Wisconsin U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher’s Committee on China Hosts Roundtable Event on Chinese Communist Threat to U.S. Manufacturing

The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party will be in manufacturing-dependent Wisconsin Wednesday afternoon for a roundtable discussion on communist China’s “deliberate undermining of American manufacturing,” according to a press release.

Committee Chairman Mike Gallagher (R-WI-08) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL-08) will host the roundtable beginning at 3 p.m. Wednesday in Stoughton, WI.

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Virginia County to Add 5,000 Households to Voucher Waitlist

Through a special application and lottery process in September, Arlington, Virginia, is opening up the waitlist for its Housing Choice Voucher Program for the first time in more than 10 years.

The process will add 5,000 people to the housing voucher waitlist, likely keeping the list full for years to come, according to the local agency that manages the Arlington Housing Choice Voucher Program.

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Data Analysis Reframes Pennsylvania Education Issues

As Pennsylvania’s legislators prepare to return to Harrisburg to sort out the state’s education system and budget, a new report challenges what they call “funding cuts and teacher shortage myths.” 

A recently released report by the Commonwealth Foundation provides data showing increased spending and hiring alongside dropping enrollment numbers – suggesting more efficient spending options, including pension system reforms. 

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Left-Leaning Groups Seek to Intervene in Challenge to New Minnesota Law That Restricts Corporate Speech

A left-leaning elections reform organization is representing a local group hoping to intervene in a Minnesota Chamber of Commerce lawsuit that’s challenging a new state law it says unconstitutionally restricts political speech of businesses.

On Friday, the Massachusetts-based advocacy group Free Speech For People, on behalf of Clean Elections Minnesota, filed a motion requesting to intervene in the Chamber’s federal lawsuit that contends a new law governing corporate speech unconstitutionally restricts the political speech of its members’ businesses who have minimal investment from foreign-based individuals and entities.

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Abortion Activists File Lawsuit Against Ohio Ballot Board’s Condensed Version of Amendment for November Election

A coalition of pro-abortion activists filed a lawsuit on Monday challenging the Ohio Ballot Board’s decision to use a condensed version of a proposed amendment written by the Ohio Secretary of State’s Office for the November ballot that would enshrine abortion into the state Constitution. 

This follows the Ohio Ballot Board rejecting the full text of the proposed amendment. The summary language does not alter what the actual amendment would say in the state Constitution but is the last representation of the amendment Ohioans read before casting their vote.

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Feds to Drop Shipping Container Border Wall Lawsuit After $2.1 Million Payment from Arizona Taxpayers

A lawsuit launched by the Department of Justice against Arizona over a makeshift border wall made of shipping containers is set to be dismissed following a final payment of $2.1 million from the state to the U.S. Forest Service, even after Governor Katie Hobbs (D) dismantled the barrier and put the containers up for sale.

The shipping container wall was constructed under former Governor Doug Ducey (R), whose administration argued the hastily constructed barrier was necessary until the Biden administration resumed construction on the southern border wall started by former President Donald Trump. A lawsuit was launched by the federal government just weeks before Hobbs took office.

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‘Hostile Takeover’: Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Accuses Liberal Majority of Staging a ‘Coup’

Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Annette Ziegler accused the court’s liberal majority of staging a “coup,” according to emails obtained by The Associated Press.

After gaining a majority August 1 for the first time in 15 years, liberal justices quickly moved to fire state court director Randy Koschnick, drawing immediate backlash, and create a committee responsible for many of the tasks that the chief justice has typically handled, the AP reported. Ziegler wrote in two emails obtained by the AP that the majority’s actions were illegal and amounted to “nothing short of an unprecedented coup.”

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Google Announces Another $1.7 Billion Investment in Central Ohio

Google announced on Monday the expansion of its footprint in Central Ohio, committing to invest another $1.7 billion between its data centers in New Albany, Columbus, and Lancaster.

Earlier this year, the firm announced that it would construct two new data centers in central Ohio, one in Lancaster and the other on South High Street in South Columbus, in addition to its existing data center complex in New Albany, bringing Google’s total investment in the state to over $2 billion. According to Google, as of May, it has generated nearly $13 billion in economic activity for businesses and nonprofits.

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Maricopa County GOP Demands Arizona GOP Withdraw from a Government-Run 2024 Arizona Presidential Preference Election

The Maricopa County Republican Committee Executive Guidance Committee (MCRC EGC) demanded on Saturday that Arizona Republican Party Chairman Jeff DeWit withdraw the Arizona GOP from a government-run 2024 Arizona Presidential Preference Election by Friday.

The Presidential Preference Election (PPE) is an election in which voters can choose who they would like to be their presidential candidate in the upcoming General Election. Party winners of the Arizona PPE are officially determined at the party’s national convention.

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Commentary: Tennessee Legislators Should Support SITE Act

Our health care institutions were put to the test during the COVID-19 pandemic, stretching everything from large hospitals and pharmacies to local emergency rooms and makeshift testing sites. We saw our medical personnel endure unprecedented strain throughout the public health crisis. As a health care professional myself, I know the unique challenges that the medical community faces, whether it’s during times of crisis or times of calm. At the end of the day, we do our work to serve patients in need.

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Biden’s Mining Strategy Is Undermining His Agenda and Helping China, Experts Say

President Joe Biden’s climate agenda is handicapping America’s ability to source key raw materials to build green technologies that the agenda simultaneously requires, a reality that experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation makes America more dependent on China in the long-term.

The Biden administration has blocked several domestic opportunities to mine raw materials for which China is the global leader in extraction, refining or both, according to a 2022 report on electric vehicles (EVs) by the International Energy Agency (IEA). Many of the minerals and materials that Biden’s agenda is restricting domestically are essential components for green technologies that his climate agenda depends upon at the same time, such as electric vehicles and solar panels, according to a different report by the IEA.

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Commentary: The Specter of the Far Right and Its Hidden Asymmetry

“Aspecter is haunting Europe — the specter of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this specter,” is the first sentence of perhaps the most important political pamphlet in history — the Communist Manifesto of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. That famous sentence would still be relevant today only if we change one word, that is, if we remove the word communism and replace it with the “far right.”  

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Commission Chair: Georgia CON Laws ‘Intended to Stifle Competition’

When officials in Lee County tried to build “a small acute care hospital” with 60 beds and four operating rooms, it began a multi-year process that cost millions of dollars and didn’t end with the construction of a facility.

“When we started our quest to build a hospital, we knew that it was going to be an uphill battle,” Billy Mathis, the Lee County Commission chairman, told lawmakers during a Senate Study Committee on Certificate of Need Reform hearing on Monday. “For the first couple of years, after you are granted a certificate of need, you fight litigation. The code in Georgia encourages litigation, basically. So, you get your certificate of need, and then all sorts of folks sue you — to put it very plainly.”

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Commentary: Woke U.S. Diplomacy Is Not Popular Around the Globe, nor at Home

The Biden administration is fraying relations with some allies and generating pushback from Congress by spending millions of taxpayer dollars to promote the woke ideology abroad that has stirred controversy at home since President Biden took office.  

In a “national security memorandum” shortly after his swearing-in, Biden ordered all federal agencies with dealings abroad not only to protect LGBT rights in the face of discrimination and violence but to actively advance them. His State Department has said one of its goals is to “embed intersectional equity principles into diversifying public diplomacy and communications strategies” in relations with other nations. 

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‘Total Lack of Critical Thinking’: Experts Question COVID Vax, Mask Mandates amid ‘Surge’

by Greg Piper   Governments and private entities are using a small rise in COVID-19 hospitalizations and new viral variants to juice interest in bivalent boosters that only 1 in 6 Americans have taken and to urge a return to routine masking, if not outright mandating new jabs and face coverings. What they aren’t providing is robust evidence for the effectiveness of the interventions against infection by a virus that has already provided natural immunity to an estimated 19 in 20 Americans as of November 2022, according to Harvard research published in this month’s journal Clinical Infectious Diseases. “If a tiny bump in the rate of new weekly Covid hospital admissions—that still is among the lowest rates over the last three years—relates to a surge, then what is an actual large rise called?” science journalist David Zweig wrote in an essay Thursday questioning explanations by public-health pundits for the increase. “The use of this hyperbolic language by so many media outlets that over-dramatizes risk skirts very close to misinformation,” said Zweig, known for his reporting on the Twitter Files and scrutiny of the evidence behind school mask mandates and the six-foot rule. Even President Biden acknowledged current COVID vaccines, which include original and Omicron variant strains, are not performing as hoped.…

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Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Accuses Liberal Majority of Staging ‘Coup’

Politico The conservative chief justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Monday told the new liberal majority in a scathing email that they had staged a “coup” and conducted an “illegal experiment” when they voted to weaken her powers and fire the director of state courts. Chief Justice Annette Ziegler, in two emails obtained by The Associated Press, said that firing and hiring a new state court director was illegal and ordered interim state court director Audrey Skwierawski to stop signing orders without her knowledge or approval. “You are making a mess of the judiciary, the court and the institution for years to come,” Ziegler wrote to her fellow justices and Skwierawski. “This must stop. … I have no confidence in the recent hostile takeover and the chaotic effect it has had on the court, staff, and the overall stable functioning of the courts.” READ THE FULL STORY              

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Multiple Analyses: The California ‘Single-Use Plastic Bag’ Ban Is a Flop

According to a new analysis from the Los Angeles Times, California’s ban on thin plastic bags is a failure, as thicker, “recyclable” replacement bags are largely unable to be recycled in California, and the majority of consumers still opt not to bring their own bags to reuse for shopping.

Additional analyses have also found increases in purchases of plastic trash bags chip away at the plastics savings from single-use plastic bag bans, the pounds of plastic bags per-capita placed in landfills has increased since the ban, and many of the alternatives to single-use plastic bags typically end up being worse for the environment. Nonetheless, a major decrease in grocery bag litter suggests at least a partial success.

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Arizona House Republicans Call on Governor and Attorney General to Protect the State’s Southern Border

All 31 members of the Arizona House Republican Majority Caucus signed a letter calling on Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs and Attorney General Kris Mayes to take executive action to protect Arizona from the crisis occurring at the state’s southern border.

This follows reports from last week where officials from the Biden administration inexplicably welded open 114 massive gates along the Arizona border allowing tens of thousands of illegal immigrants to flood into the U.S.

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Ramaswamy Lays Out Recalibrated America First Foreign Policy Vision: ‘We Will be Uncle Sucker No More’

As he takes heat for proposing that the United States roll back aid to Israel in pursuit of stronger regional relationships for the key American ally, GOP top tier presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy says he wants a new approach to U.S. relations with friends and foes alike.

And he’s harkening back to the founders’ vision of avoiding “entangling alliances” to get there. 

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Legal Opinion on New Michigan Education Agency ‘Premature,’ AG Nessel Says

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has said it’s too early to determine whether Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s new education agency is legal or not.

On August 8, the State Department of Education requested an attorney general legal opinion regarding the constitutionality of Whitmer’s executive order creating the Michigan Department of Lifelong Education, Advancement, and Potential.

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Senator JD Vance Urges U.S. Forest Service to Reverse ‘Misguided’ Proposal to Rename Wayne National Forest

U.S. Senator JD Vance (R-OH) is urging the U.S. Forest Service to reverse a “Misguided” proposal to strip Wayne National Forest of its historically significant name.

The Wayne National Forest, established in 1992, is located in the southeastern part of Ohio, in the Unglaciated Allegheny Plateau. It is the only national forest in Ohio.

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USDA Dispersing Funds for Rural Infrastructure Improvements

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday over $800 million in federal funds to improve electric infrastructure and water systems in rural communities, of which Virginia is set to receive nearly $6 million in loans and over $3.8 million in grants.

The Wise County Public Service Authority will receive the lion’s share of Virginia’s USDA dollars in this round of funding. A loan of $1.2 million and a grant of more than $3.5 million will be used to replace more than 29,000 linear feet of water line, install 12 gate valves, and assemble 10 fire hydrants, among other things, to address a current health hazard.

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Consumer Goods Giant 3M Fined More than $6.5 Million for Wooing Chinese Government Officials with Overseas Trips

The consumer goods company 3M agreed to pay more than $6.5 million to resolve charges that it violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act after its China-based subsidiary took Chinese government officials on overseas trips in an attempt to convince them to purchase 3M products, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said.

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As Americans’ Righteous Indignation Grows, Out-of-Touch Power Brokers Believe Their Coup Has Public Support

Looking at the multiple indictments against Trump, culminating in the former president’s humiliating arrest procedure in Fulton County, Georgia on August 24, some of us may feel dismayed by these highhanded actions. Both the Democrats and their allies in the Deep State and media are working, or so it seems, to create a one-party dictatorship, one in which the opposition party functions as an ineffectual check on the wielders of power.

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Georgia State Senators Spar on Special Session over Trump Indictment

While one Georgia state senator wants a special session to potentially act on the district attorney prosecuting former President Donald Trump, another says it’s impossible.

Last week, State Sen. Colton Moore, R-Trenton, sent a letter to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, calling for a special session “for all purposes, to include, without limitation, the review and response to the actions of [Fulton County District Attorney] Fani Willis.”

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Ohio Ballot Board Approves Language of Recreational Marijuana Measure for November Election

The Ohio Ballot Board has approved the language for a November ballot measure to legalize the possession, purchase, and sale of marijuana by Ohio residents aged 21 and older.

The board approved the full ballot language as drafted by the Ohio Secretary of State’s office, now titled Issue 2 for the November general election unanimously without discussion.

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Commentary: America’s Moms Saw a True Leader on the GOP Debate Stage

Donald Trump’s decision to skip the first Republican primary debate left a huge vacuum on the stage in Milwaukee. That vacuum was filled by Vivek Ramaswamy, who showed poise, conviction, and grace under fire – in the process making most of his opponents look like the career politicians they are.

Like Trump, Ramaswamy is a businessman who feels called to run for office because he sees that the country is facing dark times and needs to be saved from the political establishment, which prioritizes self-interest and the status quo over patriotism and the sort of decisive action that our country needs.

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Crime-Ridden Liberal Cities Have a New Favorite Scapegoat: Automakers

Chicago is the latest major city to sue Hyundai and Kia for failing to equip their U.S. cars for more than a decade with anti-theft technology, which was exposed on social media last year and made the vehicles a target for criminals.

“Unlike the movies, hot-wiring vehicles is far harder than it appears—unless that vehicle was manufactured by Hyundai or Kia,” the lawsuit filed Thursday by the city of Chicago states.

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Report: Millions of Americans Struggling Due to Medical Debt

A new report suggests that middle-class Americans are struggling with greater medical debt than any other class of Americans, with one out of every four having unpaid medical bills.

As Axios reports, the data comes from the left-wing think tank Third Way, which calculates that as many as 17 million middle-class Americans – those making between $50,000 and $100,000 per year – are struggling to pay off medical debts. Middle-class Americans in particular are even less likely to qualify for Medicare than low-income Americans.

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Audit Finds Unqualified Arizonans Received Driver Licenses, Including at Least One Foreign National

A new report from the Arizona Auditor General reveals that private companies authorized by the state’s Motor Vehicle Division (MVD) have issued credentials or documents to people who were unqualified, including at least one foreign national.

The Auditor General warned that “consistently” allowing vehicle titles, driver licenses, and identification cards to unauthorized individuals or entities will increase numbers of “unsafe drivers, vehicle and identity theft, fraud, and terrorism.”

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Commentary: Democrats Think They Can Capture Ohio After ‘Issue 1’ Abortion Loss but Data Shows Turnout Was the Issue

Ohio has been making waves over the past few days because voters rejected a Republican-backed measure that would have made it more difficult to change the state’s constitution to add abortion as a “state protected” right.  

The left has trumpeted the rejection of Issue 1 as a victory for Democrats and the Biden Campaign now believes Ohio is “in play” according to Politico. After the defeat of Issue 1, the Biden campaign is suddenly eyeing “long shot” states including Ohio and Florida, as well as focusing on three Rust Belt states Biden won in 2020.  

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Commentary: Christianity and the Globalist Agenda

The power of these 10 words threatens the most powerful individuals and institutions on the planet, and what might otherwise be their total control over governments. These words express a principle that an authoritarian government cannot tolerate. They proclaim “Government is not the ultimate sovereign. God is the ultimate sovereign. And if you challenge my God and make me choose, I will obey God, and I will defy you.”

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Texas U.S. Rep McCaul Presses Biden Admin for Info on Unknown Number of American Inmates in Dominican Republic

Republican Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas demanded answers from the Biden administration regarding the status of American prisoners in the Dominican Republic – the number of which is currently unknown – in a letter sent to Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday, and obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

A number of American citizens are currently imprisoned in the Dominican Republic, some of which are likely under the country’s “preventative detention” system, which requires no charges or evidence of crime for imprisonment, according to McCaul’s letter. McCaul expressed concern to Blinken that the Biden administration has failed to keep track of the number of these American prisoners and demanded action on behalf of the detainee’s families, who are unaware of the status or condition of their loved ones.

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Commentary: Searching for Truth and Excellence in Youth Literature and Movies

A couple of months ago, a friend of my wife and of mine, a young Italian priest, was visiting with us. Our conversation veered toward youth books and movies. Our friend lamented what he perceived as a lack of substance in contemporary books and movies for young people. He said that the books kids read and the movies they watch should reflect the truth and impel them toward right living and virtue, instead of simply mirroring the symptoms of a wounded culture. Perhaps my friend was onto something.

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Local Police Silent After FBI Kills Tennessee Man in His Home

The Henderson Police Department (HPD) provided no update when asked Monday by The Tennessee Star about the August 16 killing of a local man at the hands of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

The Star’s inquiries went unreturned in the case of Theodore Deschler, who was killed after the FBI raided his home. HPD did not mention the incident on its Facebook page at all. Neither did the official Facebook page for Chester County, which is used by the Chester County Sheriff’s Office. 

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Dramatic Video Shows Law Enforcement Clearing Nevada Highway Blockade, Arresting Climate Activists

A dramatic video recording of law enforcement officers ramming through climate activists’ blockade as they attempted to stop traffic surfaced on Sunday.

Climate activists blocked a road leading into the Burning Man festival in Nevada on Sunday, causing a massive traffic jam, according to multiple reports and to video footage of the incident shared on Twitter. Video footage shared on Twitter appeared to show Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribal Police vehicles smashing through their barricade, and a law enforcement officer drawing his gun and arresting the protesters.

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