Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

New cases of tuberculosis globally reached a record high in 2023, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Roughly 8.2 million individuals were newly diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) last year, which is the highest number since the organization began monitoring the disease in 1995, the WHO said in an Oct. 29 statement.

“This represents a notable increase from 7.5 million reported in 2022, placing TB again as the leading infectious disease killer in 2023, surpassing COVID-19,” the WHO stated.

TB caused an estimated 1.25 million deaths last year, according to an Oct. 29 WHO report.

The total number of people falling ill with tuberculosis has been rising since 2021, the report said. Last year, 10.8 million individuals contracted the disease, a small increase from 10.7 million in the previous year, but much higher than the 10.1 million in 2020.

The WHO noted that most of the increase in TB cases between 2022 and 2023 reflected population growth. The rate of incidence largely remained similar in both years.

Just five nations accounted for 56 percent of new annual tuberculosis cases—India, Indonesia, China, the Philippines, and Pakistan.

Dr. Tereza Kasaeva, director of the organization’s Global Tuberculosis Program, called the numbers a “sobering reality,” stressing the need for collective action to deal with the issue. There is an “urgent need to tackle drug-resistant tuberculosis, a significant driver of antimicrobial resistance.”

“Reductions in the number of deaths from TB since 2022 and the slowing increase in the TB incidence rate are the result of substantial post-COVID recovery in TB diagnosis and treatment,” the report said.

The WHO noted that a key barrier to plugging diagnostic and treatment gaps among TB-affected individuals is the financial costs. Roughly 50 percent of individuals face medical costs that are more than 20 percent of their annual incomes, which the WHO called “catastrophic.”

“The fact that TB still kills and sickens so many people is an outrage when we have the tools to prevent it, detect it, and treat it,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

US Tuberculosis Situation

According to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there were 8,331 reported tuberculosis cases in the country in 2022. The agency further estimated that up to 13 million individuals in the United States could be living with latent or inactive infection.

“During 2020, TB case counts and incidence rates declined substantially, likely because of factors associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2021, TB case counts and incidence partially rebounded, but remained lower compared with 2019,” the agency said.

“In 2022, reported TB cases and incidence rates increased for the second year in a row, but remained lower compared with 2019 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.”

The CDC pointed to birth outside the United States as a “key risk factor” for tuberculosis. Incidence rate among non-U.S.-born individuals was 17.1 times higher compared to those born in the country.

While several types of bacteria can cause TB, the majority of American cases are from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the agency noted.

Symptoms include a cough that lasts for three weeks or longer, weakness or fatigue, coughing up blood, loss of appetite, fever, chills, and chest pain. The CDC warns that active TB can be fatal without proper treatment.

In April, Chicago’s Health Department revealed that some of the illegal immigrants who had recently entered the city had tuberculosis. The agency estimated that 10–20 percent of people who come from Central and South America already have latent tuberculosis.

California issued a health advisory in April, warning about a “substantial increase” in TB cases in the state. In 2023, California reported 2,100 tuberculosis infections, up 15 percent from the previous year.

In many cases, the individuals had latent TB before the disease became active, by which time it had spread to other individuals.

Larry Fink’s BlackRock appears to have used a PR agency to tap TikTok influencers for a launch event in New York City to promote a new exchange-traded fund focused on the top 20 US stocks. 

According to TikTok influencer Piper Cassidy Phillips, she and other influencers were invited “to an influencer event with BlackRock” earlier this week. They were invited to a wine bar in the West Village. 

Phillips said this was the first time she had seen a financial institution inviting influencers to an event to promote an ETF product. She added that Fink’s BlackRock worked with “a huge PR agency” to put on the event. 

Phillips discussed the iShares Top 20 US Stocks ETF (TOPT) in the video, which is focused on the 20 largest US stocks by market capitalization. 

I cannot believe BlackRock invited a bunch of influencers to their ETF a launch party like it’s a tequila brand. Truly incredible stuff pic.twitter.com/tpwVftMKTf

— SPANE (Sperrys and Nike Elites) (@SperrysandNikes) October 31, 2024

Many of Phillips’ followers on the Chinese social media platform were upset that BlackRock used influencers to promote financial products to retail investors.

“FINRA is gonna have a field day with this one,” one TikToker wrote. 

X users respond…

Here’s where we are in the cycle. 

“Selling your soul to BlackRock for a couple bucks,” another TikTok said. 

Authored by Kevin Finn via AmericanThinker.com,

Earlier on, I argued why I think it’s useful to debate Leftists online, knowing that it’s unlikely they” change their minds on anything.

It’s good practice as it forces us to learn their arguments and how to counter them, and there are usually others silently following along who can be convinced.

But another Leftist tactic is psychological projection, which is ascribing to another person one’s own feelings, thoughts, or attitudes.

Projection is used to relieve a sense of guilt or other unpleasant feeling. Blaming your own problems on someone else seems to be de rigueur in our society of late.

It’s worth noting that there is a great deal of overlap between lying and projection.

In some cases the circles on the Venn diagram would exactly coincide.

Accusations of hypocrisy are also common and it’s worth pointing out the difference between it and projection.

In brief, hypocrisy reflects on one’s own behavior while projection concerns oneself and one’s behavior towards others.

It would be hypocritical for person (A) who frequently rolls past stop signs to say that person (B) should always observe stop signs. It would be projection for person (A) to silently assume person (B) rolls past stop signs. It would be both hypocritical and projection for person (A) to falsely accuse person (B) of rolling past stop signs.

In today’s heated socio-political climate I contend that we’re seeing both hypocrisy and projection being utilized on a daily basis. How many times have we heard a Leftist claim that Donald Trump is “a threat to our democracy”?

The better question to ask is, “Who on the Left has not made that claim?”

The people attesting to this have been noticeably silent on the case of the FBI lying to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in their quest for surveillance warrants on Carter Page.

How much of a threat to democracy was it to conduct what amounts to a coup to remove a sitting president in the final months of his campaign and replace him with someone who never earned a single primary vote? Has that ever happened before in America?

Practically every outlet in the Democrat Media Industrial Complex (DMIC) has accused Trump of being an authoritarian, a tyrant and a dictator. They cite examples such as President Trump is “tearing up trade deals and stepping back from global institutions.” The Paris climate greement placed unfair restrictions on Americans, even while “U.S. emissions of criteria air pollutants that impact human health and the environment declined by 74% between 1970 and 2018.”

President Trump cancelled the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran which enriched the regime while doing little to nothing to curb their nuclear ambitions.

The people who decried these decisions either cheered or were silent when President Biden transferred student loan obligations to the taxpayers despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that it was unconstitutional to do so.

Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senators Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris supported the impeachment of President Trump for his telephone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky with “no one is above the law.”

When the transcript of that phone call was released, it was found that President Trump did not, in fact threaten to withhold military aid in exchange for an investigation into Burisma Holdings. At the time, Burisma was paying Hunter Biden $85k/month for … what, his expertise in the extraction, processing, sale and distribution of petroleum products? Joe Biden is on video bragging about withholding U.S. aid to Ukraine unless they fired the prosecutor who was investigating Burisma Holdings.

Response from the Left? Crickets.

The same Leftists who pilloried President Trump for an innocent phone call to President Zelensky gave a pass to then Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton when she illegally used private electronic devices to send and receive classified information, and then destroyed both the messages and the devices after they were subpoenaed by Congress.

The reason for the pass? They claimed she didn’t intend to do anything wrong and “Because the government is awash in secrets, they are regularly mishandled unintentionally.” In other words, “She didn’t mean any harm and besides, everybody else is doing it!”

I wonder how often Secretary of State Clinton emailed President Obama on one of those illegal devices. All emails to the POTUS must be cleared through the White House Communications Agency (WHCA). Ms. Clinton was not using a .gov email address, which means that WHCA and President Obama knew that she was using unauthorized devices. I suspect that when James Comey said that: “No reasonable prosecutor would indict Secretary Clinton” that he was protecting Obama, and not Ms. Clinton.

Those are just a few of the more egregious examples of Leftists employing projection against their opponents in order to distract from their own nefarious actions. The fact that Leftists were engaging in the same, or worse actions that they were falsely accusing Donald Trump and others of committing reveals an entrée of Projection with a side order of Hypocrisy. There are many, many more examples.

For example, Democrats have claimed that:

• – Republicans suppress voters while Democrats founded the KKK, enacted Jim Crow Laws and, more recently committed so many suspicious actions during the 2020 and 2022 elections that Americans have lost faith in our elections.

• – Republicans carried out an insurrection while Leftists rioted nation-wide in 2020.

• – Republicans are Nazis while Democrats imprison grandmothers who pray in front of abortion clinics.

• – President Trump is Putin’s stooge while the Biden family takes cash from Russia, China and Ukraine.

In all of these examples the accusations against Republicans are false (lies) while Democrats have engaged in those or similar behaviors themselves.

So where do we go from here? Speaking for myself, whenever I come across a claim against conservatives or Republicans from Leftists or Democrats I immediately assume that not only is the opposite true, but that their accusation is probably more accurately applied to the Left. This means that to determine the truth I need to investigate the story and find out what isn’t being told. I spend a great deal of time every day sifting through news stories on various news sites. I no longer get my news from the television or print media. This is what I think we all need to do in order to be properly informed.

“An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people.” –author unknown

Just when it seemed that Nvidia’s recent record rally was in danger of fizzling, a Deus Ex Machina arrived late on Friday when the determinations committee of S&P Dow Jones Indices, the owner of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, announced that Nvidia would replace Intel on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (which has clearly become anything but), a shakeup to the blue-chip index that replaces a flagging semiconductor company with the primary vendor of GPUs for AI. Separately, Sherwin Williams will unironically replace one-time chemical giant (and Dow Jones eponym), Dow, Inc, in the average as well. The switch will take place on Nov. 8.

Intel shares were down 1% in extended trading on Friday. Nvidia shares rose 1%.

Nvidia shares have climbed over 180% so far in 2024 as investors bet the company has emerged as the primary beneficiary of the AI boom. The fast rise of Nvidia on the back of its data center AI processors has led it to be one of only a handful of companies with a market cap over $3 trillion, alongside Microsoft and Apple, both of which are already included in the DJIA.

Over the last five years, NVDA and The Dow look a little different but we are sure it will fit right in…

On the other hand, Intel shares have tumbled more than 50% so far this year as the company struggles with manufacturing challenges, new competition for its central processors, and the sad reality that this once glorious chipmaker has missed out on the AI trend.

The Dow contains 30 components and is weighted by the share price of the individual stocks instead of the companies total market value. Nvidia put itself in better position in May, when the company announced a 10-for-1 stock split. While doing nothing to its market cap, the move slashed the price of each share by 90%, allowing it to become a part of the Dow without having too heavy a weighting.

The switch is the first change to the index since February, when Amazon replaced Walgreens Boots Alliance. Over the years, the industrial-heavy Dow has been playing catch up and gaining exposure to the largest technology companies. With the addition of Nvidia, four of the six trillion-dollar tech companies are now in the index. The two not in the index are Alphabet and Meta.

The 30 companies that make up the DJIA currently are shown below:

• 3M
• American Express
• Amgen
• Amazon
• Apple
• Boeing
• Caterpillar
• Chevron
• Cisco
• Coca-Cola
• Disney
• Dow
• Goldman Sachs
• Home Depot
• Honeywell
• IBM
• Intel
• Johnson & Johnson
• JPMorgan Chase
• McDonald’s
• Merck
• Microsoft
• Nike
• Procter & Gamble
• Salesforce
• Travelers
• UnitedHealth Group
• Verizon
• Visa
• Walmart

Some will point out that such Dow Jones moves tend to be a bottom or top tick opportunity, and point to the August 2020 switch in the Dow Jones when Salesforce replaced Exxon. Since then XOM has more than doubled, while CRM is unchanged.

Will the Dow Jones also top-tick Nvidia this time, while unleashing a new golden age for Intel?

Update (1836ET): After the MSM spent the day in histrionics peddling the falsehood that Trump said Liz Cheney should face a firing squad, – when he was simply calling her a chickenhawk – CNN panelist Jonah Goldberg offered a mea culpa, and has retracted his claim that Trump called for Cheney’s execution.

“This morning on CNN I referred to Trump’s “rifles” quote as him advocating a ‘firing squad’ for Liz Cheney,” said Goldberg. “I was wrong to say he was calling for a firing squad execution. After I said that, my co-panelist, Brad Todd made the case that I was wrong.”

“I let my disgust at Trump’s comments get the better of me as this was the first time I’d heard them.“

Watch:

NEW: The media’s disinformation campaign to confuse voters over Trump’s Liz Cheney comment appears to be backfiring.

Columnist Jonah Goldberg, who falsely claimed on CNN that Trump wanted to execute Cheney, has issued a ‘correction’ for spreading the false story.

Goldberg,… pic.twitter.com/9DBGtxOWgP

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 1, 2024

This is going to make the decision by Arizona attorney general Kris Mayes (D-ildo) to investigate Trump’s remarks look even more idiotic.

Naturally, this will be strongly condemned by everyone who says he’s worried about the spread of misinformation and opposed to the abuse of government power for partisan purposes. https://t.co/5fuAObNqdM

— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) November 1, 2024

Meanwhile the nevertrumps are fighting, with Joe Walsh of all people defending the former president.

Respectfully my friend, posting that 11 second clip without the context of what he was saying is deceptive. You should have posted the entirety of what he said. Thanks

— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) November 1, 2024

*  *  *

The left has fabricated a new hit on Donald Trump – suggesting that he said Liz Cheney should be executed after he clearly said she should fight in the wars she advocates for.

While discussing Cheney with Tucker Carlson, Trump said:

“She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, ok? Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.

“You know they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying ‘oh gee, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.”

🚨TRUMP: “Dick Cheney’s daughter is a very dumb individual. She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with 9 barrels shooting at her, let’s see how she feels about it when the guns trained on her face. They’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in… pic.twitter.com/Wzq4BBiP8C

— Autism Capital 🧩 (@AutismCapital) November 1, 2024

Here’s Drudge:

Here’s CNN:

WATCH: Donald Trump suggests @Liz_Cheney should be fired upon

It’s an escalation of his violent rhetoric

My open of today’s @CNNThisMorning

Cheney just responded to Trump — shown below https://t.co/85RJ5VGZG3 pic.twitter.com/oxV0taVsEk

— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) November 1, 2024

CNBC‘s Jim Cramer and Karl Quesadilla:

On @CNBC @jimcramer & @carlquintanilla said multiple times Trump said Liz Cheney should face a firing squad. Has journalism become a bad game of telephone, where each misquotes the next outlet? Again, @NBCNews constantly chides X about misinformation, but let’s this crap air. https://t.co/T9qgCXyHNM

— Charlie Harper (@CharlieBHarper) November 1, 2024

Here’s Politico senior political columnist repeating the ‘firing squad’ lie (Jonathan you typically don’t give the condemned their own rifle in a firing squad situation):

And the willingness to explain away, well-what-he-really-meant by the firing squad is my point: no price too steep to pay to rationalize an aberrant figure https://t.co/lfvZq2pQOz

— Jonathan Martin (@jmart) November 1, 2024

KamalaHQ seized and pounced:

You’re spreading propaganda, again! Watch his full remarks!

President Trump was talking about how Liz Cheney wants to send America’s sons and daughters to fight in wars despite never being in a war herself. pic.twitter.com/oWr1eEIEoV

— Eddie (@Eddies_X) November 1, 2024

Anyone with an IQ north of double-digits sees this for what it is:

Even a Vox reporter is honest enough not only to tell corporate media that they’re outright lying about what Trump said about Liz Cheney, but that it’s what liberals said for decades.

And yes: if Trump called for a firing squad, why we he say Liz should be given a rifle?😂 https://t.co/MfURnUxfmj

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) November 1, 2024

I understand the muppet babies for whom this is their first election, but seasoned journalists? “Chickenhawk” and “would you send your own son??” were standard lines 2002-2008. Not a single human being thought the Michael Moore’s of the world were threatening Bush and Cheney. https://t.co/mMfUbzEAaL

— T. Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) November 1, 2024

@CNBC

Trump never threatened Cheney you fucking headline liars. Educate yourself. Show the clip of the Tucker interview liberal assholes.

This show with activist Carl Quantnilla is a liberal cesspool. It’s unwatchable.

Lies lies and more liberal lies!

— CrashDavis (@CrashDavis8) November 1, 2024

I don’t support Donald Trump but I also don’t support journalists lying to their audiences, and when he says (paraphrased) “these pro-war people wouldn’t be talking such a big game if they were on the front lines” it is actually not the same thing as saying they should be shot https://t.co/kyVtfjkv8e

— Kat Rosenfield (@katrosenfield) November 1, 2024

Meanwhile…

Like clockwork, DNC operative and Biden WH official @neeratanden, along with scores of liberals, scream at this Vox reporter for telling the truth, in order to signal to other journalists that the liberal mob will castigate them if they do the same:https://t.co/6SKj3G6DVg

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) November 1, 2024

Authored by Monica O’Shea via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Prominent U.S. conservative commentator Candace Owens has disputed allegations that she would incite discord in Australia after the Albanese government rejected her visa application.

Owens expressed concern about Palestine deaths and said the claims against her were “untrue” during a podcast to millions of online viewers.

This comes after Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said on Oct. 27 that “Australia’s national interest is served when Candace Owens is somewhere else.”

“From downplaying the impact of the Holocaust with comments about Mengele through to claims that Muslims started slavery, Candace Owens has the capacity to incite discord in almost every direction,” he told reporters.

In response, Owens expressed shock on her show, The Candace podcast, explaining that she found out about her visa cancellation at the “same time as the press.”

“This is supposed to be a private application process, so unless I spoke about this, no one should have known about this, but they chose to leak this, which I think is absolutely stunning,” she said.

“I am just very interested in what goes on in this country, which is supposed to be a free country, but I guess the immigration minister can unilaterally make this sort of decision.”

She explained she had travelled all over the world, from China to Tokyo, Hungary, Croatia, Italy, and France, and had never been in any trouble.

“And yet the reason that he gave to the public was because I had the capacity to incite discord in almost every direction … of course that’s not true,” she added.

“I have no idea how you are alleging I am both anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic. Again all of this is just to try to present me as some sort of very scary person akin to Adolph Hitler.”

Concerns About Palestine Deaths

Owens, who has 5.8 million followers on X and 5.4 million followers on Instagram, said that people do not want her to get in front of an audience, adding that the “audience understands what the reason is.”

She goes on to explain her concern about the ongoing violence in Gaza.

“I am not comfortable with the amount of death that is taking place in Palestine. And that’s where I am at. I have made my bed, I have chosen to lie in it,” she said.

“To me, I am not going to remove my humanity for money. It doesn’t work for me, it doesn’t work for me as a Christian.”

Owens, 35, parted with the Daily Wire in March, and converted from Protestantism to Catholicism in April 2024. Her husband, George Farmer, is a devout Catholic.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Owens criticised Australia’s lockdown policies, calling the country’s response “totalitarian” and suggesting troops should be deployed to Australia.

She also played a major role in opposing Black Lives Matter and co-founding Blexit, a movement that stands for “Black Exit” from victimhood mentality.

Tickets Still Available Amid Potential Legal Action

Tickets for the Candace Owens Live 2024 tour in Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Brisbane, and Adelaide are still available from $95 online for general admission. In Adelaide, a VIP Meet and Greet session at $295 per person is sold out.

Multiple Australian ticket pages for the event confirm Owens is planning to file an appeal and will process a refund if this fails.

“The Event Organiser and Candace Owens have confirmed they will be filing an appeal, and the case will be reviewed by a federal judge in the coming days,” the notice states.

“While they are optimistic about a favourable outcome, should the appeal be denied and cancellation become necessary, we will promptly notify all ticket holders and begin processing refunds automatically on the organiser’s behalf. Thank you for your understanding.”

On her X page, Owens shared a post by Australian political and economic commentator John Adams stating that an appeal would be filed against the decision of Minister Burke.

“I wonder whether the Federal Court of Australia is brave enough to allow Australians to listen to a black Catholic woman and make up their own minds,” the post states.

John Ruddick, NSW Libertarian Member of the Legislative Council, said Candace Owens should not be banned from Australia, explaining what anyone thinks of Candace Owens’ views should be immaterial.

He said Australia should let everyone in to speak and then the Australian people can “weigh it up.”

“In the age of the internet, it is absurd to try and prevent anyone’s views being heard,” Ruddick said.

“It is counter-productive state-sponsored vindictiveness against certain views. As Martin Luther King taught us, let freedom reign … especially the freedom to share ideas that some politicians and bureaucrats think are dangerous.”

Podcaster Joe Rogan said in an Oct. 30 episode of his show that he gave Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign an “open invitation” to sit down for an interview at any time.

“I said anytime. I said if she’s done at 10, we’ll come back here at 10. I’ll do it at 9 in the morning, I’ll do it at 10 p.m. I’ll do it at midnight if she’s up, if she wants to, you know, drink a Red Bull,” he said, recalling what he told the campaign.

Rogan’s show features around 14 million subscribers on Spotify, making it the top show on the platform, but it also generates significant traffic and engagement on YouTube.

His interview with former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, released late last week, has garnered more than 41 million views on YouTube so far.

While speaking to comedians Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster during episode 2220 of The Joe Rogan Experience…

…Rogan said that Harris “actually reached out when she found out that [Trump] was coming on.”

“So their camp reached out to me,” he said.

“So I said, ‘Great, I would love to talk to her.’ But it was very difficult to tie it down. They wanted [me] to travel, and see, the thing is, if I go somewhere, then there’s going to be other people in the room. And they want to control a lot of things, I’m sure.”

As The Epoch Times’ Jack Phillips reported, Harris was in Houston last week and held a rally there featuring an endorsement and speech from pop singer Beyoncé.

In a social media post earlier this week, Rogan said that the Harris campaign had conditions for the Democratic presidential nominee to do the interview.

The Epoch Times previously reached out to the campaign, which has not responded to Rogan’s remarks, for comment.

“For the record, the Harris campaign has not passed on doing the podcast,” Rogan wrote in a social media post on Tuesday.

“They offered a date for Tuesday, but I would have had to travel to her, and they only wanted to do an hour. I strongly feel the best way to do it is in the studio in Austin. My sincere wish is to just have a nice conversation and get to know her as a human being. I really hope we can make it happen.”

During the episode with Kisin and Foster, Rogan also addressed speculation that he might be a covert Trump supporter.

“Just because of my appearance, there’s always been this assumption that I’m some right-wing MAGA guy,” he said, referring to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan.

“I’m a politically homeless person for sure. You know, I always considered myself a left-wing person. I never thought I would ever vote right-wing, but then the tides of culture shifted in a very bizarre way. And it just made me, over time, much more aware of what this stuff is really all about.”

Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), will also air on Rogan’s show after being interviewed at Rogan’s Austin studio on Wednesday.

Both Trump and Harris have engaged in a flurry of campaigning as the race draws to a close. Both candidates have taken part in several podcasts ahead of the 2024 General Election as they attempt to reach new audiences.

More than 60 million people have cast early ballots so far ahead of the Nov. 5 contest, according to data released by the University of Florida’s Election Lab.

The Epoch Times contacted the Harris campaign for comment about Rogan’s claims but didn’t receive a reply by publication time.

Authored by Ken Silva via Headline USA,

There were two snipers posted inside the second floor of the AGR building used by alleged gunman Thomas Crooks to shoot at Donald Trump. Both failed to spot Crooks before his assassination attempt.

Ever since then, excuses have been made for the failure of the local snipers, Greg Nicol and Mike Murcko. Local officials have insisted that the snipers didn’t have a vantage of Crooks, and would have had to lean out of their windows to see him on the rooftop. Meanwhile, some media members have reported rumors that Nicol locked himself out of the building while searching for Crooks—and that the shooting happened right when Murcko went downstairs to let him back inside.

However, a time-stamped transcript of encrypted radio communications from July 13 tells a different story—showing that both Murcko and Nicol received warnings about an armed man on the rooftop at least seven seconds before he opened fire, and that Murcko radioed that Crooks was down after the shooting. The transcript further reveals other new details about the July 13 Butler rally, raising still more questions in the process.

🚨EXCLUSIVE🚨We obtained a transcript of local law enforcement radio comms from the J13 Butler Trump rally.
The transcript appears damning for the local snipers who failed to spot Crooks from their 2nd-floor post inside the AGR building. For instance, it shows that those snipers… pic.twitter.com/LPT0FD2gYy

— Headline USA (@HeadlineUSA) October 28, 2024

The transcript was obtained by Headline USA via a Right to Know Law request. The Washington Post and Congress have both obtained and cited the same transcript—but they omitted key details, and they haven’t published the actual document.

This article marks the first publication of the full transcript. However, reader beware: The document includes a disclaimer that it’s “not a legal transcript of the radio transmissions,” and was only compiled to assist in making a rough timeline of events—a fact that neither the Post nor Congress has disclosed.

But while it’s incomplete, the transcript does appear to be damning for the local snipers. Indeed, it shows that Butler ESU Commander Ed Lenz was told there was a gunman on the AGR roof by 6:08 p.m., nearly three minutes before the shooting. Lenz responded to that information by telling local sheriffs that the man on the roof wasn’t one of his officers. For some reason, Lenz didn’t immediately relay that same info to Nicol and Murcko, who were on another channel, according to the transcript.

🚨NEW TRUMP SHOOTING REVELATIONS🚨
A previously secret transcript shows that Butler ESU commander Ed Lenz knew about an armed man being on the AGR rooftop by 6:08 p.m.–some 3 minutes before the assassination attempt.
The transcript also shows that Lenz told his local snipers… pic.twitter.com/Wr6JOodx9t

— Headline USA (@HeadlineUSA) October 28, 2024

Still, the transcript shows that Lenz did tell Nicol and Murcko that there was “a male on the roof with a long gun” at 6:11:25 p.m., which was about seven seconds before Crooks opened fire. Lenz was in the middle of his transmission when shooting began.

Seven seconds may not have been enough time for Murcko to respond before Crooks began firing, but another 15 seconds ticked off before a Secret Service sniper finally put the kill shot in him—meaning that Murcko and Nicol knew Crooks was on the rooftop for more than 20 seconds, but did nothing. Then, at 6:12:11 p.m., Murcko radioed that “shooter is down, 10Sierra3, shooter is down”—undermining the excuse that he couldn’t see Crooks from his post.

CORRECTION: I’ve obtained the transcript of local radio comms from Butler, which confirms that it was indeed Murcko–NOT Nicol–who radioed that the shooter was down.

I previously reported that it was Nicol, based on a report that the DHS commissioned. However, that DHS report… https://t.co/1TGoCNks9I pic.twitter.com/1RgKoWBo0G

— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) October 28, 2024

The transcript does appear to corroborate Nicol’s claim that he left his post to search for Crooks. About a minute after the shooting, Murcko says over the radio that he’s not sure where Nicol is—suggesting that he indeed left his post. Another minute later, a dashboard police camera shows Nicol leaving the first-floor exit of the AGR building.

Along with new details of the actual shooting, the transcript includes other previously unreported revelations about the leadup to the assassination attempt, including that officers apparently had someone detained around 6:03 p.m. Who they detained and why is still unclear, as part of the transcript is redacted. Butler County officials told Headline USA that the redaction was made to protect the identity of a minor who was reported missing at that time, but the redaction is about three lines long. This publication is appealing to remove the redaction.

Lenz didn’t respond to an email with details question about the transcript, including questions about why certain communications weren’t included in the document.

Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.

By Remix News

Volodymyr Zelensky accused Poland of finding more reasons not to help Ukraine on key issues, including refusing to shoot down Russian missiles or hand over MiG fighter jets to Kyiv. His choice of words, which hints at cowardice on Poland’s part, is likely to further inflame tensions between the two countries, which have been steadily growing apart.