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State Department Sued For Labeling Trump ‘Disinformation Purveyor’

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(Miami - Flórida, 09/03/2020) Presidente da República Jair Bolsonaro durante encontro com o Senador Marco Rubio..Foto: Alan Santos/PR

The United States Department of State is being sued for documents detailing a Biden administration scheme that censored the political speech of Americans and labeled President Donald Trump a “disinformation purveyor.”

The non-profit public interest law firm Judicial Watch announced in a statement it “filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. State Department for all records which allege President Trump or any current or former member of his cabinet are ‘purveyors of disinformation.’”

“The Biden censorship operation was compiling files on his political enemies from Trump world. The State Department should immediately disclose the records about this abuse, as FOIA requires,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

Judicial Watch states in the complaint:

According to media reports on April 30, 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the State Department labeled a member of President Trump’s cabinet as a purveyor of disinformation, compiling a dossier of social media posts from the unnamed cabinet member. See, e.g., “Rubio says State had dossier accusing Trump Cabinet member of disinformation,” The Hill, April 30, 2025 

Judicial Watch reports it sued the State Department after “it failed to respond to a May 1, 2025, FOIA request for records, including those of the Global Engagement Center (GEC), about social media posts of any current or former member of President Donald Trump’s cabinet, to include Trump himself, alleged to constitute misinformation, disinformation, or malign influence. Judicial Watch also asked for any guidance or policy documents.”

Judicial Watch notes that during an April 30, 2025, Cabinet meeting, Rubio said, “We had an office in the Department of State whose job it was to censor Americans.”

Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-MI), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs South and Central Asia Subcommittee, said at a hearing in April about the center: “The GEC [Global Engagement Center] was initially authorized for the statutory purpose of countering foreign propaganda and disinformation efforts. Despite that mandate, for years the GEC instead deployed its shadowy network of grantees and sub-grantees to facilitate the censorship of American voices …”

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Great America News Desk. 

Legal Theorists Try To Attack Trump. Their Argument May Be Dead On Arrival.

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Donald Trump via Gage Skidmore Flickr

A novel legal theory from two conservative legal scholars published in the University of Pennsylvania Law Review that a section of the 14th Amendment makes Donald Trump ineligible to run for president may be getting a court hearing in Florida.

As Ballot Access news editor emeritus Richard Winger notes:

On August 24, a Florida voter, Lawrence Caplan, filed a federal lawsuit seeking to bar former President Donald Trump from being placed on 2024 ballots as a presidential candidate. Caplan v Trump, s.d., 0:23cv-61618.

Caplan, who appears to be representing himself in the case, writes:

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which provides for the disqualification of an individual who commits insurrection against our government has remained on the books for some one hundred and fifty plus years without ever facing question as to its legitimacy. While one can certainly argue that it has not been thoroughly tested, that fact is only because we have not faced an insurrection against our federal government such as the one while we faced on January 6, 2021. It should also be noted that President Trump has since made statements to the effect that should he be elected, he would advocate the total elimination of the US Constitution and the creation of a new charter more in line with his personal values.

Winger believes Caplan’s suit is “misguided:”

The Fourteenth Amendment “insurrection clause” bars individuals from being sworn in to certain offices, but it does not bar them from seeking the office. When the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, there was no mechanism to prevent any voter from voting for any candidate.

Caplan appears to be taking the law review article’s authors, William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulson, at their word:

“No official should shrink from these duties. It would be wrong — indeed, arguably itself a breach of one’s constitutional oath of office — to abandon one’s responsibilities of faithful interpretation, application, and enforcement of Section Three,” Bode and Paulsen write.

Alternatively, ordinary citizens could file challenges on the same grounds with state election officials themselves.

And other such suits may emerge over the coming weeks. I’m not convinced any federal judge will be willing to read Section 3 like Baude and Paulson say it should be. It’s not because the Section’s words aren’t clear – they are.

My concerns are akin to those of Cato’s Walter Olsen, who writes:

…no one should assume that just because Baude and Paulsen have made a powerful intellectual case for their originalist reading, that the Supreme Court will declare itself convinced and disqualify Trump. Justice Antonin Scalia memorably described himself as a “faint‐​hearted originalist,” which captures something important about the thinking of almost every Justice—if overruling a wrongly decided old case threatens to disrupt settled expectations to the point of spreading chaos and grief through society, most of them will refrain. Stare decisis, and a general preference for continuity in law, still matters.

Exactly. While some judges may nurse images of themselves as bold crusaders for justice, most jurists aren’t eager to upset established practice and precedent on a whim. Though, to be fair to the times when such upsets have occurred – Brown v. Board of Education, for example, or Griswold v. Connecticut – have been warranted, necessary, and beneficial.

Does that apply in the Caplan case? A court will decide. But as I’ve long said about Trump, the only court he cares about is public opinion. If voters reject him, that will carry more weight and sanction than any court could ever deliver.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Great America News Desk. It first appeared in American Liberty News. Republished with permission.

Stunner: CIA Approved and Promoted Biden Campaign Letter Falsely Claiming Russians Faked Hunter Laptop

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President Joe Biden hugs his family during the 59th Presidential Inauguration ceremony in Washington, Jan. 20, 2021. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris took the oath of office on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol. (DOD Photo by Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Carlos M. Vazquez II)

In a stunning revelation, congressional investigators reveal the Central Intelligence Agency reviewed, approved and may have even recruited signers for an October 2020 public letter from 51 intelligence officials that falsely claimed damaging information against Democrat nominee Joe Biden had been “planted” the Russian government.

Specifically, the letter, produced with the help of the CIA, claims Russian agents faked the contents of a laptop computer, abandoned at a Delaware computer shop by Biden’s middle-aged son Hunter.  Files, documents, and photograps on the laptop show Hunter Biden using drugs, frequenting prostitutes and engaged in shadowy business deals with foreign officials, which may also allegedly Joe Biden.

As part of a plan to assist Biden’s campaign and defeat President Donald Trump, 51 intelligence officials signed their name to a public letter claiming, without evidence, the laptop was planted by the Russian government.

That claim has since been proven to be a lie.


It is now also revealed the CIA had a hand in its production.

After an investigation, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Intelligence Committee Chairman Michael Turner (R-OH) have released a report revealing 

the CIA’s “Prepublication Classification Review Board” or “PCRB” “reviewed and approved the statement before its release.”

“Furthermore, evidence suggests that one CIA employee working at the PCRB may have shopped the letter to a former CIA officer who later agreed to add his name to the statement,” the lawmakers reveal in a statement.

The House Judiciary Committee, in a statement, further reveals:

On April 5, 2023, former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell testified before the Committees that Secretary Blinken, then serving as a senior Biden campaign advisor, was the impetus of the public statement. Documents also revealed that Morell rushed the statement through the PCRB process in order for Vice President Biden to have a “talking point” to use during the October 22, 2020, presidential debate.

Additionally, evidence suggests that senior Biden campaign officials, including now Secretary of State Antony Blinken, now Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates, and now Counselor to the President Steve Ricchetti, took active measures to discredit the allegations about Hunter Biden by exploiting the national security credentials of former intelligence officials and coordinated efforts to disseminate the statement with members of the media. Morell’s testimony also exposed that the CIA’s PCRB reviewed and approved the statement before its release.

According to a written statement provided to the Committees by former CIA official David Cariens, the CIA—or at least an employee of the CIA—may have helped in the effort to solicit signatures for the statement. Cariens explained that he spoke with the PCRB in October 2020 regarding the review of his memoir and during that call the CIA employee “asked” him if he would sign the statement.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Investigators Swoop in on Documents that Could Show Joe Biden was in on Influence Peddling Scheme

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The White House, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Congressional investigators may soon have, and could reveal to the public, hidden government documents showing how then-Vice President Joe Biden used his office and taxpayer funds to boost his family’s alleged influence-peddling business.

U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-KY) is demanding the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) turn over records regarding how Biden’s activities as Vice President coincided with his middle-aged son Hunter’s activities in Ukraine. 

“Comer is requesting all unredacted documents and communications in which then-Vice President Joe Biden used a pseudonym; Hunter Biden, Eric Schwerin, or Devon Archer is copied; and all drafts of then-Vice President Biden’s speech delivered to the Ukrainian Rada in December 2015,” a statement from the Committee announced.

“Joe Biden has stated there was ‘an absolute wall’ between his family’s foreign business schemes and his duties as Vice President, but evidence reveals that access was wide open for his family’s influence peddling,” said Comer.

“We already have evidence of then-Vice President Biden speaking, dining, and having coffee with his son’s foreign business associates. We also know that Hunter Biden and his associates were informed of then-Vice President Biden’s official government duties in countries where they had a financial interest,” Comer added.

“The National Archives must provide these unredacted records to further our investigation into the Biden family’s corruption,” Comer demanded.

“In August 2019, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden stated that when he was Vice President there was ‘an absolute wall between the personal and private, and the government’ and ‘that is why I have never talked with my son or my brother, or anyone else in the distant family about their business interests, period,’” the Committee noted.

But evidence, documents and eyewitnesses report otherwise.

“Witness testimony reveals then-President Biden spoke on speakerphone with his son’s foreign business associates over 20 times, dined with corrupt foreign oligarchs in Washington, D.C., and met with his son’s Chinese business associate for coffee in Beijing. Emails in NARA’s custody also reveal how Hunter Biden and his associates were copied on official government email,” the Committee revealed.

Below is the full text of the letter:

The Honorable Colleen Shogan

Archivist of the United States

National Archives and Records Administration

700 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, D.C. 20408

Dear Dr. Shogan:

The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is investigating President Biden’s meetings and communications with certain family members and their business associates during his tenure as Vice President. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has published the Biden Vice Presidential Records Collection, which contains information relevant to the Committee’s work. Many of these records have been redacted for publication pursuant to the Presidential Records Act (PRA) and the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). To further our investigation, it is essential that the Committee review these documents in their original format.

The Committee seeks unrestricted special access under the PRA to Case Number 2023-0022-F, entitled “Email Messages To and/or From Vice President Biden and Hunter Biden related to Burisma and Ukraine,” which has been published on NARA’s website. These records have been redacted for public release pursuant to the PRA and FOIA. For example, an email bearing the subject “Friday Schedule Card,” is withheld in part under a “P6” and “b(6)” restrictions, denoting personal information regarding the subject under the PRA and FOIA respectively.  Attached to this email, and made available on the NARA website, is a document that indicates on 9:00 a.m. on May 27, 2016, Vice President Biden took a call with the president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko. It is concerning to the Committee, however, that this document was sent to “Robert L. Peters”—a pseudonym the Committee has identified as then Vice-President Biden. Additionally, the Committee questions why the then-Vice President’s son, Hunter Biden—and only Hunter Biden—was copied on this email to then-Vice President Biden.

To further our investigation, the Committee needs to review these documents in their original format. The Committee also requests access to certain other documents and information described below. Please provide these documents no later than August 31, 2023:

Complete, unredacted versions of all documents from Case Number 2023-0022-F; 

Any document or communication in which a pseudonym for Vice President Joe Biden was included either as a sender, recipient, copied or was included in the contents of the document or communication, including but not limited to Robert Peters, Robin Ware, and JRB Ware;

Any document or communication in which Hunter Biden, Eric Schwerin, or Devon Archer was included either as a sender, recipient, copied, or was included in the contents of the document or communication; and

All drafts from November 1, 2015 to December 9, 2015 of then-Vice President Biden’s speech delivered to the Ukrainian Rada on December 9, 2015.

Special access to presidential records may be granted “to…Congress” and “to the extent of matter within its jurisdiction, to any committee… if such records contain information that is needed for the conduct of its business and that is not otherwise available….” Furthermore, the PRA subjects Vice-Presidential records to its provisions “in the same manner as Presidential records.”

The Committee’s need for these Vice-Presidential records is specific and well-documented. The Committee seeks to craft legislative solutions aimed at deficiencies it has identified in the current legal framework regarding ethics laws and disclosure of financial interests related to the immediate family members of Vice Presidents and Presidents—deficiencies that may place American national security and interests at risk. The Committee is concerned that foreign nationals have sought access and influence by engaging in lucrative business relationships with high-profile political figures’ immediate family members, including members of the Biden family. For additional information regarding the Committee’s legislative purpose regarding its investigation of the Biden family’s international business, the Committee would direct you to three bank records memoranda it has released this year.

The Committee on Oversight and Accountability has specific jurisdiction over NARA under House Rule X. Additionally, the Committee on Oversight and Accountability is the principal oversight committee of the U.S. House of Representatives and has broad authority to investigate “any matter” at “any time” under House Rule X. 

To schedule the delivery of responsive documents or if you have questions regarding this request, please contact Committee on Oversight and Accountability staff at (202) 225-5074. Thank you for your prompt attention to this important investigation.

Sincerely,

James Comer

Chairman

Committee on Oversight and Accountability

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

FBI Now Going After Its Critics as ‘Conspiracy Theorists’ Spreading ‘Misinformation’

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Arrest image via Pixabay

ANALYSIS – Be very afraid. It just keeps getting worse. Under Joe Biden, the FBI is daily being further weaponized against its critics and critics of the administration’s chosen narratives.

Following the disclosures that the FBI was in regular contact with Twitter employees to ensure they censored speech they designated ‘misinformation,’ the Bureau attacked anyone who criticizes them by, you guessed it – calling it ‘misinformation.’

It also called these FBI critics – ‘conspiracy theorists.’

This is a favorite leftwing buzz phrase often used to smear conservatives. 

The most recent outrage came when the FBI made a statement to FOX News this week after journalists posted screenshots of messages showing how FBI agents communicated with top Twitter officials relating to reports and potential posts about Hunter Biden.

In its response statement, rather than addressing the valid concerns, the Bureau slammed its critics as ‘conspiracy theorists’ spreading misinformation.’

And one legal expert, constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley, is sounding the alarm.

He told FOX News that it is a “menacing thing” for the nation’s largest law enforcement agency to declare that “combatting disinformation” is one of its top priorities, and then attack free speech advocates for criticizing them.

The Epoch Times reports:

A spokesperson for the FBI told Fox News, in response to several “Twitter Files” installments, that “conspiracy theorists” are “feeding the American public misinformation” and said they are trying to discredit the bureau and its agents.

That statement, Turley told Fox News, is “disturbing” because the FBI has allegedly “attacked many of us who were raising free speech concerns and called all of us collectively ‘conspiracy theorists spreading disinformation.’

“It was highly inappropriate, because the FBI has said that combatting disinformation is one of its priorities. So, it is a very menacing thing when you have the largest law enforcement agency attacking free speech advocates,” Turley, a professor of law at George Washington University who served as an expert witness during former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment inquiry, told the outlet.

The FBI’s outrageous response comes after journalist Michael Shellenberger wrote about the outrageous FBI-Twitter collusion:

“What I quickly put together is a pattern where it appears that FBI agents, along with former FBI agents within the company [Twitter], were engaged in a disinformation campaign aimed at top Twitter and Facebook executives, as well as at top news organization executives to basically prepare them, prime them, get them set up to dismiss Hunter Biden information when it would be released.”

Turley noted that Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk “has confirmed that the FBI paid social media companies to help them deal with what they called disinformation, which most of us call censorship.”

Turley added to FOX that the FBI “were in continuous communication [with Twitter], as were other agencies, targeting specific citizens and specific posters to be banned or suspended.”

“That really does smack of an agency relationship and that could violate the first amendment,” he warned.

But be very afraid, because things are now getting worse.

Now the FBI may also be coming after anyone who points out this clear and demonstrated FBI-Big Tech collusion for being a “conspiracy theorist” spreading “misinformation.”

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Famous Navy Seal Now De-transitioning – Says He Was Manipulated

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Katy Blackwood, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Former decorated Navy SEAL Chris Beck, who publicly announced his transition to look like a woman in 2013, has now said that this was a life-shattering mistake, and he is de-transitioning back to his biologically male gender.

Beck, who started going by the name Kirsten, was a poster child of the trans movement and was used aggressively by them to promote and impose their radical agenda in the U.S. military.

Beck earlier served in the Navy SEALs for 20 years, going on 13 deployments, including with the famed SEAL Team Six.

According to his speaker bio, he was awarded over 50 citations and medals, including the Bronze Star with valor and the Purple Heart.

But now Beck calls the trans movement a ‘cult’ that used, manipulated, and propagandized him into making this radical life change.

He is also speaking out to warn about the devastating effect of the trans agenda on children.

Beck made his explosive comments during an interview with political commentator Robby Starbuck. 

Starbuck tweeted that “Navy SEAL Chris Beck came out in 2013 as transgender. @andersoncooper did a special on @cnn about it. His story was used as propaganda to allow trans people in the military and to popularize the issue. Now Chris is ready to expose the truth.”

The Daily Caller reported:

He [Beck]told Starbuck that he is “not transgender” and used his confusion as an example of why psychologists should not “push their agenda” onto children. Beck claimed in the interview that it took a one hour long meeting at the Department of Veterans Affairs for him to be recommended hormones, which he has now been off for seven years. He went on to break down the effects of the hormones used for the gender transition on his body.

Beck was turned into a national figure when he came out as transgender in a 2013 CNN interview with Anderson Cooper. The interview came after he co-wrote the book “Warrior Princess” with psychologist Anne Speckhard. The book detailed him coming out as transgender. He warned viewers in the interview not to believe anything CNN said about him because he claims they “used [him]” and “destroyed [his] life” over the past decade.

Beck is also extremely concerned about the trans movement’s damaging effects on children.

The Blaze notes:

Beck explained the dangers of medical professionals’ “automatic acceptance” of children who have self-diagnosed themselves as transgender. He added that doctors should require “a minimum number of sessions” before allowing children to undergo life-altering hormone therapy treatment or gender-mutilating surgeries.

“There’s a lot of complications with these surgeries,” Beck noted. “And that’s a part that they don’t really talk about.”

Beck told Starbuck that he came on the podcast to take “full responsibility” for promoting gender ideology and stated that, at the time, he was “naive.” He explained that he is concerned that children are “being talked into this.”

“I don’t want this to continue, and I don’t want these kids to get hurt,” Beck stated.

And this a growing concern, especially as Team Biden is pushing to have taxpayer-funded transition surgeries for kids.

The Christian Post reports:

The United States Department of Health and Human Services says that taxpayer funds should be used to cover the cost of body mutilating “gender transition” surgeries for minors. In written responses to Rep. Mary Miller, R-Ill., U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra said that the Biden administration supports using taxpayer dollars to cover the costs of elective body-deforming surgeries on youth, such as mastectomies and vaginoplasties. His responses were submitted Tuesday to the U.S. House Committee on Education and Labor.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Amanda Head: Gabrielle Union & Dwyane Wade Give Ridiculous Interview About Kid

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Woke Hollywood has gone too far…

Watch Amanda explain the controversy below:

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Biden’s Dangerously Weak and Naive Meeting with China’s Chairman Xi – ‘Strategic Insanity’

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Joe Biden via Gage Skidmore Flickr

ANALYSIS – Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse with Joe Biden, he goes and has a chummy sideline meeting with China’s communist leader-for-life, Xi Jinping, at the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia.

While his partisan spinmeisters in the media dutifully reported the White House line that Biden was firm with Xi, the three-and-a-half-hour private meeting was muddled, absurdly naïve and dangerous.

At the summit, Biden stated that the U.S. aims to manage competition with China “responsibly” and that there is no need for a new Cold War. 

Biden also strongly and foolishly reaffirmed China’s ‘One China’ policy regarding Taiwan, adding (against warnings from NATO and his own national security officials) that he didn’t foresee any Chinese military action against Taiwan any time soon.

Fox News reported Biden said during a press conference ahead of the G20 summit in Bali:

“[Xi] was clear and I was clear that we’ll defend American interests and values, promote universal human rights and stand up for the international order and work in lockstep with our allies and partners…”

“We’re going to compete vigorously but I’m not looking for conflict. I’m looking to manage this competition responsibly,” Biden said. “And I want to make sure that every country abides by the international rules of the road. We discussed that.”

Biden’s messaging was clear in one area though.

He believes climate change is more of a threat than a revisionist, expansionist, power-hungry, communist dictatorship with an economy almost the size of the U.S.

And Biden is willing to risk America’s sovereignty, independence, security and freedom to get China’s faux help with his extreme climate agenda.

GOP Senator Marco Rubio of Florida was rightfully livid over Biden’s meeting and statements.

Rubio said in a statement:

President Biden’s claim that ‘there need not be a new Cold War’ between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party proves that this administration dangerously misunderstands the CCP, which openly pushes for conflict with the United States and its allies…

Last week, while Xi appeared in a military uniform and called on the People’s Liberation Army [PLA] to prepare for war, Biden’s Department of Defense pulled an entire squadron of American fighter jets out of the Indo-Pacific. Not only is the United States unprepared to defend Taiwan against a PLA invasion, President Biden is now downplaying its likelihood.

This meeting should have held the CCP accountable for its rampant human rights abuses, ongoing theft of American intellectual property, and its refusal to investigate the origins of COVID-19.

Rubio added: “Instead, President Biden demonstrated that he is willing to sacrifice everything — including our national security and the security of our allies — for the sake of pursuing ill-fated climate talks with our nation’s greatest adversary.”

Former Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen told Fox News on Monday that Biden’s diplomacy with China is “strategic insanity” that may only help the autocratic communist state accumulate power and global influence.

Fox News adds that “Biden reportedly has been pressuring China to essentially join him in his Green New Deal-style vision of non-petroleum power sources, which Thiessen said is one of the key areas the United States can apply pressure to Beijing if they invade their peaceable neighbor Taiwan.

“The last thing we want China to do, quite frankly, is to start weaning itself off of oil,” Thiessen said.

“If they follow Biden’s advice and wean themselves off of oil and start embracing clean energy, we lose that leverage,” Thiessen said.

“So, you know, it’s not only a sign of weakness, it’s strategic insanity.”

As I recently reported, Xi has been increasingly adamant that so-called ‘reunification’ with Taiwan can no longer wait and China will use force if necessary to control the independent democratic nation.

Top U.S. commanders and senior intelligence officials have warned that China could take forceful action against Taiwan as early as next year, and increasingly likely by 2025 or 2027, at the latest.

Meanwhile, Biden is playing footsies with Xi, hoping China will join his radical green global agenda.

Because that is all he, and his leftist puppeteers, care about. GAND

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

‘Barbie’ Movie Banned in Vietnam as Hollywood Again Kowtows to China

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ANALYSIS – China’s outrageous claim to almost the entire South China Sea – everything within a “nine-dash line” drawn on Chinese maps – has taken its most recent victim – the movie-viewing public in Vietnam. The Vietnamese government has banned the movie due to a scene with that Chinese-made line on a map.

China takes its illegal claim very seriously and strives to impose its visual representation on maps everywhere, including those appearing in Hollywood movies.

While it’s unclear why the soon-to-be-released film ‘Barbie’ about the iconic doll and her boyfriend Ken would get embroiled in international politics, it has. 

This south China Sea has been a flashpoint between Vietnam and China for years. The artificial line is shown on Chinese maps to mark their claims over the area despite Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Brunei, Malaysia, and Taiwan claiming parts of the same vast expanse of sea.

Chinese warships and fishing vessels routinely operate in these waters to establish de-facto presence, often provoking clashes with neighboring countries.

The Daily Wire (DW) reported:

“We do not grant license for the American movie ‘Barbie’ to release in Vietnam because it contains the offending image of the nine-dash line,” Vi Kien Thanh, head of the Department of Cinema, a government body in charge of licensing and censoring foreign films, was quoted as saying in the state-run Tuoi Tre newspaper.

The movie’s trailer shows Barbie leaving her perfect doll world and to explore the “real world” after becoming disillusioned with her life.

So why did a big Hollywood studio decide to include this ridiculous claim in their otherwise non-political movies?

All I can think of is – in order to please the communists in Beijing. China is obviously a far bigger market than Vietnam. And who knows if Chinese investors were involved in the movie’s production.

DW notes:

“Barbie” isn’t the first film banned for including the nine-dash line. The Vietnamese government also blocked the DreamWorks animated film “Abominable” (2019) and the action-adventure film “Unchartered” (2022) for the same reason. Netflix removed the Australian spy drama “Pine Gap” in 2021 for their inclusion of the line.

Hollywood blockbusters including the Marvel films “Eternals” and “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” have also been in China after directors or actors involved in the films made comments critical of China.

Another big controversy exploded in 2019 over the Tom Cruise movie ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’ Initially the movie appeared to remove the flags of Taiwan and Japan from Maverick’s flight jacket. The flags were part of historical patches representing prior U.S. naval deployments to the region.

As NBC News reported:

In 2019, the trailer for “Top Gun: Maverick” showed Cruise’s character, U.S. Navy pilot Pete Mitchell, in the same bomber jacket he wore in the original film. But two of its flag patches — representing Japan and the Republic of China, the official name for Taiwan — appeared to have been replaced by other emblems.

The move was criticized at the time as an act of self-censorship to please China’s censors. Beijing sees Taiwan, a self-ruling democracy of 24 million people, as an inalienable part of its territory and lashes out at any reference to it as a sovereign nation.  

In this case Hollywood, or Cruise, had a change of heart and reversed their apparent kowtowing to China. CHinese investors also pulled out of the movie.

NBC News continued:

On the film’s release last month after a two-year pandemic delay, both flags had been restored. At an advance screening in Taipei, the audience broke out in cheers and applause at the sight of the Taiwanese flag on the big screen, local news outlet SETN reported.

Sometimes in Hollywood the good guys do win. Sadly, not in the case of Barbie.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Congress Reveals Stunning New Information on January 6 Attacker

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Members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee investigating the federal government’s response to the January 6, 2021 incidents at the U.S. Capitol now reveal that a pair of pipe bombs planted at the Capitol Hill offices of the Republican and Democrat parties may have been a diversion to distract law enforcement from other events.

They also reveal that while the bombs contained live explosives, it does not appear the timers were operable, and the FBI may not even have interviewed the witnesses who discovered them.

In response, Chairmen Thomas Massie (R-KY), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Jim Jordan (R-OH), and Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray “revealing new information surrounding the FBI’s investigation into pipe bombs placed near the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Republican National Committee (RNC) on January 5, 2021,” the Judiciary Committee reports.

“On June 7, 2023, the Committee on the Judiciary conducted a transcribed interview of Steven D’Antuono, the former Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI Washington Field Office (WFO),” the Committee announced.

“In that role, Mr. D’Antuono oversaw the WFO’s investigations into the events at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, including the placement of pipe bombs near the headquarters of the DNC and RNC on January 5, 2021. Mr. D’Antuono’s testimony provided new information about the FBI’s investigation into the pipe bombs and reinforces our concerns about the FBI’s handling of this matter,” the Committee revealed.

In his transcribed interview, Steven D’Antuono “suggested that the FBI could not even determine whether the placement of the pipe bombs was a ‘diversionary’ tactic for the events of January 6,” the Committee also revealed.

D’Antuono testified:

MASSIE: Are you familiar with the diversion thesis, that these were set up to be a diversion?

D’ANTUONO: Yeah, I’ve heard people say that, but if you watch – I’ve done a lot of media reports. I was trying to get the information out there, tips and stuff like that, right. I will not speculate. I’m not going to speculate on that. I think that’s speculation, at best, when people say that it’s a diversionary tactic. We’ll never know until we find the person that actually did – or persons that actually did it. So I can’t speculate on that. Could it have been? Yes, that’s one theory. Obviously, it’s one theory. But is it the only theory? I don’t – I really don’t know.

MASSIE: It looks like the head Capitol Police [sic] believes it was a diversion.

D’ANTUONO: So Steve Sund, chief of police, yes. I believe he wrote that in his book. Again, it’s pure speculation. There’s no intelligence – look, I ran the investigation for 2 years until I stepped out. We don’t know. We don’t even know the gender at this point as to – we could speculate, and there’s a lot of people that are speculating as to the gender.

MASSIE: How confident are you that the individual depicted in the surveillance footage on January 5th set both of those pipe bombs in place?

D’ANTUONO: So the video that we saw, I feel confident that by the video that we have, that that person planted those. 

D’Antuono also testified on the “viability of the pipe bombs, which, according to reporting, were deemed to be ‘inoperable,’” the Committee reports.

“D’Antuono referenced a report from the FBI laboratory in Quantico, Virginia, that the pipe bombs were viable, and ‘they could explode, and they could cause harm or death,’” the Committee notes, adding. “D’Antuono also acknowledged that the timer used on the pipe bomb could not have detonated the pipe bomb given the time already elapsed between placement and discovery.”

He testified:

MASSIE: Well, let me ask you this: Do you think it was technically possible for a kitchen timer . . . that has [a] 1-hour duration . . . to detonate a bomb 17 hours later?

D’ANTUONO: No, I don’t. And I saw the same kitchen timer as you. I agree. I don’t know when they were supposed to go off. Maybe they weren’t supposed to go off. We can’t—we don’t know. We honestly don’t know, and that’s some of the pain . . . .

D’Antuono’s testimony “provided additional details about the FBI’s use of geofencing technology to identify the pipe bomb suspect,” the Committee revealed.

He testified:

D’ANTUONO: So the – there’s a lot of phone data that came in. Yes, I’ve seen the same video. I’ve watched the same video. We put out the same video. It looks like a phone. Was it a real phone, a not a real phone, was it a ruse? Was it a – you know, I picked up my phone several times at meetings going, oh, yeah, I got to take this call, and walk out, right. The phone’s not on, right. So was the person just sitting there trying to pretend like they’re on a bench taking a phone call? We don’t know until we find the person, right, and ask them those questions.

We did a complete geofence. We have complete data. Not complete, because there’s some data that was corrupted by one of the providers, not purposely by them, right. It just – unusual circumstance that we have corrupt data from one of the providers. I’m not sure – I can’t remember right now which one. But for that day, which is awful because we don’t have that information to search. So could it have been that provider? Yeah, with our luck, you know, with this investigation it probably was, right. So maybe if we did have that – that data wasn’t corrupted – and it wasn’t purposely corrupted. I don’t want any conspiracy theories, right. To my knowledge, it wasn’t corrupted, you know, but that could have been good information that we don’t have, right. So that is painful for us to not to have that. So we looked at everything.

D’Antuono also testified that he did not definitively know if the FBI had interviewed the individual who discovered the pipe bomb at the DNC.

He testified:

MASSIE: So just to . . . put a fine point on it, you do not know whether they interviewed the person that discovered . . . the [bomb] at the DNC?

D’ANTUONO: I don’t know.

The Committee notes “D’Antuono conceded that it would be ‘investigation 101’ to interview the individuals who discovered the bombs, yet he was unable to confirm whether the FBI had taken this basic investigative step.”

He explained:

MASSIE: So – but the person who found – you either haven’t identified the person who found the second pipe bomb, or did you?

D’ANTUONO: I – honestly, sir, I don’t know the granularity of everything my agents and analysts did in that matter. It’s just – it’s a whole host of stuff that’s going on. As the [Assistant Director in Charge], as like any senior leader, I’m getting briefed on things, and that part never came up, so –

“D’Antuono’s testimony raises concerns about the FBI’s handling of the pipe bomb investigation, more than 890 days following the placement of the pipe bombs. To date, the FBI has failed to respond to the Committee’s requests for a briefing regarding the investigation,” the Committee concludes.

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