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Trans-Identifying HS Volleyball Player Sends Illinois Community Into Uproar

A trans-identifying biological male at James B. Conant High School in Illinois, who reportedly stands 6-foot-4, made the freshman girls volleyball team despite never having previously played the sport, OutKick has learned. 

According to a parent of one of the freshman girls, who spoke to OutKick on the condition of anonymity, around 70 girls tried out for the team and only 23 made it – along with the male to complete the 24-player roster. 

In addition, the longtime girls’ volleyball coach allegedly resigned her position after being forced to allow the male – who is also allegedly using the girls’ bathroom and locker room facilities, according to parents – on the girls’ team. 

OutKick reached out to the school’s athletics department and principal. 

On Wednesday night, August 20, the Township High School District 211 school board – which oversees Conant, a school located in the Chicago suburbs – held a special meeting and allowed members of the public to speak. Chaos ensued. 

Parents beg school board to take action

Over the course of an hour, 16 people spoke at the meeting. Some were in opposition to a male on the girls’ team and some were in favor. The first few speakers all begged the school board to intervene and remove the male from the girls’ volleyball team. 

“If you want groundbreaking, revolutionary, inclusive ideas, start a trans league so trans people can compete against each other. But keep biological men out of biological girls’ sports. Protect our girls,” John Goodman, a candidate for the U.S. Senate, said. 

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DECLASSIFIED: Federal Prosecutors Secured Evidence From FBI Brass That Comey Authorized Classified Leaks – But Declined to Bring Charges

Newly declassified memos reveal federal prosecutors secured evidence from FBI brass indicating that former FBI Director James authorized classified leaks shortly before the 2016 election, but they declined to bring charges.

According to the memos obtained by Just The News, an investigation by the US Postal Inspection Service Agents revealed former FBI General Counsel James Baker and Comey’s Chief of Staff James Rybicki were involved in leaking the classified information to The New York Times in October 2016.

The specific classified information was not identified.

“The USPIS Investigation also revealed Baker disclosed USG classified information to the NYT under the belief he was ultimately instructed and authorized to do so by then FBI Director James Comey,” one summary memo reads, according to Just The News. “For example, during interviews, Baker indicated FBI Chief of Staff James Rybicki instructed him (Baker) to disclose the information to the NYT, and Baker understood Rybicki was conveying this instruction and authorization from Comey.”

Just The News reported:

Federal prosecutors gathered evidence from James Comey’s top lieutenants that he authorized the leak of classified information to reporters just before the 2016 election but declined to bring criminal charges, according to recently declassified memos that call into question the former FBI director’s testimony to Congress.

The bombshell revelations involving ex-FBI general counsel James Baker and ex-Comey chief of staff James Rybicki were memorialized in documents that FBI Director Kash Patel discovered earlier this year, but the passages were originally redacted by the Justice Department in versions sent to Congress earlier this month.

Attorney General Pam Bondi intervened and eliminated the redactions, dispatching new versions of the memos this week to the House and Senate Judiciary committees, officials told Just the News.

The memos detail evidence and interviews gathered by U.S. Postal Inspection Service agents concerning classified information leaked to The New York Times in October 2016, ahead of the November election in which Republican Donald Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.

This is not the first time it was revealed James Comey authorized the leaks of classified information.

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Meet Trump’s CDC Director: Susan Monarez

As the Trump administration has spent its first few months in The White House constructing the physical and digital infrastructure required for a pre-crime, technocratic police state, little attention has been paid to the ways in which the institutions ostensibly dedicated to “public health” are helping build out this digital control grid. As Unlimited Hangout has been reporting for many years now, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, a prominent subgroup of the surveillance state has emerged at the intersection of Big Tech, Big Pharma and the military industrial complex — one that is laying the groundwork to implement the final frontier of mass surveillance: the bio-surveillance apparatus. 

During his first term, Trump implemented the notorious Operation Warp Speed, the Pentagon-ran COVID-19 response plan which issued emergency deregulatory measures and massive funding for the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. Now, his second administration has successfully managed to become associated with COVID-era dissidence. This was primarily accomplished through Trump successfully securing the endorsements of figures who were skeptical of the official line on COVID-19, most prominently comedian and podcaster Joe Rogan and longtime environmental litigator and founder of Children’s Health Defense, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Since taking office, however, the second Trump administration has consistently contradicted this unofficial commitment to the spirit of COVID-era dissent and public health institutional overhaul. Just last week, the President touted Operation Warp Speed as one of the “most incredible things ever done in this country.” The week before, he announced an initiative to enable the vast sharing of individuals’ health data across a myriad of “health systems and apps,” in partnership with Pentagon-contracting Big Tech companies. More quietly, however, Trump nominated a seasoned official of the biosecurity apparatus named Susan Monarez to be the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Monarez, whose background is perfectly in line with this technocratic approach to healthcare that the administration has embarked on, was “handpicked” by Kennedy after the previous nominee, Dave Weldon, withdrew his nomination in March. Monarez had been acting director of the CDC for several months and was confirmed at the end of July with little fanfare.

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Ukraine Strikes Druzhba Pipeline for the THIRD TIME, Cutting Russian Oil Flow to Hungary and Slovakia – Orbán Complains Online and Trump Answers: ‘I Am Very Angry About It!’

Ukraine bites the hands that feed it.

As we reported three days ago, the Ukrainians have started attacking the Druzhba pipeline that transports Russian crude oil to Hungary and Slovakia.

While strikes on energy infrastructure have become commonplace, this specific pipeline is the lifeline for the Hungarian and Slovak economies.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó took to X, and sais that the ‘strike against our energy security is outrageous and unacceptable!’

The Ukrainian FM Andrii Sybiha was ironic, and told his counterpart ‘You can now send your complaints—and threats—to your friends in Moscow’.

Szijjártó responded with fire, saying:

“Fact 1: Russia has supplied oil to Hungary for decades via the Druzhba pipeline. This is in Hungary’s interest.

Fact 2: Ukraine attacks this pipeline, and because of these Ukrainian strikes, oil supplies to Hungary are repeatedly cut off. This is against Hungary’s interest.

As Hungary’s Foreign Minister my mandate is clear: Hungary’s interest comes first. Period.

And let’s not forget: a significant part of Ukraine’s electricity comes from Hungary…”

Yes, you read it right: Ukraine disrupts the energy security of a country who sends electricity to make up for its destroyed infrastructure!

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Giving Ukraine a US Security Guarantee Risks National Suicide

Too much of the talk about the recent Alaska summit meeting between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin focuses on the wrong issue.  The key question is not whether an eventual peace accord ending the fighting in Ukraine will require Kyiv to accept Moscow’s continued possession of Crimea and at least a portion of Ukraine’s Donbas region.  Anyone with a modicum of realism understands that such territorial concessions are unavoidable if the bloody war of attrition is to end.  The real issue involves the demand of Ukraine and of its fan club in NATO that Kyiv be given “security guarantees” in exchange for accepting that reality.  Agreeing to such an open-ended commitment could ultimately prove fatal to the United States.

Trump has attempted to steer a middle course to accommodate the competing demands and extricate Washington from its entanglement in NATO’s dangerous proxy war using Ukraine as a weapon against Russia.  He has told Ukraine leader Volodymyr Zelensky repeatedly that his country must at least make some territorial concessions – especially Crimea.  Trump also has indicated that Ukraine must give up its aspirations for official NATO membership.  However, he has been receptive to endorsing vaguely conceived security commitments to shield Ukraine from any further coercion by Russia.

Extending a U.S. security guarantee to Kyiv could take two forms – both of them bad from the standpoint of America’s genuine interests and well-being.  One version could consist of pledges from individual European NATO powers – especially major players such as Great Britain, France, Germany, Poland, and Turkey–as well as the United States to enforce a peace accord between Kyiv and Moscow.  Another equally dangerous option would be to establish an explicit pledge from NATO as an alliance to come to Ukraine’s defense if it is the victim of renewed aggression from Russia.  In essence, that move would make Ukraine a de facto NATO member, even though Kyiv apparently would not have the right accorded to formal members to vote on Alliance decisions.  Any version of a security guarantee also is almost certain to include a peacekeeping contingent to enforce a ceasefire or a full-blown peace agreement.  However, Russian leaders insist that such a deployment must never take place without Moscow’s explicit consent.

Unfortunately, the Western powers may seek to implement the scheme of deploying peacekeeping troops along with a robust NATO security guarantee to Kyiv in defiance of Moscow’s wishes.  NATO countries have already blurred and expanded the security pledge contained in Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty to consider an attack on any Alliance member to be an attack on all members and to provide aid to the victim.  Since Russia’s expanded military operations in Ukraine began in February 2022, the United States and other key NATO nations have treated Ukraine as though it were already an integral part of the alliance.

Article 5 does not require a member to launch retaliatory military strikes against the aggressor or even to provide weaponry to the alliance signatory under siege.  Yet, the United States and other NATO countries have provided sophisticated weapons to Kyiv, including missiles and drones that it has used to strike targets deep inside Russia.  NATO intelligence operatives also have assisted Ukrainian forces to conduct offensive operations against Russian targets.  Finally, although the evidence is not definitive, the United States, Britain, Norway, and possibly Poland are prime suspects in the destruction of Russia’s Nord Stream natural gas pipeline. 

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Will County Democrat Jacqueline Traynere — Who Once Struck a Child With Her Car — Now CHARGED With Three Counts of Computer Tampering After Allegedly Hacking Fellow Board Members’ Emails

The scandals surrounding Will County Democrat Jacqueline Traynere keep piling up.

Traynere, a Democrat Will County Board member serving Bolingbrook, Illinois, is now officially charged with three counts of computer tampering, according to documents filed in Will County Circuit Court this week, Patch reported.

The charges stem from an incident in March 2024 when Traynere allegedly accessed the private email account of Republican Board Chair Judy Ogalla without authorization. Prosecutors say Traynere then forwarded Ogalla’s conversations to Democrat County Executive Jennifer Bertino-Tarrant in an apparent attempt to undermine her political opponents.

Computer tampering is a Class B misdemeanor in Illinois.

More from the Chicago Tribune:

Traynere, a Bolingbrook Democrat, allegedly accessed the email account of board member Judy Ogalla, a Monee Republican, in March 2024 without Ogalla’s authorization, according to the charges.

The misdemeanor charges filed by special prosecutor William Elward state Traynere forwarded emails from Ogalla’s account to herself and others.

Ogalla, who was the Will County Board chairman at the time, said that Traynere knowingly accessed her email and knew it was unethical.

Ogalla questioned whether Traynere had opened her email more than once. She said she doesn’t know what all Traynere saw.

“Was she in my email other times and I just didn’t know?” Ogalla said. “She shouldn’t have done it.”

An email exchanged between board member Steve Balich, a Homer Glen Republican, and Ogalla regarding the controversial 143rd Street road widening project had been forwarded to the county executive, who replied to the email, Balich said during a July 2024 news conference with other County Board Republicans.

This isn’t Traynere’s first brush with controversy. Earlier this year, she was involved in a disturbing incident where she struck a child riding a bicycle with her car.

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Islamic Sharia Law Legally Valid in Austrian Civil Disputes, Vienna Court Rules

A court in Vienna ruled this week that Islamic Sharia law can be legally upheld in Austria in civil disputes, sparking accusations that the nation’s Christian values are being undermined by multiculturalism.

The Vienna Regional Court for Civil Law Matters has upheld the findings of a Sharia arbitration tribunal concerning a civil dispute between two men in Austria, with the group of informal Islamic mediators ruling that one owed the other €320,000 ($372,000).

The man appealed to the Vienna court, arguing that Sharia diktats have no standing in Austria and that the Islamic code violated the constitutional rights of the European country.

Yet, according to Kronen Zeitung, Vienna judges found that it was permissible for private individuals to settle civil disputes through the manner they saw fit, and that Sharia arbitration did not violate the basic law of Austria.

However, the court noted that this would only apply to civil matters and that Sharia is not applicable in criminal cases. Nevertheless, critics warned that the ruling demonstrated an erosion of the Western liberties and Christian ethics upon which Austria was founded.

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Jeffrey Epstein committed his first crime in the U.K. and it involved a bizarre deadly weapon

Jeffrey Epstein once admitted being convicted of a bizarre crime involving possession of an offensive weapon in the U.K.

The late disgraced billionaire revealed under oath that he was convicted of having a sword disguised as a walking cane, a device known as a ‘swordstick.’

It is unclear what Epstein’s punishment was for the crime, which happened decades ago, but records show a man later convicted of the same offense received a suspended jail sentence.

The incident, according to Epstein himself, resulted in his first criminal conviction, long before he admitted soliciting a minor in 2008, and was then charged with sex trafficking of minors in 2019.

Epstein spoke about the peculiar episode during a sworn deposition in a separate financial investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in New York in 1981.

According to a transcript of that deposition he was asked if he had ever been convicted of a crime, and replied: ‘I’ve been convicted of a crime in Great Britain at one point…I don’t believe it’s…no (U.S.) federal jurisdiction.’

He was then asked by an SEC lawyer: ‘Do you know offhand if it’s a felony or a misdemeanor?’

Epstein responded: ‘No I don’t.’

The lawyer went on: ‘What did it concern? What was the allegation and what was the conviction?’

Epstein said: ‘The allegation was I bought an antique swordstick and they said that could not be carried in the country, it had to be shipped out.’

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Microsoft AI chief says it’s ‘dangerous’ to study AI consciousness

AI models can respond to text, audio, and video in ways that sometimes fool people into thinking a human is behind the keyboard, but that doesn’t exactly make them conscious. It’s not like ChatGPT experiences sadness doing my tax return … right?

Well, a growing number of AI researchers at labs like Anthropic are asking when — if ever — AI models might develop subjective experiences similar to living beings, and if they do, what rights they should have.

The debate over whether AI models could one day be conscious — and merit legal safeguards — is dividing tech leaders. In Silicon Valley, this nascent field has become known as “AI welfare,” and if you think it’s a little out there, you’re not alone.

Microsoft’s CEO of AI, Mustafa Suleyman, published a blog post on Tuesday arguing that the study of AI welfare is “both premature, and frankly dangerous.”

Suleyman says that by adding credence to the idea that AI models could one day be conscious, these researchers are exacerbating human problems that we’re just starting to see around AI-induced psychotic breaks and unhealthy attachments to AI chatbots.

Furthermore, Microsoft’s AI chief argues that the AI welfare conversation creates a new axis of division within society over AI rights in a “world already roiling with polarized arguments over identity and rights.”

Suleyman’s views may sound reasonable, but he’s at odds with many in the industry. On the other end of the spectrum is Anthropic, which has been hiring researchers to study AI welfare and recently launched a dedicated research program around the concept. Last week, Anthropic’s AI welfare program gave some of the company’s models a new feature: Claude can now end conversations with humans who are being “persistently harmful or abusive.“

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Trans Dem Rep Makes Shocking Confession Nobody Saw Coming

One of the most prominent progressive figures in the Democratic Party has made a revealing admission that is now making waves across social media.

Rep. Sarah McBride (D-DE), who is biologically male and identifies as transgender, offered surprisingly blunt commentary during an appearance on The Ezra Klein Show. In a conversation that veered away from typical talking points, McBride acknowledged that the Democratic Party may have gone too far, too fast in advancing radical gender ideology. The fallout, McBride explained, has contributed to a nationwide backlash that is increasingly difficult to ignore.

“Candidly, I think we’ve lost the art of persuasion,” McBride told Klein. “I think that allowed for the misinformation, the disinformation — that well-coordinated, well-funded campaign — to really take advantage of that lack of understanding.”

McBride continued by noting that progressives as a whole have become too rigid in their messaging and goals. “We became absolutist — not just on trans rights but across the progressive movement — and we forgot that in a democracy we have to grapple with where the public authentically is and actually engage with it.”

The Delaware congressperson, who made history in January by becoming the first openly transgender member of Congress, has not shied away from contentious cultural issues. In fact, McBride has been at the center of several political flashpoints since being sworn in. Early in the congressional term, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) introduced a resolution aimed at preventing McBride from using women’s restrooms on Capitol Hill. Although McBride chose to comply with the policy and shift attention toward legislative work, the decision drew criticism from some transgender activists who felt it signaled a retreat from principle.

In another highly publicized incident, Rep. Keith Self (R-TX) repeatedly referred to McBride as “Mr. McBride” during a Foreign Affairs Subcommittee hearing in March. The repeated “misgendering” sparked a heated exchange that led Democrats to abruptly end the session. McBride responded coolly with, “Thank you, Madame Chair,” and later denounced the GOP for being “obsessed with culture‑war issues,” reiterating a commitment to stay focused on policy-making rather than personal attacks.

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