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Former CIA Agent Enters 2024 White House Contest

By
Madeleine Jackson
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5

The Republican presidential primary field just gained an unexpected new entry.

Thursday morning, former CIA clandestine agent Will Hurd announced he’s running for president.

Hurd, a one-time CIA officer from Texas who served three terms in Congress before deciding against running for re-election in 2020. He officially declared his candidacy in an interview with CBS News and also filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to run.

“This is a decision that my wife and I decided to do because we live in complicated times and we need common sense,” Hurd told CBS News.

“To be frank on this, that we’re not talking about these things,” he said. “I’m pissed that our elected officials are telling us to to hate our neighbors. Our neighbors are not our enemies. They’re our fellow Americans who we just happen to have a disagreement with.”

“These are the issues that we should be talking about,” Hurd continued. “And I believe the Republican Party can be the party that talks about the future, not the past.”

The Democratic National Committee welcomed Hurd to the race by seeking to tie him to Trump.

“Will Hurd spent his career in Congress in lockstep with Donald Trump’s extreme MAGA agenda – voting to rig the economy for the ultra-wealthy, ban abortion nationwide, gut Planned Parenthood, and repeal the Affordable Care Act, all while cozying up to the gun lobby,” said DNC Chair Jaime Harrison. “The GOP primary field is overflowing with MAGA Republicans desperate to win over the right-wing fringes, and Hurd is just the latest entrant into an incredibly chaotic and extreme 2024 field.”

Hurd has an uphill battle ahead of him in an already crowded primary field. Former President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis have largely dominated the polls thus far. Former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, tech mogul Vivek Ramaswamy, and former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson have lagged behind in the polls.

Former Vice President Mike Pence also recently entered the race after months of speculation.

This is a breaking news story. Click refresh for the latest updates.

GOP Congresswoman Makes Anti-Biden Move

By
Madeleine Jackson
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0
Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

MAGA Congresswoman Lauren Boebert (R) is forcing a House vote on impeaching President Biden over his handling of the U.S.-Mexico border and immigration policy later this week.

Walking off the House floor Tuesday, Boebert said that while House GOP leadership was aware she would make the privileged motion soon, according to The Hill.

A notice from House Democrat Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) on Tuesday indicated that Democrats will make a motion to table the resolution when it comes up for a vote on the floor, a procedural move that would block the resolution from coming to the floor for a vote.

The Colorado Congresswoman introduced two impeachment resolutions against Biden earlier this month.

In the first impeachment article, Boebert charges that Biden “knowingly presided over an executive branch that has continuously, overtly, and consistently violated Federal immigration law by pursuing an aggressive, open-borders agenda,” saying the U.S. allowed a high number of migrants released into the country “without the intention or ability to ensure that they appear in immigration court to face asylum or deportation proceedings.”

In the second impeachment article, Boebert’s resolution points to deportation cases being at historic lows, and deaths caused by fentanyl.

Boebert did not predict whether her impeachment articles would pass or not.

“We’ll see. I mean, I hope that Republicans and Democrats alike can recognize the invasion that’s taking place at our southern border, and that the laws of our nation are not being faithfully executed, and that we have an opportunity to bring a check and a balance to the invasion that’s going on,” Boebert said.

Durham Testifies FBI Rejected Warnings Of Clinton’s Plan To Link Trump To Russia

By
Madeleine Jackson
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6
Hillary Clinton via Gage Skidmore Flickr

On Wednesday, Special Counsel John Durham testified before Congress that the FBI ignored key intelligence reports from 2016 linking the Hillary Clinton campaign to a scheme to tie then-presidential candidate Donald Trump to Russia.

Durham testified publicly for the first time before the House Judiciary Committee according to Fox News. His testimony comes just weeks after releasing a report that ruled the Justice Department (DOJ) and FBI erred in launching the Trump-Russia investigation.

When asked about his findings, Durham said the FBI failed to “sufficiently scrutinize information it received” and also noted the agency applied a double standard to the opposing political campaigns.

“The FBI was too willing to accept and use politically funded and uncorroborated opposition research, such as the Steele dossier,” Durham said. “The FBI relied on the dossier and FISA applications, knowing there was likely material originating from a political campaign or political opponent.”

He added that the FBI “did so even after the president of the United States, the FBI and CIA directors and others received briefings about intelligence suggesting that there was a Clinton campaign plan underway to stir up a scandal tying Trump to Russia.”

Durham’s report found the FBI “failed to act on what should have been — when combined with other incontrovertible facts — a clear warning sign that the FBI might then be the target of an effort to manipulate or influence the law enforcement process for political purposes during the 2016 presidential election.”

“Whether or not the Clinton plan intelligence was based on reliable or unreliable information, or was ultimately true or false it, it should have prompted FBI personnel to immediately undertake an analysis of the information and to act with far greater care and caution when receiving, analyzing, and relying upon materials of partisan origins, such as the Steele Reports, and the Alfa Bank allegations,” Durham’s report stated.

Durham’s public testimony was part of a lengthy House hearing in which he defended his years-long investigation into the matter.

Democrats largely used the hearing to attack Durham, with some lawmakers labeling him a “political hack” and warning that his reputation is “damaged” due to getting “involved with Donald Trump.”

Fox News Panelist Exits ‘The Five’

By
Madeleine Jackson
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3
Mark Taylor from Rockville, USA, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Fox News is making some changes.

Fox News contributor Geraldo Rivera announced that he will no longer be a panelist on the network’s roundtable opinion show, The Five.

“My last scheduled show appearances are Thursday and Friday June 29th and 30th,” Rivera tweeted Wednesday morning. “It’s been a great run and I appreciate having had the opportunity. Being odd man out isn’t always easy. For the time being, I’m still Correspondent at Large.”

As a rotating panelist on The Five, Rivera was known for regularly clashing with his right-leaning co-hosts.

So far it’s unclear who the network plan to replace Rivera with.

The announcement comes nearly a month after the network suddenly cut ties with primetime host Tucker Carlson days after agreeing to a nearly $800 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems.

Most Americans Think Chris Christie Wrong on Transgender Kids

By
Paul Crespo
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5
Maryland GovPics, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

ANALYSIS – One of the most transcendent political issues today is the Left’s war on reality. Specifically, the radical efforts to push a totally made-up, anti-science, transgender ideology on society, and especially our children. 

And most Republicans agree. Actually, most Americans agree.

Being on the wrong side of this issue should automatically disqualify a GOP candidate for president. And former New Jersey governor Chris Christie is wrong on this issue – big time.

During a segment on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday, Christie argued against state bans on sex change treatments for children, reported Fox News. 

When asked about Republican governors banning life-altering, genital mutilating gender reassignment surgeries and experimental ‘puberty blockers’ drugs and hormones for minors in their states, he replied:

I don’t think that the government should ever be stepping in to the place of the parents in helping to move their children through a process where those children are confused or concerned about their gender.

To be fair, Christie also said: “What I would like to make sure each state does is require that parents are involved in these decisions.” And that is critical. But it isn’t enough.

Sadly, it’s Christie who is confused.

If this was 1980, and a Republican candidate said the government shouldn’t get between parents and their children, I would wholeheartedly agree. 

But in 1980 no one would have imagined a society, medical establishment, public school system and government pushing radical transgenderism on our kids, and their parents.

The world is now officially upside down. And even parents are being pressured to permanently damage their kids. The only chance we have to preserve basic human values is by Republican red states defending them wholeheartedly. 

And when possible, defending them at the federal level.

Former President Donald Trump has been vocal about his stance: “These people are sick, they’re deraigned,” Trump recently said in North Carolina, speaking of those who support men competing in women’s sports. 

The former president also said he would “sign a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states” if elected in 2024.

Unfortunately for Christie, and fortunately for the rest of us, Fox News reports that a strong majority of Americans disagree with him. 

A Washington Post-KFF poll “found that 68% of Americans oppose access to puberty-blocking medication for kids ages 10 to 14 and 58% oppose access to hormonal treatments for kids ages 15 to 17.”

But Christie isn’t just wrong on this extreme issue. He has been wrong on transgender issues for many years.

As Fox News reported:

While serving as governor of New Jersey in 2017, Christie passed laws allowing children to use school bathrooms and locker rooms based on their gender identity rather than sex assigned at birth.

Christie’s signature also removed restrictions on biological men competing in women’s sports, an issue that the WaPo poll found over 60% of Americans think should be banned.

Christie also signed another law that year prohibiting insurance companies from denying services to anyone based on their ‘gender identity.’

In the increasingly crowded field of GOP presidential hopefuls, former President Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and former Ambassador Nikki Haley, are all on the right side. They all support restricting children under 18 years of age from receiving gender reassignment (or genital mutilation) procedures.

All three also support banning biological men from competing in women’s sports. And they are all correct.

But, as far as I’m concerned Christie just disqualified himself from being a GOP candidate for president.

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

Amanda Head: Fox News Ratings Beat By MSNBC!

By
Amanda Head
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0

Is Fox News losing its touch?

Watch Amanda explain the controversy below:

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

Amanda Head: Wokeness Failed In Movie Theaters- Repeatedly!

By
Amanda Head
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2

Go woke, go broke…

Watch Amanda explain the situation below:

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

Feds to Charge Hunter Biden but Offer Sweet ‘No Jail’ Plea Deal

By
Paul Crespo
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0
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)

ANALYSIS – After an outrageously long five-year investigation, federal prosecutors are finally going to charge Hunter Biden for various crimes. He is expected to plead guilty.

The catch?

The charges are minimal misdemeanors, and Hunter will get a sweet deal that allows him to avoid any federal jail time. This is thanks to Biden’s attorneys who have been negotiating with prosecutors for a very long time.

Many will contrast this to the way former President Donald Trump is being treated by federal prosecutors and see the first son getting preferential treatment.

But don’t expect Republicans to just let things go.

Hunter has been under investigation for tax crimes related to his shady overseas business dealings and for illegally possessing a firearm, having allegedly lied about his documented illegal drug use when purchasing a handgun in 2018.

The Blaze reports:

The deal reached between U.S. Attorney David Weiss and Hunter’s attorneys, which a judge still needs to approve, will undoubtedly intensify concerns that Hunter received a sweetheart deal.

According to the Washington Post, Hunter “has tentatively agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax charges of failure to pay in 2017 and 2018.” Hunter is accused of not paying taxes on a liability of about $1.2 million. But instead of jail, prosecutors agreed to recommend Hunter receive only probation and pay the amount of taxes that he originally owed.

Meanwhile, Hunter will admit to illegally possessing a firearm, but he will not plead guilty to lying on the federal form. Under typical circumstances, possessing a firearm while using illegal drugs is a felony. But Hunter will technically not be prosecuted for the crime. Instead, he will be offered a diversion program and probation.

When Hunter Biden meets the conditions of diversion, the crime will be removed from his record, but he will be banned from owning firearms, the New York Times reported.

The deal would require Hunter to remain drug-free for 24 months and agree to never own a firearm again. Good luck enforcing any of that.

While the Biden’s say, ‘case closed,’ and spin it all as just a wayward son with a drug problem gone astray, it won’t end the superheated politics of the case. 

Republicans have argued for years that Hunter Biden committed an array of crimes that should put him behind bars. They have also argued that his crimes call into question the honesty of his father.

And Republicans won’t be letting go. This sweetheart deal for Hunter will just intensify their efforts. 

The New York Times reports:

Coming less than two weeks after the Justice Department indicted former President Donald J. Trump on charges that he risked exposing national security secrets and obstructed efforts by the government to reclaim classified documents from him, an agreement that allows Hunter Biden to walk free is also sure to bring a torrent of criticism from the right and intensified efforts by House Republicans to portray the Justice Department and the F.B.I. as biased.

As president, Mr. Trump had long sought to tie Hunter Biden’s business deals and personal troubles to his father. Mr. Trump’s first impeachment had its roots in his efforts to persuade the Ukrainian government to help him show wrongdoing in Hunter Biden’s work for Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, and while in the White House he pressured the Justice Department to investigate.

Republicans still believe, notes The Times, that “the president has been complicit in an effort engineered by his son to enrich his family by profiting from their positions of power.”

The Times even admits about Hunter:

After his father became vice president, he built relationships with wealthy foreigners that brought in millions of dollars, surfacing concerns inside the Obama administration and among government watchdog groups that he was cashing in on his family name…

But the questions about what occurred during that period never led to conduct that prosecutors believed could win them a conviction in court.

Let’s see if the House investigations will find more damning evidence than federal prosecutors did.

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

Trump Reacts to Hunter Biden Plea Deal

By
Madeleine Jackson
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4
Photo via Gage Skidmore Flickr

Former President Donald Trump is not holding back on Hunter Biden’s “slap on the wrist.”

The presidential candidate reacted to the news President Biden’s son Hunter has reportedly reached a plea deal to plead guilty to two federal misdemeanor counts of failing to pay his taxes and reached a diversion agreement related to the unlawful possession of a weapon.

“They gave him a traffic ticket and cleared everything up,” Trump told Fox News Digital after Biden’s plea deal was announced. “It is a disgrace to the system, it is a disgrace to America, it is a very unfair situation, it is prosecutorial misconduct, and it is election interference — all wrapped up into one.”

“This is a corrupt justice system and a corrupt FBI,” Trump said, adding that one of his family members would likely be facing “hundreds of years.”

654245909-Read-court-filingDownload

Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s son, also decried the Justice Department’s “double standard” in his own statement.

“The blatantly politicized nature of Joe Biden’s Justice Department under AG Garland couldn’t be more clear today,” Trump Jr. wrote in a statement. “The plea deal that they cut with Hunter Biden reeks of favoritism and brazenly reveals a system where there are two-tiers of Justice, wholly dependent on your political affiliation.”

Hunter’s criminal counsel, Chris Clark of Clark Smith Villazor, said that “with the announcement of two agreements between my client, Hunter Biden, and the Unites States Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware, it is my understanding that the five-year investigation into Hunter is resolved.”

“Hunter will take responsibility for two instances of misdemeanor failure to file tax payments when due pursuant to a plea agreement,” Clark said. “A firearm charge, which will be subject to a pretrial diversion agreement and will not be the subject of the plea agreement, will also be filed by the Government.”

Biden has been under federal investigation since 2018. 

However, the Biden family is still having an investigation by the House Oversight Committee.

Rep. James Comer’s (R-Ky.) investigation has most recently focused on the FBI-generated FD-1023 form alleging a criminal bribery scheme between then-Vice President Joe Biden and a foreign national that involved influence over U.S. policy decisions. 

Emails Reveal FBI Tried To Shut Off Trump Security Cameras During Documents Raid

By
Donny Ferguson
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2
Marine One lifts-off after returning President Donald J. Trump to Mar-a-Lago Friday, March 29, 2019, following his visit to the 143-mile Herbert Hoover Dike near Canal Point, Fla., that surrounds Lake Okeechobee. The visit was part of an infrastructure inspection of the dike, which is part of the Kissimmee-Okeechobee Everglades system, and reduces impacts of flooding for areas of south Florida. (Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian) [Photo Credit: The White House from Washington, DC, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons]

A flurry of emails between Justice Department figures reveal the Federal Bureau of Investigation asked former President Donald Trump’s attorneys to shut off Mar-A-Lago’s security cameras to prevent any recording of agents searching for classified documents, fearful that Trump would release the footage to his supporters.

The non-profit public interest law firm Judicial Watch reports it received 477 pages of records pages from the Justice Department revealing top officials within the National Security Division “discussing the political implications of Trump allowing CNN to use closed-circuit TV (CCTV) footage of the raid on his Mar-a-Lago home. The documents confirm that the Justice Department had asked that Mar-a-Lago CCTV be turned off before the raid.”

The records were released to Judicial Watch in response to a September 2022 Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, filed after the Justice Department failed to respond to an August 2022 request for records about the August 8, 2022 Mar-a-Lago raid.

An August 17, 2022, email exchange, with the subject “CNN – Mar-a-Lago CCTV Footage,” reveals officials discussing efforts to shut off Trump’s security cameras to prevent him releasing footage of any searches.

“I just received a call from our case agents at FBI, and apparently the Bureau has been given a heads-up by CNN that CNN has CCTV [closed circuit television] footage from Mar-a-Lago (presumably of agents executing the search) that they may air as soon as tonight [Redacted],” writes an attorney, whose name is redacted, with the Justice Department’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section of the National Security Division.

“I have no further info on what, specifically, CNN has. But [redacted],” he or she adds.

“CNN is saying FPOTUS [former president] is still weighing whether to release the footage,” Jay Bratt, chief of the Counterintelligence and Export Control Section adds.

“Got a call from Evan [likely then-Trump attorney Evan Corcoran]. As Jay says, Trump team is still weighing the release. Per Evan, some say it will energize base, others say not a good look for FPOTUS to have it out there” writes Communications Advisor Luis Rossello.

“CNN is working on a story that Jay requested Trump team to turn off the cameras and they refused,” Rossello continues.

Justice Department official George Toscas replies, “We’re waiting to hear back from FBIHQ on their recommended approach.” 

Bratt writes, “We did. This was in the call [redacted] and I had with Evan Corcoran before the search. It is standard for [redacted].” 

At one point, Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General Marshall Miller forwards the email exchange to a personal email account of Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco.

It is generally not recommended for government officials to use personal email addresses, which can evade public disclosure.

Miller’s comment is entirely redacted, Judicial Watch reports, “to which a Justice Department National Security Division official, whose name is redacted, responds, ‘Kelsey/Luis: Will we also plan to communicate to CNN the law enforcement safety need to blur agent faces if footage ends up being released?’” 

Anthony Coley, Director of the DOJ Public Affairs Office, replies, “Done.”

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

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