Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Microsoft’s cyber threat assessment unit said on Aug. 9 that a high-ranking official on a U.S. presidential campaign had been hacked by an Iran-backed group, with the Trump campaign later revealing that it had been the target of a cyber attack and linked the breach to “foreign sources hostile to the United States.”

The report from the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center (MTAC) indicates that an Iranian group called Mint Sandstorm that is connected to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps sent a spear phishing email in June to a high-ranking official on a presidential campaign from the compromised email account belonging to a former senior campaign adviser.

“Mint Sandstorm similarly targeted a presidential campaign in May and June 2020 five to six months ahead of the last U.S. presidential election,” MTAC said, adding that the same group also tried but failed to breach an account belonging to a former presidential candidate.

No details were released on the official’s identity, but Microsoft’s threat assessment team said that the Iranian-linked breaches related to increasing attempts to influence the U.S. presidential election in November.

“This recent cyber-enabled influence activity arises from a combination of actors which are conducting initial cyber reconnaissance and seeding online personas and websites into the information space,” according to the report.

Following the release of the report, the Trump 2024 presidential campaign confirmed that it had been the target of a cyberattack in which campaign documents were stolen.

The breach, which Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung told Politico on Aug. 10 has been attributed to “foreign sources hostile to the United States,” marks a significant development in the area of foreign interference in U.S. elections as the race for the White House heats up.

Politico reported that, on July 22, it began receiving emails from an anonymous source using the alias “Robert.” The emails reportedly contained internal documents from the Trump campaign, including a 271-page research dossier on Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), who was vetted as a potential vice presidential nominee and later chosen as former President Donald Trump’s running mate.

Cheung pointed to the Microsoft report and its finding that Iranian hackers had broken into the account of a high-ranking official on the U.S. presidential campaign as evidence of involvement of a foreign hostile power in the Trump campaign breach.

“These documents were obtained illegally from foreign sources hostile to the United States, intended to interfere with the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our democratic process,” Cheung told the outlet.

He also linked the timing of the breach to reports of Iranian plots against Trump, who remains a target of Iranian hostility after ordering the 2020 assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani.

Cheung, who did not immediately respond to a request from The Epoch Times for more details of the development, declined to tell Politico whether the Trump campaign had contacted law enforcement in regards to the breach.

U.S. intelligence officials recently stated that Iran had been hard at work sowing political discord in the United States via the use of clandestine or ghost social media accounts. Iran has denied that such practices are taking place and said that any actions against the United States are purely defensive and do not involve cyber attacks.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) released a statement in July confirming that Iranian groups had targeted the U.S. political campaign, specifically that of Trump, to influence the upcoming election.

The U.S. intelligence community “has observed Tehran working to influence the presidential election, probably because Iranian leaders want to avoid an outcome they perceive would increase tensions with the United States,” the statement reads.

Microsoft’s report said that the hackers’ activity also covered a wider scope, including gaining intelligence on U.S. political campaigns, which allowed Iranian groups to target political swing states in the United States.

The report also stated that the previous breach involving the county official, which took place in May, was part of a wider “password spray operation.” This type of operation involves the use of common or leaked passwords, which hackers use on multiple accounts until they find a match and break into one.

The report confirmed that no other accounts were compromised through the breach and that all other targeted officials were notified of the cyber attack.

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

Should we be alarmed? 

Many of us have been watching the spread of a deadly new strain of Monkeypox for quite some time, and now it appears that this crisis is about to reach a boiling point.  It is being reported that the World Health Organization is going to hold an “emergency meeting” to determine whether or not to declare a “public health emergency of international concern” due to a rapidly growing outbreak of Monkeypox in central Africa.  For those that are not familiar, a “public health emergency of international concern” is the highest level of alert that the WHO issues.  For example, in January 2020 a “public health emergency of international concern” was declared when COVID started to spread like wildfire inside China. 

So could we now be on the verge of the next great global health scare?

Two years ago, an outbreak of Monkeypox quickly spread all over the planet, and it is truly a horrifying disease…

Mpox is a viral disease that causes painful rashes and flu-like symptoms such as fever, headaches and body aches. The virus that causes it comes from the same family as that of smallpox. It spreads from person to person and from animals to people through direct contact.

In May, scientists reported a new strain of the virus in the DRC that they said was more virulent and might spread more easily.

Right now, if you somehow got infected with the strain that spread throughout the world in 2022, there is a good chance that you would be in so much pain that you would actually believe that you were about to die.

But that strain was rarely fatal.

Unfortunately, this strain is much more deadly.

According to the head of the World Health Organization, this new strain has already killed more than 500 people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo so far this year…

The outbreak, which began in the Democratic Republic of the Congo but has spread recently to at least three other neighboring countries, has involved more than 14,000 reported cases so far this year alone, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, with at least 511 deaths reported.

Some experts believe that this new strain also spreads more easily.

Like the strain that spread all over the globe in 2022, this new strain spreads through sexual contact, but apparently it also spreads in other ways as well…

The CDC said in the alert that outbreaks in some provinces in the Democratic Republic of Congo have been associated with sexual contact.

In other parts of the country, however, patients have gotten sick through contact with infected animals, household transmission or patient care, the CDC said, adding that a high proportion of cases have been reported in children younger than 15.

“Most reported cases in known endemic provinces continue to be among children under 15 years of age,” the World Health Organization wrote on its website on June 14. “Infants and children under five years of age are at highest risk of severe disease and death.”

In 2022, very few children got infected.

But this time around lots of children are getting infected.

There had been hope that this outbreak could be confined to the Democratic Republic of Congo, but that didn’t happen.

At this point, confirmed cases have been detected in four nations that directly border the Democratic Republic of Congo…

The WHO said the virus has now ‘spread to previously unaffected provinces.’

In the past month, at least 50 Mpox cases have been reported in four other countries bordering the DRC – countries that have not experienced the virus before.

They include Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda.

The genie is out of the bottle.

What are they going to do now?

Well, it appears that the first step will be to declare a “public health emergency of international concern”…

World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Wednesday called an “emergency” meeting of international experts amidst growing worries over the mpox virus.

With mpox spreading outside of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Tedros said the WHO emergency committee would meet “as soon as possible” to advise him on “whether the outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern.”

When a “public health emergency of international concern” is officially declared, it will get a ton of media attention and that will really ramp up the fear level.

As I noted earlier, it is the “highest level of alert” that the WHO can issue…

PHEIC, the emergency classification Ghebreyesus referred to, is the W.H.O.’s highest level of alert. The W.H.O. declared a PHEIC over the novel coronavirus that was first detected in China in late January 2020.

Thankfully, there have been no confirmed cases outside of Africa yet.

But last week the CDC instructed doctors in the United States “to be on the lookout” for cases…

The Centers for Disease Control on Wednesday alerted doctors to be on the lookout for a deadly new strain of mpox spreading through parts of Africa while U.S. officials committed $424 million to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which is the epicenter of the outbreak.

What are they expecting?

Do they anticipate that there will soon be confirmed cases here in the United States?

Needless to say, such a development would deeply alarm millions of people.

Interestingly, the CDC is also instructing Americans to limit contact with animals at county fairs all over the nation due to concerns about the bird flu…

Your trip to the county fair might look a little different this year all because of avian influenza also known as “bird flu.”

Organizers across the U.S. are working to ensure their events do not lead to the spread of the virus.

Children under five, people 65 years and older, pregnant people, people with certain chronic medical conditions, and others are at a higher risk of developing serious flu complications and should limit contact with animals that could carry influenza viruses, if possible, according tothe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Will H5N1 cause more panic during the months ahead, or will it be Monkeypox?

We will just have to wait and see how all of this plays out.

In any event, it is just a matter of time before the next major health scare paralyzes the entire globe just like we witnessed a few years ago.

Even as you read this article, scientists in secret labs all over the planet are playing around with some of the deadliest diseases ever known to humanity, and as we have seen it is way too easy for an “accident” to happen.

We live at a time when great pestilences will be a constant threat, and fear of those great pestilences will cause chaos all over the world.

So buckle up and hold on tight, because what we went through before was just a preview of what is ahead.

*  *  *

Michael’s new book entitled “Chaos” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

As 20% of California suffers in poverty amid soaring power bills, soaring homelessness, businesses fleeing the state, and sky-high taxes, one might expect the state’s leadership to focus on solutions. Instead, Governor Gavin Newsom has taken a rather unconventional approach: hiring a celebrity photographer, Charles Ommanney, with a $200,000 annual salary to enhance his public image.

Yes, you read that right. In a state where many struggle to make ends meet, Newsom has brought on board a photographer known for capturing the likes of Mark Zuckerberg, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. Ommanney’s task? To ensure that the governor is photographed in his most flattering light, whether it’s wearing aviator sunglasses while picking up trash from a homeless encampment or surveying wildfire damage in designer workwear.

This new role, which was quietly created and filled without the usual fanfare, is particularly egregious amid the backdrop of California’s economic struggles. With Ommanney now a full-time member of the governor’s team, his photos aren’t just about documenting events—they’re about crafting a carefully curated image of Newsom as a hands-on leader, Politico reports.

And while residents suffer, their governor is ramping up his meticulously polished persona, perhaps with an eye on the national stage. Earlier this year, instead of delivering the traditional State of the State address, Newsom’s office produced a glossy video, complete with dramatic visuals—some of which were shot by Ommanney—highlighting national issues over local crises.

Izzy Gardon, a spokesperson for Newsom, defended the hire.

“Charles plays an instrumental role in communicating the work of state government across visual platforms — including social media, helping us meet Californians where they are at.”

Yet, it’s hard to overlook the absurdity of this situation: a governor who earns $234,101 annually is paying a photographer nearly as much to follow him around the state, capturing photos that are, in essence, taxpayer-funded PR.

In a time when California’s residents need real solutions and tangible action, the governor’s decision to prioritize a high-priced image consultant raises more than a few eyebrows. For a state in dire need of economic revival, the focus on optics over substance is a bitter pill to swallow.

Authored by Paul D. Thacker via The Disinformation Chronicle,

Hey guys, I had a piece last week in UnHerd discussing hundreds of emails I had gone through that found social media influencer Zeynep Tufekci pressured the prestigious medical nonprofit Cochrane to put out a statement attacking their own review that found there is little evidence that masks stop respiratory viruses. One of the people Tufekci interviewed for the piece also told me that she twisted his words, which is obvious from the emails.

I want to walk you through some of those emails, but if you’d like to read the piece in UnHerd, it’s here: How the NYT undermined mask evidence: Leaked emails reveal how scientists were smeared.

The emails were sent to me after someone had filed Freedom of Information requests at different universities, and I got others from a person at Cochrane who is upset at what is happening inside the organization. Let’s first set the stage for what happened.

Mask activist on the attack

In March 2023, New York Times columnist Zeynep Tufekci wrote an essay arguing that “masks work” while attacking a review on masks by Cochrane, which publishes the gold standard of evidence for medical interventions. When Tufekci’s piece first appeared, I knew it smelled fishy.

Just a month prior, I had published a long Q&A with Tom Jefferson, the lead author of the Cochrane 2023 mask review. Jefferson loves going into all kinds of details about the hierarchy of evidence, how reviews are done, the contrasts between different types of reviews, and other tiny bits of medical information that only interest people with decades of expertise in clinical trials and medical research.

In short, very hard to follow.

My interest in masks was to help readers cut through all the controversy, to understand whether they really help with COVID and if mask mandates make sense in their schools and local community. I had noticed videos and news stories circulating on social media pointing out that several public health officials had done a 180 from the early months of the pandemic, first stating that masks don’t work, before pivoting to advocate for masks.

I called this the “great mask-science flip flop of 2020” and participants included Canada’s chief health officer, Theresa Tam, as well as the leading public health official in England, Jenny Harries.

Even Tony Fauci performed a mask-science flip flop, first arguing that masks didn’t work, before pivoting into full-on mask activist.

As Jefferson kept rambling on with tiny details about how to perform medical reviews that nobody but an expert in medical reviews could really follow, I stopped him.

“Wait, did you just say that Cochrane has done this mask review several times?” I asked. “This isn’t the first one?”

“Yes,” he replied.

So we went down the list. The Cochrane mask review published in February 2023 wasn’t the first time Cochrane scientists had examined the scientific literature to see if there was any evidence masks worked to stop viruses. They had published prior updates finding the same thing in 2020, 2011 2010, 2009, and 2007.

So the whole thing started 17 years ago.

Every time Cochrane has put out a review that looked at masks, nobody said anything, because masking wasn’t controversial. Everyone agreed that masks didn’t seem to stop viruses. Physicians had first started using masks over a hundred years ago but that was to stop spreading bacteria during surgery. And bacteria are hundreds of times larger than viruses.

I then started digging around and found several scientific studies concluding masks don’t do much to stop respiratory viruses, as well as several examples of international medical bodies drawing similar conclusions. For example, the World Health Organizations stated in their 2019 pandemic preparedness plan, “There have been a number of high-quality randomised controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrating that personal protective measures such as hand hygiene and face masks have, at best, a small effect on influenza transmission.”

So why was I reading a “masks work” essay in the New York Times?

The only explanation is Zeynep Tufekci. I didn’t really know Tufekci until I read her “masks work” essay last year, and when I looked into her background I found that she was mostly unknown in the scientific world until COVID. Once the pandemic started she made a name for herself writing essays in places like Wired and Scientific American. Intrigued, I looked into her academic publishing record and found that her academic CV was a tad barren, with few peer-reviewed studies but a slew of opinion articles.

Plus, Tufecki has no training in medicine or public health.

I then discovered that her profile had exploded in March 2020 when a New York Times media reporter praised Tufekci for a March 1 tweetstorm and March 17 essay in The New York Times that swayed the CDC to alter federal guidance and begin advising people to mask.

As I read the article praising Tufekci, I started laughing at how crazy it was that national policy could be set by tweets and an essay, not anything published by scientists. It was just so bizarre.

Tufekci has bounced around to different universities in the past four years, but at the beginning of the pandemic, she was a professor at the University of North Carolina. North Carolina’s big paper is the Raleigh News & Observer, and I found that they profiled Tufekci in 2021, anointing her a COVID hero who had challenged top health officials and got the facts right — but with essays, not science.

Instead of conducting lab experiments related to Covid-19, she used her platform on Twitter and in the opinion sections of Scientific American, The Atlantic and The New York Times to inform the public with practical advice about what to do and why.

I read that newspaper article thinking, “Thank God Tufekci didn’t use her platform on Twitter to challenge airline pilots at Raleigh-Durham International that she could fly a 747 to London’s Heathrow.”

And then I got the emails.

Opinions mean nothing, emails and documents everything

One of the first things I noticed was that Tufecki had emailed Michael Brown, a physician at Michigan State University, on February 24, 2023. According to other emails, I learned that Michael Brown had been the sign off editor for the mask review.

Why, I wondered, had Tufekci contacted Brown at this time?

Searching the news, I realized that Tufekci’s New York Times colleague, Bret Stephens, had published an essay three days prior, ribbing mask advocates like Tufekci because of Cochrane’s mask review: “The Mask Mandates Did Nothing. Will Any Lessons Be Learned?”

Tufekci’s rise in prominence is based mostly on her mask advocacy, and the thrust of Stephens’ piece in the New York Times must have cut her open like a surgeon’s scalpel:

[W]hen it comes to the population-level benefits of masking, the verdict is in: Mask mandates were a bust. Those skeptics who were furiously mocked as cranks and occasionally censored as “misinformers” for opposing mandates were right. The mainstream experts and pundits who supported mandates were wrong. 

Without much of a scientific publishing record and so much of her credibility tied to her mask advocacy, Stephens’ essay must have felt threatening.

But when she contacted Brown, Tufekci laid it on thick that she was an academic researcher, claiming expertise in statistics and causal inference, as well as scientific reviews.

“I use and participate in reviews myself (I’m writing one in my own field soon) and thus am familiar with many of the challenges and issues.”

You don’t need to have attended university to know that Tufekci is fibbing here. I glanced through Google Scholar to see what Tufeckci has published in the academic literature and didn’t find much except opinion pieces. In all of 2024, Tufecki has not published a single article in the scientific literature, and in 2023, she published one piece: an opinion essay.

As for the review Tufeckis told Brown in March 2023 that she was writing “in my own field soon”? It has never appeared.

When I contacted Brown about Tufekci, he told me that he had been a bit naive perhaps in dealing with her, as he hadn’t looked into her background, and didn’t realize that she was a mask activist. But what Tufecki did with the quotes she took from Brown is quite disturbing.

In her article, Tufekci quoted Brown and followed up in the next paragraph implying that he supported the idea that “the evidence is really straightforward” that masks provide protection from COVID. But Brown told me that’s not what the science concludes.

Here’s the section of Tufekci’s essay:

Brown, who led the Cochrane review’s approval process, told me that mask mandates may not be tenable now, but he has a starkly different feeling about their effects in the first year of a pandemic.

“Mask mandates, social distancing, the other shutdowns we had in terms of even restaurants and things like that — if places like New York City didn’t do that, the number of deaths would have been much higher,” he told me. “I’m very confident of that statement.”

So the evidence is relatively straightforward: Consistently wearing a mask, preferably a high-quality, well-fitting one, provides protection against the coronavirus.

This is just sleazy.

When I contacted Brown, he said that Tufecki spun his words, because the evidence is clear that masks don’t seem to do much. Brown actually stated as much some months after Tufekci interviewed him. Emailing the organizer of a talk he was giving, Brown wrote that masks “likely” provide “some” protection but “do not make a major impact at the community level when promoted as a public health intervention.”

This is basically the opposite of how Tufekci framed Brown’s quote in her essay.

Brown also told me that he had told Tufekci to contact the scientists who wrote the Cochrane review, because they are the real experts. Duh! While he was the editor of the review, he hadn’t read each and every published study like the review authors.

But Tufekci ignored Brown. Instead, Tufekci contacted Karla Soares-Weiser, the woman running Cochrane. Apparently, Tufekci sent a slew of questions, because Soares-Weiser then emailed Lisa Bero, a professor medicine at the University of Colorado who serves as Cochrane ethics advisor.

“Lisa, I have been back and forth with NYT about the mask review. CAN I GET YOUR VIEWS ON THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS?” emailed Soares-Weiser. She then sent questions to Bero that she had gotten from Tufekci.

What makes this all comical is that Tufekci obviously knows nothing about reviews, yet Soares-Weiser freaked out because Tufekci writes a column at the New York Times.

It’s science by essay writer.

After Bero answered the questions, Soares-Weiser thanked her. “Thank you, Lisa. I’m navigating a difficult situation and of course need to take these points into account. Help appreciated.”  

For anyone with a passing familiarity with scientific research, one thought should come immediately to mind: why didn’t Soares-Weiser tell Tufekci to send those questions to scientists who had written the review? That’s what Michael Brown did.

That will become clear in a bit.

I got a copy of the email Tufekci sent Jefferson for questions and it’s dated March 9, the day before she published her 2000+ word essay. I’ve written for the New York Times. It’s a rather laborious process dealing with editors and fact checkers. It would impossible for Tufekci to contact Jefferson for comment and then slam out a 2000+ word essay, get that essay edited, deal with those edits, and then get it fact checked.

What those dates tell you is that Tufekci had the essay ready to publish before she contacted Jefferson for comment, suggesting she didn’t even care what he had to say. Jefferson has been publishing scientific research on respiratory virus for several decades, but Tufekci wasn’t interested in what he had to say because she already considered herself the expert.

The day Tufecki published her essay, Soares-Weiser then rushed out a statement claiming she was working to fix problems in the Cochrane mask review. But Soares-Weiser did this without consulting the scientists who had done the work. This would be like the editor-in-chief of the New York Times publishing an essay complaining about a New York Times investigative series without bothering to consult any of the reporters or editors who had done the work.

“I will not speak for the others but am deeply distressed by this course of events which have occurred without our knowledge,” replied Jon Conly, a professor and former head of the department of medicine at the University of Calgary.

Michael Brown responded that he had spoken to Tufekci and told her that “I stood by the conclusions of the review but asked that she reach out to you, the authors, to answer some of her questions directly. She assured me that she would do so.”

Of course, Tufekci did NOT reach out to the scientific authors, because she wasn’t interested in what they had to say.

Brown then sent an email to Soares-Weiser and several of the Cochrane editors reminding them that changes were being considered to the mask review language, even though it was the same wording as had been used in the 2020 update.

Why were changes being considered then? As Brown explained, it had nothing to do with science. “[I]t was only under intense media coverage and criticism that these revisions were suggested.”

Emails find that Soares-Weiser appeared to be in a bit of panic, monitoring negative commentary about her decision to publish a statement without bothering to consult the scientists. “I had a challenging meeting with the [governing board] yesterday. I am holding on, stressed, but OK,” she emailed Lisa Bero.

Bero then suggested to Soares-Weiser that Cochrane publish negative comments being submitted by outsiders criticizing the mask review. “That should be published as soon as possible (following screening for libel or profanity),” Bero emailed. “It is important for readers to know that criticism has not just come through the media, but through the formal channels that we have.”

Shortly after bullying Cochrane’s Soares-Weiser to put out a statement claiming she would make changes to the mask review, Tufekci began tweeting that she had gotten the review “corrected.”

However, this isn’t true.

A month back, Soares-Weiser put out a correction to her prior statement, and now says that Cochrane will not make any changes to the mask review.

The entire saga calls into question Zeynep Tufekci’s ethics and whether Soares-Weiser is still fit to lead Cochrane.

Climate alarmists and their left-wing corporate media allies, who constantly spread fear and anxiety among an already heavily medicated population, churn out endless streams of climate doom headlines right at the peak of the Northern Hemisphere summer (how convenient). They deliberately ignore the fact that the 2022 Tonga Volcano eruption is contributing to some of the Earth’s warming—and they’ll conveniently leave out this critical piece of climate news:

“Dozens of night time low temp records have been broken the last 2 mornings. Many folks waking up to temps in the upper 40s and lower 50s this morning,” private weather forecaster BAM Weather wrote on X. 

BAM Weather explained these low temperatures are “Typical of early October weather for most.” 

Let’s not forget that climate alarmists usually point to ‘record temperatures’ with data going back several decades, half a century, or a little more. If they were to show the entire picture, well, their agenda and climate grift would evaporate overnight. 

The lower 48 region is about three weeks post-peak summer.

Looking ahead, the National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center still expects the weather phenomenon La Nina to emerge “during Sep-Oct-Nov (66% chance) and persist through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2024-25 (74% chance during Nov-Dec-Jan).” 

#ENSO-neutral is expected to continue for the next several months, with La Niña favored to emerge during Sep-Oct-Nov (66% chance) and persist through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2024-25 (74% chance during Nov-Dec-Jan). A #LaNina Watch remains in effect. https://t.co/5zlzaZ0D9Z pic.twitter.com/hRzW9Dj8un

— NWS Climate Prediction Center (@NWSCPC) August 8, 2024

Here are the weather impacts in a La Nina year across the Lower 48.

Leftist corporate media usually get it wrong – with zero accountability – because they’re plagued by the ‘climate religion’ and push an agenda to scare folks into believing that more government taxes and banning cow farts and Taylor Swift’s jet will solve the world’s problems.

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

Police audio has been released revealing that law enforcement in Las Vegas were engaged in a snap operation to secure a route for Joe Biden to get to University Medical hospital, a trauma center, corroborating previous reports that there was some sort of medical emergency involving Biden before he stepped down as the Democratic nominee.

As we highlighted at the time, police sources claimed that US Secret Service informed local law enforcement that there was an emergency situation involving Biden on July 17, and to close necessary streets so that he could be transported immediately to the hospital.

According to the sources, hundreds of officers and employees heard the broadcast live and set in motion emergency response procedures, with radio dispatchers asking for a “surge” of police resources to secure the area and the emergency room on standby.

The plan then abruptly changed and Biden was flown back to Delaware at high speed.

Speculation was that Biden was displaying stroke like symptoms, and that he could have experienced a transient ischaemic attack, also called a “mini stroke”, a serious condition where the blood supply to the brain is temporarily disrupted.

The new audio is from the Las Vegas Metro Police Department’s protective detail for Biden and was released Friday afternoon by Oversight Project, which obtained the recordings through a Freedom of Information Act request.

🚨BREAKING – AUDIO OBTAINED🚨

We just obtained the recording from the Las Vegas Police Department and have decided to immediately release it while we are simultaneously reviewing.

Links in next post. https://t.co/WUa7DjmFFA

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) August 9, 2024

The three recordings, containing police chatter, are not time stamped, but appear to span a few hours.

Here are the 3 police audio files obtained by Oversight Project through a FOIA request that corroborate the claim Joe Biden experienced some sort of medical emergency in Las Vegas, putting cops and the University Medical Center on standby. Report: https://t.co/nCAd3p1lF8 pic.twitter.com/AHhdZAXsQo

— m o d e r n i t y (@ModernityNews) August 10, 2024

In two clips, both of around four-minutes, officers are asked to respond Code 3, which is an emergency response posture.

In the third longer clip of 43 minutes, someone on the radio states “For everybody on the radio, right now they’re on a hold for something regarding the President.”

These links should work on mobile devices and desktops:https://t.co/GnuFPCgqGchttps://t.co/TDLn2A8cBdhttps://t.co/W70D8mbGe0

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) August 9, 2024

The protective detail was then informed “For everyone on the radio, right now POTUS is 421. He’s being seen, so we’re just kinda waiting to see how this is shaping out. So, for everybody’s knowledge, he’s 421 right now; we’re just trying to figure out what’s going on and we’re gonna go from there.”

Code 421 means a sick or injured person, according to LVMPD’s code sheet.

The rest of the audio contains chatter about the protective detail quickly moving their resources to ensure a secure route for “POTUS movement.”

While it is difficult to determine exact details from the audio, it is clear evidence that something significant happened to Biden. Something that the American people and the world is still not privy to.

*  *  *

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

Via Middle East Eye

The Biden administration will lift its ban on the sales of offensive weaponry to Saudi Arabia, Reuters reported on Friday, a move that reverses the three-year US ban amidst ongoing attempts by the administration to broker a Saudi-Israel normalisation deal.

The move comes against the backdrop of the 10-month-long Israeli war on Gaza and after Middle East Eye’s reporting that Russia has deployed military intelligence officers to assist Yemen’s Houthis with targeting commercial vessels in the Red Sea.

A congressional aide told Reuters that the administration briefed Congress this week on the decision, and another source said that Biden was moving ahead on Friday afternoon with notifications about a sale. “The Saudis have met their end of the deal, and we are prepared to meet ours,” a senior Biden administration official told Reuters.

Middle East Eye reached out to the White House for comment on the report, but didn’t hear back by time of publication.

The Biden administration first invoked the ban on offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia in February 2022, a move that came after US lawmakers, progressive activists, and antiwar groups were calling on Washington to end its support of the Saudi-led coalition’s war efforts in Yemen.

War broke out in Yemen in 2014 after the Houthi rebel group seized the capital Sanaa, prompting Saudi Arabia and allied Gulf Arab countries – chiefly the United Arab Emirates – to launch a coalition to fight against the Houthi gains and reinstate the internationally recognised government.

The Saudi-led coalition launched a brutal bombing campaign that killed thousands of Yemeni civilians. Outrage spread in the US when reports began to emerge that US-supplied bombs were being used by coalition forces in attacks that killed civilians.

However, the harder line taken by the Biden administration against Saudi Arabia soon began to fade, most notably since last year as the US attempted to broker a historic deal that would see Saudi Arabia and Israel normalise diplomatic relations for the first time in history.

At the same time, the US and the UK have for months been actively battling Yemen’s Houthis in the Red Sea, launching several air strikes on Houthi military sites as the armed group responded with attacks on American naval vessels and downing multiple armed reaper drones.

The Houthis, whose fight against the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen has been paused due to a UN-brokered ceasefire in April 2022 that has so far held, began to target ships travelling to and from Israel in the Red Sea last year, in what they said was in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza.

The war between Israel and Hamas is spreading far beyond the borders of Israel and Gaza.

Days ago, Yemeni Houthis went far beyond striking Israel-bound cargo ships, to navigating an armed drone over 1,200 miles, past Israel’s iron dome and into Tel Aviv.

And in the last few… pic.twitter.com/aRyeYnZy0G

— Truth In Media (@Truth_InMedia) August 1, 2024

The Houthis also claimed responsibility for a deadly drone attack in Tel Aviv in July, which prompted Israel to launch air strikes on the Yemeni port of Hodeidah. “We are regularly conducting airstrikes to degrade Houthi capabilities, an effort that is ongoing and will continue together with a coalition of partners,” a senior Biden official told Reuters.

“We have designated the Houthis as Specially Designated Global Terrorists, and we will have imposed sanctions and additional costs on the Houthi smuggling networks and military apparatus. This pressure will continue to build over the coming weeks.”

Middle East Eye’s reporting of the assistance to the Houthis provided by Moscow, a major rival to the US, has added another dimension to the situation.

The US has been actively providing Ukraine with billions of dollars in military support, including advanced weaponry such as tanks, amid Kyiv’s efforts to fend off a Russian invasion that began in 2022.

For those on the East Coast, finally – goodbye, Debby. But now, the focus shifts to a new tropical system forming in the Atlantic Basin.

The National Hurricane Center’s latest advisory note on ‘AL98’ said shower and thunderstorm activity has increased in association with a tropical wave between the Cabo Verde Islands and the Lesser Antilles. Tropical development probabilities currently stand at 30% over the next 48 hours and 80% over the next seven days.

Here’s the full advisory note:

Near the Lesser and Greater Antilles (AL98): Shower and thunderstorm activity has increased since yesterday in association with a tropical wave located roughly midway between the Cabo Verde Islands and the Lesser Antilles. Gradual development of this system is possible during the next couple of days while it moves westward to west-northwestward across the central tropical Atlantic. Afterwards, conditions are expected to become more conducive for development, and a tropical depression is likely to form by the early to middle part of next week while the system approaches and then moves near or over the Lesser Antilles. The system is forecast to continue moving generally west-northwestward and could approach portions of the Greater Antilles by the middle to latter part of next week.

• Formation chance through 48 hours…low…30 percent
• Formation chance through 7 days…high…80 percent.

AL98’s seven-day trajectory model 

Jim Cantore of the Weather Channel wrote on X, “Invest #98L is gradually get its act together, and as these things go we could easily have a depression or storm close to the Leeward Islands Tuesdayish.”

Invest #98L is gradually get its act together, and as these things go we could easily have a depression or storm close to the Leeward Islands Tuesdayish. From there, a trip north of the islands or a trip into the Greater Antilles is possible with a ramp up in intensity too for… pic.twitter.com/Yc5KnyqccX

— Jim Cantore (@JimCantore) August 10, 2024

“A hurricane is likely to be near the US East Coast next weekend, but how close?” Ben Noll, a meteorologist with New Zealand’s National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research, wrote on X. 

A hurricane is likely to be near the U.S. East Coast next weekend, but how close?

Most ECMWF-EPS members are safely offshore, nudged by an upper trough, but a small handful are close enough for a U.S. impact.

Atlantic Canada & Bermuda will want to watch this one closely! pic.twitter.com/g7B9mHecZ9

— Ben Noll (@BenNollWeather) August 10, 2024

If AL98 does become a named storm, it will be called “Ernesto.” Spaghetti models show AL98’s potential track could make a presence on or near the East Coast.

The hurricane season is beginning to ramp up, as the peak is in mid-September.