Biden’s Classified Documents Scandal: The China Connection

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As you have undoubtedly heard, classified documents from when Joe Biden was vice-president were found in an office Joe Biden used at a Washington think tank.  The documents were found last fall and a Justice Department investigation is underway.  The documents concern Iran, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom.  But many are raising questions about the Chinese connection to the growing scandal.

The documents were found at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.  The University of Pennsylvania, which created the Center, received $54.6 million in donations from China from 2014 to 2019.   This includes $30 million dollars in anonymous donations from China since it named the Center for Biden.  The University paid Joe Biden $1 million to be an honorary professor and some are asking whether the money came directly from China.

That’s not all they’re asking.  They’re asking whether China gave money to a university connected to Biden in order to facilitate business deals China was making with the Biden family.  Donald Trump and others are even asking whether China saw the classified documents in question and whether Joe Biden found another way to sell his office by selling access to classified documents.

These are all naturally occurring, legitimate questions given the extent of the Biden family’s business dealings with Chinese entities.  Those dealings were copiously documented a year ago in Peter Schweizer’s book Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win and need not be recounted here.

However, people are also asking questions about three new commercial situations involving China and Joe Biden that have recently come to light.

Senate Republicans are investigating a $200 million Biden Energy Department grant to Microvast Holdings, a battery company that operates primarily in China.  The senators say the company may nominally be American but is controlled by China.  It gets subsidies from China and serves primarily Chinese customers.  The senators are asking whether the grant endangers U.S. national security and technological superiority over China.

The Energy Department also gave over $10 million in grants to LanzaTech, another green energy company tied to China.  LanzaTech is in a partnership with the investment arm of the Chinese state-owned oil giant Sinopec.  LanzaTech acknowledged in SEC filings “the Chinese government may intervene or influence our operations at any time.”  A Sinopec executive sits on LanzaTech’s board.

The third situation involves the Biden administration allowing Chinese-owned TikTok to get away with not disclosing its far-flung lobbying and public relations activities to the American public.  TikTok’s parent company is in negotiations with the Biden administration aimed at allowing TikTok to continue operating in the U.S.  The parent’s lobbyists registered under the domestic Lobbying Disclosure Act on the pretext they are not lobbying for a foreign government.  The Act only requires barebones disclosure, not the more extensive reporting required under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.  The Justice Department has required lobbyists for other Chinese companies to register as foreign agents, but not the lobbyists for TikTok’s parent company.

The House Committee on Oversight and Reform is starting an investigation of the Biden family’s business dealings.  James Comer, the new chairman, has made it clear, “We’re investigating Joe Biden.”  I will be following the proceedings of the committee closely.  We deserve to know whether we have the most corrupt president in American history on our hands.

More on the China swamp tomorrow.

©Christopher Wright. All Rights reserved.

Visit The Daily Skirmish and Watch Eagle Headline News – 7:30am ET Weekdays

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Federal Aviation Administration Grounds All Domestic U.S. Flights

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All domestic flights in the U.S. were grounded overnight Wednesday into the morning due to a technical error. Some flights gradually started to resume shortly before 9:00 am (eastern time).

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) worked overnight to restore a system that allows air traffic control to alert pilots when there are potential hazards on their flight path. Normal air traffic operations resumed just before 9am on Tuesday while agents continued to look into the original cause of the issue, according to an update from the FAA.

“We are performing final validation checks and reloading the system now. Operations across the National Airspace System are affected,” the FAA wrote on Twitter. “We will provide frequent updates as we make progress.”

Roughly an hour after their initial tweet, the FAA sent an update to followers, announcing that the agency had “ordered airlines to pause all domestic departures until 9am Eastern Time,” to allow for research to be done on the “integrity of flight and safety information.”

Delays for arriving and departing domestic flights are likely to be substantial Wednesday, just a few short weeks after a significant winter bomb cyclone disrupted tens of thousands of flights through the holiday season.

Twitter users were quick to express concerns over the total shutdown of domestic travel, with the CEO of Evercontact writing, “This is alarming. There should be an independent audit on such a large-scale incident. Is it due to obsolete equipment? is it a hack? Human error? Accountability is key to restoring trust in an industry that can’t allow mistakes!”

The FAA then retweeted a post from White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who noted that “there is no evidence of a cyberattack at this point, but the President directed the Department of Transportation to conduct a full investigation into the causes.” She furthered that the FAA would continue to provide regular updates.

AUTHOR

KAY SMYTHE

News and commentary writer.

RELATED ARTICLE: Amtrak Trolls Southwest Airlines For Highly Questionable Free Ukulele Giveaway

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The “360,000 Amigos”

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President Biden and his Mexican and Canadian counterparts have been dubbed the “Three Amigos.” We should call the scheme he announced on the eve of their meeting this week the “Three-Hundred-and-Sixty-Thousand Amigos.”

That’s the number of aliens expected to be brought here this year from four deeply problematic countries through a gambit that is arguably illegal and certainly unauthorized by Congress. As first revealed by the author of Overrun, Todd Bensman, the administration is now enabling people who would otherwise have paid cartels to smuggle them into this country to skip that expense and grave danger.

Instead, they’ll be authorized in their home countries to “lawfully” migrate, then flown here equipped with work papers and money – all at U.S. taxpayer expense. This process may obscure, but will only exacerbate today’s border catastrophe.

Court-ordered injunctions and impeachment proceedings can’t come soon enough.

This is Frank Gaffney.

AUTHOR

Frank Gaffney, Jr.

Founder and Executive Chairman.

EDITORS NOTE: This Center for Security Policy podcast is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Biden Regime Looking To Ban Gas Stoves

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Banning gas stoves. And fireplaces next. Bottom line is good ventilation is all that’s required.  Every good thing is in their crosshairs. Gas stoves have been in use since the late 1800s.

This is just more destruction to our economy and our way of life by the totalitarian primitives.

They claim it’s for the children, These are the same folks mandating deadly RNA vaccines for kids, genital mutilation and chemical castrations for children.

Banning Gas Stoves over Health Concerns

A federal agency may look to ban gas stoves over concern about the release of pollutants that can cause health and respiratory problems, according to a new report. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is set to open public comment on the dangers of gas stoves sometime this winter. The commission could set standards on emissions from the gas stoves, or even look to ban the manufacture or import of the appliances, commissioner.

Keep reading.

US Safety Agency to Consider Ban on Gas Stoves Amid Health Fears

Natural gas stoves, which are used in about 40% of homes in the US, emit air pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and fine particulate matter at levels the EPA and World Health Organization have said are unsafe and linked to respiratory illness, cardiovascular problems, cancer, and other health conditions, according to reports by groups such as the Institute for Policy Integrity and the American Chemical Society.

Read more.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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TWITTER FILES: Pfizer Pressured Twitter to Censor Tweets

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Pure evil.

Twitter Pressured by Pfizer to Suppress Tweets #TwitterFiles

Twitter was asked to censor tweets by Pfizer that questioned its efficacy.

By: Dr Panda, January 10, 2023:

Meet former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb. He is now a board member of Pfizer. He’s been busy getting tweets that challenge the ‘safe and effective’ narrative censored and removed. This is a recap of (part 1?) of the #FacuiFiles.

On August 27, 2021, former FDA Commissioner and current Pfizer Board Member Dr. Scott Gottlieb, emailed Twitter regarding a tweet sent out by Dr. Brett Giroir, which claimed that natural immunity was superior to vaccine immunity and there’s no scientific justification for the vaccine.

In Gottlieb’s email to Twitter, he called the tweet “corrosive” and worried the tweet would end up going “viral and driving news coverage.”

Dr. Girori is the Former Assistant Secretary for Health, Acting FDA Commissioner, WHO Board Member, and Admiral in the US Public Health Service. He also worked at DARPA and currently is the CEO of Altesa BioSciences which specializes in developing treatments for respiratory viruses and global viral threats.

Here is the tweet. It is labeled as “misleading” and cannot be replied to, shared or liked. This tweet was never misleading or factually inaccurate.

Gottlieb’s email was forwarded from Todd O’Boyle, Twitter’s Manager of Public Policy at Twitter, to Twitter’s Strategic Response team. This team handles the company’s most important employees and users.

O’Boyle wrote to the team “Please see this report from the former FDA commissioner,” not mentioning Gottieb was a current Pfizer board member, the ones who make billions on the mRNA vaccines.

An analyst found that the tweet didn’t violate Twitter’s rules on false and misleading information but still slapped a “misleading” flag on it.

A week later Gottlieb was back at it, ferociously emailing O’Boyle about more tweets. This time it was Justin Hart, a fellow Substacker and COVID vaccine dissenter. His tweet (correctly) pointed out that children essentially have zero risk of dying from COVID-19. Why report this tweet? It’s easier to sell experimental mRNA if parents are terrified that their children will die.

Here is the Tweet Gottlieb reported:

Once again O’Boyle forwarded Gottlieb’s email to the Strategic Response Team, again only referencing him as the former FDA commissioner. Twitter took no action.

Gottlieb responded on Twitter blocking all replies. It’s quite long. He complained to Twitter about being doxed and feared for his safety. He actually doxed himself in his own tweets for exposing his personal email (tweet 5,6&7). Around the same time, Gottlieb also went on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” saying “I’m unconcerned about debate being made. I’m concerned about physical threats being made for people’s safety.

Dr. Brett Giroir also responded by saying Gottlieb’s behavior speaks for itself. He “put corporate interests first — not public health.” Calling for an “open, honest, uncensored debate.”

Last but not least Elon Musk, Owner and CEO of Twitter, chimed in saying “Some conspiracies are actually true.” This tweet has since been deleted.

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTICLE: Under White House Pressure, Facebook Censored Accurate Covid Vaccine Information

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House Republican Files Articles of Impeachment Against DHS Sec. Mayorkas In Wake of Border Invasion

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Finally! Millions have stormed the border while Mayorkas continues to insist “the border is secure.”

Mayorkas: ‘The border is closed, the border is secure’:

House Republican Files Articles of Impeachment Against DHS Sec. Mayorkas

Kevin McCarthy called for Mayorkas to resign in November or face an impeachment inquiry

By Kyle Morris, Kelly Phares | Fox News January 10, 2023:

Texas Republican Rep. Pat Fallon has filed impeachment articles against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, delivering on a promise he made last week before the 118th Congress was officially sworn in.

The articles of impeachment against Mayorkas for “high crimes and misdemeanors,” known as House Resolution 8, were introduced by Fallon in the House on Monday and have been referred to the House Judiciary Committee.

Last week, Fallon vowed to file impeachment articles against Mayorkas after the Congress was sworn in. The effort from Republicans in the House is one of many that the new GOP majority will take as it works to fight the Biden administration on issues related to immigration and the southern border crisis.

“Since day one, Secretary Mayorkas’ policies have undermined law enforcement activities at our southern border,” Fallon said in a statement to Fox News last week. “From perjuring himself before Congress about maintaining operational control of the border to the infamous ‘whip-gate’ slander against our border patrol agents, Secretary Mayorkas has proven time and time again that he is unfit to lead the Department of Homeland Security.”

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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1984 to 2020 Florida County Republican Presidential Election Trend Report

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The information in this 1984 to 2020 Florida County Republican Presidential Election Trend Report was originally tied to the monthly Florida’s Registrations Report but owing to a delay in reporting of one major county, and the report becoming too unwieldly, a separate report on long-term trends of the vote is being issued.

The Republican Party is a candidate-based political organization. The variability in registration and vote trends noted in past registrations reports suggests that being a candidate-based political organization does not allow for the optimization of Republican political fortunes.

There are many political organizations, both national and international, who are satisfied with undertaking long-term political efforts. Fabian Socialists and the Chinese efforts come to mind. This raises the question of how are Republicans doing in improving their long-term prospects?

1984 was chosen as the base year for the examination as the 1984 Presidential Election was the peak of Republican share of the vote and the 36-year time span (1984 to 2020) is sufficiently long to be considered long-term. The Republican national popular presidential vote margin since 1984 is an eye-opening, and poorly trending, negative 23,938,640 votes (going from a 16,938,640-vote win in 1984 to a 7,060,520-vote loss in 2020), and a worrisome, but positively trending 908,745-vote loss of margin in Florida (falling from a 1,280,431-vote win in 1984 to a 371,686-vote win in 2020).

To demonstrate the need for a change from being a solely candidate-based organization to an organization which also considers policies, charts and tables showing long-term Republican vote trends, with accompanying tables, were created. Chart 1 and Table 1 are based on percentage of the vote and Chart 2 and Table 2 are based on vote margin. These charts, and the accompanying data tables are attached.

The shift in Florida county political sentiments based on presidential elections on a percentage basis ranged from Lafayette County increasing the Republican percentage of the vote by 21.7% to Orange County seeing a drop of 33.6% in the Republican percentage of the vote, a difference of 55.3%!

The shift in county vote margin in presidential elections ranged from St. Johns County increasing the Republican vote margin by 37,255 votes while in Broward County the Democrats increased their margin by 345,302 votes, almost ten times that of the Republicans’ gain in St. Johns County.

For clarification of what is meant by vote margin, St. Johns County, the best performing county in growing Republican margin between 1984 and 2020, increased its Republican vote margin from 9,841 votes in 1984 to 47,096 votes in 2020, a gain in margin of 37,255 votes. Lee County, the county which had the largest Republican margin in 2020, had a Republican vote margin of 54,995 in 1984 which grew to 75,552 votes in 2020, a difference of 20,557 votes. In margin gain, St. Johns County outperformed Lee County by 16,698 votes.

The generally poor performance in Florida’s higher population counties has led to Florida’s Republican share of the presidential vote falling from 65.32% of the vote and a vote margin of 1,280,431 in 1984 to 51.11% of the vote, and a vote margin of 371,686 in 2020.

There were nine Florida Counties whose Republican percentage of the presidential vote exceeded 80% in 2020. These high performing counties are target poor as these counties have little room for improvement short of growing their populations, which they hopefully will pursue. Optimistically, the positive changes seen in the 2022 election in many of the traditionally poorer performing, target rich, and more highly populated counties, will carry over to the 2024 presidential election.

These data demonstrate that there are factors not associated with campaigns which, over time, have an overwhelming effect on election outcomes. Republican operatives should take this traditionally quiet times between elections to exhaustively pursue the adoption of policies that will increase Republican market share and ideally give Republican candidates ammunition to use in campaigns.

There are innumerable challenges for Republicans to adopt market share growing strategies. These include

  • No funding mechanism, as nearly all Republican funds are used in campaigns.
  • Republican politicians and their strategists, who have successfully navigated the current system, seeing no need for new strategies.
  • A dearth of Republican non-campaign strategists.
  • Unlike the free market, where the capturing of a small percentage of market share allows alternative ideas to flourish, alternative political ideas are easily stifled by the existing status quo by simply ignoring the alternative ideas.

One of the most significant long-term factors in politics is the relative size of the Democrats’ favoring demographic of those who rent their housing. Democrats, as a political strategy, champion policies which increase the relative numbers of those who cannot escape rental housing. Vote trends suggests this is a highly effective Democrat strategy!

Housing is one policy area where Republicans could gain a campaign advantage. Democrats want relatively more renters. In this effort, they, their willing allies, and their non-willing, but ignorant opposition, adopt policies which subsidize rental housing, and which make the purchasing of a first home a near impossibility for most. This successful Democrat strategy should be pointed out to the Democrat rank-and-file by Republican candidates as a part of a traditional campaign strategy.

Those multitudes of Republicans who favor policies which will be referred to here as smart growth real estate policies, face a binary choice. Our Republic cannot survive without a super-majority of its voters being propertied. Smart growth policies create costs the housing market cannot overcome while corrupting current homeowners, who are more Republican than not, with unearned wealth as the smart growth policies unfairly increase the value of their properties. The binary choice is to keep smart growth programs in place and lose our Republic, or jettison smart growth policies and keep our Republic. The choice is this stark!

Housing policy changes take time to affect the electorate. The 2011 Florida legislature and Senator Rick Scott, who was then serving as Florida’s governor, jettisoned the enforcement arm of Florida’s smart growth program, which was made operational in the late 1980s through the mid-1990s, by eliminating the Florida Department of Community Affairs.

The political significance of Florida ridding itself of The Department of Community Affairs in late 2011 is not broadly understood. Traditional political analysts tried to figure out how President Trump carried Florida in 2016. Then the analysts puzzled over how Governor DeSantis defeated Andrew Gillum in 2018. Next, the analysts pondered how President Trump carried Florida by an even larger margin in 2020. Now the analysts are trying to make sense of how Florida experienced a red wave in 2022 while other states did not.

Competent state Republican governance and national incompetent Democrat governance surely played a role in the 2022 election, as likely did an influx of Republican voting Puerto Ricans, but so did the 2011 Florida legislature, and then Governor Scott, who made the Florida real estate market less burdened resulting in comparative growth in the Republican vote!

Florida Election Report 1984-2022

©Steve Meyer, Indian River County, Florida REC Member. All rights reserved.

Numbers Don’t Lie: America’s Border Crisis Is Biden-Made

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The Biden administration’s open-border policies and its refusal to fully enforce federal immigration laws have imposed huge costs on local communities across the country. Border states are groaning under the enormous cost of sheltering, feeding, educating, policing, and providing medical care for tens of thousands of illegal aliens.

There are humanitarian costs, as well, paid by those who are assaulted and killed by the human traffickers, those who die from the fentanyl flooding across the border and those victimized by vicious criminals who have entered illegally.

This crisis is unprecedented crisis. And it is entirely man-made. Put more precisely: It is Biden-made.

The numbers don’t lie. In fiscal year 2022, ending Sept. 30, U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported a record 2.76 million alien “encounters” at our border. CBP reported another 278,102 in October and an even-more-staggering 283,189 in November. More than 3 million illegal aliens will have crossed our border illegally in the past 15 months—all because of the administration’s irresponsible stewardship of the Department of Homeland Security.

And that number is conservative. It doesn’t include the “gotaways”— those who made it across the border illegally, without getting caught. Border officials estimate there were at least 600,000 “gotaways” in fiscal year 2022, compared to only 60,000 in fiscal year 2020.

Supporters of open-border policies argue that this flood of illegal aliens is beneficial. Try telling that to the victims of violent crimes committed by illegal aliens who should never have been allowed to enter the United States.

Texas is one of the few states that provides reports on crimes committed by aliens, and the numbers are appalling. The latest report from the Texas Department of Public Safety notes that, from June 1, 2011, through Dec. 31, 2022, more than 389,000 criminal aliens were booked into local Texas jails. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security confirmed that 70% of those arrested were here illegally.

Keep in mind that Homeland Security can only confirm the illegal status of aliens who were previously detained by DHS and had their fingerprints entered into the department’s alien database.  Given the huge number of “gotaways” whose fingerprints never make it into the system, it is highly likely that many more of those arrested are also here illegally.

But just those 269,000 arrested aliens confirmed to be here illegally were charged with more than 454,000 criminal offenses. That included 847 homicides, 55,509 assaults, 901 kidnappings, 22,139 thefts, 2,551 robberies, 5,579 sexual assaults, 6,729 sexual offenses, 54,885 drug charges, 35,538 obstructing police charges and 5,315 weapons charges. And this is only in Texas.

Sanctuary states like California and New York deliberately refuse to collect or report this data. But we know that Americans are being killed and victimized all over the country. Just ask the families of the victims of criminal aliens at organizations like the Remembrance Project.

The violence, bloodshed, and mayhem caused by these criminals should shock the conscience of every government official, particularly President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris (his designated “Border Czar”) and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Those three have worked to obstruct the enforcement of our immigration laws and destroy the security of our borders.

Biden’s latest proposal for mass amnesty and mass parole would only make the problem worse.

Already exacerbating this public safety problem are rogue prosecutors such as Joe Gonzalez, John Creuzot and Jose Garza, the elected district attorneys in Dallas, San Antonio, and Austin, Texas, respectively.

Disregarding their fundamental duty to protect the public, they refuse to prosecute most misdemeanors, water down violent felonies, turn a blind eye to most illegal drug offenses, and refuse to seek cash bail for known criminals. These policies send a loud message to those inclined to commit crimes: Go ahead and do it!

One of the many reasons why people from all over the world come to the U.S. is because they want to live in a country where the rule of law, undergirded by the Constitution, matters and is honored. The rule of law is the cornerstone of an ordered society.

But when “progressive” officials—from the president down to local district attorneys—refuse to enforce the law, chaos ensues.

It’s time to end the chaos, enforce the law, and hold Biden and all federal and state executive branch officials accountable for failing to do their jobs.

Originally published at the DailyCaller.com.

Have an opinion about this article? To sound off, please email letters@DailySignal.com and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the url or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state.

AUTHORS

Hans von Spakovsky

Hans von Spakovsky is a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, a former commissioner on the Federal Election Commission, and former counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Justice. He is a member of the board of the Public Interest Legal Foundation.

Cully Stimson

Charles “Cully” Stimson is a leading expert in national security, homeland security, crime control, immigration, and drug policy at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. Read his research.

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DeSantis Tackles Divisive ‘Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion’ Programs on College Campuses

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The average American university has more than 45 individuals with jobs devoted to promoting so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion. DEI programs push divisive identity politics as well as distorted narratives about American history. But Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is once again leading on this issue, taking a first step in clamping down on these counterproductive positions and administrative bloat.

In order to provide taxpayers and parents with transparency around what tax dollars are funding within the halls of state colleges and universities in Florida, the governor’s office sent a letter to the state Department of Education this week requesting that the agency, along with public universities, provide information on initiatives and expenditures associated with DEI programs and critical race theory.

Each institution must provide by this Friday, Jan. 13, a brief description of the program or activity, the number of full and full-time-equivalent employees involved, the total funding to support the initiative, and the amount of state funding spent.

It’s a welcome survey. Florida State University has at least 31 personnel dedicated to DEI efforts, and the University of Florida has at least 29, which is likely only the tip of the DEI iceberg on that campus. Numerous such staff members are on the payrolls of Florida’s 38 other state colleges and universities.

Getting a full accounting of costs associated with the many programs and initiatives will paint a fuller picture of just how much taxpayer money is funding DEI efforts—efforts that are counterproductive to fostering welcoming environments for all students and that cement divisive, identity-focused politics on campus.

On average across the country, universities employ four times as many DEI staff as staff dedicated to helping students with disabilities, according to research by The Heritage Foundation’s Jay Greene and the Educational Freedom Institute’s James Paul. Their research also found that universities employ 1.4 times as many DEI staff as history professors.

The problem is that this proliferation of DEI personnel and initiatives is not improving student satisfaction with their higher education experience. Rather, it is increasing bureaucratic bloat and “may be better understood as jobs programs subsidizing political activism without improving campus climate,” as Greene and Paul explain.

DeSantis’ most recent move follows other important measures his administration has taken to rein in the Left’s capture of academic institutions funded by Florida taxpayers, such as:

  • The Stop WOKE Act. This law prohibits public school districts and colleges from hiring critical race theory consultants and codifies Florida’s prohibition on the application of critical race theory in K-12 schools. It also prohibits employers from requiring employees to participate in DEI training. “In Florida we are taking a stand against the state-sanctioned racism that is critical race theory … We won’t allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country or to hate each other,” DeSantis stated when he announced the proposal in December 2021. While a federal judge paused aspects of the law in November, the governor is expected to appeal the decision.
  • The Parental Rights in Education Act. This law stipulates that “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.” It puts parents—rather than public schools, which should be focused on teaching young children to read and write—in the driver’s seat on sensitive topics like sexual orientation and “gender identity.”
  • Senate Bill 7044. This law requires universities to periodically change accrediting agencies in an effort to reduce the “inordinate amount of power” held by accrediting bodies, DeSantis said. Requiring periodic changes in accrediting agencies may also mean colleges aren’t pressured to increase DEI initiatives in order to remain in good standing with the accreditation cartel. For example, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools released a DEI position statement that reads in part that it “supports and encourages the leadership role of its institutions in promoting and sustaining diversity, equity and inclusion in all arenas of higher education.” The law also requires professors to undergo “comprehensive post-tenure review” every five years to provide performance accountability.
  • Alternative Pathways Into the Classroom. In August, DeSantis announced changes to the Florida Administrative Code that provide a pathway for veterans and returning service members to obtain temporary teaching licenses. Downplaying or ending certification requirements to teach (including the requirement that teachers possess a teaching degree, with no consideration for real-world experience as a substitute qualification) would address purported teacher shortages while also weakening the power of ineffective and woke colleges of education.

From providing parents with more transparency relative to what their children are taught in schools and protecting children from the discrimination of critical race theory to weakening the accreditation cartel and shining sunlight on DEI, Florida is leading the way in weakening the Left’s capture of education institutions.

It’s a big reason—along with expansive school choice options for families and a good return on investment for taxpayers—the state ranked first on The Heritage Foundation’s inaugural Education Freedom Report Card.

As 2023 legislative sessions kick off across the country, it will be exciting to see what other states follow suit.

Have an opinion about this article? To sound off, please email letters@DailySignal.com, and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state.

AUTHOR

Lindsey Burke

Lindsey M. Burke is director of The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Education Policy and Mark A. Kolokotrones fellow in education. Read her research. Twitter:

RELATED ARTICLE: Swiss Government Bans Gender Ideology, Only Recognizes Men and Women

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Reps. Adam Schiff, Eric Swalwell, Ilhan Omar To Officially Be Kicked Off Intelligence, Foreign Affairs Committees

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Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy confirmed Monday night that Democratic California Reps. Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell will be removed from the House Intelligence Committee and the House will vote on the removal of Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee.

In February, McCarthy told the Daily Caller that if he is elected Speaker that he intends to strip Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee and Swalwell and Schiff from the Intelligence Committee. On Monday, McCarthy confirmed to The Associated Press (AP) that he would be moving forward with that decision, saying both Swalwell and Schiff should not have seats on the committee.

McCarthy has said Swalwell’s reported relationship with a Chinese spy and Schiff’s defense of the Steele dossier are some of the reasons they should be removed from the committee. McCarthy has said Omar’s anti-Semitism is a reason she should be removed from Foreign Affairs.

“Swalwell can’t get a security clearance in the private sector. I’m not going to give him a government security clearance. Schiff has lied to the American public…,” McCarthy told The AP.

In 2021, Democrats stripped Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee assignments.

The Daily Caller contacted Swalwell, Schiff, and Omar’s offices about McCarthy’s decision to move forward and have them removed from committee assignments to which they did not immediately respond.

AUTHOR

HENRY RODGERS

Chief nationals correspondent. Follow Henry Rodgers On Twitter.

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House Rules Package: A Step in the Right Direction

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Frank Gaffney pointed out on his show yesterday that every major country in the Americas is now in the hands of the Left – Canada, the United States, Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, Brazil, Peru, and Chile.  That’s really disturbing when you consider how authoritarian leftist governments become.  An island in this sea of misery is the Republican-controlled House of Representatives in the United States which just elected a new Speaker and passed a rules package that will appeal to anyone concerned about the advance of the authoritarian Left in this country.

The full text of the rule package isn’t posted yet on Congress.gov, so what I’m about to tell you is from the House Rules Committee version 3 dated January 6th.  (text – analysis).  Even if some of the details of my summation are not correct, the point will remain the same – the Republican House is standing strongly against misrule by the authoritarian Left.

The first thing that caught my eye in the rules package is the institution of CUTGO – proposals to increase spending in one area must contain equal or greater offsets to spending in other areas.  Put that together with the new rule a 60 percent majority is required in the House to pass tax increases, and you’ve got a start on getting government spending back under control.  The Left always wants to tax and spend.  Half their mischief would go away if government were forced to live within its means like the rest of us.  I also like that this restores the Holman Rule that allows members to offer amendments to reduce the salary of specific abusive federal bureaucrats and to cut specific bloated government programs.  I’d start with no more paycheck for DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas who is single-handedly dismantling the nation’s immigration laws.

Other provisions in the package I like include allowing the public to bring ethics complaints directly against House members, and limiting bills to a single subject.  The latter will make it much easier for members and the public to follow proposed legislation.  Hopefully, this means no more secret deals stuffed into giant bills passed in the middle of the night when nobody knows what’s in them.  What Pelosi said during Obamacare – ‘we have to pass it so you can see what’s in it’ – became standard operating procedure under the Democrats, making a mockery of representative government.

Other ideas I’ve seen floating around I hope made it into the final rules:

  • Requiring the text of legislation to be made available at least 72 hours prior to a vote in the House
  • Ending proxy voting in the House and remote proceedings in committees
  • No more automatic suspensions of the debt ceiling when a budget resolution is adopted.  A separate vote to raise the debt ceiling would be required.
  • No more prohibitions against gender-specific language such as “mother” or “father” on the House floor or in committee.   That’s a deserved poke in the eye to the Woke Left.

Best of all are the investigations.  One will look into the origins of COVID, the government’s involvement in gain-of-function research, COVID vaccines and vaccine mandates.    Others will take up the weaponization of government agencies against the people.  The Justice Department will be investigated for going after ordinary parents as ‘domestic terrorists’ for speaking their minds against leftist policies at school board meetings.  The FBI and other federal agencies will be investigated for their roles in censoring truthful information about COVID and election fraud.  There will also be a Select Committee established to look into the threat the Chinese Communist Party poses to the country – it’s about time.  I also hope the investigation into Hunter Biden and the Biden crime family’s foreign business dealings made the final cut.  I will be following all these investigations very closely.

Finally, I hope somewhere in all this is the restoration of regular order, that is, a return to actual separate appropriations bills with committee hearings – not just the giant take-it-or-leave-it omnibus budget packages we’ve seen under the Democrats in recent years.  Thousand page monstrosities loaded up with all sorts of leftist spending priorities that members can’t possibly read before they vote.

The battle has been joined.  May the House Republicans summon the courage to stick to their principles in the face of the onslaught from the authoritarian Left that is coming.  Democrat operative David Brock has formed a $5 million ‘SWAT team’ to deflect House Republican investigations of the administration.  That’s in addition to another multimillion-dollar ‘war room’ set up by other leftist organizers for the same purpose.  Where do they get all this money?  Big money versus sound principles and representative government – I know what side I’m on.  Do you?

©Christopher Wright. All rights reserved.

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Now The Left is Trying to Blame All Post-Vax Sudden Deaths On—Climate Change

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Now that it is impossible to escape the horrible post-vaccine phenomena of  young adults are dying suddenly, the left is blaming, wait for it — climate change. If that doesn’t tell you just how stupid they think we are and what malarkey the whole climate hoax is.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Jim Jordan Will Chair ‘Weaponization of Government’ Select Committee

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It’s a start…..

HUGE: Conservative Hero Jim Jordan Will Chair “Weaponization of Government” Select Committee

By Cullen Linebarger, TGP, January 9, 2023:

Republicans across America deserve to be thrilled this morning with the news conservative bulldog Congressman Jim Jordan (R-OH) will be leading a select committee investigating the innumerable abuses of power by the Biden Regime. Given Jordan’s impeccable credentials with the right, the Regime better start sweating.

According to the Post Millennial, this “weaponization of government” committee will chiefly focus on four areas: the collusion between the Regime and Big Tech, the politicization of the FBI, the Department of Injustice’s targeting of parents at school board meetings, and Anthony Fauci.  These are the things conservatives have been demanding from Republicans for the past two years.

Here’s the story from the Post Millennial:

“The 118th House of Representatives will see the formation of a new select committee, headed by Jim Jordan, to dig into the abuse of power and the Weaponization of Government. This investigative panel will demand emails and correspondence between the Biden administration and big tech companies, and follows the massive revelations that came to light through the recent release of the Twitter Files.

“The probe into communications between tech giants and President Biden’s aides will look for government pressure that could have resulted in censorship or harassment of conservatives — or squelching of debate on polarizing policies, including the CDC on COVID,” Axios reports.

“If government personnel and agencies do not comply, subpoenas are likely to be issued, per a GOP source. The GOP is committed to digging into “the politicization of the FBI,” which not only includes the work done to discredit accurate reporting from the New York Post in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, but the allegations of Russian election interference in the lead-up to the 2016 election.”

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Dems Ask Each Other to Stop Busing Migrants

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“You must stop busing migrants to Chicago and New York City.”

Last week I discussed the outpouring of humanitarian kindness by Colorado’s Gov Polis in shipping unwanted migrants to New York City. Don’t mistake this for the ‘bad’ kind of busing that DeSantis and Abbot do. No, in Polis’ words, it’s “honoring our values by treating people with dignity and respect.”

I’m not so sure that shipping people to NYC or Chiraq treats them with dignity and respect. NYC and Chicago certainly don’t.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot demanded Saturday that Colorado Gov. Jared Polis stop busing asylum seekers to their cities, saying they are “over capacity.”

“We respectfully demand that you cease and desist sending migrants to New York City and Chicago,” Adams and Lightfoot wrote in a letter to Polis. “Since December of 2022, Chicago and New York City have received hundreds of individuals from Colorado.”

“You must stop busing migrants to Chicago and New York City,” the mayors wrote. “In the case of family reunification, let us work together to ensure that people are reconnected with their loved ones, however sending migrants to our cities whose systems are over capacity, where they may struggle to find shelter and other services is wrong and further victimizes these most vulnerable individuals.”

Polis previously insisted, “too many people, in our opinion, view this through a political lens or as playing politics — and it’s terrible that in some places, people have been used as political props. But what we are doing here is just honoring our values by treating people with dignity and respect.”

Adams and Lightfoot should honor their values by putting the migrants on buses to Denver. Or trains or planes. The whole thing can become a paradox in which the migrants are being perpetually shipping around the country without ever stopping.

Or, and this is racist madness, we can build a border wall, enforce border security, pull out of the international refugee treaty that demands we give open the door to migrants, and then ship all the arrivals back where they came from. By bus. Even if it’s across the ocean.

But that would be madness. This way is so much better. Once all the migrants are bused to Chicago and NYC, we can build a border wall around them.

AUTHOR

DANIEL GREENFIELD

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House Passes Rules Package. Here’s What Conservatives Won

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Twenty House Republicans who initially opposed a Kevin McCarthy speakership extracted a slew of concessions from the Californian in exchange for their votes, devolving power away from chamber leadership and back toward rank-and-file members as well as themselves personally.

On the 12th and 13th speaker ballots, 15 Republicans flipped to support McCarthy. They cited negotiations between the Californian’s allies and some of the holdouts that will give members of the House Freedom Caucus representation on key committees, cut spending, and schedule key bills for votes. The complete terms of the agreement have not been fully released, although bits and pieces have been made public. The process has rankled some members of the Republican conference who argue that the agreement gives the Freedom Caucus an unfair level of influence in the lower chamber.

The official House rules package, which all but one Republican voted for, passed Monday. It includes a single member motion to vacate the chair as well as a requirement that tax increases receive 60% support before becoming law. The rules also require that legislation have only one subject, and give members 72 hours to read bills. Republicans are also creating a new Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government under the House Judiciary Committee.

“You are going to have to trust the people that are put on this committee, and I’ll tell you what, if there’s something fishy going on, I’ll come out of the SCIF and tell you, but a lot of it will be behind closed doors, it will be classified information. If we find anything illegal or unconstitutional, we will bring it forward,” Republican Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie told Tucker Carlson of the committee.

However, most provisions negotiated by the leadership team and the GOP holdouts are not included in the rules package voted on by members.

“It has to do with personnel, how members of the conference will be appropriately distributed to key committees. It is about policy imperatives. There are critical issues that we must address,” North Carolina Rep. Dan Bishop told reporters Friday.

McCarthy named Florida Rep. Byron Donalds to the GOP Steering Committee over the weekend, making him the second Freedom Caucus member, along with Arizona Rep. Debbie Lesko, on the panel. The Steering Committee doles out committee assignments to the Republican conference writ large. The Steering Committee chose Tennessee Rep. Mark Green, also a member of the Freedom Caucus, to lead the House Homeland Security Committee on Monday. Green beat out Texas Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a McCarthy ally and staunch critic of the Freedom Caucus, for the gavel.

“They should be represented like all the other caucuses, but they shouldn’t have more than other members have. We should have equal representation on these committees,” New York Rep. Nicole Malliotakis told The Dispatch of Freedom Caucus committee appointments. “I think that’s probably where a lot of members will draw the line.”

Another provision, intended to balance the federal budget within 10 years, would freeze the Fiscal Year 2024 budget at FY2022 levels. This could lead to steep defense cuts, since the FY 2022 budget included $782 billion in defense spending, while the FY2023 budget raised that number to $858 billion. Key Republicans like incoming Appropriation Committee chairwoman Kay Granger of Texas are pledging to oppose any defense cuts, although the plank still has some members nervous.

“We don’t want to go back to sequestration. That would be very damaging to our military in a very dangerous world,” incoming House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Michael McCaul of Texas told the Daily Caller.

“What we need to have conversations on is how that breaks down into defense and non-defense. Those still have to be had. I can tell you it won’t be on the backs of our troops,” Florida Rep. Mike Waltz added.

Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales cited the possibility of defense cuts in a Sunday interview explaining his lone GOP opposition to the rules package.

“When you have aggressive Russia and Ukraine, you’ve got a growing threat of China in the Pacific, you know, I’m going to visit Taiwan here in a couple of weeks, how am I going to look at our allies in the eye and say, I need you to increase your defense budget, but yet America is going to decrease ours,” he told Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation.”

AUTHOR

MICHAEL GINSBERG

Congressional correspondent.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.