Former U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, a Republican who once represented Tennessee, has no plans to challenge current Gov. Bill Lee in 2022. This, according to Corker’s spokeswoman Micah Johnson on Thursday.
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A new buzzword on social media, cable news, and among leftist activists is “deprogramming.”
Along with terms like “reprogramming,” “de-Baathification,” and “deplatforming,” deprogramming refers to cleansing the incorrect mentalities of former Trump Administration officials—and even those who voted for Trump.
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In a letter to Memphis Mayor Strickland, Governor Bill Lee refuted recent claims that the COVID-19 vaccines weren’t distributed equally to Shelby County.
“[I]t has been reported that Shelby County has not received an equitable share of vaccine doses relative to other counties across the state. However – and I want to be clear and unmistakable about this – any such claims are incorrect,” stated Lee.
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At least two House Democrats are on board to hold a hearing on “Robinhood’s market manipulation,” Democratic Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted Thursday.
Companies such as GameStop, AMC, and Blackberry recently saw their ticker’s unable to trade on the popular investment platform Robinhood. The stock surge for companies such as Gamestop and AMC, boosted by a group on Reddit, has caused hedge fund managers who held short positions on those companies to lose billions, according to Yahoo Finance.
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U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) has appointed several new people to his staff, and many of them worked for former U.S. President Donald Trump.
This, according to a press release that members of Hagerty’s staff emailed Thursday.
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Hunter Biden continues to hold a 10% stake in the Chinese private equity firm BHR Partners, Chinese business records show, despite multiple reports from December suggesting he was divesting his position in the company.
Both the Daily Mail and Fox News reported in late December that Hunter Biden was in the process of offloading his stake in BHR. Both outlets cited an unnamed source with Hunter Biden and his business dealings.
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California Democratic Rep. Jimmy Gomez said that he would introduce a resolution to expel Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene from Congress after recent reports alleging that she previously supported executing notable Democrats and FBI agents.
“Such advocacy for extremism and sedition not only demands her immediate expulsion from Congress, but it also merits strong and clear condemnation from all of her Republican colleagues, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell,” Gomez said in a statement on Wednesday evening.
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Letitia James, the New York State attorney general, is accusing the Cuomo administration of severely undercounting the coronavirus-related deaths that have occurred at nursing homes – by up to 50% – according to a report released Thursday.
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Thursday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Carol Swain to the studio to discuss the 1776 Commission’s disbandment and the lack of honest journalism today.
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The number of Americans filing new unemployment claims decreased to 847,000 last week as the economy continued to suffer the effects of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, according to the Department of Labor.
The Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) figure released Thursday represented a decrease in the number of new jobless claims compared to the week ending Jan. 16, in which there were 900,000 new jobless claims reported. Roughly 18.3 million Americans continue to collect unemployment benefits, according to the BLS report Thursday.
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Thursday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Tennessee (R) State Senator Ken Yager to the newsmakers line to talk about his background and what his constituents are thinking.
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The last person I interviewed face-to-face before the COVID shutdown was Tiffany Ashton on February 29, 2020. Her plans that day were to finish college at UNC-Charlotte in May then permanently move to Nashville.
Two weeks later, we were in lockdown as a nation and nobody went anywhere. Not only that, Ashton was one of the first people I knew who got the coronavirus and it put her out of commission for a month.
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A survey of Wyoming voters by a national consulting group shows Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) hemorrhaging support after voting to impeach former president Donald J. Trump.
“Liz Cheney’s decision to vote to impeach President Trump makes her extremely vulnerable according to a Wyoming poll conducted among 500 likely general election voters,” a memo from McLaughlin & Associates said. “It is evident her ratings are in bad shape among general election voters and have collapsed among Republicans and Trump voters. The strong voter sentiment in this survey suggests there could be similar results for other Republicans who voted for impeachment.”
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Thursday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed drummer Frank Leahy of the Canadian group Leahy Music to the newsmakers line to discuss future shows.
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President Joe Biden is signaling a pivot back to China with his most recent choice to sit on the National Security Council, former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell.
Campbell wrote the book, “The Pivot: The Future of American Statecraft in Asia,” where he argued, “While the Asian Century detoured to the Middle East in the years following the September 11 attacks… the United States has led a ‘Pivot’ (or ‘rebalancing,’ as many prefer) of American diplomacy toward the nuanced yet demanding tasks of engaging a rising Asia. The Pivot is premised on the idea that the Asia-Pacific region not only increasingly defines global power and commerce, but also welcomes U.S. leadership and rewards U.S. engagement with positive returns on political, economic, and military investments.”
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The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is looking into an officer-involved shooting Wednesday of a suspect who allegedly rammed several police cars in north Nashville.
The TBI on Wednesday tweeted, “HAPPENING NOW: TBI Agents are investigating a reported officer-involved shooting in Nashville, at a location in the 2200 block of Brick Church Pike.”
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Thursday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Tennessee Congressman Tim Burchett to the newsmakers line to discuss Woketopia in Washington and seeking the wisdom of God.
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Tennessee collected more than $3 million in sports wagering revenue in December, according to a report from the Tennessee Education Lottery.
More than $180 million in legal sports wagers were placed in Tennessee during the month – the second full month of legal sports betting in the state.
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The U.S. economy contracted 3.5% in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, marking the nation’s worst economic performance since the end of World War II.
The U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), which measures net services and goods produced by a country, fell 3.5% in 2020 compared to the 2.2% increase in 2019, according to a Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) report released Thursday. The overall decline came despite 4% growth in the fourth quarter, the period from October to December, and 38.3% growth in the third quarter, the period from July to September.
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Democrats in the Virginia House of Delegates have introduced a bill that would allow presidential electors to be chosen based on the national popular vote, as part of a broader push among left-leaning activists to end states’ rights to choose their own electors.
“Every American citizen is created equal,” Del. Mark Levine (D-Arlington), who introduced HB 1933 told The Virginia Star. “We should all have an equal right to elect the President of the United States.”
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The Georgia House approved changes Thursday to the state’s fiscal year 2021 spending plan.
The House voted 149-20 to approve a 2.5% increase – or $654 million more – in spending for the remainder of the fiscal year, which ends June 30.
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Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said he entered into the controversial Compromise Settlement Agreement and Release with Stacey Abrams because members of the Georgia Attorney General’s Office Chris Carr recommended he do so. In a letter dated January 6, Raffensperger told former U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) that the agreement strengthened Georgia’s signature verification system.
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Georgians are circulating petitions demanding that the state government, particularly the Georgia Department of Labor (GDOL) begins responding to their requests for information.
“This petition was started and organized by residents all throughout the State of Georgia that have filed claims with the Georgia Department of Labor,” says a Change.org petition started by Felicia Primus. “Many of Georgia Residents [sic] haven’t received any updates on claims or they’re missing payments from the Department of Labor. GDOL has not provided better Self-service [sic] options for its website or phone support to help with the increasing demand of unemployment claims, during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
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Gov. Gretchen Whitmer delivered her third State of the State Wednesday night on a mostly optimistic note.
The governor spent much of her 30-minute speech discussing bipartisan successes.
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The Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors (BOS) sent a scathing letter on Tuesday to Governor Ralph Northam criticizing the slow COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Virginia.
“Simply put, Virginia’s campaign to vaccinate the masses is totally defective. On this issue, we have run out of patience and tolerance. Our citizens deserve better,” the five supervisors wrote. “Virginia has far too many doses still not administered, and that’s not the fault of the federal government.”
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The Medical Center of Elberton has been barred temporarily from administering COVID-19 vaccines after mistakenly vaccinating teachers and other school staff without state permission. The medical center reportedly vaccinated around 40 percent of the Elbert County School District employees.
For that, the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) suspended the medical center from receiving vaccine supplies for 6 months.
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U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH-4) has said that he will not seek election for the Senate seat that will soon be vacated by Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH).
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Governor Ralph Northam approved the Permanent COVID-19 Workplace Safety and Health Standards, which replace the expiring COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standard. The standard requires Virginia businesses to develop COVID-19 safety strategies much like other workplace safety requirements.
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The 2021 Atlantic 10 Conference men’s basketball tournament is coming to the city of Richmond this year.
Normally viewed as crosstown rivals, the University of Richmond and Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) will serve as co-hosts for the annual championship tournament in order to accommodate for safety precautions in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the conference announced in a news release on Thursday.
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Virginia’s public gathering limits, daily curfews, face mask requirements and other COVID-19 restrictions will stay in place until the end of February, drawing concern from some members of the business community.
Gov. Ralph Northam announced Wednesday he issued Executive Order 72, which extends and slightly modifies the state restrictions. Under the new restrictions, face masks will be required in not only indoor settings but also in any outdoor setting when a person cannot remain 6 feet away from other people.
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State Attorney General Mark Herring filed papers with the Virginia Supreme Court on Wednesday formally asking the body to reject an appeal that seeks to keep the controversial Robert E. Lee statue in Richmond from being removed.
The appeal was filed with the high court Monday on behalf of the plaintiffs, a group of Richmond residents living near the monument who have been challenging Governor Ralph Northam’s authority to remove the statute in court since summer.
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State Senators Terry Johnson (R-District 14) and Rob McColley (R-District 1) introduced Senate Bill 22 Tuesday, a proposed law aimed at providing oversight to the emergency declarations made by the governor, as well as the governor’s and health orders that flow from the state of emergency.
SB22 gives the legislature the authority, by passing a joint resolution, to immediately rescind a public health state of emergency declaration, as well as related rules and orders.
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Minneapolis City Council member Steve Fletcher wrote an amendment to the city’s code of ordinances that would ban facial recognition technology in the police department and all city departments.
The basis for the ban is that facial recognition technology “has been shown to be less accurate in identifying people of color and women,” according to the amendment.
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Mayor John Cooper claimed on Thursday that Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) may open up in the near future. He cited the downturn in local COVID-19 case metrics as the main indicator of this prediction, though he didn’t offer any specific timelines.
“[O]ur COVID metrics continue to improve,” stated Cooper. “We’re working with public health and MNPS to evaluate the timely and responsible return of an in-person learning option on a daily basis. Current case trends will allow MNPS to have an in-person option very soon.”
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