Tag: corruption

AOC email seeks donations for turkey giveaway — but money goes straight to her campaign coffers

This fundraiser is for the birds.

Power-hungry “Squad” member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) cooked up a new way to have her cake and eat it too this Thanksgiving – by tying her annual turkey giveaway to her massive reelection campaign enterprise. And critics are crying fowl.

“Thanksgiving is two weeks away,” the self-described “Bronx girl” wrote in an email pitch last week. “Will you chip in $5 or anything you can today to help us bring the joy of the holiday season into homes around NYC this year?”

But clicking on the contribution link sends people directly to a campaign fundraising page operated by ActBlue, where donors are prompted to make a one-time or recurring monthly donation.

Selecting a dollar amount brings a disclosure that the appeal is “paid for by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for Congress” and a reminder that donations are not deductible as charitable contributions at tax time.

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EPA Greenlights Second ‘Forever Chemical’ Pesticide in Two Weeks

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved the highly persistent pesticide isocycloseram on Thursday for golf courses, lawns and food crops such as oranges, tomatoes, almonds, peas and oats.

The pesticide is a “forever chemical” — one of a group called PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances.

Today’s announcement marks the second approval of a PFAS pesticide since President Donald Trump took office, with the first approval coming just two weeks before. The administration plans to approve three more PFAS pesticides in the coming year.

“To approve more PFAS pesticides amid the growing awareness of the serious, long-term dangers from these forever chemicals is absurdly shortsighted,” said Nathan Donley, environmental health science director at the Center for Biological Diversity.

“The undeniable reality is that the Trump administration is knowingly putting the nation’s children at greater risk of developing serious reproductive and liver harms for generations to come.”

Isocycloseram is classified as moderately persistent to persistent and is known to transform into 40 smaller PFAS chemicals, some of which are much more highly persistent.

Among the most concerning harms from isocycloseram is reduced testicle size, lower sperm count and liver toxicity.

While the agency found that people would not be exposed to enough isocycloseram in their diet to cause these harms, it opted not to implement a child-safety buffer to account for the fact that children are more sensitive to chemical pollutants than adults.

If that safety buffer were included, as it is with some other pesticides, young children would have been found to be at high risk of those effects from dietary exposure.

“For all of the rhetoric about caring about children’s health and well-being, this administration is quick to throw them under the bus whenever it suits their polluting benefactors,” said Donley.

“Instead of erring on the side of safety, we get a quick, reckless approval of a new forever chemical without any real thought given to its serious harms.”

Isocycloseram is also highly toxic to bees and other pollinators, with the EPA finding that vital pollinators could be exposed to 1,500 times the lethal level of the pesticide just by collecting nectar and pollen near treated fields.

One out of every three bites of food we eat — and nearly all nutrient-dense foods like fruits and vegetables — come from plants that need to be pollinated by bees and other pollinating animals.

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Court Filings Allege Meta Downplayed Risks to Children and Misled the Public

Sex trafficking on Meta platforms was both difficult to report and widely tolerated, according to a court filing unsealed Friday. In a plaintiffs’ brief filed as part of a major lawsuit against four social media companies, Instagram’s former head of safety and well-being Vaishnavi Jayakumar testified that when she joined Meta in 2020 she was shocked to learn that the company had a “17x” strike policy for accounts that reportedly engaged in the “trafficking of humans for sex.” 

“You could incur 16 violations for prostitution and sexual solicitation, and upon the 17th violation, your account would be suspended,” Jayakumar reportedly testified, adding that “by any measure across the industry, [it was] a very, very high strike threshold.” The plaintiffs claim that this testimony is corroborated by internal company documentation.

The brief, filed by plaintiffs in the Northern District of California, alleges that Meta was aware of serious harms on its platform and engaged in a broad pattern of deceit to downplay risks to young users. According to the brief, Meta was aware that millions of adult strangers were contacting minors on its sites; that its products exacerbated mental health issues in teens; and that content related to eating disorders, suicide, and child sexual abuse was frequently detected, yet rarely removed. According to the brief, the company failed to disclose these harms to the public or to Congress, and refused to implement safety fixes that could have protected young users.  

“Meta has designed social media products and platforms that it is aware are addictive to kids, and they’re aware that those addictions lead to a whole host of serious mental health issues,” says Previn Warren, the co-lead attorney for the plaintiffs in the case. “Like tobacco, this is a situation where there are dangerous products that were marketed to kids,” Warren adds. “They did it anyway, because more usage meant more profits for the company.” 

The following allegations against Meta come from the brief filed in an unprecedented multidistrict litigation. More than 1,800 plaintiffs—including children and parents, school districts, and state attorneys general—have joined together in a suit alleging that the parent companies behind Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, and YouTube “relentlessly pursued a strategy of growth at all costs, recklessly ignoring the impact of their products on children’s mental and physical health,” according to their master complaint. The newly unsealed allegations about Meta are just one small part of the sprawling suit. 

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An Intriguing Detail Emerges that Likely Explains the Exact Date Marjorie Taylor Greene has Chosen to Officially Resign from Congress

A fascinating detail has come into focus that almost certainly explains the exact timing of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s resignation from Congress and raises questions about her true motivations for quitting.

As The Gateway Pundit’s Cassandra Macdonald reported, MTG declared in a stunning Friday night announcement that she is resigning from Congress effective January 5, 2026.

MTG posted a nearly 11-minute video and a four-page signed resignation letter to X, confirming the end of her five-year tenure representing Georgia’s 14th District.

The dramatic exit comes after Greene repeatedly demanded the immediate public release of the Jeffrey Epstein client list and files, which led to her being scolded and unendorsed by President Donald Trump in a series of posts to Truth Social.

“I’m going back to the people I love, to live life to the fullest as I always have, and look forward to a new path ahead. I will be resigning from office with my last day being January 5, 2026,” she said.

Following the news of MTG’s announcement, several Capitol Hill reporters noted that she timed her announcement JUST IN TIME for her to receive her federal pension.

Was it really just all about the money?

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Brazil’s ex-president Bolsonaro detained by police

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who had been under house arrest in the country’s capital, Brasilia, has been detained by police officers, his lawyer has confirmed.

In September, the Brazilian Supreme Court sentenced Bolsonaro to 27 years in prison after he was found guilty of attempting to overturn the results of the country’s 2022 presidential election. The 70-year-old, who denies any wrongdoing, had been under house arrest since early August, appealing the ruling.

Bolsonaro’s attorney Celso Vilardi did not provide the reason for his client’s detention, but it happened shortly before the former president’s supporters had planned to hold a vigil near his home.

According to Reuters, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered Bolsonaro to be taken into custody, citing the risk of the activists hampering the police monitoring of his house arrest. The judge also pointed to evidence of tampering with the politician’s ankle monitor the night before, the agency said.

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REVEALED: Chicago Man who Set Woman Ablaze on Chicago Train Had 72 Prior Arrests, Prosecutors Say – Not 49 as Previously Reported 

More details on the suspect who doused a woman in gasoline and lit her on fire on a Chicago train have emerged, revealing that he had been arrested at least 72 times over the past 32 years. 

During a court hearing on Friday, a prosecutor told the judge that Lawrence Reed, 50, had been arrested 72 times, according to the Chicago Sun Times.

The Gateway Pundit reported on the incident, as preliminary evidence showed he had only been arrested 49 times in the past. Reed now faces federal terrorism charges for the horrifying crime.

He was even released back into the streets following his last arrest in August after a Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney warned Cook County Judge Teresa Molina-Gonzalez that Reed had a lengthy criminal history and that his next crime would “likely be violent.”

But Molina-Gonzalez told the prosecutor, “I can’t keep everybody in jail because the State’s Attorney wants me to.”

Fox’s Mike Tobin reported on Friday that “Reed will be once again before the judge today, this time to determine if he will be held behind bars before he goes to trial.”

“On Monday, he was out walking the streets, despite a pending case for allegedly knocking a woman out— able to ride the L train, where a woman was set on fire,” Tobin said.

“The criminal complaint against Reed says he went to a gas station, filled a plastic bottle with gasoline… 20 minutes later, he was on the Blue Line train, dumped the gasoline on the woman’s head. She ran, but he chased her down with the flaming remnants of the bottle and set her on fire.”

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Trump Stands by Huckabee After Unannounced Pollard Meeting

n 1987, Jonathan Pollard was sentenced to life in prison for selling national secrets to Israel. Last July, nearly a decade after his parole, the disgraced former Naval intelligence analyst met with U.S. Ambassador to Mike Huckabee at the United States Embassy in Jerusalem.

The meeting was his first with U.S. officials since his release and immigration to Israel. A break with precedent, the move by Huckabee, even all these years after the crime, still alarmed intelligence officials.

The Trump administration was left in the dark. “The White House was not aware of that meeting,” Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told RealClearPolitics. It was reportedly left off the public schedule of the ambassador. And yet, the administration still condoned the actions of the U.S. envoy to Israel.  

“The president stands by our ambassador, Mike Huckabee,” Leavitt added, “and all that he’s doing for the United States and Israel.”

The case sent shockwaves through both Washington and Tel Aviv at the time of the conviction. The rare spy who offered his services to an ally, Pollard pled guilty, confessing to selling thousands of pages of secret documents to the Israelis for cash, vacations to Europe, and promised future payments to be wired to a Swiss bank account. A federal judge dismissed pleas for mercy even after Pollard’s cooperation led to the indictment of an Israeli air force officer.

The episode came at the height of the Cold War when the CIA was on the lookout for Soviet, not Israeli, spies. The press had dubbed 1985 the “Year of the Spy” as President Ronald Reagan vowed to combat espionage wherever it might fester. “We’ve added resources, people, and top-level attention to this task,” Reagan said during a November radio address that year. “We will not hesitate to root out and prosecute the spies of any nation.”

The FBI nabbed Pollard two years later outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., during a failed attempt to gain asylum.

Pollard was released from prison in 2015 during the Obama administration. After his parole restrictions expired in December of 2020, at the tail end of the first Trump administration, the former spy emigrated to Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu greeted him on the tarmac, telling Pollard “You’re home.”

The private jet that flew him there was reportedly owned by the late casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, a Republican megadonor who was a benefactor of both Netanyahu and Trump.

Pollard has no regrets for his actions. He told the New York Times, who first broke the news of his meeting with Huckabee, that it was necessary because the U.S. had cut Israel out of intelligence sharing. During that interview, the former spy, who was granted Israeli citizenship while incarcerated, reportedly called Trump a “madman who has literally sold us down the drain for Saudi gold.”

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Congresswoman Faces Expulsion After Indictment for Stealing FEMA Funds, Filing False Tax Return

Far-left Democratic Representative Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick might soon be expelled from Congress if House Republicans get their way.

The reason: A federal grand jury has indicted her and other defendants, including her brother, for purloining $5 million from the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) and using it for contributions to her 2021 congressional campaign.

The indictment isn’t Cherfilus-McCormick’s first brush with federal law. In April, she was the target of a complaint to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) for myriad shenanigans with campaign funds and contributions.

The indictment and the FEC complaint are cited in the expulsion resolution from GOP Representative Greg Steube, also of Florida.

The DOJ Indictment

The Justice Department’s (DOJ) summary of the indictment explains that Cherfilus-McCormick, 46, and her brother, Edwin, 51, “worked through their family health-care company on a FEMA-funded COVID-19 vaccination staffing contract in 2021. In July 2021, the company received an overpayment of $5 million in FEMA funds.”

The defendants conspired to steal the money, then attempted to disguise the sources by routing the funds through “multiple accounts,” DOJ alleges:

Prosecutors allege that a substantial portion of the misappropriated funds was used as candidate contributions to Cherfilus-McCormick’s 2021 congressional campaign and for the personal benefit of the defendants.

The indictment also claims that Cherfilus-McCormick and another conspirator, Nadege Leblanc, 46, “arranged additional contributions using straw donors” from that contract. That went to “friends and relatives who then donated to the campaign as if using their own money.”

Also involved in the scheme, prosecutors allege, was Cherfilus-McCormick’s tax preparer, David K. Spencer, 41, who helped the congresswoman file a false return in 2021. The pair “falsely claimed political spending and other personal expenses as business deductions and inflated charitable contributions in order to reduce her tax obligations,” DOJ alleges.

Cherfilus-McCormick could go to prison for half a century, while big brother Cherfilus faces up to 35 years. Spencer and Leblanc face 33 years and 10 years, respectively.

Said U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi:

Using disaster relief funds for self-enrichment is a particularly selfish, cynical crime. No one is above the law, least of all powerful people who rob taxpayers for personal gain. We will follow the facts in this case and deliver justice.

“This is an unjust, baseless, sham indictment — and I am innocent. The timing alone is curious and clearly meant to distract from far more pressing national issues,” Cherfilus-McCormick claimed.

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Some evidence appears to be missing in Charlie Kirk murder case: Report

Apublic records request with the Washington County Sheriff’s Office found that video footage of alleged Charlie Kirk assassin Tyler Robinson turning himself in no longer exists, a Utah news outlet reported Wednesday. 

Kirk, who is remembered for his staunch Christian faith and for founding the conservative grassroots organization Turning Point USA, was assassinated at a rally in Utah in September. Robinson has been charged with aggravated murder, two counts of obstruction of justice, witness tampering and commission of a violent offense in the presence of a child for Kirk’s death.

Washington County Sheriff Nate Brooksby told KUTV 2 News that Robinson was taken to his office days after the shooting, where he was greeted by two plainclothes detectives. But a public records request found that video showing Robinson entering the Washington County Jail and holding area no longer exists. 

“We do not have any records responsive to this portion of the request, as Tyler Robinson did not go to or enter the jail area,” a records officer with the sheriff’s office told the outlet. 

The outlet then filed another request a few weeks later that more broadly requested footage of Robinson walking into the department, which the sheriff’s office again said it did not have. 

“Our office does not have any applicable records responsive to this request, as the surveillance footage is no longer available after the 30-day retention period,” the officer said.

When asked whether the footage was ever shared with another law enforcement agency or department, the office said, “It is my understanding it was never sent out to any agency.”

Criminal defense attorney Rudy Bautista told the outlet that the office not having the footage was “concerning.” 

“For the state of Utah, we would certainly hope that this video is available,” Bautista said. “If, in fact, it has been destroyed and not preserved, it’s very concerning. And if it has, then it’s very concerning that they’re telling you they don’t have it. If they no longer have it, I would have expected to say that this video has been provided to the Utah County law enforcement.”

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How CDC and FDA Defrauded the American Public about Serious Vaccine Harms

n a fascinating book released in September, Vaccines, Amen. The Religion of Vaccines, lawyer Aaron Siri explains how the American public was systematically misled by the very institutions they are supposed to trust. 

Via numerous lawsuits, Aaron brought many deeply buried, politically inconvenient facts to light, and he is very factual, which is uncommon for vaccine books. They are usually emotional and far too critical of vaccines, or far too positive, with little in-between, which is where the truth is.

The value of lawyers cannot be overestimated. Nothing hurts like the truth about healthcare, which is why we badly need lawyers to dig it out. When drug policy researcher Alan Cassels reviewed my 2025 book, How Merck and Drug Regulators Hid Serious Harms of the HPV Vaccines, he concluded that “If you want the real truth about drugs, don’t ask doctors – ask lawyers.”  

Another quote on my book cover is from Martin Kulldorff, the current chair of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC): “Drugs and vaccines can heal and save lives, but also harm. That puts our lives in the hands of pharmaceutical companies. Can we trust them? In this well-documented book, the clear answer is: NO.”

It is essential to understand this. We know very little about the harms of vaccines because most of the data come from substandard and flawed trials performed by drug companies, which leave out important adverse events from their publications and avoid, with virtually no exceptions, to compare their vaccines with a placebo. 

As an expert witness in a lawsuit against Merck, I read 112,452 pages of confidential study reports and uncovered multiple instances of scientific misconduct in which the drug agencies were complicit. It turned out that Gardasil, an HPV vaccine, causes serious and persistent neurological harms, which drug regulators have denied. 

Aaron explains right from the start why vaccines are sacrosanct. People never say they believe in cars but many say they believe in vaccines, without having the data needed to provide an informed opinion. I found the same when I analysed BMJ articles about Kennedy’s much-needed vaccine reforms; it was all about faith, not about science. 

Aaron has used lawsuits to demonstrate that vaccinologists have a self-reinforcing belief system whose dogmas do not stand up to scrutiny in court. His takedown of Stanley Plotkin, the “high priest” of vaccines, during a deposition is a masterpiece in exposing that the emperor has no clothes when claiming that childhood vaccines are safe and have been carefully tested. 

Plotkin was unable to understand why his earnings of hundreds of millions of dollars from royalties and his close alignment with the interests of the industry could influence his views on vaccines. He didn’t know that safety monitoring in certain trials only lasted 4-5 days after vaccination, which is way too short to capture autoimmune adverse events. Worst of all, Plotkin stated that certain vaccines don’t cause certain harms, or he stated that they were rare, without having any evidence in support of his wishful thinking. 

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