Mamdani’s one-word border answer said it all

"Have you ever been to the U.S.-Mexico border?” “No.”One word. That may have been the most revealing moment of New York City Democratic Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s recent interview with the New York Times.Sanctuary policies are easy to defend from a podium at New York City Hall. They are much harder to defend before communities that have already paid the price.Mamdani defended his city’s sanctuary policies, which he reinforced after taking office by signing an executive order reaffirming them.The problem is not so much that Mamdani has never visited the border. It is that he seems unwilling to understand why communities that lived through the border crisis reached a very different conclusion.That lesson is visible far beyond the Rio Grande.Consider Goliad County in South Texas. The rural county has about 7,000 residents and sits roughly 160 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border.Testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee last year, Sheriff Roy Boyd described how the crisis transformed the community he serves.Boyd’s office averaged 77 arrests a year during the five years before 2021. From 2021 through 2024, that average jumped to 413. Deputies discovered 16 cartel stash houses, and pursuits involving suspected human smugglers became routine.Residents began hearing voices and movement on remote properties after dark. Many no longer felt safe alone in their own homes.Those facts expose what Mamdani’s answer overlooks. The border crisis did not remain at the border. Cartel activity and illegal immigration reached inland communities that lacked the personnel and equipment to confront them. Former Border Patrol agent and Texas Public Policy Foundation senior fellow Ammon Blair calls cartels “hybrid threats.”As Blair puts it, “Cartels don’t just smuggle. They destabilize.” Boyd has described them as “contractors and subcontractors” in a network moving migrants and drugs from the border into Texas’ largest cities.That reality changed Texas’ response. In 2021, as illegal crossings surged under President Joe Biden, Goliad became one of the first inland counties to declare a local disaster. Boyd suggested giving local law-enforcement agencies flexible grants for overtime, new officers, patrol vehicles, and other equipment.Those grants became part of Operation Lone Star.According to Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, Operation Lone Star has produced more than 535,700 apprehensions and referrals, 57,400 criminal arrests, and 47,500 felony charges. Texas law enforcement has also intercepted more than 779 million lethal doses of fentanyl.RELATED: The revolution will not be televised — it will be livestreamed in 4K Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty ImagesBoyd later launched the Operation Lone Star Task Force, which allows local agencies to share deputies, intelligence, and resources across jurisdictional lines while targeting human smuggling, cartel activity, and organized crime.New York has felt the downstream effects too. Former Mayor Eric Adams warned that the migrant crisis would “destroy New York City.” Mamdani nevertheless continues to defend sanctuary policies that impede cooperation with federal immigration authorities.Goliad’s experience carries a national lesson. Criminal organizations do not recognize state boundaries. The same networks that move people across the border traffic drugs, weapons, and money into communities nationwide. They exploit ports of entry, the northern border, and weaknesses far from either frontier.The farther those networks spread, the more Americans discover that border security is not someone else’s problem.Mamdani may be proud of New York City’s sanctuary stance.His one-word answer showed more than where he has never been. It revealed what he refuses to see.Sanctuary policies are easy to defend from a podium at city hall. They are much harder to defend before communities that have already paid the price.

Trump’s unprecedented $37B failure exposed as secret meeting details leak: report

President Donald Trump's escalating military campaign against Iran is achieving the “opposite” of its intended effect, according to a senior U.S. official cited in a New York Times report Saturday.“The official said the strikes have the opposite effect of what is intended, keeping Iran cohesive and allowing Iranian leaders to focus attention on an external threat,” the Times’ report reads.The assessment came after insiders leaked details to the Times about a Friday meeting between Trump and his top advisers and Cabinet members, where officials weighed whether or not to escalate the war further. According to the Times, few, if any, in Trump's inner circle believed intensifying the bombing campaign was wise.A separate senior official who was briefed on the discussion expressed doubts that resuming major combat operations would push Iran back to the table at all.The “private deliberations” focused on what officials warned was the Pentagon’s “shrinking inventory of Patriot interceptors and other air defenses,” the Times reported.“Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has cautioned privately that resuming major combat operations against Iran was doable but that it would dangerously deplete interceptors available to the military’s Central Command, which is responsible for operations in the Middle East, the officials said,” the Times’ report reads.Earlier this week, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told a congressional committee that Trump’s deeply unpopular war against Iran had cost taxpayers $37.5 billion so far.The internal skepticism adds to a growing list of signs that the administration's approach to Iran isn't producing the results Trump has publicly promised, even as the financial and human costs of the conflict continue to climb.

Body language expert exposes Trump's signs of 'anger and embarrassment' on live TV

President Donald Trump's reactions at a recent awards ceremony were extremely telling about his true feelings, with one body language expert highlighting all the signs of his "anger and embarrassment" that got caught on live TV.Trump was in attendance during Friday evening's White House Correspondents' Dinner, which was rescheduled after an attempted shooting at the previous attempt to hold the annual event. During the event, CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer presented the Katharine Graham Award for Courage and Accountability to the team of Wall Street Journal reporters for their story relating to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his past connections to Trump, which included the bombshell revelations about the sexually suggestive birthday note the president sent to Epstein.Trump previously attempted to sue the outlet, owned by major conservative backer Rupert Murdoch, over the story, leading many to note his awkward and frustrated reactions during the presentation of the award.In a video shared Saturday, Dr. John Paul Garrison, a licensed clinical and forensic psychologist with expertise in body language, broke down the segment moment by moment in order to highlight all of the signs pointing to Trump's unease.Early on in the video, Garrison noted Trump's "classic look of disapproval" as Blitzer introduced the award, something he has pointed out in numerous other past examinations of the president's body language.A short time later, as Blitzer is discussing the "thousands of documents" contained in the Epstein files, Trump appeared to look away momentarily."It's because this is too intense. It's too anger-inducing," Garrison explained. "He cannot continue to look at Wolf Blitzer because it's making him mad. So, he looks away to try to get support from someone else. So, right now he's turning to face [White House Press Secretary] Karoline Leavitt."While he was looking away, Garrison noted that Trump then gave a "half smile," which appeared to reveal his "contempt, because contempt is the only emotion that's only on one side of the face." The psychologist suggested that Trump might have been attempting to hide his feelings of contempt with the smile, but it was still unmistakably there. The president then transitioned to a look of "fake confusion.""Now he's trying to appear confused. He's feeling awkward," Garrison explained. "He doesn't know how to react to something like this. So he's facing away. He's looking confused, although not really confused, but trying to feign confusion. So, at this point right here, this is everything he can do to disengage from what's going on right now because he absolutely does not want to have to sit and listen to this."Several more times, Garrison noted how Trump showed looks of disapproval as Blitzer continued to talk. When the address turned to Trump's $20 billion lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal, Trump then appeared to show a happy expression over something he felt "pride" about, but Garrison suggested that "he's not actually feeling happy right now, but he's willing to show a fake smile to draw attention to himself."When the reporters were finally brought on-stage, Trump showed various signs of faux-embarrassment and disbelief over the situations, which Garrison said were meant to convey "I can't believe this just happened to me," before he moved on to an expression of "tension.""What we saw was anger and embarrassment, but he tried to cover it by playing to the audience," Garrison concluded.

Antisemitism on the Rise: Radical House Dem Joins Mamdani in Calling for Netanyahu's Arrest

Mamdani’s municipal bond mess will only get worse as mayor prioritizes anti-Israel policies over NYC’s fiscal health

New York City's municipal bond prices continue to decline as Mayor Zohran Mamdani doubles down on his Marxist Third-Worldism, every minute of every day, it seems.

Is Zohran Mamdani Mentally Ill?

‘Unwelcome Guest’: 9/11 Families Demand Muslim Mayor Mamdani Banned From 25th Anniversary

LeBron James’ decision to reject Warriors was ‘tough,’ agent says

Warriors fans will forever imagine what could have been had LeBron James chose to play in the Bay Area. Would Golden State have won a title? Probably not. LeBron James and Steph Curry teamed up for the first time in their careers at the 2024 Paris Olympics. But the next two seasons for the Warriors...