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Waste Of The Day: Austin Funds Allegedly Sent To Fake Companies

Topline: A then-employee at the City of Austin’s energy utility allegedly paid $980,000 in taxpayer funds to fictional companies with bank accounts belonging to his family members, according to a new report from the city auditor.

Key facts: Mark Ybarra was given a city credit card from 2018 to 2023 to hire repair companies for city buildings. He used it to pay 30 different vendors, but the city auditor could only verify that eight of them were real companies, according to the report. 

Ten of the companies reportedly had the same address, which the city auditor said is the home of one of Ybarra’s relatives. The businesses received $400,000 from the city. One of them had Ybarra’s email address listed as its contact information, according to the report.

The remaining $580,000 went to businesses that “appeared to be fake,” many of which were missing basic information like an address and phone number, according to the report. 

Ybarra resigned in October 2023 after Austin Energy officials asked questions about the invoices, according to the report. He was indicted for felony theft this September. 

Records obtained by Open the Books show Ybarra earned $534,797 in taxpayer-funded salary during the six years he was allegedly defrauding the city.

The city auditor claimed the alleged fraud went undetected because of Austin Energy’s “inefficient purchasing controls.” Most of his purchases were approved by former Facility Service Supervisor Sammy Ramirez, who never raised questions about the missing addresses and phone numbers on Ybarra’s invoices, according to the report.

Mark Ybarra’s wife, Ambrosia Ybarra, worked at the city’s Watershed Protection Department. She was questioned by the city auditor about her husband’s invoices but allegedly left the interview before it was over, according to the report. She resigned this November.

Ambrosia Ybarra made $70,174 in 2024. Ramirez made $87,262 in 2022, his last year of employment, but made as much as $104,698 in 2021.

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‘Disclosure is required now’: DOJ stalling case against 2020 election denier accused of planting bombs ‘outside the RNC and DNC’ day before Jan. 6, lawyers say

Newly released court documents accused a Virginia man of confessing to planting pipe bombs “outside” the headquarters of the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee in Washington, D.C., just one day before the Jan. 6 Capitol Attack. Federal prosecutors who say the man told investigators he did this because he wanted to “speak up” for 2020 election deniers are now choosing to stall the case, according to his lawyers.

“Disclosure is required now, not later,” Brian Cole Jr.’s attorneys write in a 15-page motion for discovery filed Monday, which seeks an order that directs the government to cough up all copies of evidence against him, including “any and all statements, confessions, or admissions.”

Cole’s lawyers say the Justice Department has “asked to push” his preliminary hearing to either Jan. 7 or 8 — but prosecutors have no concrete reason why, the attorneys say, other than “ordinary scheduling matters and the possibility of a forthcoming indictment,” according to court documents.

“That request comes too late,” Cole’s team says in a motion to confirm his preliminary hearing filed late Sunday. “In its email to defense counsel, the government has identified no extraordinary circumstances.”

Cole’s lawyers want the court to direct the government to be “prepared to present its evidence in support of probable cause” on Tuesday, should the preliminary hearing happen. They say Cole has already consented to an extension that moved his hearing to Tuesday, “but he has not consented to any further delay,” according to their motion.

“Dec. 30 is the proper, timely date for the preliminary hearing,” Cole’s team says. “The government’s desire to accommodate ordinary scheduling or the pace of a grand jury is not a lawful basis to continue the hearing for which it has had more than three weeks to prepare.”

Cole, 30, of Woodbridge, was arrested and charged in the District of Columbia earlier this month with transporting an explosive device in interstate commerce with the intent to kill, injure, or intimidate any individual or unlawfully to damage or destroy any building, vehicle, or other real or personal property. He was also charged with attempted malicious destruction by means of fire and explosive materials.

According to federal prosecutors, Cole drove his Nissan Sentra to Washington, D.C., by himself on Jan. 5, 2021, to plant at least two pipe bombs downtown “in the immediate vicinity” of the RNC and DNC headquarters. The improvised explosive devices had 60-minute timers, but failed to detonate. Cole allegedly said he planted them at night “because he did not want to kill people,” according to the DOJ.

Federal prosecutors say Cole learned how to make the bombs by playing video games. He allegedly admitted that he is a Trump supporter but does not like “either party” and wanted to go after the RNC and DNC because he was sick of election deniers being called “conspiracy theorists” and other “bad” things.

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The AI Arms Race Is Cracking Open The Nuclear Fuel Cycle

  • The abstract “cloud” of artificial intelligence possesses a massive, structural demand for 24/7 “baseload” power that is equivalent to adding Germany’s entire power grid by 2026, a need intermittent renewables cannot meet.
  • Decades of underinvestment have resulted in a widening uranium supply deficit, with mined uranium expected to meet less than 75% of future reactor needs and an incentive price of $135/lb required to restart mothballed mines.
  • Big Tech hyperscalers are privatizing energy security by locking in clean baseload nuclear power via long-term agreements, effectively making the public grid’s “service” secondary to the “compute-ready” requirements of major platforms.

We are seeing a violent collision between two worlds: the high-speed, iterative world of artificial intelligence and the slow, grinding, capital-intensive world of nuclear physics. 

Data from a survey of over 600 global investors reveals that 63% now view AI electricity demand as a “structural” shift in nuclear planning. This isn’t a temporary spike or a speculative bubble. It is the physical footprint of every Large Language Model (LLM) query finally showing up on the global balance sheet.

For years, the energy narrative was dominated by “efficiency.” We were told that better chips would offset higher usage. That era is over. Generative AI doesn’t just use data; it incinerates energy to create it.

Why the “Efficiency” Narrative Failed

The “Reverse-Polish” reality of AI is that the more efficient we make the chips, the more chips we deploy, and the more complex the models become. This is Jevons Paradox playing out in real-time across the data centers of Northern Virginia and Singapore.

When you look at the energy density required for an AI hyperscale center, you aren’t looking at a traditional office building. You are looking at a facility that pulls as much power as a mid-sized city, but does so with a 99.999% uptime requirement.

Traditional demand models simply didn’t account for a single industry deciding to double its power footprint in less than five years. S&P Global Energy recently highlighted that data center electricity consumption could hit 2,200 terawatt-hours (TWh). 

Intermittent renewables…the darlings of the corporate ESG report…cannot provide the 24/7 “baseload” these machines require…

The hyperscalers have realized that if they want to dominate AI, they need to secure physical atoms before the other guy does.

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Russia ‘Confidently Advancing’ In Ukraine, Over 30 Settlements Captured In December: Putin

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made clear to both his citizens and to the world that the ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine will continue on until all goals are achieved, and that his forces are advancing ‘confidently’.

He chaired a televised meeting with the country’s top military officials, focused on a status update regarding Ukraine, and crucially coming the day after Presidents Trump and Zelensky met in Florida in a failed effort to reach breakthrough on the proposed peace deal. Moscow is pressing ahead with its goal of fully capturing and pacifying the four Ukrainian regions it declared part of the Russian Federation in fall of 2022 via a ‘popular referendum’.

“The goal of liberating the Donbas, Zaporizhia and Kherson regions is being carried out in stages, in accordance with the plan of the special military operation,” Putin described before underscoring, “The troops are confidently advancing.“

At the meeting it was also announced that Russian troops have made more gains in the last 24 hours, especially the capture of Dibrova village in Donetsk region.

According to an update of the meeting via RT translation, battlefield gains of the past month are significant:

In December, Russian forces liberated over 700 square kilometers of territory, taking some 32 settlements under control, Gerasimov said at the meeting. This month, the military has shown the highest rate of progress in the entire outgoing year, he noted, adding that troops are advancing “along virtually the entire frontline.”

“The adversary is not undertaking any active offensive actions. They have concentrated their main efforts on strengthening their defenses and are attempting to slow the pace of our advance by conducting counterattacks in isolated areas and using drones en masse,” Gerasimov said.

The Kremlin has at the same time reiterated that it is not interested in a ‘Plan B or Plan C’ in terms of a peace deal, but that it only seeks lasting political settlement. This will of course include international recognition of its territories in the Donbass.

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Arizona Ballot Measure Seeks To Roll Back Marijuana Legalization

A newly filed ballot initiative in Arizona would repeal of key provisions of the state’s voter-approved marijuana legalization law by eliminating commercial sales, while still permitting possession and personal cultivation.

The “Sensible Marijuana Policy Act for Arizona” is being spearheaded by Sean Noble, president of the political strategy firm American Encore. Paperwork to register the initiative was filed with the secretary of state’s office this month.

This year has seen a series of attempts to roll back adult-use legalization laws, with anti-cannabis activists in Maine recently approved for signature gathering for a similar ballot initiative and a Massachusetts campaign clearing an initial signature threshold for their version that will first put the issue to lawmakers before it potentially heads to the ballot.

The Arizona measure is distinct from those proposals in at least one significant policy area: It would not take away the rights of adults to grow up to six cannabis plants for personal use.

Also, it explicitly preserves components of the law aimed at expunging prior marijuana records.

Like the anti-cannabis proposals in other states, possession would remain lawful if voters chose to enact the initiative—and Arizona’s medical marijuana program would remain intact—but the commercial market for recreational cannabis that’s evolved since voters approved an adult-use legalization measure in 2020 would be quashed.

“For adults that want to consume cannabis, they will be able to do that,” Noble told the Arizona Daily Star.

But the GOP operative—who has worked with Republican legislators on efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and played a role opposing a failed attempt to legalize for adult use in 2016—said declining revenue and advertising rules he perceives as insufficient to deterring youth use puts the campaign at an advantage among voters.

A findings section on the latest initiative states that “the proliferation of marijuana establishments and recreational marijuana sales in this state have produced unintended consequences and negative effects relating to the public health, safety, and welfare of Arizonans, including increased marijuana use among children, environmental concerns, increased demands for water resources, public nuisances, market instability, and illicit market activities.”

“Arizona’s legal marijuana sales have declined for two consecutive years, resulting in less tax revenue for this state, while some patients have relied on recreational use of marijuana instead of utilizing the benefits of this state’s medical marijuana program,” it says.

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Did US Land Strikes On Venezuela Begin Last Week & No One Knew It?

President Trump on Friday in a radio interview disclosed something which missed the attention of the US and global media. He let slip that a large land site had been knocked out by a strike from US forces in the Caribbean – however without specifying which country was hit (whether Venezuela or perhaps Colombia).

Trump may have actually assumed the attack which he disclosed publicly for the first time was already being reported on, but it had not. He was being interviewed by John Catsimatidis, the Republican billionaire who owns the WABC radio station in New York on his The Cats & Cosby Show, and the two were talking about the Venezuela campaign. 

The United States had knocked out “a big facility” last week, Trump described somewhat vaguely, in apparent reference to a drug facility on the Latin American coast. 

“They have a big plant or a big facility where the ships come from,” Trump said, though he did not explicitly identify the exact location or even country attacked. “Two nights ago we knocked that out.”

According to the full remarks in context, the president said:

“But every time I knock out a boat, we save 25,000 American lives. It’s very simple. And what’s happening is they’re having a hard time employment-wise, they can’t get anybody.

And we just talked out, I don’t know if you read or you saw, they [Venezuela] have a big plant or a big facility where the ships come from. Two nights ago, we knocked that out. So we hit them very hard. But drugs are down over 97 percent. Can you believe it?”

Some unnamed American officials suggested to the New York Times that the Commander-in-Chief was referring to a drug facility in Venezuela: 

Trump did not name the location of the facility, though American officials told the New York Times that the president was referring to a drug facility in Venezuela that was eliminated. The president’s comment is the only report of such an attack. No other Latin American government, including Venezuela, has disclosed a strike of this sort.

But information or confirmation other than that disclosure remains a mystery, as neither the CIA nor Pentagon have commented, as the NY Times notes:

If Mr. Trump’s suggestion that the United States had struck a site in the region proves accurate, it would be the first known attack on land since he began his military campaign against Venezuela. U.S. officials declined to specify anything about the site the president said was hit, where it was located, how the attack was carried out or what role the facility played in drug trafficking. There has been no public report of an attack from the Venezuelan government or any other authorities in the region.

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Kremlin claims Ukraine ‘attacks Putin’s residence’ – shortly after Trump hailed progress in peace talks

The Kremlin has claimed that Ukraine attempted to attack Vladimir Putin‘s residence in a long-range drone attack hours after Donald Trump hailed progress in peace talks.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov ​said on ​Monday ​that ⁠Kyiv had attempted ​to ‍attack President ​Putin’s remote retreat in ‍the ‍Novgorod region and so ⁠Moscow‘s negotiating position ⁠would change, Interfax reported.

‘Such reckless actions will not ⁠go unanswered,’ Lavrov was quoted as saying, adding that the attack involved 91 long-range drones. 

Zelensky has denied the claims, calling them ‘lies’. 

It was ⁠not immediately clear if Putin was in the residence at the time. ‍

The attempted attack comes as the warring countries edge closer to signing a peace deal after almost four years of conflict. 

Trump on Sunday celebrated the success of his highly anticipated peace talks with Zelensky, revealing they are ‘very close’ to striking an agreement on all but ‘one or two thorny issues’.

The President had earlier welcomed the Ukrainian leader to his Mar-a-Lago estate with open arms when he arrived in Florida to discuss a 20-point plan aimed at ending the war with Russia.

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Zelensky Wants 50-Year(!) Security Guarantee From Trump

There were no substantial breakthroughs in the latest Trump-Zelensky talks on Ukraine peace at Mar-a-Lago resort on Sunday, and fresh reporting on Monday reveals why.

A major point of disagreement remains security guarantees. Ukraine has been pushing maximalist demands for something akin to NATO Article 5 protections. It would be like getting all the benefits of being in NATO but without being a formal member of the Western military alliance.

The Ukrainian side has revealed that President Trump had offered security guarantees for 15 years following a peaceful settlement, but Zelensky considered this much too short to protect from future potential Russian aggression.

But in classic Zelensky fashion, he wants way more than this. Also, maximalist demands are something that European leaders have backed him on all along – and they may have even put him up to. According to The Wall Street Journal:

Kyiv had asked for security guarantees to last up to 50 years after the end of the conflict during weekend discussions. In the documents currently being discussed, the U.S. offered a 15-year guarantee with the possibility of extension, Zelensky said in audio messages to journalists on Monday.

That’s half a century! Would Congress and the American public sign off on this? Congressional hawks like Lindsey Graham surely would, but others might not want to be hitched to the Ukraine wagon for yet decades more to come.

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Iranian President Says His Regime in a ‘Full-Fledged’ War With America and Its Allies

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Saturday that Iran is engaged in what he described as a “full-fledged war” with the America and its allies.

Speaking in an interview published on a website affiliated with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Pezeshkian said Western powers are attempting to prevent Iran from becoming economically and politically self-sufficient.

“In my opinion, we are in a full-fledged war with America, Israel, and Europe,” Pezeshkian said. “They do not want our country to stand on its feet.”

“This war is worse than Iraq’s war against us,” he said, referring to the conflict between the two nations that ended in 1988.

”If one understands it well, this war is far more complex and difficult than that war,” he added.

The remarks come as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to travel to Washington for meetings with Trump focused on Iran.

Trump ordered strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites in June, a move that escalated a nearly two-week armed conflict between Iran and Israel, later referred to as the “12 Day War.”

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Could Republicans Gain a U.S. House Seat Because of Texas Democrat Fraud?

Historically, South Texas has been shaped by entrenched political machines, most notably the one built by Lyndon B. Johnson, who advanced by aligning with local Democrat bosses, leveraging federal patronage, and mobilizing Mexican American voters through New Deal–era programs. 

The region became a Democrat stronghold defined by infrastructure spending and centralized political control, with county officials often acting as power brokers rather than neutral administrators. 

That system was epitomized by George B. Parr, the Duval County boss who delivered Johnson his first major electoral victories and demonstrated how county-level authority could shape statewide outcomes. 

The legacy of that model continues to influence South Texas politics, particularly when modern election disputes arise from the same institutional culture.

In fact, every major failure in American election administration begins long before voters submit ballots. Collapse starts when officials charged with enforcing election law treat statutory requirements as discretionary rather than mandatory.

Once that shift occurs, the legal framework designed to safeguard transparency and the republic itself ceases to function as law. Instead, it becomes a set of procedures that can be delayed, reinterpreted, or quietly ignored.

President Donald Trump’s pardon of Democrat Rep. Henry Cuellar and his wife addressed a politically motivated Biden Justice Department prosecution. 

Separately, an unresolved issue remains in South Texas: a congressional election marked by statutory violations, conflicting directives, and institutional resistance that prevented a full accounting of what occurred in Texas’s 28th Congressional District.

Texas’s 28th District occupies an unusually sensitive position along the southern border. Centered on Laredo, the district encompasses Port Laredo, which processes roughly 45% of all U.S.–Mexico trade and oversees more than 260 miles of the U.S.–Mexico border. 

Political behavior in the region has shifted rapidly in recent election cycles, mainly driven by dissatisfaction with border enforcement and illegal immigration under the Biden administration.

In 2020, President Trump lost the district by five points. In 2024, he carried the same district by approximately seven points. 

This shift occurred despite post-2020 redistricting changes expected to benefit Democrats. Under the new lines, Trump’s 2020 performance would have translated into a loss of roughly seven points.

Over four years, the district moved approximately fourteen points toward the Republican presidential nominee.

Despite that result, on the same ballots and using the same voting machines, Rep. Cuellar defeated Republican challenger Jay Furman by approximately five points. A twelve-point divergence between the top of the ticket and a long-serving incumbent does not, on its own, prove misconduct. Voters are free to split their ballots.

However, ticket-splitting in modern federal elections is extremely rare. In 2024, only 16 congressional districts nationwide split their presidential and House results. 

Election law exists precisely to examine outcomes that depart sharply from prevailing voting patterns. In this case, that examination never entirely occurred.

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