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New York Doomed To Be Migrant Central – Other Cities Take Note

New York Doomed To Be Migrant Central – Other Cities Take Note

Authored by Betsy McCaughey via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Mayor Eric Adams’ agreement, announced Friday, to limit the time illegal immigrants can stay in shelters at taxpayers’ expense, is smoke and mirrors. It’s designed to fool you into thinking he’s solving a problem when he’s actually caving to the illegal immigrant industrial complex.

Hundreds of illegal immigrants line up outside of the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building in New York City on June 6, 2023. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Images)

Adams claims the agreement, with the Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless, will allow the city to evict adult migrants from city-run shelters after 30 days, saving taxpayers money and limiting the need for more shelters. Not true.

The fine print says illegal immigrants have a shot at staying longer if they obtain a driver’s license, follow shelter rules, and show good behavior, or—get this one—apply for public benefits. And this is a “non-exhaustive” list of reasons making illegal immigrants eligible to stay longer.

The agreement also applies only to single adults. A staggering 78 percent come with children and get priority placement in hotels. The city currently spends a whopping $387 a night for food and a roof alone for each family, and shells out more money for free medical care, education, and legal services. This agreement does zero to alleviate those staggering costs.

The deal dooms New York City to fiscal disaster, because it will continue to be the No. 1 destination for illegal immigrants seeking a free roof over their heads. The Big Apple is now Migrant Central.

Worst of all, nothing in the agreement empowers the mayor to evict troublemakers who have repeat run-ins with police. The illegal immigrants who beat up cops in Time Square were living in shelters, courtesy of taxpayers, and already had long rap sheets.

When troublemakers are arrested and give a shelter address, the shelter should be contacted and told they no longer qualify. Why should taxpayers be footing the bill to house criminals?

Notorious gangs like Tren de Aragua and MS-13 recruit from the shelters. How convenient that taxpayers pay to house these gangs’ lackeys.

In October, Adams imposed a 30-day limit on adult migrants but wound up in court when Legal Aid and the Coalition challenged. A long negotiation ensued, ending with Friday’s agreement.

Since 1981, Legal Aid and the Coalition have fought successfully to impose a “right to shelter” on New York. Now these two self-appointed guardians of the downtrodden—not elected by anyone—insist that the “right” applies not just to New Yorkers but anyone from anywhere in the world who wants shelter here. That’s crazy.

After months of negotiating, Adams capitulated. No one at the table was looking out for taxpayers or New Yorkers who see their services being cut and their neighborhoods disrupted by the proliferation of shelters. The multibillion-dollar shelter industry came out a winner, but Joe Public got shafted.

As the agreement was announced, Deputy Mayor Anne Williams-Isom praised the “right to shelter” and Legal Aid Society for the work they do. They’re all in bed together.

Josh Goldfein, a Legal Aid attorney, explained that despite the settlement, “no migrant would be left out on the streets.” In fact, the agreement bans the city from even making illegal immigrants sleep overnight in chairs while waiting to be placed, imposing stricter shelter requirements than before.

A “right to shelter” for anyone who shows up on Gotham’s doorsteps means New Yorkers who want sanitation services, police and fire protection, and other city amenities go to the back of the line. Their services get cut to pay for sheltering illegal immigrants. Adams needs to battle aggressively, up through the highest courts, to get that “right” reexamined.

Only New York has a “right to shelter,” and it makes the city the top destination for illegal immigrants. New York City spends more than 10 times as much as Los Angeles per illegal immigrant and more than five times as much as Chicago.

To top it off, the agreement and the Adams administration are renaming illegal immigrants as “new arrivals,” whitewashing the laws they broke to get here.

Expect hundreds of thousands more to see these welcome signs and come. Who wouldn’t come?

On Sunday, Adams praised the city’s “responsible policies” and blamed “Republican extremists” for the border crisis. Sorry, Mr. Mayor, but the crisis here in New York City is due to the lavish benefits local Democrats insist on offering “new arrivals.” There’s no whitewashing that.

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

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 21:40

RFK Jr. Destroys His Candidacy With VP Pick

RFK Jr. Destroys His Candidacy With VP Pick

Authored by Roger L. Simon via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

I interviewed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Epoch TV’s “Roller Coaster” series and also attended one of his birthday parties. In both instances, I liked the man, found him to be intelligent and personable, and also unafraid to take stands against the über-conformist Democratic Party, notably on health care and, to some degree, on the dangers of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. holds a voter rally in Grand Rapids, Mich., on Feb. 10, 2024. (Mitch Ranger/The Epoch Times)

Although I have been an unabashed Donald Trump supporter since he came down the escalator and continue to be so, I would not have been disappointed, even pleased, had former President Trump chosen Mr. Kennedy as his vice-presidential candidate.

Unlikely as it may have been, it could have helped bring our fractured country together.

No longer.

If reports are true—and, in that regard, the website name www.kennedyshanahan.com was reportedly registered by one of his campaign operatives on March 13—Mr. Kennedy has chosen attorney Nicole Shanahan as his running mate.

I find this bizarre, to say the least, not to mention disappointing.

Whatever his intentions, such a ticket would drive this country even further apart because Ms. Shanahan is a self-described “progressive.” But that’s only the tip of a disturbing iceberg I will get to in a minute.

Let’s start with this. Mr. Kennedy, of all people, should know that the basic requirement for a vice presidential candidate, now more than ever, is that a person be qualified to assume the presidency at a moment’s notice.

We have had disasters in that regard, dodging several bullets, including vice presidents Spiro Agnew, Mike Pence, and (for now, holding one’s breath) Kamala Harris.

Mr. Trump has made clear that qualification for the presidency is now his first consideration, as it should be.

What do we know of Ms. Shanahan?

Not much, except that she is a philanthropist to largely progressive causes and that she is very rich.

She reportedly helped pay for Mr. Kennedy’s Super Bowl ad to the tune of $4 million via a Super PAC. The ad got mixed reviews and ended up with the candidate apologizing to his family

How rich Ms. Shanahan really is is unclear, but it is clear the bulk of her money comes from her divorce from Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google and, depending on the source, the ninth richest man on the planet.

RFK Jr’s campaign had been luffing and needed a boost. He looked to the financial. It’s hard to blame him, because that’s the putrid state of American politics. But if you’re trying to run an honest broker campaign against corrupt traditional parties, it’s not the best approach. It’s actually a turn-off.

This is rather sad because of the optimism and excitement he initially engendered.

It was said that much of RFK Jr’s appeal was with the more libertarian right, not the increasingly leftist Democrats. I thought that was accurate. I would imagine that unfortunately those days are over if the nomination of the “progressive” Ms. Shanahan is real. Who will RFK Jr. appeal to now?

Of course the candidate is not confirming this nomination until March 26. We shall see.

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

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 21:20

Study Says “Interpersonal Racism” Linked To Heart Problems In Black Women

Study Says “Interpersonal Racism” Linked To Heart Problems In Black Women

By Caleb Nunes of The College Fix

“Interpersonal racism” might lead to higher rates of coronary heart disease, according to a recent study. But a health scholar who spoke to The College Fix questioned the findings.

“Perceived experiences of interpersonal racism in employment, in housing, and with the police were associated with higher incidence of CHD among Black women,” the study from Boston University epidemiologist Shanshan Sheehy concluded. However, “perceived racism in everyday life was not associated with higher risk,” Dr. Sheehy wrote.

She wrote the study, published in the American Heart Association journal, with Michelle Albert, the most recent president of the group. The paper used data from nearly 50,000 black women beginning in 1997.

The study found that after adjusting for multiple variables, the link between racism and heart problems was “no longer statistically significant,” meaning the connection could be explained by chance. 

Sheehy did not respond to two emailed requests for comment on the paper, including the claim “racism is highly prevalent in America.”

The research director at Do No Harm said the extensive data set is a strength of the study, but there are many problems with its designs.

Ian Kingsbury said, “the association [of interpersonal racism] is not significant when it comes to myocardial infarction,” in his emailed comments to The Fix.

When it comes to coronary heart disease, Kingsbury said “there is no association with self-reported racism in everyday life but an association with self-reported discrimination in employment, housing and interactions with police.”

There could be a confounding variable at play.

Kingsbury said those reporting higher levels of racism in everyday life “are more anxious and prone to conflict,” and people with these personality traits have higher incidence of coronary heart disease.

When asked about the strengths of this paper, Kingsbury said the paper “connect[ed] data collected decades ago to contemporary health outcomes.”

Weaknesses included “overstating…findings” as well as a “lack of candor around the limitations of self-reported racism as a measure of actual racism.”

He said the medical community should not use this paper. The results are “unconvincing” he said, when other variables are taken into consideration.

Kingsbury said, “it’s unclear how [the results] would be actionable” and said there is a growing view doctors are “people who can solve all the world’s problems.” This often “invites activism into medical training at the expense of technical expertise.”

Other studies have tried to connect police interactions with health problems.

For example, a University of Minnesota researcher found a correlation between police stops in a neighborhood and preterm births. However, the researcher, Rachel Hardeman, could not identify any woman who had an interaction with police and then had a preterm birth.

Furthermore, black immigrant women had better pregnancy outcomes than even white women, according to the study.

That did not stop Hardeman from blaming racism.

“These findings suggest that racialized police patterns borne from a history of racism in the United States may contribute to racial disparity in preterm birth,” the Planned Parenthood board member wrote.

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 21:00

Ukraine Drones Again Target Strategic Bomber Base Deep Inside Russia

Ukraine Drones Again Target Strategic Bomber Base Deep Inside Russia

On Wednesday a wave of Ukrainian drones targeted a well-known airbase deep inside Russia which is home to strategic bombers. The air base, called Engels 2, is near the Russian city by the same name, and nearby residents reported hearing at least four explosions during the attack.

The Main Directorate of Ukraine’s Military Intelligence (HUR) has since owned up to the attack, with sources in Russia confirming to international media that “targets had been hit” and the damage is being assessed.

Some drones may have been intercepted, however, with Roman Busargin, the governor of the Russian region of Saratov, describing in a statement that a drone attack was “repelled”. This attack is significant given Engels is located over 600km from the Ukraine border. But it’s not the first time it has come under attack during the war.

In December of 2022 there were reports that two Tu-95 bombers were damaged in a similar drone operation from Ukraine. Later that same month explosions were reported at the airbase but the extent of damage on the ground was unclear. During this latter attack, three Russian servicemen were reportedly killed by falling debris after UAVs were intercepted.

A well-known Russian Telegraph channel which reports breaking news related to the Ukraine war said of this newest assault on the airfield: “Preliminary data suggests the anti-aircraft defense system was activated. Residents report hearing a prior siren. There is no official information on casualties or damages.”

Ukraine-based media sources have speculated that something was hit at Engels:

Meanwhile, social media users mentioned a fire at the airfield area post-explosions, with rescuers quickly arriving.

One commentator, residing near the airfield, wrote, “There was at least one direct hit, the rest (of the drones) likely shot down by anti-aircraft missiles. Then came the fire trucks, ambulances, police with flashing lights.”

Engels has long been known to house both Tu-160 and Tu-95MS long-range bombers which are being used in Ukraine, thus it remains a high priority target for Ukraine’s cross-border attacks against Russian territory.

The Kremlin has accused Western intelligence with assisting in such operations. This recently found some degree of positive confirmation in a damning New York Times story detailing the extent of the CIA’s presence in Ukraine going back a decade. The CIA established intelligence outposts along the border with Russia, many of which are likely directing these attacks into Russian territory.

Via Ukraine Battle Map/Twitter

Feeling emboldened by a string of ‘successes’, including prior attacks and bombings in Crimea but especially destruction of oil refineries, Ukraine forces will likely try to continue hitting targets inside Russia, also as their capability grows given they have been supplied with ever-longer range rockets from the US and NATO countries

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 20:40

Boeing Has Been Prioritizing Production Over Safety, FAA Chief Says

Boeing Has Been Prioritizing Production Over Safety, FAA Chief Says

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) chief Michael Whitaker said on March 19 that his impression from a recent visit to Boeing’s facilities suggests that there are issues within the aerospace giant’s safety culture.

Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Michael Whitaker testifies before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington on Feb. 6, 2024. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

During an interview with NBC Nightly News, Mr. Whitaker said the FAA’s audit and a culture survey of Boeing revealed that the aircraft maker’s “priorities have been on production, and not on safety and quality.”

So what we really are focused on now is shifting that focus from production to safety and quality,” the FAA administrator told the media outlet.

When asked if certain protocols were not being met regarding how the aircraft manufacturer approached airplane production, Mr. Whitaker said: “Not what you would have expected if safety is the first priority.

“Whenever someone comes into the FAA to brief on their company, the first thing I expect is to talk about safety because we all have to start there.

If it’s not safe, then the whole system is not working the way it should.

FAA Audit on Boeing

The FAA initiated a six-week audit on Boeing’s manufacturing processes for the 737 Max jetliner after a panel blew off one of the planes during an Alaska Airlines flight on Jan. 5.

The Alaska Airlines flight was en route to Ontario, California, from Portland, Oregon, when its door plug blew off, forcing the pilots to turn back and make an emergency landing.

A gaping hole where the paneled-over door had been at the fuselage plug area of Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 in Portland, Ore., on Jan. 7, 2024. (National Transportation Safety Board via AP)

The FAA published its 50-page report on Feb. 26, noting that its experts had identified 27 areas in which Boeing’s safety procedures and culture were insufficient.

According to the report, experts observed a “disconnect” between Boeing’s senior management and other members of the organization when it comes to safety culture.

The report also found a “lack of awareness of safety-related metrics at all levels of the organization” and could not find a “consistent and clear” process for employees to report safety concerns.

The procedures and training are complex and in a constant state of change, creating employee confusion, especially among different work sites and employee groups,” the report reads.

Experts also highlighted “hesitation in reporting safety concerns for fear of retaliation,” noting that managers at the plane manufacturer authorized to oversee employee performance evaluations, salary decisions, promotion, and disciplinary actions are also tasked with investigating safety concerns.

The company was given 90 days to develop a comprehensive plan to address “systemic quality-control issues.” Mr. Whitaker has urged Boeing to make “real and profound improvements.”

A Boeing 737 Max 8 airplane lands following a test flight at Boeing Field in Seattle on April 10, 2019. (Ted S. Warren/AP Photo)

Stan Deal, CEO of Boeing’s commercial plane division, said in a March 12 update that the “vast majority” of violations found by the FAA involved workers not following Boeing’s approved procedures.

Mr. Deal said Boeing will take remedial steps that include “working with each employee noted with a non-compliance during the audit to ensure they fully understand the work instructions and procedures.”

The company will also add weekly compliance checks for all work teams in the Renton, Washington, factory, where Max jets are assembled, he said.

“We will assess our status in the factory and, if needed, put mitigation plans in place. We will not hesitate in stopping a production line or keeping an airplane in position,” Mr. Deal stated.

The Alaska Airlines mishap is not the only recent incident to cause concern. On March 7, a United Airlines Boeing 777-200ER plane lost a wheel shortly after takeoff from San Francisco International Airport. On Jan. 20, a Boeing 757 jet operated by Delta Air Lines lost its nose wheel while preparing for takeoff in Atlanta.

Katabella Roberts and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 20:20

Biden Campaign Distances Itself From Mysterious Big Dem Donor ‘Chairman G’

Biden Campaign Distances Itself From Mysterious Big Dem Donor ‘Chairman G’

Authored by Soobin Kim and Bradley Hope via whalehunting.projectbrazen.com,

Last fall, we reported on a man named Gaurav Srivastava who pretended to be a CIA operative to allegedly fleece the sanctioned Dutch oil trader Niels Troost. The ruse was simple, according to extensive recorded conversations: hand over half your company to me, a secret spy, and I’ll protect you from the US government because … I’m a secret spy.

In the following months since our original article, it emerged that Srivastava – or “Chairman G,” as he likes to be called – is a big time political donor in the United States.

  • Whale Hunting can exclusively reveal that FBI agents in Los Angeles have been interviewing Srivastava’s current and former associates about his campaign donations, claims of being a federal officer and other financial affairs.

  • We also confirmed from a staff member for the Washington State Democratic Party that the Biden campaign is in the process of quietly refunding thousands of dollars of his political donations.

The FBI inquiries — ongoing for last several months — may lead nowhere, but the Biden campaign’s decision to start refunding donations suggests there are deeper issues afoot for Srivastava.

“All allegations raised in this story are false,” a spokesman for Srivastava told us (full statement and more details on the news after the jump).

Source: Sponsored content on LA Weekly

The culmination of Srivastava’s rise to public life came alongside a more than $1 million donation in 2022 to the Atlantic Council, a DC-based think tank. The money underwrote a conference in Bali, where he was a “co-host” and rubbed shoulders with business magnates, political honchos and John Legend.

But that relationship isn’t going smoothly. The Atlantic Council terminated its relationship with Srivastava, Politico reported last month, and returned additional funds donated by Srivastava in 2023.

We made the decision to terminate our relationship with Mr. Srivastava in May 2023 upon learning new information because of our donor review process. For example, we learned that The Gaurav & Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation was not an established 501C3 in April of 2023, despite Mr. Srivastava’s representation to the Council that this was a registered foundation,” the spokesperson told Politico.

Srivastava’s lawyer told Politico the Atlantic Council made the decision after they “disagreed” about how a gift would be implemented. (Small note: Recipients of gifts usually try very hard to implement the handover of gifts.)

Alongside his campaign to solve global food security he also became a big spender on political campaigns. Among Srivastava’s key advisors for how to best disperse funds for political purposes were Greg Schultz (Biden’s 2020 campaign manager) and Ret. General Wesley Clark. They didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The Federal Election Commission’s database of individual contributions shows that Srivastava contributed at least $1 million to political campaigns and committees in the United States. As an Indian national he is eligible to donate to political campaigns as a Green Card holder. Lo and behold, the donations led to a photo op with Biden which you can find here.

Since 2022, Srivastava has made sizeable donations – including over $500,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and $500,000 to Senate Majority PAC.

One mystery we are continuing to investigate: Whale Hunting discovered publicly available evidence suggesting Srivastava contributed over $116,000 using the personal details of an individual with the same name who resides in the same city. The funds were donated under the previous employer, occupation and mailing address of the namesake, who denies making the donations.

It’s unclear how those donations were made. Impersonating another individual to make a political contribution is strictly prohibited by law.

The single biggest recipient for the donations made with the namesake’s personal details was the Biden Victory Fund, a joint fundraising committee for Joe Biden’s 2024 re-election, which received $50,000. About a dozen state Democratic parties across the U.S. also received funds through the Biden Victory Fund.   

“The Biden campaign is aware of the issue and the donation is in the process of being refunded,” a staff member with Washington State Democratic Party, which received these funds, told Whale Hunting in an email.

It’s unclear the exact allegations the FBI is investigating, but among the questions they’ve presented current and former associates of Srivastava have been queries about his political spending, source of funds, involvement in international money transfers and other topics related to the allegations already aired publicly about Srivastava in a litany of lawsuits.

Srivastava’s spokesman’s full comment here:

All allegations raised in this story are false. The source for this story and others, including 87 paid stories on obscure websites, is tied to a Russian asset facilitating the unfettered trade of Russian oil as made clear by the U.K. sanctions. There’s a direct through-line between Russia, a barrel of oil and the high price of gas at the pump squeezing the American consumer. The slanderous suggestion of a fabricated relationship between Mr. Srivastava and a U.S. intelligence agency was orchestrated by the same Russian asset relied on as a source for your stories and designed by that Russian asset to put a target on his back, threatening the safety of him, his friends and family.

So if your year is off to a bad start, think about what Srivastava is now dealing with: being on the Feds’ radar, juggling a glut of lawsuits brought on by all the people he’s allegedly stiffed – from his former interior designer to former landlord to former business partners – and witnessing the collapse of his carefully crafted reputation. 

In the meantime, Whale Hunting will be chasing this story to fill its gaping plot holes, one among them being where on earth Chairman G got the funds to make the donations in the first place. If you have any insight, please get in touch!

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 19:40

Major Jeweler Sees Youngsters Postponing Engagements In Era Of Failed Bidenomics

Major Jeweler Sees Youngsters Postponing Engagements In Era Of Failed Bidenomics

Signet Jewelers Ltd., the parent company of Kay Jewelers and Zales, had previously signaled to investors that there would be an upswing in US engagements this year as dating patterns returned to normal. But that forecast was downgraded on Wednesday as the jeweler warned that persistently high inflation and job market uncertainty have forced some young folks to delay engagements. 

“If right now they’re worried about their jobs or they’re still paying a little bit more for rent or for gas, then they might wait a few months for that engagement,” Gina Drosos, the CEO of SignetSignet, explained in a Wednesday interview quoted by Bloomberg.

Signet previously told investors that 2024 would be the year of an upswing in US engagements. However, this outlook was revised on Wednesday, and the number of engagements for the year is expected to rise between 5% and 10% versus the previous forecast of 10%. 

Drosos said 2.1 million couples were engaged last year, the lowest in years, but recovered from the dating dry spell during Covid. Still, the number is well below the 2.8 million level seen pre-2020. 

The downshift in the outlook comes after three years of elevated inflation, which has strained consumers’ finances. 

In the era of failed Bidenomics, Gen-Zers and millennials have flooded social media platforms, complaining about their financial hardships:

For youngsters who have already planned a wedding, average costs hit a new record high in 2023, exceeding $30,000, according to The Wedding Report, a research company that tracks wedding data. 

Drosos added, “Wouldn’t it be great if the Fed lowered interest rates and if consumer confidence got on a really consistent upswing?” She noted that easing financial conditions would push the number of 2024 engagements to the high end of Signet’s guidance. 

The obsession with lavish weddings is over for the average couple. Say goodbye to elaborate floral displays, a beautiful venue on a golf course, crab cakes and steak for dinner, fancy champagne toasts, live bands, open bars, chocolate fountains, and multi-tiered cakes, as an increasing number of folks are opting for courthouse weddings in the era of failed Bidenomics. 

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 19:20

How The Democrats Plan To Steal The Election

How The Democrats Plan To Steal The Election

Authored by Llewellyn Rockwell via LewRockwell.com,

Biden and Trump have clinched the nominations of their parties for President. Everybody is gearing up for a battle between them for the election in November. It’s obvious that Biden is “cognitively impaired.” In blunter language, “brain-dead”. Partisans of Trump are gearing up for a decisive victory.

But what if this battle is a sham? What if Biden’s elite gang of neo-con controllers won’t let Biden lose?

How can they stop him from losing? Simple. If it looks like he’s losing, the elite forces will create enough fake ballots to ensure victory. Our corrupt courts won’t stop them. They have done this before, and they will do it again, if they have to.

I said the Democrats have done this before.

The great Dr. Ron Paul explains one way they did this in 2020. The elite covered up a scandal that could have wrecked Biden’s chances:

“Move over Watergate. On or around Oct. 17, 2020, then-senior Biden campaign official Antony Blinken called up former acting CIA director Mike Morell to ask a favor: he needed high-ranking former US intelligence community officials to lie to the American people to save Biden’s lagging campaign from a massive brewing scandal.

The problem was that Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, had abandoned his laptop at a repair shop and the explosive contents of the computer were leaking out. The details of the Biden family’s apparent corruption and the debauchery of the former vice-president’s son were being reported by the New York Post, and with the election less than a month away, the Biden campaign needed to kill the story.

So, according to newly-released transcripts of Morell’s testimony before the House judiciary Committee, Blinken “triggered” Morell to put together a letter for some 50 senior intelligence officials to sign – using their high-level government titles – to claim that the laptop story “had all the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign.”

In short, at the Biden campaign’s direction Morell launched a covert operation against the American people to undermine the integrity of the 2020 election. A letter signed by dozens of the highest-ranking former CIA, DIA, and NSA officials would surely carry enough weight to bury the Biden laptop story. It worked. Social media outlets prevented any reporting on the laptop from being posted and the mainstream media could easily ignore the story as it was merely “Russian propaganda.”

Asked recently by Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) why he agreed to draft the false sign-on letter, Morell testified that he wanted to “help Vice President Biden … because I wanted him to win the election.”

Morell also likely expected to be named by President Biden to head up the CIA when it came time to call in favors.

The Democrats and the mainstream media have relentlessly pushed the lie that the ruckus inside the US Capitol on Jan. 6th 2021 was a move by President Trump to overthrow the election results. Hundreds of “trespassers” were arrested and held in solitary confinement without trial to bolster the false narrative that a conspiracy to steal the election was taking place.

It turns out that there really was a conspiracy to steal the election, but it was opposite of what was reported. Just as the Steele Dossier was a Democratic Party covert action to plant the lie that the Russians were pulling strings for Trump, the “Russian disinformation campaign” letter was a lie to deflect scrutiny of the Biden family’s possible corruption in the final days of the campaign.

Did the Biden campaign’s disinformation campaign help rig the election in his favor? Polls suggest that Biden would not have been elected had the American electorate been informed about what was on Hunter Biden’s laptop. So yes, they cheated in the election.

The Democrats and the mainstream media are still at it, however. Now they are trying to kill the story of how they killed the story of the Biden laptop. This is a scandal that would once upon a time have ended in resignation, impeachment, and/or plenty of jail time. If they successfully bury this story, I hate to say it but there is no more rule of law in what has become the American banana republic.” See here.

But the main way the election can be rigged is by fraudulent “voting.” It’s much easier to do this with digital scanning of votes than with old-fashioned ballot boxes.

Dr. Naomi Wolf explains how electronic voting machines make it easier to steal elections:

“People could steal elections in this ‘analog’ technology of paper and locked ballot boxes, of course, by destroying or hiding votes, or by bribing voters, a la Tammany Hall, or by other forms of wrongdoing, so security and chain of custody, as well as anti-corruption scrutiny, were always needed in guaranteeing accurate election counts. But there was no reason, with analog physical processing of votes, to query the tradition of the secret ballot.

Before the digital scanning of votes, you could not hack a wooden ballot box; and you could not set an algorithm to misread a pile of paper ballots. So, at the end of the day, one way or another, you were counting physical documents.

Those days are gone, obviously, and in many districts there are digital systems reading ballots.” See here.

This isn’t the first time the Left has stolen an election. It happened in the 2020 presidential election too. Ron Unz offers his usual cogent analysis:

“There does seem to be considerable circumstantial evidence of widespread ballot fraud by Democratic Party forces, hardly surprising given the apocalyptic manner in which so many of their leaders had characterized the threat of a Trump reelection. After all, if they sincerely believed that a Trump victory would be catastrophic for America why would they not use every possible means, fair and foul alike, to save our country from that dire fate?

In particular, several of the major swing-states contain large cities—Detroit, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, and Atlanta—that are both totally controlled by the Democratic Party and also notoriously corrupt, and various eye-witnesses have suggested that the huge anti-Trump margins they provided may have been heavily ‘padded’ to ensure the candidate’s defeat.” See here.

In a program aired right after Biden’s pitiful State of the Union speech, the great Tucker Carlson pointed out that Biden’s “Justice” Department has already confessed that it plans to rig the election. It will do this by banning voter ID laws as “racist.” This permits an unlimited number of fake votes:

“If Joe Biden is so good at politics, why is he losing to Donald Trump, who the rest of us were assured was a retarded racist who no normal person would vote for? But now Joe Biden is getting stomped by Donald Trump, but he’s also at the same time good at politics? Right.

Again, they can’t win, but they’re not giving up. So what does that tell you? Well, they’re going to steal the election. We know they’re going to steal the election because they’re now saying so out loud. Here is the Attorney General of the United States, the chief law enforcement officer of this country in Selma, Alabama, just the other day.

[Now Carlson quotes the Attorney General, Merrick Garland:]

“The right to vote is still under attack, and that is why the Justice Department is fighting back. That is why one of the first things I did when I came into office was to double the size of the voting section of the Civil Rights Division. That is why we are challenging efforts by states and jurisdictions to implement discriminatory, burdensome, and unnecessary restrictions on access to the ballot, including those related to mail-in voting, the use of drop boxes and voter ID requirements. That is why we are working to block the adoption of discriminatory redistricting plans that dilute the vote of Black voters and other voters of color.

[Carlson then comments on Garland:]

“Did you catch that? Of course, you’re a racist. That’s always the takeaway. But consider the details of what the Attorney General of the United States just said. Mail-in balloting, drop boxes, voter ID requirements. The chief law enforcement officer of the United States Government is telling you that it’s immoral, in fact racist, in fact illegal to ask people for their IDs when they vote to verify they are who they say they are. What is that? Well, no one ever talks about this, but the justification for it is that somehow people of color, Black people, don’t have state-issued IDs. Somehow they’re living in a country where you can do virtually nothing without proving your identity with a government-issued ID without government-issued IDs. They can’t fly on planes, they can’t have checking accounts, they can’t have any interaction with the government, state, local, or federal. They can’t stay in hotels. They can’t have credit cards. Because someone without a state-issued ID can’t do any of those things.

But what’s so interesting is these same people, very much including the Attorney General and the administration he serves, is working to eliminate cash, to make this a cashless society. Have you been to a stadium event recently? No cash accepted. You have to have a credit card. In order to get a credit card you need a state-issued ID, and somehow that’s not racist. But it is racist to ask people to prove their identity when they choose the next President of the United States. That doesn’t make any sense at all. That’s a lie. It’s an easily provable lie, and anyone telling that lie is advocating for mass voter fraud, which the Attorney General is. There’s no other way to read it. So you should know that. You live in a country where the Attorney General is abetting, in fact calling for voter fraud, and that’s the only chance they have to get their guy re-elected.” See here.

Because of absentee ballots, the voting can be spread out over a long period of time. This makes voting fraud much easier. Mollie Hemingway has done a lot of research on this topic:

“In the 2020 presidential election, for the first time ever, partisan groups were allowed—on a widespread basis—to cross the bright red line separating government officials who administer elections from political operatives who work to win them. It is important to understand how this happened in order to prevent it in the future.

Months after the election, Time magazine published a triumphant story of how the election was won by “a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information.”  Written by Molly Ball, a journalist with close ties to Democratic leaders, it told a cheerful story of a “conspiracy unfolding behind the scenes,” the “result of an informal alliance between left-wing activists and business titans.”

A major part of this “conspiracy” to “save the 2020 election” was to use COVID as a pretext to maximize absentee and early voting. This effort was enormously successful. Nearly half of voters ended up voting by mail, and another quarter voted early. It was, Ball wrote, “practically a revolution in how people vote.” Another major part was to raise an army of progressive activists to administer the election at the ground level.

Here, one billionaire in particular took a leading role: Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

Zuckerberg’s help to Democrats is well known when it comes to censoring their political opponents in the name of preventing “misinformation.” Less well known is the fact that he directly funded liberal groups running partisan get-out-the-vote operations. In fact, he helped those groups infiltrate election offices in key swing states by doling out large grants to crucial districts.

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, an organization led by Zuckerberg’s wife Priscilla, gave more than $400 million to nonprofit groups involved in “securing” the 2020 election. Most of those funds—colloquially called “Zuckerbucks”—were funneled through the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), a voter outreach organization founded by Tiana Epps-Johnson, Whitney May, and Donny Bridges. All three had previously worked on activism relating to election rules for the New Organizing Institute, once described by The Washington Post as “the Democratic Party’s Hogwarts for digital wizardry.”

Flush with $350 million in Zuckerbucks, the CTCL proceeded to disburse large grants to election officials and local governments across the country. These disbursements were billed publicly as “COVID-19 response grants,” ostensibly to help municipalities acquire protective gear for poll workers or otherwise help protect election officials and volunteers against the virus. In practice, relatively little money was spent for this. Here, as in other cases, COVID simply provided cover.

According to the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), Georgia received more than $31 million in Zuckerbucks, one of the highest amounts in the country. The three Georgia counties that received the most money spent only 1.3 percent of it on personal protective equipment. The rest was spent on salaries, laptops, vehicle rentals, attorney fees for public records requests, mail-in balloting, and other measures that allowed elections offices to hire activists to work the election. Not all Georgia counties received CTCL funding. And of those that did, Trump-voting counties received an average of $1.91 per registered voter, compared to $7.13 per registered voter in Biden-voting counties.

The FGA looked at this funding another way, too. Trump won Georgia by more than five points in 2016. He lost it by three-tenths of a point in 2020. On average, as a share of the two-party vote, most counties moved Democratic by less than one percentage point in that time. Counties that didn’t receive Zuckerbucks showed hardly any movement, but counties that did moved an average of 2.3 percentage points Democratic. In counties that did not receive Zuckerbucks, “roughly half saw an increase in Democrat votes that offset the increase in Republican votes, while roughly half saw the opposite trend.” In counties that did receive Zuckerbucks, by contrast, three quarters “saw a significant uptick in Democrat votes that offset any upward change in Republican votes,” including highly populated Fulton, Gwinnett, Cobb, and DeKalb counties.

Of all the 2020 battleground states, it is probably in Wisconsin where the most has been brought to light about how Zuckerbucks worked.

CTCL distributed $6.3 million to the Wisconsin cities of Racine, Green Bay, Madison, Milwaukee, and Kenosha—purportedly to ensure that voting could take place “in accordance with prevailing [anti-COVID] public health requirements.”

Wisconsin law says voting is a right, but that “voting by absentee ballot must be carefully regulated to prevent the potential for fraud or abuse; to prevent overzealous solicitation of absent electors who may prefer not to participate in an election.” Wisconsin law also says that elections are to be run by clerks or other government officials. But the five cities that received Zuckerbucks outsourced much of their election operation to private liberal groups, in one case so extensively that a sidelined government official quit in frustration.

This was by design. Cities that received grants were not allowed to use the money to fund outside help unless CTCL specifically approved their plans in writing. CTCL kept tight control of how money was spent, and it had an abundance of “partners” to help with anything the cities needed.

Some government officials were willing to do whatever CTCL recommended. “As far as I’m concerned I am taking all of my cues from CTCL and work with those you recommend,” Celestine Jeffreys, the chief of staff to Democratic Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich, wrote in an email. CTCL not only had plenty of recommendations, but made available a “network of current and former election administrators and election experts” to scale up “your vote by mail processes” and “ensure forms, envelopes, and other materials are understood and completed correctly by voters.”

Power the Polls, a liberal group recruiting poll workers, promised to help with ballot curing. The liberal Mikva Challenge worked to recruit high school-age poll workers. And the left-wing Brennan Center offered help with “election integrity,” including “post-election audits” and “cybersecurity.”

The Center for Civic Design, an election administration policy organization that frequently partners with groups such as liberal billionaire Pierre Omidyar’s Democracy Fund, designed absentee ballots and voting instructions, often working directly with an election commission to design envelopes and create advertising and targeting campaigns. The Elections Group, also linked to the Democracy Fund, provided technical assistance in handling drop boxes and conducted voter outreach. The communications director for the Center for Secure and Modern Elections, an organization that advocates sweeping changes to the elections process, ran a conference call to help Green Bay develop Spanish-language radio ads and geofencing to target voters in a predefined area.

Digital Response, a nonprofit launched in 2020, offered to “bring voters an updated elections website,” “run a website health check,” “set up communications channels,” “bring poll worker application and management online,” “track and respond to polling location wait times,” “set up voter support and email response tools,” “bring vote-by-mail applications online,” “process incoming [vote-by-mail] applications,” and help with “ballot curing process tooling and voter notification.”

The National Vote at Home Institute was presented as a “technical assistance partner” that could “support outreach around absentee voting,” provide and oversee voting machines, consult on methods to cure absentee ballots, and even assume the duty of curing ballots.

A few weeks after the five Wisconsin cities received their grants, CTCL emailed Claire Woodall-Vogg, the executive director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, to offer “an experienced elections staffer that could potentially embed with your staff in Milwaukee in a matter of days.” The staffer leading Wisconsin’s portion of the National Vote at Home Institute was an out-of-state Democratic activist named Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein. As soon as he met with Woodall-Vogg, he asked for contacts in other cities and at the Wisconsin Elections Commission.

Spitzer-Rubenstein would eventually take over much of Green Bay’s election planning from the official charged with running the election, Green Bay Clerk Kris Teske. This made Teske so unhappy that she took Family and Medical Leave prior to the election and quit shortly thereafter.

Emails from Spitzer-Rubenstein show the extent to which he was managing the election process. To one government official he wrote, “By Monday, I’ll have our edits on the absentee voting instructions. We’re pushing Quickbase to get their system up and running and I’ll keep you updated. I’ll revise the planning tool to accurately reflect the process. I’ll create a flowchart for the vote-by-mail processing that we will be able to share with both inspectors and also observers.”

Once early voting started, Woodall-Vogg would provide Spitzer-Rubenstein with daily updates on the numbers of absentee ballots returned and still outstanding in each ward­­—prized information for a political operative.

Amazingly, Spitzer-Rubenstein even asked for direct access to the Milwaukee Election Commission’s voter database:

“Would you or someone else on your team be able to do a screen-share so we can see the process for an export?” he wrote.

“Do you know if WisVote has an [application programming interface] or anything similar so that it can connect with other software apps? That would be the holy grail.”

Even for Woodall-Vogg, that was too much.

“While I completely understand and appreciate the assistance that is trying to be provided,” she replied, “I am definitely not comfortable having a non-staff member involved in the function of our voter database, much less recording it.”

When these emails were released in 2021, they stunned Wisconsin observers. “What exactly was the National Vote at Home Institute doing with its daily reports? Was it making sure that people were actually voting from home by going door-to-door to collect ballots from voters who had not yet turned theirs in? Was this data sharing a condition of the CTCL grant? And who was really running Milwaukee’s election?” asked Dan O’Donnell, whose election analysis appeared at Wisconsin’s conservative MacIver Institute.

Kris Teske, the sidelined Green Bay city clerk—in whose office Wisconsin law actually places the responsibility to conduct elections—had of course seen what was happening early on. “I just don’t know where the Clerk’s Office fits in anymore,” she wrote in early July. By August, she was worried about legal exposure: “I don’t understand how people who don’t have the knowledge of the process can tell us how to manage the election,” she wrote on August 28.

Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich simply handed over Teske’s authority to agents from outside groups and gave them leadership roles in collecting absentee ballots, fixing ballots that would otherwise be voided for failure to follow the law, and even supervising the counting of ballots. “The grant mentors would like to meet with you to discuss, further, the ballot curing process. Please let them know when you’re available,” Genrich’s chief of staff told Teske.

Spitzer-Rubenstein explained that the National Vote at Home Institute had done the same for other cities in Wisconsin. “We have a process map that we’ve worked out with Milwaukee for their process. We can also adapt the letter we’re sending out with rejected absentee ballots along with a call script alerting voters. (We can also get people to make the calls, too, so you don’t need to worry about it.)”

Other emails show that Spitzer-Rubenstein had keys to the central counting facility and access to all the machines before election night. His name was on contracts with the hotel hosting the ballot counting.

Sandy Juno, who was clerk of Brown County, where Green Bay is located, later testified about the problems in a legislative hearing. “He was advising them on things. He was touching the ballots. He had access to see how the votes were counted,” Juno said of Spitzer-Rubenstein. Others testified that he was giving orders to poll workers and seemed to be the person running the election night count operation.

“I would really like to think that when we talk about security of elections, we’re talking about more than just the security of the internet,” Juno said. “You know, it has to be security of the physical location, where you’re not giving a third party keys to where you have your election equipment.”

Juno noted that there were irregularities in the counting, too, with no consistency between the various tables. Some had absentee ballots face-up, so anyone could see how they were marked. Poll workers were seen reviewing ballots not just to see that they’d been appropriately checked by the clerk, but “reviewing how they were marked.” And poll workers fixing ballots used the same color pens as the ones ballots had been filled out in, contrary to established procedures designed to make sure observers could differentiate between voters’ marks and poll workers’ marks.

The plan by Democratic strategists to bring activist groups into election offices worked in part because no legislature had ever imagined that a nonprofit could take over so many election offices so easily.

“If it can happen to Green Bay, Wisconsin, sweet little old Green Bay, Wisconsin, these people can coordinate any place,” said Janel Brandtjen, a state representative in Wisconsin.

She was right. What happened in Green Bay happened in Democrat-run cities and counties across the country. Four hundred million Zuckerbucks were distributed with strings attached. Officials were required to work with “partner organizations” to massively expand mail-in voting and staff their election operations with partisan activists. The plan was genius. And because no one ever imagined that the election system could be privatized in this way, there were no laws to prevent it.

“Such laws should now be a priority.” See here.

Let’s do everything we can to publicize the steal. That way, we have a chance to prevent it.

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 19:00

Badass ‘Vigilantes’ Show Up Evict Squatters At NY House Where Homeowner Arrested

Badass ‘Vigilantes’ Show Up Evict Squatters At NY House Where Homeowner Arrested

A pair of vigilantes showed up to a house in Queens, New York where the homeowner was recently arrested for changing the locks on her own house in order to try and evict squatters.

On Tuesday afternoon, two unidentified men driving a black pickup truck pulled into the driveway of the Flushing home in search of the squatters.

“We are looking to get this guy out,” one of the men told the Daily Mail. “I am here to talk to him. I want to see why he is here.”

The owner, Adele Andaloro, 47, was in the process of selling the inherited property valued at roughly $1 million, when the squatters moved in.

One man, who is believed to be squatting in the home, walks past the property (via the Daily Mail)

One of the neighbors on the block, who saw what transpired, said ‘holy c**p,’ and said she had no idea that the squatter issue was causing so much backlash.

Many of the neighbors are baffled by the ordeal – and say they want to know how the squatters gained access into the house in the first place.

It’s disgusting,’ one person said, who mentioned that he has seen one of the squatters walking around outside.

He added sarcastically: ‘I wish I could live rent free.’ -Daily Mail

A woman, who is squatting inside, peers through the window to watch a confrontation

Another neighbor told the Mail that she had seen concerning activity at the house over the past few weeks – including one of the squatters carrying a door into the house one night.

“I actually saw the door go into the house. The guy looked at me then looked away,” she said. “I didn’t know what was going on.”

“They are doing construction on the house all night long,” said another neighbor. “I heard a drill and saw through my window that they were drilling holes into the wall and putting up boards.”

One of the ‘vigilantes’ goes to confront the squatters

Andaloro’s arrest was captured on video.

According to locals, Andaloro lived in the house with her daughter and mother. When her mother passed away several years ago, she stayed in the house and rented out the basement to an older man and his dog. After the man moved out of state, Andaloro put the house on the market – when the squatters showed up

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 18:40

Watch: Biden Bizarrely Wanders Off Stage Mid Event To Pull Faces At A Baby

Watch: Biden Bizarrely Wanders Off Stage Mid Event To Pull Faces At A Baby

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

Joe Biden wandered off stage during an event in Phoenix, Arizona so that he could pull funny faces at a baby.

Biden suddenly walked off camera while his campaign manager was introducing him at a Mexican diner in front of literally dozens of people who had shown up to see him.

When he came back, Biden announced “Well folks, I have to tell you straight up… I like you all, but I couldn’t resist that little baby.”

He reportedly asked the mother holding the child “how old?”

The rest of the appearance was the usual Biden vs teleprompter slur fest:

The reason Biden was holding this Mexican Diner event is that Donald Trump leads Biden among Hispanic voters 39% to 34%, according to a  USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll released in January. 

A New York Times/Siena College Poll released in February also found Biden losing the Hispanic vote to Trump, 40% to 46%.

Biden’s popularity among minority demographics is tanking, while Trump’s is soaring.

*  *  *

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.

Tyler Durden
Wed, 03/20/2024 – 18:20