Americans for Limited Government Urge Veto of Tennessee Campaign Finance Reform Bill If Passed by Legislature

Americans for Limited Government, an organization that supports reducing the size and scope of government, sent a letter to Governor Bill Lee to urge him to veto a new campaign finance reform bill, if it passes the state legislature.

SB 1005, which was passed on a bipartisan vote in the Senate, would enact multiple changes to disclosure rules for political action committees (PAC), certain nonprofits, and candidates.

Read the full story

Commentary: The White House’s Swift Surrender on Federal Mask Order Underscores the Tricky Politics of Mask Mandates

The Biden administration announced Monday it will no longer enforce a federal mask mandate on public transportation, including airplanes. The decision was announced after Federal Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle ruled that the directive was unlawful, noting that the CDC had not sought public comment prior to its order—issued 14 months ago—and did not adequately explain its reasoning.

Following the court’s decision, four major airlines immediately announced they would drop mask requirements on all domestic flights.

Read the full story

Pennsylvania Lawmaker Wants Education Department to Explain ‘Gender Unicorn’ Material

A Republican lawmaker is pressing the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) to explain the use of material featuring characters called “Genderbread Person” and “the Gender Unicorn.” 

A week ago, State Rep. Aaron Bernstine (R-Ellwood City) sent a letter to Pennsylvania Secretary of Education (PDE) Noe Ortega asking about a diagram apparently distributed by the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) that depicts the two figures.

Read the full story

Arizona Lawmakers Approve Right to Try Expansion

Arizona is inching closer toward enacting new legislation allowing a patient the right to try remedies that could save their lives but not given government approval for use.

The Arizona House of Representatives passed the Right to Try for Individualized Treatments (SB1163) on Monday. The bill passed in the Arizona Senate in February, so now it will soon head to Gov. Doug Ducey’s desk for his signature. 

Read the full story

Gov. Lamont Vows to Keep Abortion Legal in Connecticut If Roe v. Wade Goes

Gov. Ned Lamont (D-Connecticut) gathered at the Lyceum Center in Hartford with abortion advocates on Tuesday to promise abortion rights will continue in the state regardless of any forthcoming decision by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“The right to choose is under attack in numerous states across America,” Lamont declared, flanked by representatives of Planned Parenthood of Southern New England and the Connecticut Women’s Education and Legal Fund. “We won’t let that happen in Connecticut.”

Read the full story

Virginia House Finance Committee Sends Gas Tax Holiday Bill to Appropriations Committee

House Finance Committee Republicans advanced Governor Glenn Youngkin’s gas tax holiday bill and killed Democrats’ alternate $50-per-car tax refund proposal on Tuesday. The bill includes a 100-percent motor fuels tax reduction from May 1 through July 31, a 50 percent reduction in August, and a 25 percent reduction in September. It also includes a two percent cap on future annual rate adjustments.

“As I testified to the House and the Senate early in the year, we have an exceptional amount of revenue that we did not expect a couple of years ago in the transportation plan. Over the six years it’s in the billions of dollars. And obviously, the governor has made a pledge to try to get some of the revenue back to the citizens who’ve contributed to the Commonwealth, particularly in this time of high inflation and economic trouble,” Secretary of Transportation Sheppard “Shep” Miller III told the committee.

Read the full story

Ohio Elections Commission Books Blystone Campaign ‘Probable Cause’ Hearing Thursday

The Ohio Elections Commission executive director informed attorney Curt C. Hartman that the commission’s Probable Cause Panel scheduled a hearing Thursday to address two complaints his client, Butler County resident Mary Capella, filed April 7 against GOP gubernatorial candidate Joe Blystone.

“After further consideration, I have determined that the matters at issue in these cases will be expedited for consideration pursuant to Ohio Revised Code §3517.154(A)(2)(b) and placed before a Probable Cause Panel of the Commission,” wrote Philip C. Richter, who also works as the commission’s staff attorney.

Read the full story

Hillsdale College Begins Academic Programming at Connecticut ‘Faith and Freedom’ Campus

Hillsdale College’s Blake Center for Faith and Freedom in Somers, Connecticut, has begun its academic programming that includes seminars, lectures, training sessions for K-12 teachers, and community events, according to information sent to The Connecticut Star.

Hillsdale spokeswoman Emily Stack Davis sent information about the start of the Blake Center’s spring offerings, noting that its programs “will focus on Christianity, Western Civilization, and America.”

Read the full story

DeSantis Calls Special Session to Review Disney’s ‘Special District’ Status

In what is being viewed as an escalation in the conflict between Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and The Walt Disney Company, the Florida governor has called a special legislative session to review a 1968 law – designed for the company – that allows it to govern itself. 

According to a proclamation from the governor’s office, “it is necessary to review such independent special districts to ensure that they are appropriately serving the public interest,” and that it is “also necessary to consider whether such independent special districts should be subject to special law requirements of the Florida Constitution of 1968.”

Read the full story

Florida School Superintendent Uses Misleading CNN Fact-Check to Discredit Parental Rights Bill

At a recent Leon County School Board meeting, Superintendent Rocky Hanna used a misleading CNN fact-check to publicly criticize Governor DeSantis’ rationale for the Parental Rights in Education bill, while ignoring facts related to a lawsuit filed against the school district.

The CNN fact-check uses selective comments from a DeSantis press conference, related to an incident which took place at a Leon County middle school, to question the rationale for the Parental Rights in Education bill.

The incident involved the failure of school officials to notify parents about a meeting with their daughter concerning gender issues. The parents have filed a federal lawsuit against the Leon County School Board.

Hanna, reading DeSantis’s comments from the CNN fact-check, said that “none of this happened, none of this is true, it is all fabricated…”

While DeSantis’s comments about the specifics of the incident were partly inaccurate, Hanna ignored facts that were consistent with the comments made by DeSantis.

What Hanna did not reveal in his comments to the school board is that school officials initiated an interview with the student as part of a  “Transgender/Gender Nonconforming Student Support Plan” without including the parents.

Read the full story

Virginia State Troopers Partnering with Homeland Security on Human Trafficking Initiative

In partnership with two federal law enforcement agencies, the Virginia State Police (VSP) is conducting a three-day sweep to combat human trafficking on the I-95 corridor. 

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Washington, D.C. partnered with the Virginia State Police and the Virginia Trucking Association in order to detect, deter, and raise awareness of the growing problem of human trafficking,” said an ICE press release. “During mid-April, they will conduct Operation Safe Passage, a high‐visibility, human trafficking prevention and public outreach initiative.”

Read the full story

Ohio Unemployment Rate Dips, Remains Above National Average

Ohio added more than twice as many private-sector jobs in March than it did in February, and the state’s unemployment rate fell slightly, according to recently released figures by the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

Overall, the state’s unemployment rate for March of 4.1% was down slightly from February’s 4.2% but higher than the national average of 3.6%. Also, Ohio’s labor participation rate rose to 61.7% from 61.6%, below the national average of 62.4%.

Read the full story

Nearly Two-Thirds of Voters Believe Biden Is Compromised by Ties to China, Poll

Nearly two-third of U.S. voters think President Biden has been compromised by his and his families’ ties to China, according to new survey.

The survey from the Trafalgar Group, in conjunction with Convention of State Action, found over 50% of those polled said it is “very likely” that Biden is “conflicted/compromised when dealing with China due to the Biden family’s personal business dealings in China.”

Read the full story

Border Patrol Arrests Highest Number of Migrants in over 20 Years

U.S. Border Patrol agents in March arrested the highest number of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border in a month in over 20 years.

Border agents arrested 209,906 people in March, according to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) statistics released Monday. The figure is the highest number of monthly arrests at the southern border since March 2000, when Border Patrol apprehended 220,063 migrants.

Read the full story

Commentary: ‘Genocide’ Is Not a Throwaway Term of Abuse

Soaring inflation is leaving Americans battered and bruised—and not just inflation in prices. Inflation in rhetoric is also doing a number on the people of our republic.

We’ve seen it unfold with depressing regularity. Donald Trump was a “fascist dictator,” we were told. The Capitol riot was a “coup” and an “insurrection.” Climate change poses an “existential threat” to all life on earth. And, just this past week, after failing to get the legislative redistricting map he wanted from the state Supreme Court, Wisconsin’s Democratic Governor Tony Evers declared: “At a time when our democracy is under near-constant attack, the judiciary has abandoned our democracy in our most dire hour.”

Read the full story

Washington Post Publishes Straight-Up Propaganda Piece Outing ‘Libs of TikTok’

Washington Post reporter Taylor Lorenz exposed the identity behind the “Libs Of TikTok” Twitter account in an article that widely characterized exposure of questionable school policy and problematic teacher-student interactions as “anti-LGBT.”

Rather than grapple with the issues the account brought to light — some of which resulted in discipline of teachers — Lorenz drew on interviews from left-wing activists at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the left-wing organization Media Matters, who predictably supported the narrative that exposing controversial classroom instruction to the public at large essentially amounts to bigotry for the transgender and gay community.

Read the full story

Commentary: European Military Contractor Must Be Punished for Cheating

Members of the military know they must be able to trust everyone in their squad. This trust is earned. That’s why troops drill together, eat together, and live together. It builds confidence and trust.

Of course, they must also be able to trust their equipment. The Army still remembers when its bazookas were useless against Soviet-made tanks during the Korean war. Today’s American warriors don’t want to repeat the same mistakes by using inferior equipment. And when it comes to weapon systems, there is no reason to trust certain contractors — including the European aerospace giant Airbus.

Read the full story