Victor Davis Hanson: Trump’s Jacksonian Foreign Policy [With a Twist]

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos.

This content was recorded by Victor Davis Hanson prior to his Dec. 30 medical operation.

Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. In the past, I’ve characterized as, Walter Russell Mead, most famously [said], that Trump’s foreign policy is neither interventionist, surely not nation building, nor is it isolationist, as the Left accuses. It was something called Jacksonian. That is, “no better friend, no worse enemy.” “Don’t tread on me.”

At various times if people took advantage of the United States’ desire to live in peace, and they started to push their luck, then we would hit them, overwhelmingly. Sort of what we saw with the two Americans that were tragically killed in Syria. Then there was an overwhelming retaliation.

But I think there’s a quirk to Jacksonianism, a subset. And I would call the Trump Foreign Policy, the Vise Policy. V-I-S-E. Like a vise, that you clamp down on something. By that, I mean, rather than intervene or even use kinetic force, he has another alternative when he sees a renegade country.

Most famously, we saw Iran, that when he came into office, the first thing he did was get back out of the Iran Deal, put back the sanctions, support Israel’s effort to retaliate against Iran.

Although he did take out the nuclear facilities, that was an act that he felt he had no choice, because Iran was reaching a point where they’d have a nuclear weapon. But up until then, he had almost bankrupt, again, by squeezing the Iran economy at no cost to the United States.

We see that much better with Venezuela and the rogue Maduro government. The illegitimate government, that throughout the last elections, in which [Nicolas] Maduro lost, and has been sending shiploads of narcotics to the United States.

It’s using embargoed oil tankers to sell sanctioned oil to Cuba, to China, and, more or less, opened up its jails and mental institutions and sent thousands of people, in spite, to the United States.

So, Trump is now reestablishing the Monroe Doctrine. Remember, Secretary of State John Kerry said that the Monroe Doctrine was pretty much ossified, calcified. Trump has reinstated it. But with a vise policy.

So, sanctions on Maduro. He’s not going to have any income through narco sales. We’re blowing up narco terrorist shipments on the high seas.

He uses that money to bribe officers, bribe the media, bribe the opposition, to stay in power illegitimately. And then, in addition to that, he’ll have no oil income. Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. So, he has a limitless supply of credit and cash. But not if he can’t get it to somewhere.

And, in the Western hemisphere, Trump is showing the world that he just almost automatically reestablished the Monroe Doctrine. What is China going to do? They may say they have a blue-water Navy. They may say they’re catching up. But they’re not there yet. And they have no ability to transmit power, in the Western hemisphere, among our shores.

So, Maduro is in a vise. And we’re squeezing it down, at no cost to us. Is Trump going to invade? I doubt it. Is he going to bomb? I doubt it. I think he’s just slowly going to intimidate Maduro so people within the Venezuelan hierarchy, both legitimate opponents and opportunistic supporters, who feel that he’s a bad investment. And they will throw him out.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Since this commentary was recorded, President Donald Trump did launch a military operation to seize Nicolas Maduro so he could face criminal charges in the United States. What assistance the U.S. had from “legitimate opponents and opportunistic supporters” within Venezuela has not been made known.

The same thing is true of Cuba. We didn’t really know how to deal with Cuba. Since 1959, we’ve had embargoes. Sometimes they’re liquid. Sometimes they’re fluid. They don’t really work. But, more or less, the Castro-ite government in Cuba is an existential enemy of the United States.

We have a lot of people who go there and visit. But the country has never worked. It’s impoverished. And it’s dependent wholly on the legacy of Hugo Chavez and now Maduro, to give them cheap oil. If they don’t get cheap oil, and what do I mean by that?

If Maduro cannot put embargoed oil on sanctioned tankers and get to Cuba, then Cuba’s going to have no ability to distill gasoline, nor will it have energy. And that’s exactly what is happening. The Cuban economy is in a Trump vise.

Are we going to bomb Cuba? No. Are we going to have a Bay of Pigs standoff or invasion? No. Are we going to have a Cuban missile crisis with China? No. We’re going to have a Trump vise. And it’s going to squeeze.

Does this work all the time? No. I mean, it doesn’t work in the case of a full-fledged war, like the Ukraine War or the Middle East, sometimes.

But with other powers in our vicinity or that we have leverage over, we’re going to start to squeeze them, to bring back legitimate government, pro-American governments, and stability for the entire Western hemisphere. And most importantly, a chance for their citizenry to have a normal life.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

AUTHOR

Victor Davis Hanson, a senior contributor for The Daily Signal, is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and host of “The Victor Davis Hanson Show.” His website, The Blade of Perseus, features columns, lectures, and exclusive content for subscribers. Contact him at authorvdh@gmail.com. VDH on X: .

The Dominos Begin to Fall

The Domino Theory was a strategic concept popular in the 1950s and 1960s, which asserted that once one country succumbed to Communism, its neighbors would soon follow.

Because it was widely cited to justify the unpopular U.S. wars in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, it fell out of favor by the 1970s. That didn’t mean it wasn’t true.

Today, I believe we will soon witness an updated version of the Domino Theory. President Trump is calling it the “Donroe Doctrine,” but I think it goes way beyond the Western Hemisphere.

The takedown of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela, and the apparent subservience of his successor, will have far-reaching consequences in Russia, Iran, and Communist China, but also in Europe.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Coast Guard conducted back-to-back operations to intercept and board two “ghost fleet” oil tankers, one in the North Atlantic and the other in international waters near the Caribbean.

Both vessels “were either last docked in Venezuela or en route to it,” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in a tweet.

The Bella 1, a supertanker headed for Venezuela from Iran to collect Venezuelan oil, was first intercepted by the US Coast Guard off the Venezuelan coast on December 17, but went dark and escaped into the North Atlantic.

While fleeing US pursuers, the crew painted over the vessel’s name with that of a ship registered to the Russian Federation, the Marinera, but was intercepted and boarded on January 7, in heavy seas off the coast of Ireland. 

It was a scene right out of the Nicholas Cage movie, Lord of War, with Coast Guardsmen rappelling down from hovering MH-60 Jayhawk helicopters.

The US ignored Putin’s claim of sovereignty over the vessel, and has vowed to pursue the 300-vessel ghost fleet used by Russian, Iran, China and Venezuela to evade US sanctions wherever it sails.

Not only is this an America First national security policy; it also makes for great television.

The Chinese had been big allies of Maduro for years, but the regime’s slovenly approach toward business convinced Chinese state-run businesses to seek opportunities elsewhere in the Western hemisphere, primarily Brazil.

China’s malign influence in our hemisphere could be the next domino to fall. But the President has said, graciously, that we won’t stop them from purchasing Venezuelan oil. In the future, however, the Chinese won’t be getting the $20-per-barril discount Maduro had been giving them. They will pay full freight, and the proceeds will be shared by Venezuela and the US Treasury.

The biggest losers in Venezuela, beyond the narco-traffickers, are Iran and its ally, Hezbollah. And that’s where the dominos are going to fall hard and heavy.

For decades, the Iranians have been building missile factories in Venezuela, under the guise of tractor production. In 2022, they signed a 20-year cooperation agreement with Maduro that included additional arms sales, defense plants, and oil field technology.

The deal gave Iran a logistics hub in the Western hemisphere to evade US sanctions and their ally Hezbollah a base from which to infiltrate terrorists across our southern border. By 2023, you could see the Iranian presence in Venezuelan military parades.

The Venezuelan navy also began to operate Iranian go-fast missile boats (top speed: 54 knots), armed with supersonic sea-skimming cruise missiles. All that will soon be gone.

I would not like to be an Iranian leader today. They see that when President Trump says he will do something, he does. And he has told them if they start to massacre protesters, the US is “locked and loaded” and ready to take them out.

I happen to believe that the United States has many ways of influencing events inside Iran without going into the country guns a’blazing.

For starters, the Iranian regime is intensely paranoid. After the 12 day war in June that took out their nuclear plants, they believe 1) that Israeli spies are everywhere, and 2) the United States military is a force to be feared.

When Ayatollah Khamenei sees Maduro taken away in handcuffs, he can feel those handcuffs slipping over his wrists in his dreams.

How do you keep from engaging in forever wars? By demonstrating the awesome power of the US military, and instilling fear in potential adversaries.

There are no US troops on the ground in Venezuela, nor any immediate plans to send them there. This president has demonstrated the big stick; now he can speak softly and be obeyed.

It’s entirely possible that he could take down the mullahs in Iran with words alone. Mark my words.

I discuss these topics on this week’s Prophecy Today Weekend, and will have much more to say about the ongoing Iranian revolution in the weeks to come.

As always, you can listen live in the Jacksonville, Florida area at 1 PM on Saturday on 104.9 FM or 550 AM or by using the Jacksonville Way Radio app. You can listen to the podcast later here.

Yours in freedom,

Ken

PS: I discuss Iran at greater length in a new edition of The Right Take with Mark Tapson, which is scheduled for release on Tuesday.

©2026 . All rights reserved.


Website: kentimmerman.com

Ken Timmerman’s 14th book of non-fiction, THE IRAN HOUSE: Tales of Revolution, Persecution, War, and Intrigue, can be ordered by clicking here or by viewing my author’s page, here. 

Raising Olives in Provence, can be ordered by clicking here.

How American Leftist Groups Collaborated With Maduro For Over A Decade

Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro and his socialist regime spent years coordinating with American leftist movements such as Black Lives Matter (BLM) before the U.S. removed him from power.

BLM activists, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and other groups met with Maduro, spoke at events alongside him or became official observers for Venezuela’s heavily-criticized elections for more than a decade, according to the groups’ public statements and online posts documenting the meetings. Some of the same organizations called for protests in the U.S. against the Trump administration’s Jan. 3 arrest of Maduro and his wife on drug and weapons charges.

The Venezuelan regime won influence with activists to its own benefit long ago, in part through a 2006 speech by former President Hugo Chavez that called for Americans to form an organized front against their own country’s interests, according to Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

“They played a key role in setting up the U.S. Social Forum from the World Social Forum which was the network of networks for the Left,” Gonzalez, a former foreign affairs journalist and State Department official, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. He credits Chavez’s speech with sparking the 2007 inaugural meeting of the World Social Forum’s U.S. branch in Atlanta, Georgia.

“We must save the world, the people can save this world, but essential to this formula to save the world are the people of the U.S., the conscience of the U.S. people, the resurrection of the U.S. people … All of us must unite; join together in a victorious offensive against the empire,” Chavez said.

BLM movement co-founders Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi have both attended World Social Forum events, while a left-wing think tank that employed BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors was part of the U.S. Social Forum’s inaugural planning committee.

Gonzalez also alleged in an October report that Chavez once paid Tometi to foment political revolution in the U.S., citing an anonymous former Venezuelan government official who defected to the U.S.

Cameo Appearances

Years before federal agents brought him to court in New York City, Maduro visited Harlem in 2015 for an event focused on Venezuelan rights alongside BLM’s Tometi, as shown on a Venezuelan government website. The BLM movement went on to defend the Venezuelan government against criticism by U.S. officials, including after Maduro’s arrest.

The BLM Global Network Foundation did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

Manolo De Los Santos, head of the New York-based People’s Forum, also spoke at the People’s World Congress for Peace in Caracas, Venezuela, in 2021, with Maduro announcing him in front of their audience, video footage shows. Maduro again gave a shout-out to De Los Santos by name in a 2024 speech in Caracas.

People’s Forum Executive Director Manolo De Los Santos speaks at the People’s World Congress for Peace in Caracas, Venezuela, on Dec. 10, 2021. (Image credit: X.com/@NicolasMaduro)

The 2022 International Summit Against Fascism, hosted in Caracas, also featured Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) founding member Eugene Puryear, whose group gained prominence in the U.S. starting in 2023 by organizing pro-Palestinian protests. The PSL has since played a role in protesting against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) across the country.

Maduro’s government hosted the Caracas summit with delegates from 53 countries, with the dictator giving his own speech, left-wing outlet People’s Dispatch reported.

“There is a particular variant of fascism that is imprinted in the political culture of the United States,” Puryear said on video. “It goes to the roots of the ethnic cleansing of Indigenous people, the imprisonment in slave labor camps of African people.”

The PSL and People’s Forum swiftly organized pro-Venezuela protests across the country in the days following Maduro’s arrest, complete with signs and marchers, The New York Post reported. Both organizations did not respond to the DCNF’s requests for comment.

Allyship between Venezuelan officials and American leftists can be chalked up to the fact that “they are all collectivists,” Gonzalez told the DCNF. Their posturing against Western “authoritarianism” is merely a “ruse,” he said.

“The Left loves authoritarianism, or even better, totalitarianism,” Gonzalez said.

‘Election Observers’

Weeks after Maduro’s Harlem visit, Tometi announced on X that she was “doing my duty as a global citizen and serving as an election observer” in 2015, posting a picture with an official uniform. “Such a relief to be in a place where there is intelligent political discourse,” she said in another post about the trip.

The DSA, National Lawyers Guild (NLG) and the Alliance for Global Justice (AFGJ) — all U.S.-based — also sent “election observers” to the country in 2024. The three groups did not respond to requests for comment.

Both the Trump and Biden administrations, as well as Latin American countries, have denounced the incumbent Maduro’s win that year as fraudulent. Legacy news outlets in the U.S. also cast serious doubt on the results based on their own analyses, citing vote tallies, reports of irregularities and government tactics such as blocking candidates from running.

A demonstrator holds a banner that reads in Spanish “For a christmas without Maduro” as Venezuelans demonstrate in support of a change in presidential political leadership outside El Genio Shawarma restaurant during the presidential elections in Venezuela on July 28, 2024 in Orlando, Florida.

American activists supporting the country’s socialist status quo sought to paint a different picture.

“The delegation witnessed no instances of fraud or serious irregularities, and found overall voter satisfaction with the electoral process,” the NLG said. “We observed a deeply participatory and pluralistic process where the Venezuelan people are directly engaged in the social and political life of their nation.”

The organization said it talked to voters on-site who reinforced that view.

“Because there is broad faith in election procedures and the overall electoral system, as our interviews suggest, mainstream media within the US has ramped up negative media representations of the Maduro government in the weeks leading up to the elections,” the NLG wrote. “This is a flagrant attempt to delegitimize the Bolivarian Republic, downplay widespread popular support for the Maduro government, and present the divided opposition as more unified and influential than it actually is.”

“We commend the Bolivarian Republic for its commitment to electoral democracy in the face of such brutal repression by its powerful neighbor to the north and stand with the voters who cast their ballots in support of democracy, justice and liberation,” the group wrote.

AUTHOR

Hudson Crozier

DCNF Crime and Extremism Reporter

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


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

A Great Maneuver to Save Western Hemisphere

The American operation in Venezuela and arrest of its leader Nicolas Maduro is the second unprecedented event accomplished by the Trump administration. Defeat of the ideology and system of Soviet Socialism and the return of successful American Capitalism by Trump is the first unprecedented victory in world history. President Trump introduced to the world a new concept of International Relationships. Soviet Socialism, which I called Soviet Fascism has been defeating capitalism in the countries of Western civilization for the last hundred years. President Trump is the first leader in the history of the free world who stopped and reversed the triumph of Soviet Socialism. It is not yet finalized, but to complete it, America should learn about its “enemies foreign and domestic” and about their global threat. Humanity needs the American Greenland!

We have never been divided like now. We have witnessed a culture of assassination against the Republican leaders for years. But the Dems are claiming that U.S. democracy is in crisis, according to Jimmy Kimmel’s holiday monologue on British TV. He was crying about fascism and tyranny in America under Trump. He missed a real Soviet Fascism within the Dems’ party of America. I am a former Soviet defense attorney, who has been writing about Soviet Socialism, which I called Soviet Fascism for the last forty years. But all those years the Dems’ FBI was systematically sabotaging my writings. I have written seven books and over two hundred columns, but you were deprived of reading them on time, because of the FBI’s illegal action against me since 2002. Reading my books and columns would educate you and prepare for what happened in America under the Dems rule. Allas! You don’t know Soviet Fascism, because of the crime committed by the Dems’ FBI. That crime cost America and the world $$ Trillions, and millions of dead and injured…

You don’t know the name of Joseph Stalin; he was a Dictator of Soviet Russia. His ideology and system of Soviet Socialism had a grandiose agenda—to destroy Western civilization and implement his system of Soviet Socialism globally. Under the ideology of Marxism-Leninism Stalin promoted his design as—One World Socialist Government Under Russia’s rule. The Soviet Intel Apparatus had designed the methods and strategy of how to  infiltrate countries of the West. Stalin had married his Soviet Socialism with Islam, it was an ideological fusion and a special role was given to the Muslim Agents, I called them Soviet Jihadis. You know some of them: Zohran Mamdani, Ilhan Omar, and many others. All Islamic groups and gangs have been coordinated and supervised by Russian Intel. Read details in my columns…

​Designing  One World Socialist Government, Stalin understood that his agenda and design required a lot of people to succeed. A few years after Socialist Revolution in Russia, Stalin began preparation of Socialist Revolution in China. Russian Military and Intelligence had been flooding China and expanding their power in Asia and the Middle East. They all were served by Russian Intel I called the KGB’s Mfia/Army—the Evil Doer. The main tactic was “divide and conquer”—Inciting differences to destroy the basic foundation of Western civilization. I discussed the events of the 20th century in my previous columns. Please, also read my column written eight years ago: Failed American Intelligence: North Korea, Syria, Putin, and the Obama Connection  August 20, 2017.

Stalin created not only strategy and tactics’ but also the Soviet Socialist modus operandi for all forces infiltrating and fighting Western civilization. Here is the Soviet Socialist modus operandi: lies, deception, fabrication and fraud—the face of Soviet Socialism. I had mentioned those modus operandi in my columns for years to introduce and educate you with Soviet behavior, methods and dirty tricks. Just recall four year under Biden, his team was constantly lying, deceiving and defrauding America. The shameful withdrawal of American Forces from Afghanistan drove me to such a resentment that I wrote three columns in August 2021, suspecting Putin and the KGB’s Mafia/Army designing and exercising it in the White House. I suspected the Dems  were in cahoots with the Russian Intel. That happened five years ago. Today, January 2026, I have more evidence that I was right then. Just look at pervasive fraud in Minnesota to  recognize the system of Soviet fascism in America. Please, read the documents below:

“Washington, December 20, 1972 [Page 1]

SOMALIA: THE SOVIET PRESENCE

This paper assesses the USSR’ position in Somalia, Soviet interests and objectives in the Horn of Africa, and prospects for Somali-Soviet relations.

ABSTRACT

The Soviet Union has greatly expanded its presence in Somalia beginning in 1963. The USSR has strategic interests in Somalia associated with, but peripheral to, its larger interests in the Middle East and the Indian Ocean. Lesser or supporting interests appear to be to secure a foothold in East Africa and to pre-empt Western and Chinese positions in the Horn. How the USSR hopes to exploit its currently favorable position in Somalia depends on presently uncertain factors, such as the Middle East situation.” Office of the Historian, Documents on Sub-Saharan Africa, 1969–1972 United States Government Printing Office Washington 2005.

​Millions of the Somalian refugees came to America from the system of Soviet Socialism, which I called Soviet Fascism and you saw the result. Brainwashed Somalians carried Soviet Socialism to America. The Somalian criminals are not alone, Hilton refused to house ICE and DHS personnel to fight fraud in Minneapolis. Besides, hundreds of protesters trained by the Russian Intel are on the streets of Minneapolis. This is a sinister sign of the system’s unity under the Democrat party. The Dems Governor and Mayor have become the professional agitators against the Law Enforcement, inflaming the crowd of protesters and creating a very dangerous situation in Minneapolis, helping criminals to destroy America from within. The protesters were weaponized against Fed Agents and finally it ended up with ICE — involved in shooting… There will be investigation, but the behavior of the Dems party and unity in confronting the Fed Agents was a major factor in the tragedy. They are a part of Socialist Revolution still going on in the Blue States of America.

Stalin’s system of Soviet Socialism was predominantly carried out and implemented by the KGB’s Mafia/Army, like you saw it in Venezuela under Chaves/Maduro. In America the Democrat party was using TDS very conveniently to cover-up their dislike of American capitalism. Look at the Dems’ policy today: open border policy, money for illegal migrants in the expense of American citizens, covering up Minnesota fraud, confronting Fed Agents and so on. Those actions belong to the enemy of the American republic. Unfortunately, we saw the same in the rest of America and not only in Minnesota. Democrats have created fraud everywhere. Today Mamdani is a Mayor of New York and Rudy Jiuliani is a defendant waiting for his trial. What a Shame! I am from New York and know its history. The conclusion is simple—Soviet Fascism came to New York, too. Please, read my column about the history of the world destabilization written three years ago:

“Those who don’t know Stalin’s legacy of the 20th century will pay a dear price for their ignorance. I want to prevent it. As you don’t have time to read my books, I will give you the summary of what Stalin has arranged for the future. Check the story on fact-check. The Spanish Civil War had broken out in 1936-39. Stalin sent the Soviet military there and participated in the war. His side lost the war and the Soviet military retreated. While retreating Stalin brought several thousand Spanish orphanages to Russia. The Spanish-speaking children had been schooled and trained by the KGB and sent to Central America and Mexico in 1950-1960s. They are the Russian Cartels of criminal gangs like MS-13. All details you can find in my columns.

This story is critical for two reasons. First, to verify actual accuracy of the event on fact-check. Second, to see a strange similarity with a current situation on our Southern border. Thousands of unaccompanied children are crossing the Southern border and then they have been flown by Biden’s government and appalling information comes back from those states: the children have been abused by different criminal groups and exploited by some companies. Immigration authorities encountered more than 152,000 unaccompanied minors at or near the U.S.-Mexico border in fiscal year 2022 (FY2022).

Don’t be surprised by all the troubles the Republicans find themselves in: Putin’s KGB’s Mafia/Army—the Evil Doer has been working tirelessly against them since the 20th century. The brainwashing started from the kindergartens, schools, and Colleges, preparing the cadres of Soviet Socialism, which I called Soviet Fascism in America. You saw them on the recent House Hearing of Judicial Committee. Just remember two things: Socialist modus operandi: lies, deceit, fabrication and fraud; and Stalinist famous postulate “Never admit crime committed, instead accuse your opponent of that exact crime.”. Socialist fraud is running America from the policy of open borders to BLM and Antifa, from DOJ to the Crypto King, and many others…”  Putin’s Socialist Revolution in America: The Stalinist Mexican Cartels  October 6, 2023

If you still don’t know who is destabilizing the world, please read about Somalian General Mohamed Farrah Aidid. He was chosen to study advanced military science at the Frunze Military Academy in the Soviet Union. This was a top school for the best officers from many countries. I have written a column about the revolution in many countries of the Middle East implemented by the design of the Chairman of the KGB Yuri Androov and coordinated by the Soviet Intel in 1979. Alumni of the Frunze Military Academy participated in the Civil War and have become the leaders of their countries for many years… “Throughout Surviving Black Hawk Down, a figure known as Mohamed Farrah Aidid is referenced several times, with his life and role in the Somali Civil War being touched on.” Decades later, we are again dealing with Somalia, not with General Aidid, but with the Democrat party fighting the American republic from within.

​History is the mother of all sciences. I am a student of History and I have been reporting for four decades about the major Soviet/Russian Forces destabilizing the world—the KGB’s Mafia/Army. DJ Vence is right: “Too many on the left want blood.” Yes, I was right exposing the Dems’ collusion with the Soviet/Russian Intel—both wanted blood and don’t be surprised by the global Antisemitism rising. Now is the time for the FBI to exercise their duty, to prevent any blood loss by using the information above presented by me. Knowing that the FBI and CIA have been infiltrated by foreign forces and malfunctioned for thirty years, the current FBI should help President Trump to complete his victory and uncover the truth.

The truth is obvious for me—the Dems have betrayed the American republic and colluded with Soviet/Russian Intel. The current FBI should investigate it.

©2026 . All rights reserved.

To be continued simonapipko.com  and   www.drrichswier.com/author/spipko/

One Video Blows Up Countless Media Narratives About Minnesota ICE Shooting

One video sank an entire media news cycle of false narratives.

On Friday, Alpha News released a video taken by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent involved in the shooting of a woman in Minnesota by an ICE agent that’s become an international story. The notion that the agent shot her for no reason at all has just gone up in smoke.

Not only does it appear the deceased woman, Renee Nicole Good, was being egged on to behave aggressively by her wife, but it’s clear that she hit the gas of her SUV while seeing the agent was directly in front of her.

Take a look and judge for yourself.

Bodycam video of Rebecca Good taunting ICE, ignoring orders and accelerating her SUV into the agent

At the end of the day this is still a tragedy, even if it’s one of Good’s own making. Her partner should have never encouraged her to disobey the authorities, she should never have blocked traffic, and it’s terrible that she lost her life for a very bad judgment call. The officer too will have to live with the fact that he shot someone.

But in no way is this story anything like the narrative that’s been generated by much of the legacy media in the last 24 hours. And I’m not even just counting the hot takes. There have been enough bad ones on this incident since Wednesday to blot out the sun. I’m also talking about the reporting.

Frankly, I agree with Vice President JD Vance who said at a news conference Thursday, “The way that the media, by and large, has reported this story has been an absolute disgrace, and it puts our law enforcement officers at risk every single day.”

Vance read a headline by CNN during the press conference, “Outrage After ICE Officer Kills Citizen in Minneapolis.”

As of my writing this, the Washington Post hasn’t issued a correction.

The New York Times wasn’t much better. The Times reported, after interviewing President Donald Trump–who said the woman ran the officer over—that according to their “analysis” from three camera angles “the motorist was driving away from—not toward—the federal officer when he opened fire.”

Even before this recent video was released it certainly appeared to me that the vehicle was driving toward the officer.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt demanded The New York Times correct this report.

I don’t know where the media goes from here. Maybe they just move on to other things. Hey, there was another incident in Portland they could twist to fit the narrative (though that one is looking even less useful for their purposes).

Maybe they focus on the fact that the ICE officer cursed under his breath after firing at Good.

Or maybe they just blindly charge ahead as if the most recent video doesn’t exist or that 2+2=5.

I really don’t know.

What I do know is that this incident highlights just how the legacy media long ago lost the trust of the American people. Hopefully this incident will get the investigation it deserves. There are still many unanswered questions about what led up to this incident.

I’m certainly thankful there is a vaster ecosystem, whatever its faults, of alternative media that now exists in this country.

AUTHOR

Jarrett Stepman is a columnist for The Daily Signal. He is also the author of “The War on History: The Conspiracy to Rewrite America’s Past.” Send an email to Jarrett. Jarrett on X: .

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Feds Say Two Shot By Border Patrol In Portland Were Gang Member And His Prostitute

The Department of Homeland Security says the two individuals shot by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents in Portland, Oregon, on Thursday were a gang member and “his prostitute.”

The statement was a direct response to ABC 17 News, which shared a CNN article on the shooting to X with a caption saying federal agents “left a married couple wounded in Portland.”

“The two criminal illegal aliens who attacked Border Patrol in Portland are a gang member and his prostitute, NOT an innocent ‘married couple,’” DHS said.

The CNN article ABC 17 shared did not the pair’s immigration status, though other details about the couple were not reported at the time.

DHS identified the driver as Luis David Nico Moncada, a Venezuelan national and suspected member of Tren de Aragua, which the State Department has designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization. Nico Moncada entered the U.S. in 2022 and was released into the country during the Biden administration, according to DHS. He has since been arrested for DUI and unauthorized use of a vehicle and has a final order of removal.

DHS identified the woman as Yorlenys Betzabeth Zambrano-Contreras, also allegedly associated with Tren de Aragua. She entered the U.S. in 2023 and was released during the Biden administration. She “played an active role in the Tren de Aragua prostitution ring,” DHS said, and was involved in a prior Portland shooting.

Local police said Thursday they responded to a call for help from Nico Moncada — unidentified at the time — and treated both his and Zambrano-Contreras’ gunshot wounds.

The shooting came two days after a woman died while evading arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Minneapolis.

Portland City Council President Elana Pirtle-Guiney said Thursday afternoon that both individuals were alive to her knowledge, while Mayor Keith Wilson called for a halt to federal operations in the city, according to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

AUTHOR

Derek VanBuskirk

Reporter

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

The Insurrection Act Could Be Invoked Tomorrow

Minnesota is calling for  open revolt with corrupt Governor Tim Walz threatening to use the Minnesota Guard against federal officers.

We are a nation of laws—and the Democrat Party of treason intends to blow that foundation apart. Minnesota is now teetering on the edge of open revolt, with a corrupt governor threatening to deploy the Minnesota National Guard against federal officers.

Fort Sumter wasn’t just the first battle of the Civil War—it was the moment a state decided federal authority no longer applied, and backed that claim with force. The point wasn’t the fort itself; it was the precedent: if Washington can’t enforce federal law on federal property, the Union is no longer a union.

That’s why the comparison fits here. When a governor talks about being “at war” with the federal government and floats deploying the National Guard in response to federal officers enforcing federal law, it echoes the same escalatory logic: state power openly challenging federal supremacy, daring the federal government to either retreat or respond. Fort Sumter was the spark because it turned political defiance into physical confrontation. This kind of rhetoric—and any move to interpose state force against federal enforcement—risks the same dangerous slide from agitation to outright conflict.

Tim Walz has effectively declared Minnesota to be at war with the federal government.

As Newt Gingrich put it: Is Governor Tim Walz insane? When a governor tells the president and the secretary of Homeland Security, “You’ve done enough,” and announces preparations to deploy state troops against federal authority, sanity itself must be questioned. History is unambiguous. Andrew Jackson threatened to crush South Carolina for defying federal law. Lincoln fought a four-year Civil War to preserve the Union. Eisenhower sent troops into Arkansas; Kennedy did the same in Mississippi and Alabama—to enforce federal law against defiant states.

What does Walz think he is doing—or is thinking too generous a word? This is not protest. This is nullification. This is defiance of federal authority. And it is beginning to sound dangerously familiar—like Fort Sumter all over again.

Gingrich: Is Governor Tim Walz insane? When a Governor says ““We do not need any further help from the federal government,” the governor declared. “To Donald Trump and Kristi Noem, you’ve done enough. I’ve issued a warning order to prepare the Minnesota National Guard. We have soldiers in training who are prepared to be deployed if necessary.” You have to question their sanity. Andrew Jackson threatened to crush South Carolina when it opposed federal law. Lincoln fought a four year civil war to force states to accept federal rules. Eisenhower sent troops into Arkansas and Kennedy into Mississippi and Alabama. What is Walz thinking or is thinking too strong a word for his behavior?

AUTHOR

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

VIDEO: American Communist Party Chair Threatens Extreme Violence if ‘Venezuela Capitulates to the U.S.’

For decades, the hard left has been working alongside Islamic supremacists to destroy America and other Western countries from within. They came close to achieving full victory during the Barack Obama and Joe Biden years. Obama served as a vehicle for the Muslim Brotherhood‘s rise in America, while Biden flung open the southern border to create the kind of chaos necessary for a communist societal takeover.

David Horowitz warned about the left for a long time. Among some of his books were Take No Prisoners: The Battle Plan for Defeating the Left (2014); Dark Agenda: The War to Destroy Christian America (2019); and The Radical Mind: The Destructive Plans of the Woke Left (2023).

And now comes the tacit (if you can call it that) threat for trained Venezuelan militants to execute violence against Americans, such as kidnappings and the like.

“American Communist Party (ACP) International Chairman Chris Helali In Interview With Jackson Hinkle: If Venezuela Capitulates To The U.S., Thousands Of Trained Militants Will Resist U.S. Forces; Americans Will Be Targeted In Kidnappings By People Resisting U.S. Imperialism,” MEMRI, January 7, 2026:

Christopher Helali, international secretary of the American Communist Party (ACP), said on a January 4, 2026 episode of Moscow-based American political commentator Jackson Hinkle’s Legitimate Targets podcast that if Venezuela capitulates to the United States or if privatization takes place, armed factions will mount resistance at all levels. He said that this includes the ELN, former FARC rebels, and thousands of other militants who have trained with the PFLP, Abu Nidal, the Libyans, and the Soviet Union. Helali elaborated that the political cost for the Trump administration and future administrations could be high if the current course in Venezuela continues, saying that American “body bags” would start coming home. He added that Venezuelans and Americans would be targeted in kidnappings and other actions by those resisting U.S. imperialism.

Christopher Helali was elected High Bailiff of Orange County, Vermont, winning the race as a write-in candidate. He received 2.5% of the vote. Between February 13 and February 23, 2025, Helali traveled with fellow ACP founder Jackson Hinkle and Russian-American Haz Al-Din to Beirut, where they visited the assassination site of Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, followed by his funeral on February 22. A week earlier, on February 14, Helali and Hinkle were in Qatar, where they interviewed two senior leaders of Hamas, Basem Naim and Osama Hamdan.

During a May 17, 2025 interview with Iran’s Press TV, conducted in Moscow, Helali noted that he had just returned from Sana’a, Yemen, where he attended the “Palestine: The Central Issue of the Nation” conference alongside Hinkle and Haz Al-Din. Helali spoke at the opening session of the conference, organized by the Iran-backed Designated terror organization Ansar Allah, a.k.a. the Houthis. In an X post on April 2, 2025, Helali said that he was questioned by authorities upon returning to the U.S. from Yemen…

Note how interviewer Jackson Hinkle goads on Helali. Hinkle, of course, is the infamously dishonest co-founder of the American Communist party and open supporter of Hamas, Hizballah, the Houthis, and all the jihadis arrayed against Israel.

Of course, it would be up to a court to prove intent, but Helali’s graphic incitement is at least apparent, given the current climate. Federal authorities should investigate Hinkle and Helali to determine their level of  collaboration with foreign entities, and whether proof can be established for incitement. Note:

The First Amendment does not protect speech that incites imminent violence or lawlessness.

Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447 (1969)….

o It is is felony under federal law to communicate a threat to injure or kidnap another person online, by phone or mail, or using other interstate channels. 18 U.S.C. § 875(c).

Helali holds a residence in Vermont, but lives in Moscow, where this maniac says he feels “safer” and actually references Charlie Kirk (whom communists despised) in saying that “he feels safer there than he does in the United States, a sentiment he says has been reinforced by recent events, including the assassination of right-wing activist and media personality Charlie Kirk.” He adds:

I think the recent killing of Charlie Kirk points to the level of political violence and decay and the, you know, the fragmentation in American society.

And we can all thank leftists, Marxists, and all communists for that “fragmentation,” which can also be attributed to their alliance with Islamic supremacists in the great battle to subvert America. Danger is now lurking everywhere in America. Two things the red-green-axis holds in common are the employment of deceit and violence as tools.

AUTHOR

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

PODCAST: Maduro’s trusted lieutenant now works for Trump?

Many of those who tuned in to U.S. President Donald Trump’s news conference on Saturday were probably hoping to hear dramatic details of how U.S. forces seized Venezuela’s leader, Nicolás Maduro, in a pre-dawn raid.

But arguably a more surprising moment came when Trump announced that now that Maduro was in custody, the U.S. would “run” Venezuela “until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition”.

In another unexpected development, he added that Secretary of State Marco Rubio had been speaking to Maduro’s Vice-President Delcy Rodríguez who he said was “essentially willing to do what we think is necessary to make Venezuela great again”.

However, Rodríguez seemed less than co-operative in her own news conference later where she denounced Maduro’s detention as a kidnapping and stressed that Venezuela would not become a colony.

©2026 . All rights reserved.

Nine Reasons Why Trump’s Venezuela Operation Is Great for America

The brilliantly executed US operation to snatch Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro benefits American citizens in many different ways.

  1. It took out the head of a major international organized crime cartel. The cartel, which the US has labeled the “Cartel de los Soles,” or Cartel of the Suns, is responsible for cocaine trafficking into the United States. Maduro had turned the upper levels of the Venezuelan government, military, and security services into a huge organized crime entity. The Department of Justice is prosecuting Maduro and others for running what a federal grand jury indictment calls “a corrupt and violent narco-terrorism conspiracy.” While no evidence indicates that Maduro’s cartel directly trafficked fentanyl into the U.S., the Treasury Department sanctioned the Cartel of the Suns last July for providing material support to the Sinaloa cartel of Mexico, which the DOJ described as “flooding the United States with fentanyl.”
  2. It took out the leader who flooded the United States with hardened criminals, organized terrorist gangs like Tren de Aragua, and millions of refugees. Once a new leadership is established in Venezuela, the country can take back its criminals and terrorists, and its refugees can return home and rebuild.
  3. It took out the leader of an international terrorist organization. Maduro’s Cartel of the Suns is a federally designated foreign terrorist organization, or FTO, which the State Department said is “responsible for terrorist violence throughout our hemisphere.”
  4. It took out the sponsor of Hezbollah and other jihadists on our southern maritime border. For more than a decade, the Maduro regime has hosted, sheltered, armed, and provided training for Hezbollah terrorists and other jihadists under its protection, just a three-hour flight from Florida. Hezbollah is responsible for killing hundreds of Americans since the 1980s.
  5. It took out the sponsor of Iranian surveillance and kamikaze drones on our southern maritime border. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), responsible for supporting Hezbollah and other terrorists, outsourced its drone production to Venezuela, where the weapons were seen stationed at a Venezuelan air base.
  6. It took out a major supply of cash to the Iranian force responsible for killing hundreds of Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan. Maduro ran a scheme with Iran to exchange fuel and gold to fund the IRGC and its terrorist Qods Force. The IRGC and its Qods Force designed, developed, manufactured, and deployed key improvised explosive device (IED) components, as well as training, to wound and kill hundreds of American and allied men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan. These components included explosively formed penetrators (EFP), improvised rocket-assisted munitions (IRAM), and other devices. The IRGC/Qods Force, which also provided training, was responsible for 17 percent of American casualties in Iraq, according to the State Department and Pentagon.
  7. It deprived Communist China of plans to deploy its navy around Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and the Panama Canal. China is rapidly expanding its navy to become a global force. Maduro provided China with a reliable partner in the Caribbean. Late in 2025, China conducted war games simulating a battle against the United States in the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico. Removing Maduro has now deprived Beijing of the promise of a naval basing partner on our southern maritime border.
  8. It restored and modernized our 200-year-old Monroe Doctrine. Since 1823, the Monroe Doctrine—implemented by our last Founding Father president, James Monroe—kept foreign empires from exerting their presence in the Americas. President Obama renounced the Monroe Doctrine, opening the door for China to build a beachhead in our hemisphere. President Trump added a Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, which would push back against China’s gains, reasserting a free hemisphere through skillful statecraft and minimal use of force.
  9. The operation was not a war. It did not attempt to destroy the Venezuelan military, its command and control, or the regime’s power structures. As Senator Mike Lee reported from his January 3 conversation with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the military “was deployed to protect and defend those executing the arrest warrant.” It was over in an hour.

AUTHOR

J. Michael Waller

J. Michael Waller is Director of Strategy at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC, and author of Big Intel: How the CIA and FBI Went from Cold War Heroes to Deep State Villains (Regnery, 2024). Follow him on X @JMichaelWaller.

RELATED ARTICLE: Real Clue Behind The Maduro Capture Might Lie In Trump’s Flashy Past

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

Manuel Noriega: The Precedent for Maduro’s Capture

The Trump administration’s sudden capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro caught many Americans by surprise, giving Democrats a leg up in the subsequent messaging war. Democratic leaders in Congress asserted that the operation was executive overreach, an act of war, and the beginning of another foolish attempt at nation-building. In a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted on Sunday and Monday, only 11% of Democrats, 23% of Independents, and 65% of Republicans approved of the overseas military operation.

But this lack of support is likely due in large part to Americans’ unfamiliarity with such a display of total military dominance — something rarely implemented in this century. Its execution left many Americans wondering: what was the justification? Are there any precedents? Does the Constitution allow this? And, perhaps most of all, are we now at war with Venezuela?

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio answered the first and last questions during a Sunday interview on NBC. “This was, at essence, at its core, a law enforcement function,” he stated. “There’s not a war. I mean, we are at war against drug trafficking organizations and not at war against Venezuela. We are enforcing American laws.”

The Trump administration contends that they arrested Maduro on the basis of an outstanding warrant, issued by a U.S. federal court. Based on reports from his Monday court appearance, “it sounds like a criminal enterprise: they were working with the cartels, running drugs, weapons,” assessed Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on “Washington Watch.” “He was using the country as a launching pad for criminal activity that was affecting the United States.”

This criminal indictment for drug trafficking establishes a connection to a precedent. In 1989, President George H.W. Bush authorized a military invasion of Panama to capture General Manuel Noriega, the country’s de facto leader, for his connection to the Medellin cartel.

“This is exactly the same scenario,” argued retired Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin, an original member of the U.S. Army Delta Force that helped capture Noriega, and now executive vice president of FRC. “You had a guy that was pushing drugs into America, and nobody had done anything to try and stop him. … Those people are killing Americans. And our president’s first duty to the people is to protect the nation.”

“What prompted George H.W. Bush to finally pull the trigger on that,” Boykin explained, “was that Noriega’s thugs down there killed an American naval officer and, and in some ways brutalized his wife.” Maduro had not taken so bold a step, but his regime had detained at least five Americans in recent months.

The circumstances for the two episodes are not identical. For one thing, “the U.S. already had a military in Panama. We were still controlling the Panama Canal at the time,” listed Richard Gregorie, a DOJ veteran of four decades who indicted Noriega and also investigated corruption inside the Maduro regime, on “Washington Watch.”

“Secondly,” Gregorie continued, “Noriega was the military head in Panama … he was never made the head of the government. The U.S. did not recognize him as the head of state.” Whether Maduro is considered the head of state for Venezuela is a relevant legal question because active heads of state are immune from prosecution for actions taken in the course of their official duties.

However, that second distinction may not actually be a difference, as the Trump administration contends that the U.S. did not recognize Maduro as the legitimate head of state for Venezuela. “Determining who is the head of state is a diplomatic question, which is handled by the executive branch of government and not the legislative branch of government,” said Gregorie. “So, technically, when our secretary of state and our president say you are not a head of state … then Mr. Maduro was not a head of state and not entitled to head of state immunity.”

The un-recognition of Maduro is not some squirrely move made by the Trump administration to evade their legal obligations, as some might choose to argue. Rather, it is consistent with the policy pursued by the Biden administration, after the opposition collected conclusive evidence that Maduro had himself fraudulently declared the winner of the 2024 election.

Ten days before President Trump re-assumed the office of president, Biden administration Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote:

“Today, Nicolás Maduro held an illegitimate presidential inauguration in Venezuela in a desperate attempt to seize power. The Venezuelan people and world know the truth — Maduro clearly lost the 2024 presidential election and has no right to claim the presidency. The United States rejects the National Electoral Council’s fraudulent announcement that Maduro won the presidential election and does not recognize Nicolás Maduro as the president of Venezuela. President-elect Edmundo González Urrutia should be sworn in, and the democratic transition should begin.”

Blinken also announced that the Biden administration was raising the bounty on Maduro to a sizable $25 million, while imposing additional “visa restrictions on Maduro-aligned individuals for their roles in undermining the electoral process.”

The other main question Americans want answered is whether Maduro’s capture was constitutional. Since the U.S. Constitution invests the power to declare war in the Congress, and Congress has not authorized a war against Venezuela, the question remains whether the Maduro raid constituted an act of war.

“If we’re going to declare war or take some serious military action, Congress should be informed and there should be some congressional action taken,” Gregorie contended. He did not hazard an answer to that important question. Instead, he predicted, “This is a question that will start with the district court in New York and will work its way up, I’m sure, all the way to the Supreme Court.”

Notably, the lack of constitutional authorization is another parallel Maduro’s capture shares with Noriega’s capture. The 1989 Panama invasion lacked congressional authority, too. That did not stop the U.S. judicial system from convicting Noriega, who served a 20-year prison sentence before being extradited to France.

What is true is that hours-long Maduro raid presents a favorable contrast with America’s pursuit of Noriega. Even with twice the military presence, it took the U.S. weeks to capture Noriega, after a military campaign in which 23 American soldiers were killed, besides 500 Panamanians. In the Maduro raid, the U.S. did not suffer a single fatality; the only reported deaths were those of Maduro’s bodyguard, largely comprised of Cuban mercenaries.

While American courts sort out the legal issues at play, that display of power sends a message sure to chill any dictator’s spine.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Real Clue Behind The Maduro Capture Might Lie In Trump’s Flashy Past

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2026 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

ROOKE: It Only Took A Couple Weeks For Dark Skies To Clear Up For GOP’s Future

The Republican Party has faced ongoing challenges in 2025, including economic pressures, immigration concerns, and criticism over inaction in Washington. Yet, under President Donald Trump’s leadership in early 2026, a renewed sense of optimism is emerging within the GOP.

New year, new party? Not exactly. While core issues like stagnant economy, border security, and bureaucratic gridlock persist, Trump’s decisive actions are creating momentum for progress and demonstrating the impact of strong leadership.

Take Venezuela as a prime example. U.S. forces conducted a successful operation, capturing former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife and bringing them to the United States to face longstanding drug trafficking and narco-terrorism charges. This bold move removed a hostile regime, enhancing American national security by disrupting alliances with adversaries like Iran, Russia, and China, as well as narco-trafficking networks.

Economically, Trump’s move will deliver immediate gains. Venezuelan officials have agreed to supply the U.S. with 30 to 50 million barrels of oil at market prices, stabilizing energy markets, reducing dependence on unreliable sources, and helping lower gas prices for Americans. The intervention showcases a president who is decisively committed to protecting U.S. interests.

Building on this momentum, Trump’s tariff policies are positioned to yield tangible benefits in 2026 as companies ramp up reshoring efforts to navigate the trade environment. While they appeared to be a drain on the American economy in 2025, these tariffs encourage domestic production, reversing years of offshoring that cost American jobs. Apple expanded U.S. facilities for products like iPads and Watches. Nvidia initiated major investments in chip manufacturing in Arizona and Texas. Intel and TSMC accelerated semiconductor plants in Ohio and Arizona. General Electric increased its domestic operations. Whirlpool announced expansions for domestic appliance production.

These initiatives are driving a revival in American industry, generating higher-wage jobs, more resilient supply chains, and greater energy independence. As facilities become operational in 2026, communities in manufacturing centers will see real economic gains, reinforcing support for the GOP’s America First approach.

Further bolstering this trajectory is Trump’s firm response to fraud scandals, especially those involving Somali-operated programs in Minnesota, where billions in taxpayer funds were allegedly diverted in childcare and welfare schemes. The administration has deployed approximately 2,000 federal agents to Minneapolis, frozen suspicious funding, and launched comprehensive investigations to uphold accountability. The focus on enforcing the law protects public resources for American citizens.

For Republicans, the Somali fraud scandal in Minnesota serves as a powerful unifying issue, galvanizing the party around a shared agenda to overhaul immigration policies, reform entitlement programs, and strengthen oversight mechanisms — all while reinforcing core commitments to fiscal responsibility and border security. The allegations involve billions in misused federal funds through childcare and welfare schemes, with the Justice Department charging 98 individuals, most of Somali origin, in what has been described as one of the largest fraud operations in U.S. history.

It allows the perfect opportunity for GOP leaders to highlight how Democrats promoted lax immigration enforcement and inadequate vetting that have enabled such abuses. Republicans should propose reforms like blocking immigrants from accessing benefits, mandatory audits for high-risk programs, and stricter penalties for those who exploit our systems.

By framing the scandal as a symptom of broader systemic failures under prior administrations, Republicans can rally their base, attract independents frustrated with waste, and build momentum for comprehensive reforms that protect American resources and sovereignty. 

Republicans’ main goal for the rest of 2026 is not to waste this opportunity. Maximize domestic efforts to revitalize the economy and address fraud, waste, and abuse of American taxpayer dollars. Use the wins to highlight the successes in messaging and campaigns, pursue legislation to solidify them, and engage grassroots supporters. Trump has once again set the stage for them to win. All the GOP has to do is not screw it up.

AUTHOR

Mary Rooke

Commentary and Analysis Writer. Follow Mary Rooke on X: @MaryRooke. Sign up for Mary Rooke’s weekly newsletter here!

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

JD Vance Breaks Down The Latest On The Trump Administration’s Crackdown On Left-Wing Violence

Vice President JD Vance told Salem Radio Network host Scott Jennings on Tuesday that the Trump administration was looking into the “entire network” of organizations that support left-wing violence.

President Donald Trump declared Antifa a domestic terrorist organization in a Sept. 17 post on Truth Social, a week after Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk was assassinated during an event at Utah Valley University. Vance told Jennings that the administration would not just stop at those who threw bricks at United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents or who attacked conservatives.

“It’s not just the people who commit the violence, Scott, I mean, look for every person who throws a brick at an ice agent or takes a shot at a conservative commentator, there’s an entire network behind it,” Vance told Jennings. “Who brought the brick? Who paid for it? Who are the networks, the violence that actually support this stuff, that ferment this stuff? How do people get radicalized, if not for the really crazy rhetoric we see coming from some corners of the far left?”

WATCH: JD Vance Breaks Down The Latest On The Trump Administration’s Crackdown On Left-Wing Violence

“You know, Scott, even after Charlie was shot there were people who are celebrating, who said that he deserved it,” Vance continued. “All of that is part of a network of left-wing violence. It’s not just the person who pulls the trigger, it’s all the people who support them and make it possible for them to get radicalized in the first place.”

During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump survived two attempts on his life  one during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, the other while he was playing a round of golf in Florida. Ryan Wesley Routh, who was charged with the September 15 attempted assassination, declared his intent for Trump’s death in a letter, according to legal filings.

“We have a very aggressive task force right now to try to root out this left-wing political violence, try to find out who’s funding some of this crazy stuff, try to find out who’s buying the bricks that these people are throwing at ICE agents and I think that’s going to bear some real fruit,” Vance said. “Obviously, that stuff takes time, but I do think the American people should expect that their government is going to respond to this stuff.”

ICE facilities in Chicago and Portland, Oregon, have been the site of several riots as resistance to the agency’s efforts targeting undocumented immigrants has increased during President Donald Trump’s second term. During one ICE operation in Chicago, agents were assaulted by multiple attackers who used vehicles to ram cars used by the agency.

Before those events, the Department of Homeland Security stated in a Sept. 26 post on X that there had been several violent assaults on an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois. In Portland, Oregon, left-wing rioters have allegedly attacked conservative reporters covering the unrest and intended to use lasers against aircraft operated by federal law enforcement agencies.

Two individuals were killed during a shooting at an ICE office in Dallas on Sept. 24, with the shooter taking his own life. In Texas, there were at least two earlier cases where gunfire was aimed at ICE or Border Patrol locations in July, with ten people being charged in connection with the event in Alvarado, Texas.

ICE agents have also been shot at while carrying out enforcement operations in Illinois and California.

AUTHOR

Harold Hutchison

Media Reporter

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RELATED VIDEO: Kristi Noem has a message for Gavin Newsom…

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


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Democratic Socialists Demand Maduro Be Freed and Put Back in Power

Zohran Mamdani is the new mayor of New York, but in his first few days in office he appeared to be spending most of his time on foreign policy, that is, he has rejected the IHRA’s broad definition of antisemitism, in particular in relation to the unhinged criticism of Israel. He has come out foursquare for narco-trafficker, Hezbollah supporter, and killer Nicolás Maduro, demanding — demanding! — that he be freed and sent back to Venezuela to continue his ruinous rule. And the Democratic Socialists, of which Mamdani is one, have made the same demand of the administration. They are, you see, “Bolivarian Revolutionaries.” It’s an exciting time to be a communist in New York. “Mayor Mamdani’s comrades in DSA demand Trump release Nicolas Maduro: ‘Solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution!,’” by Carl Campanile, New York Post, January 4, 2026:

Socialists of a feather flock together.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s comrades in the Democratic Socialists of America want deposed Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro returned to power.

The Democratic Socialists of America put out a lengthy statement demanding “the return of President Nicolas Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores to Venezuela.”

Meanwhile, the DSA is starting a “join our “Hands Off Venezuela” to get the “imperialist” United States out of the socialist, oil-rich country.

“Solidarity with the people of Venezuela! Solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution!”, separate DSA International Committee policy statement says.

In its statement on the removal of Maduro, the DSA claims the Trump administration has started “an illegal war” against Venezuela….

The DSA apparently wasn’t listening when Trump explained that the Americans would be investing billions in order to resurrect Venezuela’s oil production, providing the expertise needed to deal with the problems that lifting the heavy oil that Venezuela produces present, and then the country with the largest oil reserves in the world would be put back on the path of massive production, up to 3 million more barrels a day, which would bring in hundreds of millions of dollars annually. The whole point of the post-Maduro scenario is to bring back Venezuela’s ability to create its own wealth. How would such a plan “impoverish the people of Latin America”? DSA doesn’t say, because they can’t.

The DSA has not been paying attention to the Venezuelan demonstrators in their country and around the world, who have been expressing their delight that Maduro, the longtime tormentor of Venezuelans, who has allowed drug traffickers and Hezbollah terrorists free reign in his country, has now been deposed. The DSA upper-middle-class gringos know better: though he lost the last election and held onto power anyway, they insist that Maduro must now be put back in power. The Democratic Socialists must support any man President Trump opposes, for that very reason.

The call for all American forces to leave the Caribbean overlooks the aid those troops provide when natural disasters strike. The American military provides humanitarian aid — food, and medical aid of all types, but does so especially after major disasters such as the earthquake in Haiti that caused 250,000 deaths in 2010. It provides free health checks, dental care, and surgery for particularly difficult cases.

“This is a nakedly imperialist war to install a US puppet government that will give Venezuela’s oil resources over to US corporations and to force US hegemony over Latin America — the new `Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. This war is illegal both under international law and the laws governing the declaration of war within the United States,” the left-wing group’s statement says.

“Trump’s war has nothing to do with drug trafficking. There is no substantiated evidence that high-level members of the Venezuelan government are `narco-terrorists.’ Yet, the Trump administration is using this claim as the pretext for this illegal war.”

None of this is true. For years, the Americans have been complaining to Caracas about the narco-traffickers who are operating from Venezuela. They have followed their routes. They know where the drugs are manufactured. And furthermore, they know the Hezbollah operatives in Venezuela who are involved in the drug trade. The DSA is simply making things up.

DSA likened the US military’s action to the “failed” war against Iraq, claiming it will only “impoverish the people of Latin America.”

The situation in Venezuela is nothing like the war in Iraq. The Americans have no intention of remaking the entire country, as Washington naively thought it could do in Iraq, because it failed to understand Islam, or what minds on Islam are like. The Americans in Iraq moved in hundreds of thousands of troops, spend more than two trillion dollars, and remained for nine years. In. Venezuela there be a handful of troops in the country for possibly a few months. A few billions will be spent at first by the US to resurrect the country’s oil industry, after which Venezuela will be self-sustaining and able to pay back the Americans for their initial help.The Venezuelans are “impoverished” now, thanks to Chavez and Maduro. Now they will have a chance, through greatly increased oil sales, to return to the prosperity they enjoyed before Chaven took power.

Here are those DSA demands, each sillier than the next:

  • A return of Maduro to Venezuela and restoration of diplomatic relations with the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela — the Maduro-led regime
  • An immediate end to “military violence” against Venezuela and a total withdrawal of all US forces and operations from the Caribbean
  • Ending sanctions against Venezuela and suspending the failed “war on drugs”
  • A US foreign policy centered on peace, multilateralism, and respect for national sovereignty and self-determination

Not one of these preposterous demands will be met. Maduro will not be returned to his role as dictator of Venezuela; his life of crime is over, and he will now be put on trial, with as much due process as anyone could want.

The call for the American military to pull out of the Caribbean would be violently opposed by the peoples of the Caribbean, who rely on the American military in times of natural disasters, to bring in food and humanitarian aid, and to build and staff field hospitals, a they did after the massive earthquake struck Haiti in 2010, killing 250,000 people. The American military also provides medical assistance — surgeries, dental treatments, inoculations — in normal times, to the people living in the Caribbean, who would be loath to lose it. The Democratic Socialists are salon Bolsheviks, who do not know what the poor need, and would rather have them do without if that would lead to their cutting ties with the “colonialist” and” imperialistic” Americans. .

When the DSA calls for “respect for national sovereignty and self-determination,” do they expect us to believe that Venezuelans were enjoying “self-determination” when election after election was stolen from them, and they had no way to throw off the Chávez-Maduro yoke on their own; it required the Americans to do it for them, and then to arrange for a very temporary caretaker government to be followed by elections in what would then have become a real democracy? If they hate imperialistic capitalistic colonialist America so much, no one’s forcing them to stay. I hear Pyongyang is beautiful at this time of year.

AUTHOR

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

The Global Left’s Romance with Violence and Tyranny

The red-green alliance is the greatest threat to human survival. 

The global left is not a political movement; it is a parasitic organism that feeds on the foundations of sovereign nations.

For decades, it has operated as the primary architect of chaos, hiding behind the veneers of “human rights” and “social justice” while systematically empowering the most regressive forces on the planet.

From the destruction of Imperial Iran to the current subversion of the United States, the left’s objective remains constant: the eradication of excellence, nobility, and national identity.

To understand the left’s methodology, one must look at the 1979 catastrophe in Iran.

The global left, in a fit of ideological hysteria, abandoned a modernizing, secular, and noble monarchy to facilitate the rise of a medieval theocracy. They traded the Pahlavi nobility — a symbol of Iranian dignity and rapid advancement —- for the charlatanism of Ruhollah Khomeini.

The left-wing media and intellectual apparatus did not just report on the revolution; they curated it. They took a parasitic cleric and packaged him as a “saintly” figure to the Western world.

In doing so, they deliberately suppressed the legacy of figures like Gen. Nader Jahanbani, the “Blue Eyed General,” who represented the pinnacle of Iranian honor and military brilliance. By helping the Islamists execute the elite of the Iranian military and aristocracy, the global left ensured that Iran would be transformed from a regional powerhouse into a hub for global terror.

The left’s hatred for Iranian history and  dignity continues today through their selection of “symbols.” They ignore the true underground resistance that seeks a return to nationalistic roots and instead elevate “activists” like Narges Mohammadi and a cultist, Islamist-Marxist MEK leader, Maryam Rajavi.

These figures are hand-picked by the global leftist establishment because they do not threaten the status quo but merely act as a safety valve, ensuring that the discourse remains trapped within the left’s approved framework of “reform” rather than total liberation and the restoration of Iranian pride.

This is a recurring theme: the left mocks the proud history of the Great Civilization and replaces it with a curated gallery of victims and “reformers” who are, in reality, extensions of the same ideological rot. They want an Iran that is weak, perpetually “reforming,” and stripped of its Imperial grandeur.

The same machinery that dismantled Iran is currently deployed against the United States and Europe. The global left has moved from the “Red Terror” of the 20th century to a more insidious form of institutional terrorism. By capturing the education systems, the media, and the bureaucracy, they are executing a slow-motion demolition of Western civilization.

  • The Erasure of Borders: Just as they sought to weaken Iran’s sovereignty, they now demand the total dissolution of Western borders, inviting chaos to dilute national identity.
  • The War on Merit: The left’s obsession with equity is a direct assault on the concept of the “Nobility of Spirit.” They seek to replace the high-achiever – the Jahanbanis of the world – with the mediocre and the parasitic.
  • The Funding of Proxies: Through back-channel diplomacy and the loosening of sanctions, the left-wing establishment in the West has effectively funded the very terror networks that threaten global security. The billions of dollars funneled back to Tehran under various “deals” are the lifeblood of global instability.

We are no longer in a phase of political disagreement; we are in a state of existential war. The left’s alliance with Islamists — often called the Red-Green Alliance — is the greatest threat to human survival. By destabilizing the Middle East and weakening the West from within, the left is creating a vacuum that can only be filled by ultimate escalation.

Once a cornerstone of American political life, the Democrat party has transformed into something unrecognizable — a force that now threatens the fabric of the nation.

If the left is not confronted and eradicated from the halls of power, the trajectory is clear: a nuclear-armed theocracy in Iran, emboldened by a hollowed-out West, will eventually trigger a global conflagration. The left’s “diplomacy” is nothing more than a stay of execution while they help the enemies of civilization sharpen their blades.

The solution does not lie in “centrism” or polite debate. You cannot debate a movement that seeks your total humiliation. The path forward requires:

  1. The Restoration of National Identity: Embracing the symbols of nobility and strength, such as the Pahlavi legacy, to counter the left’s cult of victimhood.
  2. The Dismantling of the Leftist Bureaucracy: Removing the ideological parasites from the institutions of power in both the East and the West.
  3. Absolute Zero Tolerance for Terror: Ending the cycle of appeasement that has defined Western foreign policy for decades.

The global left is the true face of modern terror. It provides the intellectual cover, the funding, and the moral justification for the destruction of nations. To save the future, the left must be treated not as a political opponent, but as the existential threat to civilization itself.

©2026 . All rights reserved.

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