hearing, Chief Justice Jill Karofsky challenged the plaintiff attorney by citing a post from President Donald Trump about former President Barack Obama that many saw as racist."Just last week, the president of the United States posted a remarkably and insanely racist video of President and Michelle Obama depicted as apes," Karofsky said."In this state, people of color contribute to the vitality of our state, and they are thanked by facing disparities when it comes to housing, access to medical care, transportation, incarceration, financial stability, and education," she added. "Do you take issue with anything I just said up to that point?”Luke Berg, of the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, responded that the worst discrimination is "when the law treats individuals differently based on their race."RELATED: Supreme Court hands huge victory to Trump over DEI funding — John Roberts sides with liberal justices The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty's managing vice president, Dan Lennington, praised the ruling."This is a major win for students," he said. "Race cannot be used to dole out scholarships and other financial aid. This is also a big win for taxpayers, who can now challenge many other race-based programs in state court. WILL is proud to stand for equal rights and make that case everywhere we can."Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Iran re-closed the Strait of Hormuz Friday, citing Israel's refusal to leave Lebanon and US forces' ongoing presence in the region.
The Office of Legal Counsel opinion released Thursday said states aren't required by law to integrate mentally disabled patients with their peers by providing community or home-based care.
"It would only make matters worse if the king refused to see her," a source said of Markle.