Tuesday, February 18, 2025

February 18, 2025

Good morning,

Welcome to the news for independent thinkers

On Friday, we ran a Wall Street Journal piece, based on an interview with JD Vance, which said Vance had threatened military action as leverage against Putin. Vance later said on X that the Wall Street Journal had "twisted my words." A look at the transcript shows that Vance was right. Vance said in the interview, "There are economic tools of leverage, there are, of course, military tools of leverage," and he didn't rule out putting US troops in Ukraine. But military tools of leverage could easily mean sending weapons to Ukraine. "Military action," a phrase that the interview transcript shows Vance did not use, implies fighting Russia. So his words were twisted.

Leading the News . . .

USAID's Troubling Ties to the Woke Nonprofits That Called the Shots in the Biden Administration . . . The U.S. Agency for International Development wasn't just spending your hard-earned tax dollars on transgender operas overseas—USAID also has troubling connections with the leftist pressure groups that infiltrated and advised the Biden administration. My book, "The Woketopus: The Dark Money Cabal Manipulating the Federal Government," exposes the woke activist groups that fed staff into the administrative state and pushed woke policies on the bureaucracy. Daily Signal

Politics

Democrat Governors Arranged Meeting With Biden White House to Thwart Trump Agenda, Emails Show . . . White House officials under outgoing President Joe Biden may have colluded with staffers representing a coalition of Democrat governors planning to thwart President-elect Donald Trump's agenda, according to a watchdog group and internal emails obtained from the coalition, known as Governors Safeguarding Democracy. The precise date of the meeting is not clear, but it appears to have been either Dec. 16 or Dec. 17. Daily Signal

Hochul to Meet With City Leaders to Discuss removing Mayor Adams . . . The alleged conduct at City Hall that has been reported over the past two weeks is troubling and cannot be ignored," Gov. Hochul said. The governor was referring to comments from the federal prosecutor in Mr. Adams's criminal case that the mayor's lawyers had offered the White House a "quid pro quo" — helping President Trump's immigration crackdown in return for dropping the charges. Her comments followed the resignations of four of Mr. Adams's deputy mayors, including his second-in-command, amid criticism that the mayor has put his own interests above those of New Yorkers. New York Times

DOGE Seeks Access to IRS System That Houses Sensitive Taxpayer Data . . . An agreement with the IRS could give the team access to the Integrated Data Retrieval System, these people explained. That system, according to the IRS, allows anyone with access the ability "to have instantaneous visual access to certain taxpayer accounts." DOGE is operating as a unit within the new administration that President Trump has tasked with cutting spending and regulations. Wall Street Journal

Top Social Security official exits after clash with Musk's DOGE over data

Judge refuses to block DOGE's access to student borrower data

Fox's Turley decries 'prosecution' of Ocasio-Cortez over immigration webinar . . . "Border Czar Tom Homan doubled down last night that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) might be prosecuted for hosting a forum on 'Know Your Rights' for accused illegal aliens. Such a prosecution would be an assault on free speech rights," Turley said in a thread on the social platform X on Monday. Turley said the New York Democrat "has never been a defender of free speech" but also added that "principle demands something more from the rest of us who value the First Amendment." The Hill

Homan had said he was consulting with the Justice Department over whether to prosecute Ocasio-Cortez because her forum might have impeded law enforcement efforts.

'President Trump Saved My Life': Pardoned Pro-Lifers Reflect on Incarceration, Newfound Freedom . . . Pro-lifers convicted under the FACE Act and released from prison after President Donald Trump pardoned them on Jan. 24 tell The Daily Signal they are grateful to God and to Trump for returning them to their families. Trump pardoned 23 pro-lifers who were convicted for actions including praying outside abortion clinics and encouraging women in unplanned pregnancies to choose life. Daily Signal

Culture

Caroline Kennedy to meet with Trump about president's Kennedy Center takeover . . . Kennedy, 67, who is Emeritus Trustee at the D.C.-based center, named in honor of her father John F. Kennedy, is set to meet with Trump along with her daughter, Rose Kennedy Schlossberg, according to insiders. Sources with knowledge of the situation say Rose, 36, and her friends have bemoaned the Trump administration's recent policies targeting trans athletes and intends to support her mother in addressing the drama at the institution that bears their family's namesake. Daily Mail

Kennedy Center has recent history of showcasing politicized art . . . In 2019, the nonprofit arts center launched a social impact program to "advance justice and equity in all that we do." The facility's subsequent insistence on making race and sexuality dominant factors in artistic decisions teed up Mr. Trump's decision this month to reconstitute its board with loyalists to his administration."The previous Kennedy Center leadership spewed nothing but liberal talking points and asserted that a DEI agenda would take center stage," Gregory Angelo, president of the right-leaning New Tolerance Campaign. Washington Times

Education Dept. Gives Schools Two Weeks to Eliminate Race-Based Programs

'Just the Beginning': Californians Fight Back Against Leftist Gender Ideology . . . Californians are fighting back against radical transgender ideology in their schools and athletic associations. With the announcement of new legislation in the state Assembly on Friday to protect girls and women's sports as well as parental rights, advocates say they want California to set a precedent for other liberal blue states. Daily Signal

Washington State Dems Want To Remove George Washington's Image From State Flag

George Mason Guest Speaker Tells Students: The Holocaust Was Not 'Unique' . . . George Mason University, the Northern Virginia school that has grappled with high-profile instances of pro-terror student radicalism, hosted an anti-Israel professor who delivered a lecture aimed at "shattering this idea that anything that is to do with Jews, the Holocaust, Israel is somehow unique." The school's Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine sponsored the event. Washington Free Beacon

National Security

Hegseth Has Tapped Investigators for Botched Afghanistan Withdrawal: 'Accountability Will Be Coming' . . . Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview that he has already picked investigators who will look into the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal. "We've already identified folks that'll be in charge of that full investigation inside the Pentagon," Hegseth said in the interview Thursday. Breitbart

Time to go: DHS tells illegal immigrants to 'self-deport and stay out'

International

WATCH: Rebekah Koffler reveals on Fox why Zelenskyy is in a legal conundrum as US, Russia hold talks . . . Former defense intelligence officer Rebekah Koffler joined 'Fox & Friends First' to discuss why Putin won't negotiate with Zelenskyy on a possible peace deal and the NATO secretary general's plea for EU countries to bolster defense spending. Fox News

Israel Gets First U.S. Heavy Bombs Since Biden's Block . . . A shipment of 2,000-pound bombs arrived in Israel from the U.S. over the weekend, the first such shipment since former President Joe Biden put a hold on the heavy munitions. President Donald Trump lifted the hold on the MK-84 bombs when he entered office, restarting the flow of the heavy bombs to Israel. On Sunday, Israel's Defense Ministry announced the arrival of the first shipment of 2,000-pound bombs in roughly nine months. Daily Wire

Money

DOGE find $4.T in Treasury payments were missing critical code: 'Traceability almost impossible' . . . The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) announced Monday that some $4.7 trillion in payments from the Treasury Department were missing a critical tracking code, which made tracing the transactions "almost impossible." The transactions were reportedly missing the Treasury Account Symbol (TAS), an identification code which links a Treasury payment to a budget line item, according to DOGE, which described the use of such code as a "standard financial process." New York Post

You should also know

Delta jet flips upside down on a snowy Toronto runway and all 80 aboard survive . . . A Delta Air Lines jet flipped on its roof while landing Monday at Toronto's Pearson Airport, but all 80 people on board survived and those hurt had relatively minor injuries, the airport's chief executive said. Snow blown by winds gusting to 40 mph swirled when the flight from Minneapolis carrying 76 passengers and four crew attempted to land at around 2:15 p.m. Communications between the tower and pilot were normal on approach and it's not clear what went so drastically wrong when the plane touched down. Associated Press

FAA's new air traffic control towers go 'green' instead of the latest safe tech . . . Aviation experts anticipating Elon Musk's plans to tackle the nation's antiquated air traffic control system are scratching their heads over the Biden administration's move to rebuild dozens of aging regional airport towers with "green" replacements instead of cheaper and safer digital technology. Remote towers, essentially cameras on tall scaffolding, are used widely throughout Europe. Infrared cameras and other advanced equipment can provide safer, less expensive air traffic monitoring, particularly when visibility is low in inclement weather. Washington tiomes

Team from Elon Musk's SpaceX to review air traffic control system

Guilty Pleasures

Mayor Adams bizarrely invokes 'Mein Kampf' . . . During his remarks, Adams also claimed he once heard Martin Luther King, Jr. recite a quote from Hitler's infamous Nazi manifesto, "Mein Kampf," that went something like, "If you tell a lie long enough, loud enough, people will tend to believe it's true." "And that's what you're seeing right there, right now: A modern-day 'Mein Kampf,'" Adams told his supporters, appearing to imply he was being persecuted by liars. New York Post

Can you remove someone from office just for being dumb?

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