Jeffrey Epstein’s most prominent victim, Virginia Giuffre, died by suicide on Thursday according to her family – weeks after she said she had ‘days to live’ and was in renal failure following a collision with a bus.

The 41-year-old died in Neergabby, Australia, where she had been living for several years.

“It is with utterly broken hearts that we announce that Virginia passed away last night at her farm in Western Australia,” he family said in a statement to NBC News. “She lost her life to suicide, after being a lifelong victim of sexual abuse and sex trafficking.“

“Virginia was a fierce warrior in the fight against sexual abuse and sex trafficking. She was the light that lifted so many survivors,” the statement continues. “In the end, the toll of abuse is so heavy that it became unbearable for Virginia to handle its weight.”

Giuffre was one of the earliest Epstein abuse survivors to come out publicly and call for criminal charges against the convicted pedophile, who himself died while in custody awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges – while cameras were mysteriously malfunctioning and guards had ‘fallen asleep.’

Six years ago, Giuffre proclaimed “I am making it publicy known that in no way, shape or form am I sucidal,” adding “If something happens to me- in the sake of my family do not let this go away and help me to protect them.”

I am making it publicy known that in no way, shape or form am I sucidal. I have made this known to my therapist and GP- If something happens to me- in the sake of my family do not let this go away and help me to protect them. Too many evil people want to see me quiteted 🦋 https://t.co/8463mPR6YU

— Virginia Giuffre (@VRSVirginia) December 11, 2019

Raised in Florida, Giuffre said she was sexually abused by a family friend, and was eventually groomed by Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell. Giuffre was abused by Epstein and pals between 1999 and 2002, when she was trafficked to Epstein’s powerful friends, including Prince Andrew and French modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel. 

Giuffre took legal action against Epstein in 2015, claiming that she was sex trafficked at the age of 16 at various locations – including Epstein’s Little St. James island (aka Pedo Island), his New Mexico compound, and Maxwell’s home in London, where a notorious photo of her was taken with Prince Andrew – which the Andrew and supporters claim was fabricated.

Maxwell – a former British socialite whose father was a suspected agent for Mossad, was found guilty on five counts of sex trafficking in 2021 for her role in recruiting girls to be abused by Epstein and his network.

Giuffre isn’t the first deceased Epstein victim:

REPORT: Epstein Victim Who Testified Against Ghislaine Maxwell Found Dead..

MEDIA SILENT..

Carolyn Andriano, a key witness in the case against Jeffrey Epstein’s associate Ghislaine Maxwell, has passed away.

Her death occurred earlier this year, and it WAS NOT marked by an… pic.twitter.com/5u22velaPC

— Chuck Callesto (@ChuckCallesto) November 21, 2023

Giuffre sued Prince Andrew in 2021, alleging that he sexually abused her when she was 17. Andrew agreed to settle the case for an undisclosed amount in 2022, and denied all allegations.

Brunel, meanwhile, was charged with sexual harassment and rape of a minor in December of 2020. He ‘died by suicide’ in his jail cell in February 2022 – months after Giuffre appeared in court to advocate for Brunel’s victims.

“I wanted Brunel to know that he no longer has the power over me,” Giuffre said, adding “that I am a grown woman now and I’ve decided to hold him accountable for what he did to me and so many others.”

Giuffre moved to Australia with her husband before Epstein’s 2019 arrest. The couple has three children.

Her brother, Danny Wilson, told NBC News she “pushed so hard to snuff the evil out” of the world.

“Her biggest push was, ‘If I don’t do this, nobody’s going to do it,‘” he said, regarding her advocacy. “She was in real physical pain — suffered from renal failure. But I think that the mental pain was worse.” -NBC News

And for Epstein’s network of abusers who are still running around uncharged, another loose end has been tied up.

*  *  *

Psst! – click here for a sneak peek at new offerings at ZeroHedge Store ahead of our official announcement…

The Trump Administration’s efforts to finally put controls on the illegal immigration crisis made a substantial impact, but many conservatives feel the process is still not moving fast enough.  ICE has arrested and deported an estimated 100,000 -150,000 illegals in the past four months.  This is a far cry from the President’s call for 1 million deportations in 2025. 

The true success story has been the southern border – Illegal crossing have plummeted 95% since 2024 and many migrants have chosen to self deport rather than be arrested.  Border encounters are currently at 8000 per month, which Border Patrol officials say is the lowest number since records began in the year 2000 and might be the lowest since 1968.

The true scale of self-deportations, however, is not clear.  This leaves an estimated 17 million illegals still in the US (probably more given Biden’s border blitzkrieg since 2021).  A vast majority of these people reside in Democrat run sanctuary states and sanctuary cities where welfare programs are plentiful and protection from federal authorities is assumed.  Without state and federal coordination the ability of the White House to achieve 1 million deportations per year is limited.  

That said, rumors are swirling that Elon Musk and DOGE are building a “Master Database” to track and remove migrants from the country using correlated data obtained from multiple agencies from the IRS to the Health Department to Social Security and beyond.  CNN recently claimed they have multiple sources familiar with the plans, though these sources are not named.    

“If they are designing a deportation machine, they will be able to do that,” a former senior IRS employee with knowledge of the plans told CNN.

The database would also make it easier for the Trump Administration to block illegals from access to public housing and other public programs, which would take away incentives and compel migrants to exit the country.

The idea of data tracking for illegals seems to have a number of Democrats worried.  Democratic lawmakers have slammed the plan, claiming DOGE is “rapidly, haphazardly, and unlawfully” exploiting Americans’ personal data.  But the concept of mass tracking of citizens (rather than illegal migrants) didn’t bother Democrats during the pandemic scare.  They fought for years to create a database to track the vaccination status of all Americans.  Why are they suddenly bothered by the notion of a database to track people that are in the country illegally?

It’s obvious that the open border policies of the Biden Administration were at least partially intended to secure a voting majority in the near future; expanding the Democrat base by paying off illegal migrants with government subsidies and eventual amnesty.  A number of blue cities and counties have tried to institute voting rights for illegal residents, despite the fact that the media calls immigrant voting a “conspiracy theory”.  By extension, the mere presence of millions of illegals in blue states adds to their census numbers, which then translates to more seats in Congress.  

Remove the illegals efficiently and in large enough numbers and the Democratic Party loses leverage in the House.  Is this the reason why activist judges have been obstructing DOGE access to agency data at nearly every turn?  

One could make a case for a “slippery slope” if data collected on a meta-scale was used against legal US citizens (as if this has not already been happening); we all saw how Democrats pushed for such a precedent during Covid and the results would have been disastrous had they gotten what they wanted.  But it’s hard to make a case for similar privacy protections for migrants who have broken the law and are, by every measure, foreign invaders.  

Iran’s top diplomat Abbas Araghchi is in Oman preparing for the next round of nuclear talks with the United States, which will mark the third direct engagement, after President Trump just made an unexpected overture. Trump in a newly published Time interview says he is open to meeting Iran’s supreme leader or president, as the two sides have made clear they are open to achieving peace on the question of the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.

“I think we’re going to make a deal with Iran,” Trump said to Time. The US president was then questioned over whether he is open to meeting Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei or President Masoud Pezeshkian, to which he responded: “Sure”.

Officials involved in the Iran dialogue have presented that “very good progress” has been made. This comes after last month Trump warned that Tehran can choose inking a peace deal or possibly face American bombs. 

“Ultimately I was going to leave that choice to them, but I said I would much prefer a deal than bombs being dropped,” Trump described in the interview. “We can make a deal without the attack. I hope we can.”

There have been recent reports and fears that Prime Minister Netanyahu is seeking to drag the White House into waging preemptive attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.

But Trump has said he’s not worried that Israel would drag him into war. But that’s when he warned that, “I may go in very willingly if we can’t get a deal. If we don’t make a deal, I’ll be leading the pack.”

Below is the key section of the Time interview transcript regarding Israel, Iran and US policy:

You reportedly stopped Israel from attacking Iran’s nuclear sites. 

Trump: That’s not right. 

It’s not right?

No, it’s not right. I didn’t stop them. But I didn’t make it comfortable for them, because I think we can make a deal without the attack. I hope we can. It’s possible we’ll have to attack because Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. But I didn’t make it comfortable for them, but I didn’t say no. Ultimately I was going to leave that choice to them, but I said I would much prefer a deal than bombs being dropped.

Are you worried Netanyahu will drag you into a war? 

No. 

Let’s talk about some of the issues with universities—

By the way, he may go into a war. But we’re not getting dragged in. 

The U.S. will stay out of it if Israel goes into it? 

No, I didn’t say that. You asked if he’d drag me in, like I’d go in unwillingly. No, I may go in very willingly if we can’t get a deal. If we don’t make a deal, I’ll be leading the pack. 

We detailed before that within the administration there is an emerging divide on Iran between the hawks and those that want a peaceful resolution. It seems Trump has been favoring the doves, also given the obvious negatives of the US getting bogged down in another Middle East quagmire.

On the eve of the 3rd round of US-Iran talks, Trump says negotiations have been “very successful,” with a “very positive decision” possible—one that “could save many lives.”

To Time: “We’ll make a deal with Iran. No one else could’ve done this.”

Meet Iran’s leader? “Absolutely” pic.twitter.com/nokJXeOlY0

— Sina Toossi (@SinaToossi) April 25, 2025

A fresh nuclear deal might also east the pressure facing US naval forces in the Red Sea, amid the ongoing anti-Houthi campaign, given the Houthis have long been considered Tehran’s proxies. Better US-Iran relations could serve to silence the missiles and drones over the Red Sea.

Authored by Jeffrey A. Tucker via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

There’s a Tesla in my neighborhood with a bumper sticker that seems to be begging people not to key the car. “I bought this car before I knew that Elon was crazy,” it says.

Fascinating message there. Is it a protest, plea, or both? The car is brilliant, obviously and the guy loves it. But these days, driving a Tesla comes with implied messaging, due entirely to Musk’s political actions.

Elite liberals were buying this car for years as a status symbol of their love of the planet. Then everything changed. Now they are experiencing something like an existential crisis. That’s because a movement has emerged among elites who have turned against it.

Then began a campaign of violence against property. Marauding gangs have attacked dealerships and vigilantes have vandalized cars and trucks all over the country. It’s revealed a point about the political left that has heretofore been only suspected: it harbors a violent streak that is alarming, even terrifying.

This idea that we are what we buy—that our purchases are not just about the products but a judgment for or against the companies that make them—seems rather new as a mass phenomenon. We saw it in the mass consumer boycott of Bud Light.

These violent actions, however, go far beyond a buyers’ boycott. No one in a free enterprise system objects to declining to buy. It’s another matter to lash out at others for their decisions.

The political actions of the CEO dragged the company into a difficult relationship with the main customers of the product. There seems to be no question that this is the reason for the dramatic fall in both sales and the company’s stock price.

EV sales otherwise seem to be on the rise, while Tesla has experienced disproportionate losses at the tail end of a very contentious election followed by the CEO’s actions that have attempted to gut the civil service.

The fall has been so stinging that Elon is stepping back from politics to focus again on bolstering his company and reputation. Certainly he seems to have become less outspoken than he was a few months back. The markets seem to have humbled him into going back to business and staying out of the political muck.

His project called DOGE will live on, and I suspect that he will ultimately be vindicated. For now, however, he is taking it on the chin. His early estimate of saving $2 trillion with cuts kept being pared back given court judgements and impossible bureaucracy. It now stands at $150 billion, much of which will be lost in litigation fees. It’s a terrible realization: if Musk could not do it, even with the full confidence of the U.S. president, can it even be done?

Ever since Musk distinguished himself as the most prominent corporate voice against lockdowns, I’ve paid careful attention to his political migration. He was a conventional corporate liberal not too long ago, say 10 years ago. His experience during COVID changed him. This was when governments around the country and the world said they and they alone would decide which companies would open and which would close. Understandably, he came to believe that civilization was under attack and swore he would do something about it.

He promised to keep his factories open even as the rest of the world was shutting down. He moved his company out of California and his corporate registrations out of Delaware in protest against what was happening. The sudden dawning of his political enlightenment mutated into a serious attack on a range of government and corporate policies that mitigate against merit in hiring and promotion. He turned on “woke”—also in part due to private family struggles that hurt him deeply.

Elon eventually put his money where his mouth was. He decided to buy a heavily censored and deeply propagandistic Twitter and turn it into the much freer X that drove forward public narratives which contributed mightily to Trump’s victory in 2024. In so doing, he fired 4 out of 5 employees in the wildly bloated staff and dramatically changed the platform to become the world’s most popular news and social media application.

Those actions earned him a great deal of influence over policy in the new administration. He was tasked with doing to the government what he had done at Twitter: clean it up, refresh it to become more effective and efficient, and bring some degree of transparency to government finance.

Musk had some success. That said, changing government is much harder than changing a private company over which you are CEO. He has had wide influence within the Trump administration, but not as much as perhaps he had hoped. He wanted budget cuts and worked within established parameters to get them, even fully gutting several terrible sources of corruption like USAID.

My judgment on his role is that Musk’s activities here have been absolutely heroic. He helped restore free speech. He has cleaned up some waste and fraud. He has streamlined some processes of government. He has set a new standard for accounting, personnel, and accounting. DOGE will go on without him.

Also, it is not generally understood how xAI or Grok broke an emergent monopoly in artificial intelligence, shattering OpenAI’s hopes for a monopoly once it let go of its non profit status. Grok made that impossible. Even now, Musk’s Grok AI engine ranks very high in all side-to-side comparisons of AI tools, and certainly excels in its user interface.

Musk is very easily the leader in autonomous driving, which could revolutionize transportation on many fronts. And he does it all with open-source technology.

I’m not a Tesla owner and I’ve written many articles with grave doubts about EVs in general. That said, I’m for consumer choice. If you think he makes a better car, great. Buy it and drive it. He has been very clear, too, that he is against all mandates, subsidies, and even patent protections, which is quite remarkable. In general, I would say that he has behaved throughout with notable scrupulosity.

Further, he threw himself into politics with the best of motives. He wanted to end censorship. He wanted to stop the corruption. He wanted to fix government finances. He has been sincere throughout and performed extraordinary deeds. He was not only not paid for his service; he has been punished financially for what he has done.

This entire episode prompts a kind of reflection on the role of public life, courage, and doing what is right. Musk truly attempted to make a difference. He was courageous. He took on huge financial risks in buying Twitter that seem to have paid off. He risked the status of all of his companies when he threw in with Trump’s campaign. He could have played it safe but chose a different path.

Why did he risk it all? Because he strongly believed it was the right thing to do. This is a beautiful thing to see in our cynical times. There is an element of tragedy in how his sacrifices have not been rewarded but rather punished.

What message does this send to the business culture at large? It says: do not stick your neck out to stand up for what is right. Instead, be more compliant and agreeable with whomever or whatever is in power. That’s the best way to protect the bottom line.

This is an unfortunate signal for business in general. It’s extremely rare that someone so accomplished in enterprise would stand up for what is right and true. He deserves the gratitude of everyone who believes in free speech and freedom generally. Arguably, his actions saved both from grave danger. He was and is paying a heavy price for doing this.

What might he have done differently? He might have some thoughts on that but the general theme is that he did the right thing when it mattered the most. I seriously doubt that he would change anything about his big decisions.

As for the bumper sticker on the Tesla that attacks Musk, it’s truly pathetic, an act of cowardice, whatever the motive. In multiple ways, he has been the benefactor of us all. Is every hero doomed to live a thankless life in these times? Maybe. But they will prevail in the end.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

If you blinked during Tuesday’s Health and Human Services Department press conference on the agency’s plans to ban artificial dyes, you may have missed Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. teasing his next target.

Kennedy announced plans to target pharmaceutical additives, signaling he is getting ready to fire his opening salvo against Big Pharma.

A reporter asked, “I’m wondering if there’s any pharmaceutical additives that you’d like to eliminate?” prompting laughter from the audience.

“We’re gonna start on that next,” the HHS secretary replied, offering no further details on his plans.

REPORTER: “I’m wondering if there’s any pharmaceutical additives that you’d like to eliminate?”

RFK JR: “We’re gonna start on that next.” pic.twitter.com/FWx41wKquK

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) April 23, 2025

Kennedy on Tuesday unveiled a plan to eliminate eight artificial food dyes and colorings from the U.S. food supply by the end of next year, committing to collaborate with food companies to ensure a smooth transition and remove these additives from products.

Kennedy, pioneer of the Make America Healthy Again movement, has long criticized Big Pharma, vowing to hold the industry accountable for what he calls rampant corruption and profiteering. Kennedy has accused pharmaceutical giants of manipulating federal agencies like the FDA and seeks to curb direct-to-consumer advertising that he says taints media. Kennedy also plans to scrutinize vaccine safety. He was one of the most outspoke critics of the COVID vaccine and government-instituted lockdowns.

“I just want to urge all of you, it’s not the time to stop; it’s the time to redouble your efforts, because we have them on the run now, and we are going to win this battle,” Kennedy said. “And four years from now, we’re going to have most of these products off the market, or you will know about them when you go to the grocery store.”

ABC News reports:

Federal officials are taking steps to pull the authorization for two rarely used synthetic food colorings — Citrus Red No. 2 and Orange B — within the coming months. In addition, the six other petroleum-based dyes that federal health agencies are seeking to eliminate by the end of next year are Green No. 3, Red No. 40, Yellow No. 5, Yellow No. 6, Blue No. 1 and Blue No. 2.

The FDA is also taking steps to authorize four new natural color additives, officials announced Tuesday.

The plan, however, is contingent on an “understanding” with major food companies that they will voluntarily remove them to meet consumer demand, Kennedy said Tuesday.

“There’s no need to have a regulation or a statute when companies are volunteering to do it,” FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said. “We are going to use every tool in the toolbox to make sure this gets done to the best of our abilities.”

“For the last 50 years, American children have increasingly been living in a toxic soup of synthetic chemicals,” Makary added. 

When the fast food joints start closing, it’s usually not a great indicator for the economy. 

Jack in the Box plans to close up to 200 underperforming locations, aiming to bolster its balance sheet amid declining consumer spending.

The San Diego-based chain also announced it’s exploring a sale of its struggling Del Taco brand, according to CBS News. Most closures will target older, low-performing stores, with up to 120 shutting down by year’s end and the rest phasing out based on franchise terms.

Starting in 2026, the company expects to maintain a 1% annual closure rate.

The CBS News report says that Jack in the Box hasn’t released its 2025 closure list but says more details are coming in August. The move is part of a push to cut debt and improve finances.

“Jack in the Box has gotten away from some of the core characteristics that have made it a successful driver of shareholder value in the past and it’s time we return to those basics,” said CEO Lance Tucker.

Second-quarter sales fell 4.4% at Jack in the Box and 3.6% at Del Taco. The company’s stock has tumbled 57% over the past year.

Broader industry headwinds persist. McDonald’s CEO admitted its “value leadership gap has shrunk,” while U.S. consumer sentiment dropped for a fourth straight month in April amid economic worries and tariff fears.

Authored by Corinne Clark Barron via American Greatness,

By now, you’ve probably seen the clip that launched a thousand self-righteous Instagram reels. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. dared to say something uncomfortable about autism—specifically, the profound kind—and the internet lost its collective mind.

Here’s what he said:

“Autism destroys family. And more importantly, it destroys our greatest resource, our children. And these are kids who will never pay taxes, they’ll never hold a job, they’ll never play baseball, they’ll never write a poem. They’ll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted. We have to recognize we are doing this to our children and we need to put an end to it.”

It doesn’t take a genius—or even a full listen—to understand that he was referring to severe, nonverbal, profoundly disabling autism. Not quirky software engineers or brilliant kids who need a little extra support in school. And yet, the outrage machine went into overdrive. Moms on X and Instagram rushed to share glowing tributes to their high-functioning children on the spectrum, explaining how autism is their family’s greatest blessing. And you know what? That’s beautiful. But that’s also not what RFK was talking about.

This wasn’t a sweeping statement about every autistic person. 

It was a serious moment about a serious public health issue. But as usual, nuance doesn’t fit into a TikTok soundbite.

The backlash wasn’t just misplaced—it was manipulative. 

All these people who claim to be champions of neurodiversity suddenly can’t tolerate a conversation about the darker, more painful realities many families face. They took a statement meant to elevate the need for answers and twisted it into a personal insult.

And here’s where it gets rich: many of the loudest critics belong to the same liberal cohort that routinely defends aborting children with Down syndrome or other detectable conditions. 

We’re supposed to believe they’re the defenders of all life now? Spare me.

These libs will write a tearful thread about autism acceptance, then turn around and shout down anyone who dares to ask why so many children are being diagnosed with it in the first place.

The truth is, they don’t want a solution. They want a platform. They want to be seen as more compassionate than you, especially if it means ignoring the moms who are absolutely drowning trying to care for a nonverbal 12-year-old who can’t sleep through the night, can’t be left alone, and may never live independently. RFK was speaking to those parents. The ones who love their kids desperately but who are desperate for answers too.

If RFK had gone the other direction and said, “Autism isn’t a big deal,” these same people would be screaming that he wasn’t taking the challenges of raising autistic children seriously. 

It’s not about the message—it’s about being mad. 

These people are outrage machines running on bad faith and buzzwords.

RFK didn’t say anything cruel. He said something real. And in politics today, that’s more offensive than anything else.

Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via The Daily Signal,

We’ve talked about higher education before, but now it’s come into sharper focus with the Trump administration’s deadlock with Harvard University over its unwillingness or inability—whatever term we like to use—to meet the administration’s demands that it ensures an antisemitic-free campus that does not allow people to disrupt classes. 

It doesn’t use race, after the Supreme Court decision that went against Harvard and said that affirmative action was no longer legal.

Columbia had the same type of disagreement, other campuses are.

I don’t think it’s a wise thing for them to get into a fight with the federal government.

If they are dependent on federal funding, these big private marquee universities—Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Stanford, Duke—and they want federal money, then the federal government is going to ask for some transparency. And we, the public, really don’t know much about it.

It’s like a rock, a traditional rock on moist ground. You don’t wanna turn it over because there’s going to be things underneath there that you would better not—it would be better not to be seen. And that’s what the public is going to learn about higher education.

Now, what do I mean? I mean loans. 

These universities are raising tuition higher than the rate of inflation. And that started when the federal government said, “We will ensure these loans for students.” 

Once that happened, the moral hazard shifted away from the university. 

So, they have been gouging students for room and board.

I’ll give you an example. 

Hillsdale College, its room, board, and tuition is about $45,000 a year. It takes no money. 

Harvard gets about $9 billion in total. Its room, board, and tuition is about $95,000. 

Same with Stanford. They’re about double what Hillsdale charges. And one of the reasons is that they’re so dependent on federal money and therefore they can spend like drunken sailors.

Remember, of that 1.7, about 10%, 8% are nonperforming and about maybe 14% are late. The public doesn’t know all that. But they’re paying for it—especially kids, the half of the cohort 18 to 30 that’s not going to college, they’re subsidizing this university boondoggle.

The second thing is the university doesn’t really obey the first 10 amendments of the Constitution. If you get accused of particular crimes as a student, faculty member, let’s say, sexual harassment or untoward speech, hate speech—whatever the term they use—it’s very unlikely you’re going to get Fourth and Fifth, maybe Sixth Amendment protection. That is, you’re not going to have an open hearing. You’re not going to be tried by a jury of your peers. You’re not going to necessarily have legal counsel. You’re not necessarily going to know who your accusers are.

The affirmative action ruling by the Supreme Court outlawed the use of race in admissions. And we have civil rights statutes that also do that. But the universities do something funny. They have safe spaces. They have theme houses. And they have auxiliary graduations. But the common denominator, they’re predicated on race. So, a black theme house, a Latino theme house has almost very few people.

Nobody would want a European, so-called white theme house or an alternate white graduation. And you would say, “Why not, Victor?” Because it would be considered racist, I suppose.

But at Stanford, only 22% of the student body is white. Are they going to say, “Well, we’re one of the minorities now. Why don’t we do this?” That’s where it will lead if you enhance tribalism.

There’s no intellectual diversity. The National Association of Scholars did a study not long ago. They found not one of the 133 faculty members at Bryn Mawr was a Republican. At Williams, I think they found one or two. They found a lot of elite universities where there was nobody who openly acknowledged that they were a Republican.

There are a couple of other things that are disturbing too. And that is the universities get individual faculty grants—Department of Energy, National Institutes of Health. And usually, in most private foundations, the university is not following their model.

What I mean is, a private scholar at a think tank, they might deduct 15% for the use of the phone or office that they would get out of that federal grant. But universities like Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, they can go from 40% to 50% to 60% and they’re relying on that multimillion-dollar—I guess we’d call it—price gouging from the federal government.

And finally, these universities don’t have multimillion-dollar endowments anymore. They have multibillion-dollar—$30 billion, Stanford $53 billion. And they’re predicated—the income—on that. And sometimes they get almost 10%. They’re very good in investing. This $5 or $6 or $7 or $4 billion a year in income is tax-free, for the most part. Tax-free. And that’s predicated that they’re nonpolitical, they’re nonpartisan. But when you look at the makeup of the faculty and the use of race and gender, contrary to federal law, you can see they’re very partisan.

So, let me just sum up. 

Does the university really want to get in a fight with the Trump administration and then bring all of this information about their endowments; their lack of intellectual diversity; their segregation; their lack of due process for people who undergo inquiries or accusations; their separate racial graduations, safe spaces, theme houses; the use of student loans? 

I don’t think they want to do that. The public would be shocked. And it’s a losing proposition.

If I were the presidents of these major universities, I would do this: I would make a deal with the Trump administration. 

And I would welcome it because then I would tell my radical students, “You can’t wear a mask. I’d like you to, but the federal government won’t let me.” Or, “We can’t have racially segregated dorms anymore, theme houses. I’d like to, but it’s against the law.” And that would be their way out.

Is that going to happen? I don’t think so. And I think we’re going to see some accountability. And the universities are not going to like the consequences.

For many years now the narrative on California is that it is a country unto itself and it generates so many tax dollars the federal government and red states should be throwing a garden party in its honor.  In reality, California is not a “donor state” as the Rockefeller Institute claims.  It can’t even support itself, let alone bolster the rest of the country.

This problem has become more evident in the past year as Los Angeles hits a budget deficit of a billion dollars and, the state government doesn’t have the funds to help the city recover because of it’s own $68 billion deficit.

In response to the lack of aid from the state or federal government, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass unveiled a proposed $13.9 billion municipal budget for fiscal year 2025-26, which includes more than 1,600 layoffs and the consolidation of four city departments in an effort to eliminate the overdraft.  Though LA employs around 50,000 people in total and the layoffs might seem minor in comparison, the city’s expansive programs require employee growth this year, not cuts. 

Furthermore, it is likely that the 1600 fired workers are just the beginning.  The city removed at least 2000 positions from its employee roster at the end of last year and is already moving to make cuts to existing workers.

It’s no coincidence that LA is in fiscal trouble in 2025, and it’s not only because of the $2 billion in damages associated with the recent wildfires.  After decades of decadent debt spending CA is deeply dependent on federal funds.  Federal budget cuts and the shutdown of agencies like USAID are having far reaching consequences, especially in progressive states with a heavy emphasis on socialized programs.  

For example, the federal Department of Health and Human Services recently terminated $12 billion in grants intended for infectious disease response, mental health services and other public health issues.  At least $1 billion of this cash was supposed to go to California in 2025.  Covid money is funneled into various health departments and other projects and California was the biggest recipient of pandemic funds by far with over $77.8 billion received through the state government and over $600 billion in total relief.  Some critics argue that covid relief in California was wrongly exploited as a financial boon for various state agencies, politicians and employees.

Now the pandemic funding is finally cut off after 5 years.  $45 million of the $1 billion lost was supposed to go to Los Angeles. 

The LAPD is also losing over $10 million due to federal funding cuts.  The agency and city officials are trying to sort out the potential impact of being cut-off from millions of dollars in law enforcement and homeland security grants, following the US Justice Department’s announcement such programs would be suspended for any municipality that considered itself a so-called, “sanctuary city,” that bars local officers from playing a role in immigration enforcement.

The Orange County Register reported last month that Orange County will lose out on more than $68 million in federal earmarks for 2025, money that was previously approved for community projects.

California schools have been warned by the Trump Administration that if they don’t stop instituting DEI programs and indoctrination, they will lose at up to $16 billion in funding, with $1.26 billion of that going to the Los Angeles Unified School District.

The sheer enormity of federal funds floating around California should be taken into account, but also the fact that despite access to so much money California and LA are still facing a massive budget shortfalls.  The chances of this dilemma being solved through layoffs and department consolidation is next to nil.  The real root of the problem is policy driven; Democrat welfare programs, social programs and their open border mentality have resulted in a never ending drain on their finances, slowing destroying what was once one of the greatest states in the nation.