Tom Zawistowski: Vivek Ramaswamy Likely to be Favorite Gubernatorial Candidate Among Ohioans

Tom Zawistowski, president of the Ohio-based We the People Convention, said businessman and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy is likely to be the favorite Republican candidate among Ohioans in the 2026 gubernatorial race.

While Ramaswamy has not officially launched a bid for Ohio governor, reports have recently confirmed that the businessman and former presidential candidate has hired Vice President JD Vance’s top political advisers to head his expected campaign.

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Appeals Court Overturns Law Banning Handgun Sales to Young Adults

handgun

An appeals court found that a federal preventing gun stores from selling handguns to people between 18 and 20 years old was unconstitutional.

“The text of the Second Amendment includes eighteen-to twenty-year-old individuals among ‘the people’ whose right to keep and bear arms is protected. The federal government has presented scant evidence that eighteen-to-twenty-year-olds’ firearm rights during the founding-era were restricted in a similar manner to the contemporary federal handgun purchase ban, and its 19th century evidence ‘cannot provide much insight into the meaning of the Second Amendment when it contradicts earlier evidence,’” the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals court ruled on Thursday.

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‘Great Day for Tennessee’: Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson Celebrates Passage of Education Freedom Act

Jack Johnson

Tennessee Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson (R-Franklin) said the passage of the Education Freedom Act of 2025 sends a message that the Volunteer State believes in “parents making choices that are right for their kids.”

On Thursday, the Education Freedom Act (SB6001/HB 6004) passed the Tennessee House by a 54-44 vote and the Tennessee Senate by a 20-13 vote.

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Trump to Slap Mexico, Canada and China with Tariffs Saturday

Claudia Sheinbaum and Donald Trump

President Donald Trump will be following through on his threat to hit Mexico, Canada and China with sweeping tariffs over complaints about illegal immigration and illicit drugs entering the U.S.

The administration will begin hitting Mexico and Canada with a 25% tariff and China with a 10% tariff beginning Saturday, White House Spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt announced during a press briefing Friday. The announcement follows import tax threats long made by the Republican unless all three countries do more to address the illegal immigration crisis and the smuggling of fentanyl into the United States.

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Legal Expert Phill Kline: Trump’s Work to Address the ‘Unaccountable Government’ Will Be Hard for the Left to Stop Through the Courts

Donald Trump

Phill Kline, former Kansas Attorney General and current law professor at Liberty University School of Law, said he believes President Donald Trump’s work to address the “unaccountable government” through the temporary pause of federal financial assistance programs to review such funding is likely to be “backed up” by the courts as the Left attempts to derail the president’s actions through litigation.

Kline said Trump’s use of the presidential impoundment power to potentially save federal funds by pausing federal financial assistance programs pending further review is “clearly” appropriate.

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Tennessee Law Enforcement Arrested or Convicted over 2,000 Illegal Immigrants in Final Months of 2024: State Report

ICE Arrest

Complying with legislation passed last year, the first annual report by the Tennessee District Attorneys General Conference (TNDAGC) containing the number of illegal immigrants arrested by Tennessee law enforcement, or convicted by a Tennessee court, between the months October and December 2024 was published Friday.

The TNDAGC report includes data from 73 of Tennessee’s 93 counties, with complete reports from only 71, and reveals there were 2,719 reports of illegal immigrants charged with or convicted of a criminal offense in Tennessee during the last three months of 2024.

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Republicans from Local to Federal Levels Focus on Election Integrity as New Terms, Sessions Begin

Mail-In Ballot Processing

As new terms and legislative sessions begin, Republican politicians from the local level to the White House are focusing on passing and implementing various election integrity efforts, from banning ranked-choice voting to ending “Bidenbucks.”

With a trifecta Republican government at the federal level, Republicans are prioritizing issues such as ensuring that only U.S. citizens vote in federal elections and that the private funding of U.S. elections is prohibited. Meanwhile, Republican-led state and local governments are focusing on banning the ranked-choice voting system and cleaning up voter rolls.

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Medicaid Fraud Implicated in Deaths of Native Americans Who Died in Phoenix Sober Living Homes, Governor Katie Hobbs Blamed

Group therapy treatment center

A massive Medicare fraud scheme has been unraveling in the state recently, involving sketchy sober living homes taking advantage of Native Americans, many who ended up dead. Scammers used hastily popped up sober living centers to take advantage of the program, which is operated under the state’s welfare system, the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS). Estimates of deaths range from two dozen to 200 people, with the fraud costing taxpayers up to $2.5 billion. Much of the blame has been placed on Governor Katie Hobbs for not stopping the fraud. 

Three wrongful death lawsuits have been filed related to the fraud. A 232-page class action lawsuit was filed in December. It alleged, “The grossly negligent and indifferent misconduct of Defendant STATE OF ARIZONA, including through its agencies AHCCCS and AZ-DHS, caused thousands of Native Americans, who are the class action Plaintiffs and proposed Class Members, to suffer and incur horrific injuries, deaths, dangerous drug addictions, fraudulent mental health services, homelessness, and other damages described herein that resulted in the so-called ‘sober living crisis.’ Defendant STATE OF ARIZONA is culpable for creating the crisis.”

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Virginia Bill Would Force Congress to Declare War Before Governor Authorizes Virginia National Guard for Overseas Deployments

Virginia National Guard

Legislation under consideration by the Virginia House of Delegates would require the U.S. Congress to formally pass an act of war against a foreign country before the Governor of Virginia is allowed to authorize the Virginia National Guard to deploy overseas.

The Defend the Guard Act, or HB 2193 was submitted on January 7 by Delegate Nick Freitas (R-Culpeper), and on Thursday the legislation was advanced unanimously in vote by the House Subcommittee on Public Safety, prompting the conservative lawmaker to celebrate in a video posted to the social media platform X.

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Commentary: Trump’s Executive Orders Are Taking a Massive Chunk Out of the Censorship State

President Donald Trump

President Donald Trump has hit the ground running, issuing a flurry of executive orders. Two of them are particularly welcome.

The first, “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship,” mandates agencies across the government cease funding and end any activities that would “unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.” The other, “Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government,” requires agencies “to identify and take appropriate action to correct past misconduct by the Federal Government related to the weaponization of law enforcement and the weaponization of the Intelligence Community.”

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ASU Journalism School’s ‘Dishonest Hit Piece’ Hurting Reputation of Retired Sheriff Mack and His Law Enforcement Group

Retired Graham County Sheriff Richard Mack

Retired Graham County Sheriff Richard Mack, known for his lawsuit in the 1990s that successfully convinced the Supreme Court to strike down the Brady Bill’s requirement that local law enforcement conduct background checks, is suffering damage to his reputation after journalists at Arizona State University wrote a “dishonest hit piece” about Mack and his law enforcement organization. Arizona State University’s Howard Center for Investigative Journalism (HCIJ), in collaboration with the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting (AZCIR), published an article on August 21, 2023 that falsely portrayed Mack and his Constitutional Sheriffs & Peace Officers Association (CSPOA) as vigilantes who were prone to violence. 

Mack met with the journalists prior to the article to provide them with CSPOA’s standard training on the Constitution, which the group offers to law enforcement officers and others. It thoroughly goes over how CSPOA was formed on the basis of the principles laid out in his famous case, Printz v. United States. However, Mack told The Arizona Sun Times the eventual article the journalists produced never mentioned anything from his almost two-hour long presentation, which refuted many of their assertions about him and CSPOA. The article barely mentioned the case, which is the reason why Mack is famous. 

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Commentary: The Flaws of ‘Equitable Discipline’ and Its Impact on School Safety

Misbehaving class

In a December Education Week poll, teachers and administrators disclose that student behavior is worsening. Since pre-pandemic 2019, “there’s been a pronounced spike in behavior problems, ranging from minor classroom disruptions to more serious student fights broadcast on social media.”

The survey results reveal that 72% of educators say that students in their classroom, school, or district have been misbehaving either “a little” (24%) or “a lot” (48%) more than in the fall of 2019, the last semester before the COVID-19 shutdowns began.

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