Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

President-elect Donald Trump based much of his campaign on promises to crack down on immigration and carry out mass deportations.

Politically, this was likely a winning issue for Trump after social media exposed millions of Americans to countless reports and videos of foreign nationals getting free cash, free housing, food allowances, and overall special treatment at taxpayer expense. Meanwhile, actual taxpaying Americans endured inflation-fueled price hikes and a worsening economy while being harangued by the smug upper classes about the need to be “welcoming.” Many voters chose to support the candidate who wasn’t in favor of importing a new taxpayer-subsidized underclass.

Because of this, Trump is likely to prioritize delivering at least some of his promised immigration crackdown.

However, one does not need to be an advocate of open borders to have concerns when one hears about a federal law enforcement agency engaging in a “crackdown.”

Federal officials don’t exactly have a stellar record when it comes to respecting the property rights of peaceful, law-abiding Americans, even when the purported target is foreigners.

The countless violations of the rights of Americans under the Patriot Act and the “war on terror” are examples of this.

On the other hand, many aspects of the proposed Trump crackdown are, one might say, “no-brainers” and have no apparent downside at all. These include cutting off all funding of any kind to migrants, and deporting all foreign nationals with a known criminal record.

Nonetheless, some aspects of Trump’s immigration policy have the potential for fueling further expansion of a federal police state. These include any deportation plan that involves a “drag net” and places peaceful residents under suspicion for no offense other than “looking like” a migrant.

The No-Brainer Solutions

Immigration has long been subsidized in the United States in the sense that there are low barriers to new migrants benefiting from a bevy of social benefit programs. Immigrants who achieve status as refugees or asylees can access welfare programs almost immediately. Even run-of-the-mill legal migrants need only wait five years to begin living off taxpayer-funded benefits.

These subsidization schemes have only grown more aggressive in recent years. It is now well known that many American cities and states—not to mention the federal government—offer “free” cash, housing, food, and more.

This has done much to attract the flood of migrants that has arrived in the US in recent years. Earlier this year, for example, The New York Post reported that the mayor of New York is giving away pre-paid cash cards—each carrying “up to $10,000“— to foreign nationals in New York. Most of these migrants have arrived in New York with no invitation, no employment prospects, and no plan for housing. But most of them plan on staying. And why shouldn’t they? Upon arrival, thousands of them immediately went on the public dole in some way or another, relying on taxpayer-funded shelters, housing programs, and a variety of sources for “free” food. The federal government also provides free transportation to various American communities for many migrants, including 400,000 free riders in 2023 alone.

Reversing this should be seen as “low-hanging fruit” by the Trump administration. Obviously, any and all access to federal dollars should be cut off immediately. This is true for both legal and illegal immigrants. Immigration needs to be a fully private-market process, not a taxpayer-subsidized activity.

Any state or local government that attempts to entice more migrants with social benefits programs should lose all access to federal grants. All federal dollars should be cut off from any government schools that cater to illegal immigrants. Any NGO that attempts to funnel taxpayer dollars to immigrants should be blacklisted from any and all federal grants. These NGOs are still free to offer services to anyone they want—just not with taxpayer dollars.

Many of these programs for putting immigrants on welfare are nowadays facilitated by smart-phone apps. These include the CBP One app which is designed to streamline migrants’ requests for asylum. This, of course, is an attempt to circumvent the normal immigration process and get migrants on social benefits even faster. Obviously, all of these apps should be immediately disabled.

Note that none of this requires any law-enforcement contact with migrants at all. These solutions simply cut off migrants’ access to the hard-earned dollars of taxpayers. The phone apps will no longer work. The free money will no longer materialize to provide free food and housing for migrants. Those migrants who actually have jobs and contribute to the community can continue to do so. Those who relied on stealing from taxpayers will self-deport when the free ride disappears.

The option of immigration—including legal immigration— to the United States must be fully privatized so it is only an option for those with the ability to support themselves economically.

Note that none of this violates anyone’s property rights. No one’s right to travel is limited by cutting off free money for migrants. No one is being prevented from contracting with another private party for employment or housing. People simply are being forced to do all this with their own private property.

Other Laissez-Faire Solutions: No Fast Path to Citizenship

Another key in the equation is limiting access to citizenship. Citizenship is not a property right of any kind, and there is no such thing as a natural right to citizenship in any particular place. Excluding the tiny number of migrants who are genuinely stateless, all foreign nationals arriving in the United States already enjoy the benefits of citizenship somewhere.

Moreover, gaining citizenship in the United States brings with it a variety of economic benefits. It provides permanent access to the welfare state. The granting of citizenship also provides foreign nationals—few of whom renounce their citizenship in their home countries—greater access to US government institutions.

The benefits of citizenship ought to be greatly limited for new immigrants, with a waiting period of at least a decade, or perhaps even twenty years. Again, this does not limit a migrant’s ability to fully exercise his or her property rights.

Birthright citizenship, a “right” invented by a federal judge, should also be abolished.

The Problem with Mass Deportations

Ultimately, when we consider options for limiting migration, while also respecting property rights, self-deportation needs to be the focus. The alternative is to empower the federal government to track down and round up countless US residents, demand “papers, please!” and then deport those without the proper government forms.

Many supporters of mass deportation plans seem to think that federal agents can, through some magical power, identify illegal immigrants on sight. The reality is that immigration status must be determined by an investigation into whether or not a resident has the proper paperwork.

Now, it is true that many illegal immigrants will essentially volunteer for deportation. Such people include criminals who are convicted of real crimes. Clearly, it does not require any sort of drag net to simply deport convicts who have already attracted the attention of authorities. Similarly, in a system that denies taxpayer funded benefits to foreign nationals, immigrants who attempt to collect social benefits would be guilty of fraud, and thus volunteer themselves for deportation. The same would be true of any non-citizen who attempts to vote.

But what about immigrants who remain peaceful, self-supporting, and keep to themselves? The way federal agents have generally identified these people is by harassing residents through internal checkpoints and harassment of people who “look like” immigrants.

For example, one of the great overreaches of federal power—one that is blatantly unconstitutional—is the 100-mile border zone. In 1946, Congress passed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1946. The law granted immigration agents the authority “to interrogate any alien or person believed to be an alien as to his right to be or to remain in the United States.” This power was limited to a “reasonable distance” from the US border. Originally, this “reasonable distance” was 25 miles. But it was unilaterally extended by the Department of Justice to 100 miles without any change to the statute. Given that “the border” includes both land and water borders, two-thirds of Americans live within this border zone. Entire states are included within the zone, including Florida, Michigan, and Maine.

Many peaceful Americans get caught up in this bureaucratic nightmare. Thanks to the hundred-mile zone American citizens who don’t carry their passports on them at all times can be harassed and arrested by Border Patrol agents, even well inside the US border. As the New York Post describes it, “Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are arresting US citizens by mistake and holding them at detention centers for months—sometimes even years.”

There is nothing shocking here. This is how government agencies work.

Yet, many Trump supporters are cheering the idea that an army of government agents be let loose on American cities and towns, as if this will not affect ordinary, law-abiding citizens in any way. This is the same attitude that gave us the Patriot Act, NSA spying programs, and everything else justified by the despotic slogan of “if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about.”

Indeed, there are countless ways that the federal government can harass ordinary citizens and violate their property rights. Consider, for example, how anti-immigration advocates promote despotism with programs like “eVerify.” The activists want federal bureaucrats to determine if you have a right to work. And then there are the calls for new laws designed to prosecute private citizens who are guilty of the “crime” of using their own private property to rent apartments to immigrants or pay immigrants for services rendered.

It’s one thing to build a wall, to deport convicted criminals, or end taxpayer-funded subsidies for migrants. It’s quite another thing when federal agents start asking us for our papers and telling us what we can do with our own property. 

A related video: 

Some parts of the Trump plan are no-brainers like ending all federal money for immigrants. Other stuff raises red flags, such as the prospect of mass investigations of non-violent people to determine if they have all the right gov’t paperwork. I think the key here is to make… pic.twitter.com/5aLGrqeA4S

— Ryan McMaken (@ryanmcmaken) November 19, 2024

Gold and oil – two of the most influential commodities on the planet – have a fascinating relationship that has evolved over decades, captured in the gold-to-oil ratio.

The gold-to-oil ratio represents the number of barrels of crude oil equivalent in price to one troy ounce of gold.

It is viewed as an indicator of the health of the global economy, indicating when gold or oil prices are significantly out of balance with each other.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Niccolo Conte, shows the gold-to-oil ratio since 1946, using data compiled by Macrotrends.

What is the Gold-to-Oil Ratio?

The gold-to-oil ratio expresses the price relationship between gold and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil. WTI is a grade of crude oil and one of the three primary benchmarks for oil pricing, along with Brent and Dubai Crude.

A high ratio indicates that gold is relatively expensive compared to WTI crude oil, and vice versa. This can indicate periods of outsized demand for energy in the form of crude oil, or periods of monetary uncertainty when there is higher demand for gold.

Below is the gold-to-oil ratio every decade between 1946 and 2024.

During the 1950s and 1960s, fixed gold prices and stable oil prices kept the ratio between 11 and 13 for 20 years.

Since the 1980s, the ratio has typically traded within the range of 6 to 40 with a notable exception: in 2020 when the ratio reached a high of 91.1. The peak in 2020 was driven by COVID-19, which boosted gold prices as a safe haven while oil demand and prices plummeted due to global lockdowns.

In contrast, between 2000 and 2008, oil prices were relatively high compared to gold. During this period, the ratio dropped to nearly 6 but never rose above 16.

When comparing the two commodities, it’s worth remembering that the crude oil market is around 10 times larger than that of gold, making it the largest commodity market in the world.

If you enjoyed this graphic, make sure to check out this graphic that shows the top countries by natural resource value.

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

During a discussion with president-elect Trump’s former Office of Management and Budget Director, Russ Vought, Tucker Carlson posited that the outgoing administration is attempting to saddle Trump with a global conflict.

“If you doubt how serious the opposition is to the public, not just to Trump, but to the majority of the country that voted for him, They’re trying to leave him with World War III on the way out,” Carlson urged.

Russia is furious about the Biden administration lifting restrictions on use of US developed long range missiles, and Putin has repeatedly stated that such a move would mean NATO countries are at war with Russia.

Carlson continued, “I can’t imagine a more desperate or evil thing for Tony Blinken, who I think is desperate and evil, in my view, to do. Leave him with a war?”

“A lame-duck president trying to start a war with the world’s largest nuclear power, Russia. What do you make of that?” Carlson asked Vought.

Vought responded, “It’s incredibly insidious, and then add to the fact that he can’t put two sentences together and he is largely not in control of his own government,” referring to Joe Biden.

“You have almost an unelected president with individuals behind the scenes doing this,” he continued, further asserting “It doesn’t surprise me, though. I mean, these are the same people that have weaponized the Department of Justice and the lawfare.”

“I have a colleague, Jeff Clark, who they’re trying to disbar because of the care he showed on behalf of the president in dealing with voter integrity and election fraud after 2020,” Vought further noted.

“The system has thrown everything at the warriors who are on the field. You’re seeing that with Tulsi, you’re seeing that with Matt Gaetz,” he pointed out, adding “Why is all of this stuff being thrown at him slanderously?”

The full exchange is below:

Russ Vought ran OMB under Trump the first time, and hopefully will again. Here’s what he learned about how the deep state actually works.

(0:00) What is the Office of Management and Budget?
(7:57) How Our Intel Agencies Overrule the President
(29:21) What Will the Congressional… pic.twitter.com/vl9au8UwU7

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) November 18, 2024

Carlson also discussed the spiralling escalation in Ukraine with journalist Glenn Greenwald, noting that the decision to escalate the conflict with ATACMS missiles is “the most evil thing I’ve seen in my lifetime.”

Greenwald also pointed out that Ukraine doesn’t have the expertise to use the guidance system for the weapons and therefore NATO countries and the US would be actively involved in launching them at targets inside Russia.

Permanent Washington decides nuclear war is preferable to Donald Trump. Glenn Greenwald on the nihilism of our ruling class.

(0:00) Permanent Washington Dangerously Misunderstands Vladimir Putin
(23:06) We Are on the Verge of Nuclear War
(28:11) The Concerted Effort to Control… pic.twitter.com/GOJDslU23W

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) November 20, 2024

As we highlighted yesterday, NATO member state Sweden is sending out pamphlets advising citizens how they should prepare for nuclear war in the wake of the escalation.

*  *  *

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In a shocking development, but perhaps coming as no surprise to some (who have long warned “Brazil’s Donald Trump” would be target of an avalanche of further political persecution from the left once out of office) Brazil’s federal police on Thursday announced a formal call for the the indictment of ex-president Jair Bolsonaro over a 2022 “coup” plot.

Supposedly this involved an organized criminal network which Bolsonaro directed to prevent current president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office. The police allege Bolsonaro and 36 other officials and individuals plotted the “violent overthrow of the democratic state.”

“Federal police concluded on Thursday the investigation into the existence of a criminal organization that acted in a coordinated way in 2022 in an attempt to maintain the then-president in power,” the statement said.

“The final report has been sent to the Supreme Court with the request that 37 individuals [including the ex-president] be indicted for the crimes of the violent overthrow of the democratic state, coup d’etat and criminal organization.”

An initial social media statement from Bolsonaro responded simply, “The fight begins at the Attorney General’s office.” It’s as yet unclear whether the attorney general will take up the case, which could bring at least 12 years in prison if the ex-president is convicted.

Bolsonaro has also said he’s the victim of a state-backed “persecution” and that he’s innocent of all allegations. Police allege the criminal conspiracy occurred in the last several months of Bolsonaro’s 2019-2022 presidency.

Current reports have left open whether the plotting had anything to do with the later “insurrection” which rocked central government buildings Brasilia on January 8, 2023 – involving angry pro-Bolsonaro demonstrators breaking into the Congress building, the Supreme Court, and also storming the presidential palace. American and some international commentators had at the time characterized it as Bolsonaro’s own “J6 riot”.

Bolsonaro is already facing other more minor investigations and charges, including allegedly falsifying his Covid-19 vaccination record. This new allegation by the federal police is the most serious one yet.

The NY Times details that “The charges are the culmination of a sweeping two-year investigation in which police raided homes and offices, arrested senior aides to Mr. Bolsonaro and secured confessions and plea deals with people involved in the plot.”

“The announcement comes two days after four members of an elite military unit, including a former top aide to Mr. Bolsonaro, were arrested and accused of planning to assassinate Mr. Lula shortly before he took office in January 2023,” the report indicates further.

. @BRASILWIRE reports that another of the arrested is Rodrigo Bezerra de Azevedo, a former instructor at The School of the Americas — the infamous US army school in Georgia that trains Latin Americans how to torture people and carry out coups. pic.twitter.com/eOX3oXyHaf

— Alan MacLeod (@AlanRMacLeod) November 20, 2024

So ultimately, the police are claiming a direct assassination plot targeting Lula. Already Bolsonaro has been barred from running for office for eight years, after in June 2023 Brazil’s highest electoral court says that he cannot run for or hold any public office until 2030. This means he’ll have to sit out the 2026 election regardless of if these coup allegations stick.

Authored by Daniel Lipinski via RealClearPolitics,

Here we go again. Voters have elected Donald Trump president while giving Republicans majorities in the House and Senate. And once again, Democrats are asking themselves, “What do we do now?” When this occurred eight years ago, I was a Democrat serving in the House of Representatives. At that time, some of my colleagues who had seen many traditional Democrats in their district vote for Trump spoke out. They said that working-class voters were tired of feeling looked down upon by Democrats because of policies they supported, what they believed, or even who they were. So when Hillary Clinton was caught claiming that half of Trump’s supporters were a “basket of deplorables: racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic,” she was seen to be confirming this, helping to doom her campaign.

But instead of changing course, Democrats doubled down by embracing a more ardent progressivism and demanding that everyone follow. Primary challenges by progressives rose dramatically. My experience was emblematic. Working-class voters were my base because I focused on bread-and-butter issues critical to struggling families, and I was not supportive of progressive social issues. After surviving in 2018, I lost in 2020 to a progressive challenger bankrolled by millions from national groups. At the same time, candidates for the Democratic nomination for president in 2020 were stumbling over each other, trying to get further to the left on a variety of issues. Decriminalizing illegal border crossings, funding sex-change operations for prisoners and detained illegal immigrants, and defunding the police became party dogma, further alienating the working class.

Thanks to bumbling by President Trump and congressional Republicans, however, Democrats won the House in 2018 and captured the White House and both chambers of Congress in 2020.  Progressives felt vindicated and were emboldened to continue their agenda with a self-righteous swagger. President Biden, whose victory was made possible by a reputation he had built over five decades as a moderate deal-maker, foolishly embraced progressives to prepare to run for reelection in 2024. Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who won in a state that gave Clinton and Biden less than 30% of the vote, was hounded out of the party by progressives who should have been thankful for every vote he gave them.

In 2024, Republicans handed a massive in-kind gift to their opponents when they nominated the man most responsible for the Democratic Party’s election victories the past six years. Democrats were also given a unique opportunity to install a nominee who did not have to pander to progressives to win primaries. Perhaps the party had no other choice but Vice President Kamala Harris, who had taken some very progressive positions when running for the nomination in 2019. But with five long years having passed, she could have tried to make a clean and hard break from these. Instead, she chose to walk away from some of these positions softly, never seizing the opportunity to claim that a new working-class friendly perspective led her to change. Harris sealed her fate when she delivered a too-clever-by-half professorial response – “I’ll follow the law” – when asked whether she still supported taxpayer-funded sex-change operations for prisoners and detained illegal aliens. Donald Trump went on to become just the second Republican in 36 years to win the popular vote, thanks in part to significant support from non-white working-class voters, particularly Hispanics. 

As Democrats try to figure out what to do next, it is folly to believe that all the party needs is “clarity of message,” as former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (CA) recently claimed. And while it is good to propose new policies directed at helping those left behind economically, as Rep. Ro Khanna (CA) did, it won’t solve the political problem. But buried in that post-election piece by Khanna was one sentence that gets much closer to what Democrats must do: “For our economic message to be heard, we must show common sense on issues of crime and the safety of families and not shame or cancel those who may have honest disagreements with us on a particular social issue.” Rep. Seth Moulton (MA) expressed a similar sentiment when he said, “We lost, in part, because we shame and belittle too many opinions held by too many voters, and that needs to stop.” 

While these are hopeful signs, Democrats must do more than pay lip service to change. After all, a few years ago, Khanna – who is now positioning for a presidential run – was publicly urging our Democratic House colleagues to cancel me from Congress because of honest issue disagreements. And last week, when Moulton dared to give a specific example of not wanting his daughters “getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete,” he was lambasted by multiple Democratic officials, including his state’s governor and one of his congressional colleagues. Nowhere did I see any Democrat have the courage to support Moulton’s commonsense concern or even defend him for being willing to raise an issue with significant public resonance.

Voters are not fools, especially working-class voters who continue to feel that the country is going in the wrong direction and that they always get the short end of the stick. They may not watch day-to-day politics closely, but they understand who and what the Democratic Party now seems to really value. Only time will tell if the party has finally learned a lesson.

Daniel Lipinski is a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He represented the Third District of Illinois in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2005 to 2021.

The most corrupt and incompetent – not to mention most hacked – SEC chair in history, Gary Gensler, is finally out.

Gensler, whose departure we previewed last week, announced his plan to step down as chair of the US Securities and Exchange Commission on January 20, when Donald Trump is set to be sworn in as president.

On January 20, 2025 I will be stepping down as @SECGov Chair.

A thread 🧵⬇️

— Gary Gensler (@GaryGensler) November 21, 2024

Officially, Gensler’s five-year term on the commission does not run out until 2026, but it has become customary for SEC chairs, and especially corrupt and incompetent ones who follow the rules of their political masters, to move on as when the presidency changes hands.

“It has been an honor of a lifetime to serve w/ them on behalf of everyday Americans & ensure that our capital mkts remain the best in the world” the slimy former Goldman banker said.

“I thank @POTUS for entrusting me w/ this incredible responsibility. The SEC has met our mission & enforced the law w/o fear or favor”, he added.

In case it wasn’t clear by now, Gensler – whose vendetta against entities like SilverGate cost hundreds of people their jobs and set back the US crypto industry years – will go down in history as perhaps the most corrupt and incompetent SEC chair in modern history, doing little to protect investors and doing everything in his power (as he followed the orders of Elizabeth Warren) to destroy the US crypto industry, crushing the spark of enterprise in the US and culminating in a series of humiliating defeats as courts ruled the regulator had exceeded its authority again and again.

According to Charlie Gasparino, Gensler will be replaced with the very pro-crypto Potomac Global Partners CEO and former SEC commissioner Paul Atkins, who since 2017 has led industry efforts to develop best practices for digital asset issuances and trading platforms as Co-Chair of the Token Alliance

SCOOP: Former SEC commission Paul Atkins is said to be in the lead position to replace @GaryGensler as @SECGov chair, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. As with all things in Trump World this could change, of course. Fox Business has previously reported…

— Charles Gasparino (@CGasparino) November 21, 2024

Needeless to say, it is poetic justice that Gensler bailed the day bitcoin hits a new record high, and is about to surpass $100,000.

His announcement came hours after a federal court in Texas tossed out the SEC’s new rules for the $27tn Treasury market, finding that the watchdog exceeded its authority when it tried to force more large traders to register as “dealers”.

We refuse to waste any time on this worthless bureaucrat who will soon be collecting $100,000 per speech by an establishment that is as corrupt as him, and will likely end up with some cushy professor job in some woke, liberal B-grade college, even as he is completely forgotten by history, so instead we will give the final word to Tyler Winklevoss whose eulogy captures everything we could say on the topic.

Let’s all be clear on one thing. Gary Gensler is evil. He should never again have a position of influence, power, or consequence. Any company, university, or organization that hires or works with him post-SEC is betraying the crypto industry and should be boycotted aggressively. This the only way to prevent this kind of misuse of government power from happening again in the future.

Gensler’s behavior can’t be explained away as a good faith mistakes. It was entirely thought out, intentional, and purposeful to fulfill his personal, political agenda at any cost. Even if this meant nuking an industry, tens of thousands of jobs, people’s livelihoods, billions of invested capital, and more. Ironically, his sociopathic ambition ended up torching his own political party.

No amount of apology can undo the damage he has done to our industry and our country. This type of person has no place at any institution, big or small. Americans have had enough of their tax dollars going towards a government that is supposed to protect them, but instead is wielded against them by politicians looking to advance their careers. It’s time for this pathology to be stopped once and for all. Onward!

Onward indeed.

Authored by Alex O’Donnell via CoinTelegraph.com,

Bitcoin exchange-traded funds now collectively manage approximately $104 billion, and are on track to surpass gold ETFs in net assets.

United States Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) broke $100 billion in net assets for the first time on Nov. 21, according to data from Bloomberg Intelligence.

Bitcoin has dominated the ETF landscape since spot BTC ETFs launched in January. Investor interest accelerated after crypto-friendly President-elect Donald Trump prevailed on Nov. 5 in the US elections.

Collectively, BTC ETFs now manage approximately $104 billion. They are on track to surpass gold ETFs in net assets, which together hold approximately $120 billion in assets under management (AUM) as of Nov. 21, according to Bitcoin Archive.

Bitcoin ETFs are “now 97% of way to passing Satoshi as biggest holder and 82% of way to passing gold ETFs,” Eric Balchunas, an ETF analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence, said in a Nov. 21 post on the X platform.

Source: Bitcoin Archive

BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) leads the pack, pulling $30 billion in net inflows since January, according to Bloomberg data.

Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) has been the second most popular BTC ETF, seeing inflows of more than $11 billion so far this year, per Bloomberg.

The crypto market surged following Trump’s victory in the US presidential election, as many believe his win will benefit the industry, Cointelegraph Research said.

Spot BTC traded at more than $96,000 as of Nov. 21, up nearly 120% since the start of 2024, according to Google Finance data.

Nov. 6 was IBIT’s “biggest volume day ever” as investors flocked to cryptocurrencies after Trump’s election win, Balchunas said in a Nov. 6 X post.

On Nov. 7, IBIT clocked $1.1 billion in inflows, reclaiming inflow status after two consecutive days of outflows totaling $113.3 million, according to Farside data.

Source: Bloomberg Intelligence

BTC is expected to top somewhere between $100,000 and $150,000 per coin, MV Global said.

BlackRock’s IBIT now holds more assets than the asset manager’s gold ETF despite only launching in January, data from BlackRock shows.

Investors are turning toward gold and BTC in a so-called “debasement trade” as they brace for a “catastrophic scenario” amid rising geopolitical tensions, according to an Oct. 3 report by JPMorgan.

With the Russian army relentlessly seizing more territory while mounting casualties, power outages, and aggressive conscription tactics make life miserable for everyone, half of Ukrainians have had enough: They now want their government to pursue a deal that ends the war as soon as possible.  

According to the latest Gallup polls, 52% of Ukrainians agreed with the statement “Ukraine should seek to negotiate an ending to the war as soon as possible.”  That’s substantially more than the 38% who said the country should “continue fighting until it wins the war.” These are huge shifts in sentiment from polls taken in 2022. Then, 73% of Ukrainians were gung-ho about fighting to victory, while only 22% were eager for a speedy, negotiated end to the conflict. 

Of those who want a negotiated end to the war, 52% say Ukraine should be willing to make territorial concessions; 38% disagreed. Meanwhile, among the “keep-fighting” crowd, the definition of victory is starting to bend to realities on the ground. Last year, 93% of them defined victory as Ukraine regaining all territory, even Crimea. That’s now dropped to 81%.   

In a sign that fewer Ukrainians view the United States government as part of the solution, more Ukrainians think the European Union and the United Kingdom should play “a significant role” in peace negotiations than the United States. The poll was taken in October; at the time, more Ukrainians wanted a potential Kamala Harris administration to play a significant role than a Donald Trump one. 

The important new read on sentiment inside Ukraine comes days after President Biden gave the green light for a major escalation of the war, by authorizing Ukraine to use the long-range, US-made MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System to strike deeper into Russian territory. Ukraine quickly put its new permission to work, striking a Russian military facility near the city of Karachev in the Bryansk region — about 71 miles from the Ukraine border. 

Biden’s policy change prompted Russian President Vladimir Putin to threaten a “symmetrical” response, enabling strikes against the United States by third parties: 

“If someone considers it possible to supply such weapons to a combat zone to strike our territory and create problems for us, then why do we not have the right to supply our weapons of the same class to those regions of the world from which the strikes will be carried out on sensitive objects of those countries that do this in relation to Russia? That is, the answer may be symmetrical. We will think about it.”

On Tuesday, Putin signed off on an update to Russia’s nuclear weapons policy. Under the revised doctrine, a conventional attack on Russia that is enabled by a nuclear power will be considered a joint attack by the two actors. More chillingly, Russia will now consider nuclear retaliation for conventional attacks by a nuclear power.

Since Ukraine is constantly — if dubiously — touted as an exemplary democracy, let’s hope its government yields to its citizens’ growing desire for peace before it’s too late for all of us. 

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

I have previously written about the dubious investigations of the shooting of Ashli Babbitt on Jan. 6th and the alleged violation of the standards for the use of lethal force by the officer who shot her. I strongly disagreed with the findings of investigations by the Capitol Police and the Justice Department in clearing Captain Michael Byrd, who shot the unarmed protester. Now, Just the News has an alarming report of the record of Byrd that only magnifies these concerns.

Liberal politicians and pundits often refer to multiple deaths from the Jan. 6th riot. In reality, only one person died that day, and that was Babbitt, who was shot while trying to climb through a window.

However, the media lionized Byrd and portrayed the killing of the unarmed Babbitt as clearly justified. That is in sharp contrast to the approach that the media has taken in other shootings by law enforcement.

An unjustified killing by police on that day was inconsistent with the public narrative pushed by the pundits and the press.

As I have previously written, what occurred on Jan. 6th was a disgrace. However, it was a riot, not an insurrection. (It was certainly not an act of terrorism as claimed by some Democratic politicians). A protest at the Capitol resulted in a complete breakdown of the inadequate security precautions, a failure that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi privately admitted but only recently was disclosed.

The failure of Pelosi and others to properly prepare for the protest, despite the offer of President Donald Trump of 10,000 National Guard troops, does not excuse the conduct of the rioters who attacked the Capitol, interrupted the constitutional process, and committed property damage.

Babbitt was one of those rioters. She was wrong in her actions, but the penalty for breaking a window and unauthorized entry is not death in this country. I previously spoke with her mother, Micki Witthoeft, and her husband, Aaron Babbitt, about their continuing effort to expose what occurred that day.

The new report confirms what many of us had previously heard about the Byrd controversy.

Babbitt, 35, was an Air Force veteran and Trump supporter who participated in the riot three years ago. She was clearly committing criminal acts of trespass, property damage, and other offenses.  However, the question is whether an officer is justified in shooting a protester when he admits that he did not see any weapon before discharging his weapon.

Just to recap what we previously discussed in the earlier column:

When protesters rushed to the House chamber, police barricaded the chamber’s doors; Capitol Police were on both sides, with officers standing directly behind Babbitt. Babbitt and others began to force their way through, and Babbitt started to climb through a broken window. That is when Byrd killed her.

At the time, some of us familiar with the rules governing police use of force raised concerns over the shooting. Those concerns were heightened by the DOJ’s bizarre review and report, which stated the governing standards but then seemed to brush them aside to clear Byrd.

The DOJ report did not read like any post-shooting review I have read as a criminal defense attorney or law professor. The DOJ statement notably does not say that the shooting was justified. Instead, it stressed that “prosecutors would have to prove not only that the officer used force that was constitutionally unreasonable, but that the officer did so ‘willfully.’” It seemed simply to shrug and say that the DOJ did not believe it could prove “a bad purpose to disregard the law” and that “evidence that an officer acted out of fear, mistake, panic, misperception, negligence, or even poor judgment cannot establish the high level of intent.”

While the Supreme Court, in cases such as Graham v. Connor, has said that courts must consider “the facts and circumstances of each particular case,” it has emphasized that lethal force must be used only against someone who is “an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others, and … is actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by flight.” Particularly with armed assailants, the standard governing “imminent harm” recognizes that these decisions must often be made in the most chaotic and brief encounters.

Under these standards, police officers should not shoot unarmed suspects or rioters without a clear threat to themselves or fellow officers. That even applies to armed suspects who fail to obey orders. Indeed, Huntsville police officer William “Ben” Darby was convicted of killing a suicidal man holding a gun to his head. Despite being cleared by a police review board, Darby was prosecuted, found guilty, and sentenced to 25 years in prison, even though Darby said he feared for the safety of himself and fellow officers. Yet law professors and experts who have praised such prosecutions in the past have been conspicuously silent over the shooting of an unarmed woman who had officers in front of and behind her on Jan. 6.

Byrd went public soon after the Capitol Police declared that “no further action will be taken” in the case. He then demolished the two official reviews that cleared him.

Byrd described how he was “trapped” with other officers as “the chants got louder” with what “sounded like hundreds of people outside of that door.” He said he yelled for all of the protesters to stop: “I tried to wait as long as I could. I hoped and prayed no one tried to enter through those doors. But their failure to comply required me to take the appropriate action to save the lives of members of Congress and myself and my fellow officers.”

Byrd could just as well have hit the officers behind Babbitt, who was shot while struggling to squeeze through the window.

Of all of the lines from Byrd, this one stands out: “I could not fully see her hands or what was in the backpack or what the intentions are.” So, Byrd admitted he did not see a weapon or an immediate threat from Babbitt beyond her trying to enter through the window. Nevertheless, Byrd boasted, “I know that day I saved countless lives.” He ignored that Babbitt was the one person killed during the riot. (Two protesters died of natural causes and a third from an amphetamine overdose; one police officer died the next day from natural causes, and four officers have committed suicide since then.) No other officers facing similar threats shot anyone in any other part of the Capitol, even those who were attacked by rioters armed with clubs or other objects.

The new report confirms prior accounts that Byrd had prior disciplinary and training issues. According to Just the News, they included “a failed shotgun qualification test, a failed FBI background check for a weapon’s purchase, a 33-day suspension for a lost weapon and referral to Maryland state prosecutors for firing his gun at a stolen car fleeing his neighborhood.”

Given this history and the shooting of Babbitt, Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., the chair of the House Administration Oversight Subcommittee investigation, wrote to express concern over Byrd’s promotion to captain. Those incidents included Byrd firing at a car and allegedly misrepresenting the incident in claiming that “he fired at a vehicle trying to strike him when the evidence fellow officers found at the scene indicated he shot at the vehicle after it had already passed him and no longer posed a threat.” The letter states the Office of Professional Responsibility found that the evidence did not support his claim and “OPR concluded that the evidence suggests Byrd ‘discharged his service weapon at the vans after they passed him by.’”

The concern is that the political environment — and powerful interests in Congress — demanded that Byrd be cleared. As discussed in my new book, “The Indispensable Right,” the Justice Department had publicly pledged to bring “shock and awe” in prosecuting anyone associated with the riot. Finding that the only person killed that day was an unjustified shooting would not exactly fit with the narrative.

The incidents also include allegations of improper handling of his weapon, including reports that Byrd left his service weapon in a public bathroom in the Capitol Visitor Center complex used by tourists and visitors.

The Babbitt family has continued to fight to force the facts into the open and has filed a civil case. A trial is now set for 2026.

Here is his letter detailing the disciplinary problems of Captain Byrd: 11.20.2024 Letter From Rep. Barry Loudermilk to USCP Chief of Police Manger.pdf

*  *  *

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”

One week after our viral “Dear Border Czar: This Nonprofit Boasts A List Of 400 Companies That Employ Migrants” note revealed the Tent Partnership for Refugees, an open border aligned nonprofit, funded by a Turkish billionaire who was a mega supporter of Kamala Harris, funneled migrants into factories via a complex network of settlement agencies, staffing agencies, and other nonprofits… 

Dear Border Czar: This Nonprofit Boasts A List Of 400 Companies That Employ Migrants https://t.co/LuwWdgOzgD

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) November 14, 2024

… Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita released a statement Wednseday, indicating his office has sent a civil investigative demand (CID) to Tyson Foods’ meat factory in Logansport, Indiana, seeking information about human labor trafficking. 

When you have an open border and an influx of people coming over illegally by the millions, we can’t have companies incentivizing this criminal behavior by offering jobs for cheap labor. It’s not fair to those looking for employment or to our law enforcement, local hospitals and… pic.twitter.com/M4NwW7bPIk

— AG Todd Rokita (@AGToddRokita) November 20, 2024

Rokita’s office stated, “Tyson Foods may be in possession, custody, or control of documentary materials or may have knowledge of facts that are relevant to an investigation being conducted concerning human labor trafficking and indecent nuisances.” 

Here’s where things get very interesting…

Attorney General Rokita announced he sent CIDs to Cass County Health Department, Logansport Community School Corp., Berry Global Group Inc., Tent Partnership for Refugees, God is Good, and Jackson County Industrial Development Corp. over this same growing issue.

On October 10, we first commented on the Tyson meatpacking plant in Logansport. 

First Springfield, Then Charleroi, Now Migrant Crisis Swamps This Small Indiana Town https://t.co/g1ev2yZwi7

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 10, 2024

The investigation is focused on the complex web of nonprofits, “refugee resettlement” organizations, and employers like Tyson Foods… 

We first revealed Tent’s questionable activity in funneling migrants into corporations as early as Much in a note titled “How Shadowy Network Of NGOs Supplies Mega-Corporations With Migrants To Exploit Cheap Labor.”

What’s very clear is that migrants did not aimlessly walk across Biden-Harris’ wide-open southern border and then find instant job placements that displaced and replaced blue-collar native-born workers. There is a massive NGO network, internationally and domestically, that channels unvetted migrants from foreign lands into US factories.

Last week, incoming “border czar,” Tom Homan, told “Fox & Friends” hosts, “Public safety threats and national security threats will be the priority…they pose the most danger to this country.” 

Homan said, “Where do we find most victims of sex trafficking and forced labor trafficking? At worksites...” 

Homan’s team will have a field day with Tent’s list of 400 companies that used their services to source low-cost, cheap migrants instead of holding job fairs for US citizens.

Tyson Foods must respond to the CID by December 4, 2024.

Lining America’s food supply chain with unvetted migrants raises significant national security concerns.