Month: October 2025

Federal Judge Authorizes Transfer of Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Tennessee for Vindictive Prosecution Hearing

Tom Pappert
Kilmar Abrego Garcia

U.S. District Court Judge Paula Xinis, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, on Thursday authorized the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to transfer Kilmar Abrego Garcia from an Immigration and Customs and Enforcement (ICE) facility in Pennsylvania to another federal facility in Tennessee, where he will be allowed to attend the evidentiary hearing called as part of his effort to prove the human smuggling case against him is being vindictively prosecuted. 

News that Abrego Garcia would be transferred to Tennessee first emerged through a filing by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) attorneys representing the DHS in the civil immigration lawsuits brought by the alleged human smuggler over the government’s desire to fulfill his 2019 deportation order, who submitted an unopposed motion for Abrego Garcia to be transferred on Thursday. 

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Virginia Lawyer and Republican Delegate Candidate Tim Anderson Warns Democrats’ Redistricting Measure Is Illegal

Kaitlin Housler
Tim Anderson

Tim Anderson, a prominent Virginia Beach lawyer and Republican candidate running for the Virginia House of Delegates District 97, warned that the Democrats’ proposed constitutional amendment to change Virginia’s redistricting process is not legal, arguing that it violates the House of Delegates’ own procedural rules.

A redistricting constitutional amendment, HJ 6007, was filed in the Virginia House of Delegates this week after state legislators were called to convene for a surprise special session. The measure passed the House on Wednesday and was agreed to in the Senate on Friday.

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Federal Judge Orders Trump Admin to Use Emergency Funds to Pay SNAP Benefits amid Shutdown

Just the News
Grocery Shopping

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Trump administration to use emergency funds to pay for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program amid the government shutdown.

As a result of the month-long government shutdown, SNAP benefits for November have not been funded. U.S. District Judge John McConnell, an Obama appointee, blocked the Trump administration from cutting off SNAP benefits, and ordered the roughly $5.25 billion emergency fund be used to cover it, The Hill news outlet reported.

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Justice Department Probes Allegations of Fraud in Black Lives Matter Movement: Sources

Just the News
BLM Protest

The Justice Department has opened a probe into fraud allegations tied to the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, sources familiar with the investigation confirmed to Just The News on Thursday.

The investigation centers on allegations that the leaders of the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, Inc. and other Black-led organizations defrauded donors during the racial justice protests in the summer of 2020, who poured tens of millions of dollars into the movement. 

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Abigail Spanberger’s Record Shows She’d Bring Forced Unionism to Virginia, National Labor Expert Warns

Kaitlin Housler
Abigail spanberger

Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Committee, warned against Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger’s stance on Right-to-Work laws, stressing how Spanberger has consistently opposed Right-to-Work protections not only in the Commonwealth but across the country.

During an appearance this week on The John Fredericks Show, Mix criticized Spanberger for her repeated votes in Congress to eliminate Right-to-Work protections nationwide, including her sponsorship of the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, a bill that would repeal Right-to-Work laws nationwide.

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Tennessee U.S. Congressmen Andy Ogles, Scott DesJarlais, Tim Burchett Back Impeachment of District Court Judge James Boasberg

Tom Pappert
Judge James Boasberg

U.S. Representatives Andy Ogles (R-TN-05), Scott DesJarlais (R-TN-04), and Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) will support an effort to impeach District Court Judge James Boasberg, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, who approved the subpoenas requested by former special counsel Jack Smith for phone records of prominent Republicans, the congressmen or their spokesmen told The Tennessee Star on Friday. 

The prospect of impeaching Boasberg was first broached earlier this year, after the judge controversially threatened to hold the Trump administration in contempt after issuing a verbal order blocking the government from deporting Tren de Aragua (TdA) terrorists to El Salvador after the planes had already left the United States, which prompted U.S. Representative Brandon Gill (R-TX-26) to file articles of impeachment.

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Kamala Harris Wants Voter Age Lowered to 16 Because Gen Z Has ‘Climate Anxiety’

Admin

Breitbart   Failed Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris believes the voting age should be lowered because Gen Z suffers from “climate anxiety.” During a recent interview, Harris laid out her beliefs and explained the “fear” she claimed the younger generation is experiencing: “I think we should reduce voting age to 16. I’ll tell you why. So, Gen Z, they’re aged about 13 through 27. They’ve only known the climate crisis. They missed substantial parts of their education because of the pandemic. If they’re in high school or college, especially in college, it is very likely that whatever they’ve chosen as their major for study may not result in an affordable wage. They’ve coined the term ‘Climate anxiety’ to describe fear of not only being able to buy a home but fear it will be wiped out by extreme weather, but fear of having children. It is expected that Gen Z will have ten to 12 jobs in their lifetime. They are a larger number than boomers. READ THE FULL STORY                 

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Head Start Programs Begin to Close as Funding Ends During Government Shutdown

Admin

CBS News   With the Senate out of town, the government shutdown is almost certain to extend through at least Monday, as millions of Americans begin to feel its effects. Among them are those who rely on Head Start, a free early childhood development program for low-income families.  The Southwestern Wisconsin Community Action Program is shuttering nine Head Start centers in early November because of the shutdown. A program in Richland Center, Wisconsin, is closing its doors Friday. Stephanie Wallace, who has taught at the center for 13 years and has now been temporarily laid off, said goodbye to her students this week.  “Some of the kids already knew,” she said. “We told them, you know, we’re not going to see you for a little bit.” READ THE FULL STORY                 

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Rubio Dismisses Report That U.S. Is Poised to Strike Venezuela as a ‘Fake Story’

Admin

The Hill   Secretary of State Marco Rubio pushed back on a report Friday that the Trump administration had decided to strike military installations in Venezuela. “Your ‘sources’ claiming to have ‘knowledge of the situation’ tricked you into writing a fake story,” Rubio posted on social platform X.   He was responding to a Miami Herald report that said the strikes could come “at any moment” amid an increasingly aggressive posture from the U.S. toward Venezuela. Sources told the news outlet the strikes aimed at cutting off the hierarchy of the Soles drug cartel. READ THE FULL STORY                 

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Commentary: Halloween’s Roots in the Christian Tradition

Intellectual Takeout
Person decorating with candles and pumpkins

Conventional wisdom holds that Halloween is essentially a secular and pagan holiday, the result of the Christian Church appropriating an ancient Celtic harvest festival. But one strain of critical opinion tends to the view that the holiday was thoroughly Christian from the start.

In the church calendar, Halloween (All Hallows’ Eve) is the beginning of a triduum of holidays commemorating the dead, continuing with All Saints’ Day on November 1 and All Souls’ Day on November 2. It was common practice among the early Christians to commemorate the deaths of various martyrs at the places of their demise. In the 9th century Pope Gregory IV decided that the time had come for a single universal feast to commemorate all the saints, as well as a day to pray for one’s deceased loved ones. The pope chose a time of year—the end of harvest and the beginning of winter—when many people’s thoughts naturally turned to the idea of death.

The macabre aspects which have grown up around Halloween in modern times—the emphasis on witches, ghosts and other ghoulish figures, the glorification of gore and violence—have led many people to doubt its Christian character and many Christians to shun it. Yet according to some historians, these demonic elements of the holiday originated from a distinctively medieval Christian idea of exorcising evil by ridiculing it. Christian theology holds that Jesus conquered sin and death; and death loses its sting precisely when one is able to laugh at it.

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‘Cannot Be Trusted’: Winsome Earle-Sears Slams Spanberger for Selling Out Virginia for $150,000 to Back Redistricting Plan

Kaitlin Housler
John Fredericks, Winsome Earle Sears

Virginia Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears is slamming her Democratic opponent in the gubernatorial race, Abigail Spanberger, for betraying Virginia voters by accepting $150,000 from a Democratic redistricting group and then backing a controversial special session to redraw the state’s political lines.

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LGBTQIA History Month Lessons Reportedly Distributed by Metro Nashville Public Schools

Tom Pappert
Schoology: Pulse Night Club Shooting

Images obtained by The Tennessee Star appear to show lessons about Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, and Asexual (LGBTQIA) History Month, unofficially observed in October, were distributed by Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) to social studies teachers using Schoology, the Learning Management System (LMS) used by the district.

The images appear to depict two lessons that are part of an LGBTQIA History Month curriculum, with the materials obtained by The Star covering the Lavender Scare of the 1950s and the Pulse nightclub shooting in 2016.

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Court of Appeals Oral Argument in Covenant Case: Attorney for Tennessee Star Says Trial Court Decision Citing Copyright Claim Creates Legal ‘Black Hole’

Tom Pappert

A panel of three judges on the Tennessee Court of Appeals on Thursday heard oral arguments for the lawsuit brought by Star News Digital Media, Inc. (SNDM), which owns and operates The Tennessee Star, and Editor-in-Chief Michael Patrick Leahy, which seeks to compel Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) to release the complete writings of Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who killed six at the Covenant School on March 27, 2023. 

Leahy and SNDM initially sued in May 2023, after Metro Nashville refused to comply with a Tennessee Public Records Act (TPRA) request seeking the voluminous writings left by the killer, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation. Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles later allowed a group of Covenant parents to intervene in the lawsuit, as they claimed to own the copyright to the killer’s written works, and claimed that the government could not release them without the permission of the copyright owners.

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JD Vance Explains Memphis Safe Task Force Arrests for Guns Involve ‘Illegally Possessed, Illegally Obtained’ Weapons

Tom Pappert
Vice President JD Vance

Vice President JD Vance on Wednesday spoke at the Turning Point USA (TPUSA) event held at the University of Mississippi, and answered a question from a citizen of Memphis, who questioned Vance about the arrests by the Memphis Safe Task Force involving firearms. 

Telling Vance that he drove from Memphis to ask the vice president a question, the audience member asked if the nearly 400 firearms recovered by the Memphis Safe Task Force contradict the pledge by U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to lead a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that is friendlier to the Second Amendment. 

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Jack Smith Issued Subpoenas Targeting More than 400 Republicans in Arctic Frost Case, Grassley Says

Just the News
Special Counsel Jack Smith

Then-Special Counsel Jack Smith issued nearly 200 subpoenas in his sweeping Arctic Frost-linked case against President Donald Trump related to the 2020 election and the events of January 6, 2021, seeking records on more than 400 Republican personalities and groups, according to records related Wednesday by a top Senate investigator.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, made public 197 subpoenas which Smith and his Biden-era DOJ team issued “as part of the indiscriminate election case against President Trump,” the Republican senator’s office said on Wednesday. Smith’s case began at the FBI — led at the time by now-former FBI Director Chris Wray — under the codename of “Arctic Frost.”

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Commentary: The Broader Reasons for Trump’s Urban Crackdown

American Greatness
ICE arrest

“We’re not going to lose our cities over this. This will go further. We’re starting very strongly with D.C., and we’re going to clean it up real quick.” — President Donald Trump, August 11, 2025

For nearly three months, National Guard troops have been deployed in cities across the U.S., including Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Memphis, Chicago, and Portland. Despite near-universal opposition from the Democrat city leaders, the deployments will continue, and more cities are expected to follow.

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Commentary: We’re Making Memphis Safe Again – Now Let’s Make Digital World Safe Too

Admin
TN National Guard

Memphis is a city in transformation. Thanks many of our state’s policymakers and federal partners, our state has pushed back on crime, bolstered our police and law enforcement presence, and embraced community initiatives to reclaim our neighborhoods. However, while our streets and communities are patrolled by public safety authorities, our children roam a much less supervised digital world that leaves them exposed and vulnerable. 

Over the past month, Memphis has seen a dramatic surge of law enforcement. This “Memphis Safe Task Force,” backed by President Trump’s administration, Governor Bill Lee, Senator Marsha Blackburn, Senator Bill Hagerty, the Tennessee National Guard, state legislators, and federal agencies, has made over 1,000 arrests in just weeks for offenses ranging from homicides and sex crimes to narcotic trafficking and gang activity. Law enforcement has also served 418 warrants and located 40 missing children in this same period.  

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Music Spotlight: Calamity Jane

Bethany Bowman

Since joining the country music bandwagon over 20 years ago, I quickly learned that a lot of country music evolved from bluegrass. I also learned that bluegrass musicians are some of the most talented instrumentalists in the world. Calamity Jane also hails from that genre with a more modern twist affectionately labeled “Newgrass.” 

Violinist Lucy Cantley and powerhouse vocalist Camille Rae founded Calamity Jane. They fuse Cantley’s classical roots and Rae’s strong vocals with a bold, boundary-pushing take on bluegrass/newgrass, crafting a sound that is both timeless and daringly modern. Their artistry has redefined the newgrass space, blending precision musicianship with unshakable authenticity.

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Tennessee Appeals Court to Hold Hearing on Tennessee Star Lawsuit Seeking Full Release of Covenant Killer Manifesto

Tom Pappert
Audrey Hale

A panel of three judges on the Tennessee Court of Appeals Middle Section on Thursday will hear oral arguments for the lawsuit brought by Star News Digital Media, Inc. (SNDM), which owns and operates The Tennessee Star, and Editor-in-Chief Michael Patrick Leahy. 

Leahy and SNDM first sued in May 2023 to compel Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) to release the writings left by Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who killed six at the Christian elementary school she once attended, after authorities initially claimed they would not release the manifesto until their investigation was complete.

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Memphis Democrats Urged to ‘Keep Going with Cohen’ as 20-Year Incumbent Faces Challenge from State Rep. Justin Pearson

Tom Pappert
Steve Cohen

U.S. Representative Steve Cohen (D-TN-09) urged Memphis Democrats to “Keep Going with Cohen” in remarks published Wednesday by NOTUS, arguing that his primary challenger, State Representative Justin Pearson (D-Memphis), has “no record” to show voters as he seeks their support. 

While the news outlet described the upcoming Democratic primary in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District as a test of the party’s desire for “generational change,” and Pearson claimed the race was about “energy,” Cohen told NOTUS that his record speaks for itself. 

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Experts Say Housing Affordability Won’t Change Much from Fed’s Rate Cut

Daily Caller News Foundation
Sale Pending Home

The Federal Reserve announced its second interest rate cut of the year on Wednesday, reducing the benchmark rate by a quarter-point to lower the target range to 3.75%-4.00%.

The decision, made by the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) after a two-day meeting, follows a quarter-point reduction in September. The move comes amid softer labor market conditions and a federal government shutdown that has stalled most economic data releases.

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Sean Davis: Charlie Kirk’s Assassination Marks Start of Dangerous New American Era

Kaitlin Housler
Charlie Kirk

Sean Davis, CEO and co-founder of The Federalist, described America as entering a dangerous new phase he calls the “post-Charlie Kirk era,” claiming that the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk marked the nation’s first true instance of Christian martyrdom.

On Wednesday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show, Davis argued that Kirk was murdered because his Christian faith shaped every part of his political beliefs, and that his death represents a moral and cultural breaking point for the U.S.

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Top DOJ Official Threatens to Punish States That Don’t Clean Up Voter Rolls, Follow Law

Just the News
Harmeet Dhillon

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon announced that states that do not comply with Justice Department requests to examine voter rolls face lawsuits, eight of which have already been filed. 

“We’ve been asking states to produce the data of their voter rolls, to be able to make sure that they only have citizens on the rolls and that they don’t have duplicates and have people voting in multiple jurisdictions,” Dhillon told Just The News. “So we’ve had to file eight lawsuits throughout the United States to enforce our data requests, which is something that they have to comply with under the Voting Rights Act and Civil Rights Act of 1960.”

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Mamdani’s Dad Claimed ‘Moral Equivalence’ Between U.S. and Al-Qaeda, Compared Afghan War to 9/11

Just the News

Zohran Mamdani’s father Mahmood — a prominent leftist in his own right — penned a book in the wake of the terrorist attacks of 9/11 where he argued that there was a “moral equivalence” between the United States and al-Qaeda, compared the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan to the terrorist destruction of the World Trade Center, blamed the U.S. for 9/11 and al-Qaeda, and much more.

Mahmood Mamdani is a longtime tenured Columbia University professor, where the school says he “specializes in the study of colonialism, anti-colonialism, and decolonization.” Raised in Uganda and of Indian descent, the likely future mayor’s father also previously taught at the University of Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania, Makerere University in Uganda, and the University of Cape Town in South Africa. The leftwing academic wrote a 2004 book — Good Muslim, Bad Muslim — which may help explain his son’s views on terrorism.

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Maryland Democrat Refuses to Go Along with Party’s Gerrymandering Push

Daily Caller News Foundation
Bill Ferguson

Democratic Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson on Tuesday blocked his party’s effort to redraw congressional maps, halting plans to target the state’s only Republican lawmaker.

In a three-page letter to his Democratic colleagues, first obtained by Politico, Ferguson said he would not support holding a special session to redraw the maps and warned that a mid-cycle redistricting effort would be “catastrophic.” Despite controlling the governor’s office and holding supermajorities in both chambers, Democrats cannot advance a redistricting plan without Ferguson’s support.

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Sen. Marsha Blackburn Highlights ‘Disturbing’ Comments from Tennessee Professors for Hearing on Political Violence

Tom Pappert
Marsha Blackburn

U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) on Tuesday highlighted the “disturbing” comments made by three Tennessee professors following the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA (TPUSA), during a hearing on political violence.

Blackburn made the remarks as Daily Wire host and author Michael Knowles testified before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, which on Tuesday held a hearing examining the potential threat of political violence to the nation.

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Tennessee County Signs Deal to Partner with ICE

Zachery Schmidt
Sheriff Sexton

The Washington County Commission approved a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that will allow the county to take part in the federal government’s Section 287(g) program.

This federal law enforcement program allows the federal government to enter into agreements with local and state law enforcement so they “can perform certain functions of an immigration officer,” the MOA states.

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House Chairman Comer Calls on AG Bondi to Invalidate All Biden Pardons, Orders Signed by Autopen

Just the News
Biden signature

The chairman of the powerful House Oversight and Accountability Committee on Tuesday demanded that Attorney General Pam Bondi take steps to invalidate all of Joe Biden’s pardons and executive orders signed by autopen, saying there was ample evidence the former president did not follow the law and was unaware of actions being taken in his name by staff.

“We’ve handed this to Pam Bondi on a silver platter. We’ve done all the heavy lifting,” Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., said in a wide-ranging interview on the Just the News, No Noise television show. “We’ve done the depositions. We’ve combed through the emails. I mean, this is the hard, tedious work of an investigation.

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Commentary: The Fed Must Act Now Before the Job Market Cracks

RealClearWire

America’s labor market is flashing red, and the Federal Reserve is watching the light change instead of hitting the brakes. Job openings have fallen to 7.26 million, the lowest level in 4½ years. Private-sector hiring has turned negative, with September’s ADP data showing -32,000 jobs after August was revised down to -3,000. Employers’ plans to add workers have plunged 71% from last year, and year-to-date hiring announcements are the weakest since 2009. The Fed must move decisively by cutting rates 50 basis points in both the October and December meetings to prevent further deterioration in employment and restore confidence to the private economy.

For the first time since early 2021, there are more unemployed Americans than job vacancies. If the Fed waits until 2026 to cut rates meaningfully, it will be too late. Monetary policy works with long and variable lags. By the time a policy shift filters through credit markets and small-business balance sheets, another million jobs could be lost.

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