Tag: journalists

Ilhan Omar Rages at Reporter Who Confronted Her About Financial Disclosure: ‘You’re Stupid’

Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota brushed aside a journalist who asked her to explain how Omar’s net worth on reporting forms could shrink.

Last week, Congressional disclosures reviewed by the Wall Street Journal put Omar’s wealth at somewhere between $18,000 and $95,000. Previous filings put her wealth between $6 million and $30 million, Fox News reported.

Omar’s office has said accounting errors were responsible for the initial estimates, but has never explained them in detail.

A Lindell TV reporter tried to break through the stone wall of vague deflections, but was turned aside. The conversation began with Omar insisting she stood by a past denigration of the reporter, according to a video posted to X.

“I said I absolutely think you’re stupid for asking me anything,” Omar said.

When offered a chance to explain how her wealth could shrink once it became a lightning rod for criticism, she refused.

“I have explained to the American people,” she said, adding, “I have given them the explanation.”

The reporter tried again to get a response. She did.

“I don’t want to tell you jack s***,” Omar said in closing.

“How about that?” Omar said, ending the conversation by telling the journalist, “Have a good day.”

Certified Public Accountant Dan Geltrude, who founded Geltrude & Company in 1995, said Omar cannot shift blame onto others, according to Alpha News.

“Let’s call this for what it is: When a congressperson has to file these financial disclosure forms, they are signing them and by signing them, what are they saying? They are true, complete, and accurate to the best of their knowledge,” Geltrude said.

“So are you telling me that she didn’t notice that her net worth went from 100,000 to 30 million? Don’t blame the accountant. You can’t say you don’t know. Your signature on that form holds you legally accountable,” he said.

“The accountant did not make these numbers up. These numbers were provided in some form for the accountant to prepare the forms,” Geltrude said.

“But again, I go back to she is responsible. So what it tells me is either she misled in some way, or she simply didn’t review the forms. Either way, there is no excuse here … None.”

How the change came about could still be revealed as House Republicans investigate, Fox News wrote.

“Ilhan Omar is even more clueless than I thought if she thinks this financial disclosure revision clears her of suspicion,” Republican Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota said.

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Family of ‘suicided’ reporter who exposed Clinton in 2016 comes forward with disturbing inside info

Strange details have come to light regarding the death of an Alabama news anchor from his family members.

In 2016, 45-year-old Christopher Sign broke a story about former President Bill Clinton meeting on a tarmac in Phoenix, Arizona, with then-Obama administration Attorney General Loretta Lynch at a time when Clinton’s wife, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, was under intense scrutiny for her use of a private email server while leading the State Department.

When the conversation was made public, Lynch said she would take the advice of prosecutors and the FBI concerning charging Clinton.

Although the president and the attorney general insisted the tarmac meeting was just a normal meeting, it appeared Sign had stumbled upon the former president trying to use his political clout to help his wife avoid justice.

The anchor said the backlash was immediate with death threats coming his way. Sign published his work in 2020, “Secret on the Tarmac,” while insisting he was not suicidal. Oddly enough, he was found hanged in his Hoover, Alabama, home on June 12, 2021, by his wife and oldest son.

The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office deemed it a suicide, as Sign had taken his life with a dog leash and his feet were touching the floor. The reporter was by no means a small man, at 6’1 and 215 pounds, playing lineman during his time at the University of Alabama.

Bill Naugher, who helped publish Sign’s book, was suspicious.

“None of it makes any sense,” he said. “It’s very fishy. I don’t know what to think but I know nothing in this story adds up.”

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California’s “Stop Nick Shirley Act” Would Penalize Journalism

California’s Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee voted 11-2 on April 7 to advance a bill that would let employees and volunteers at immigration service organizations demand the deletion of their images and personal information from the internet, backed by civil penalties starting at $4,000 and the threat of criminal charges.

AB 2624, authored by Assemblywoman Mia Bonta, is already being called the “Stop Nick Shirley Act.”

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

The bill arrives just weeks after investigative video creator Nick Shirley published a 40-minute video on alleged hospice fraud in California that racked up 42 million views on X.

Other investigations have found that a single program is causing the state to lose an alleged $6 billion in fraud annually. Shirley had already reported on over $110 million in Somali daycare fraud in Minnesota in December 2025, with empty facilities billing taxpayers while kids were nowhere to be found.

His California reporting uncovered an alleged $170 million in similar fraud in daycares and hospices, with ghost operations registered to empty lots and strip malls. Sacramento’s response to this flood of documented waste and abuse was not an audit, not an investigation into the programs themselves, but a bill to make it harder to film the people running them.

Under AB 2624, anyone affiliated with an organization providing “designated immigration support services” can send a written demand prohibiting the publication of their personal information or image online.

That demand remains effective for four years, even after the person leaves the organization. If the demand is ignored, the person can go to court for an injunction or declaratory relief.

Fines run up to three times the actual damages, with a floor of $4,000, meaning the minimum penalty triples to $12,000 in cases where a takedown demand is defied. If a journalist or anyone else is accused of posting information with the intent to incite harm, they face criminal charges and fines of $10,000.

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Harmeet Dhillon: DOJ ‘Will Explore Possibility of Federal Charges’ in Brutal Assault on TPUSA Journalist Savanah Hernandez

As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, conservative journalist and TPUSA Frontlines reporter Savanah Hernandez was viciously assaulted by a deranged far-left anti-ICE mob outside the Whipple ICE Facility in Minneapolis on Saturday during their unhinged “National F*ck ICE Day” meltdown.

United States Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Harmeet Dhillon, appeared on Newsmax and told host Carl Higbie that the DOJ will explore the possibility of federal charges in the attack on Hernandez.

Carl Higbie: United States Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Harmeet Dhillon. Great to have you back on, ma’am. This is incredible that we’re actually having to have this conversation.

AAG Dhillon: Yeah, I mean, it’s all too familiar for me. I’ve been fighting for journalists under this kind of attack for, you know, close to a decade now, representing journalist Andy Ngo several years ago in an Antifa attack in Portland, Oregon. And since then, we’ve seen countless incidents like this.

And, you know, very concerning what happened to this young lady, this reporter, and I’ve been in touch with her team. And, you know, we have an open investigation, so I can’t get into any details.

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What are They Hiding? — Radical California Democrats Pass ‘Stop Nick Shirley Act’ to Criminalize Investigative Journalism and Shield Massive Immigrant Services Fraud from Scrutiny

The radical Left in Sacramento has finally done it.

In a move straight out of a totalitarian playbook, the California Assembly Judiciary Committee voted 11-2 on Monday to advance AB 2624, the so-called “Stop Nick Shirley Act,” a disgusting Democrat power grab designed to make it illegal for brave citizen journalists like Nick Shirley to expose the rampant fraud bleeding American taxpayers dry in immigrant service centers.

This is nothing less than an all-out assault on the First Amendment by the radical left in the People’s Republic of California.

The bill, authored by far-left Assemblywoman Mia Bonta (wife of Attorney General Rob Bonta), would slap investigative reporters with massive civil sanctions starting at $4,000 minimum if a fraudster from one of these “immigrant service centers” decides they don’t want to be caught on camera committing their scams.

The crook can then run to court for an injunction banning the journalist from filming or exposing them on camera for up to four years.

And if the journalist refuses to take down the original video? Triple the damages, $12,000, just for telling the truth!

In the worst cases, if the journalist is accused of “doxxing” or creating an “imminent threat” by simply reporting the facts, they could face criminal charges and $10,000 fines.

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Journalist Who First Broke Missing Airman Scoop Steps Forward After Trump’s Jail Threat — Vows to ‘Protect Sources’

The identity of the journalist who first broke the sensitive story about a missing American airman has now been revealed.

An Israeli journalist has come out and admitted to being the first to drop the bombshell details on the second missing U.S. airman in Iran, the New York Post reported.

The Gateway Pundit previously reported on President Trump’s explosive White House comments slamming “somebody” for leaking sensitive details about the missing fighter pilot.

Trump made it crystal clear that reckless disclosure put hundreds of U.S. troops, including elite SEAL Team 6 operators, in mortal danger during the high-stakes rescue deep inside hostile Iranian territory.

The rescue of both airmen was nothing short of an Easter miracle. One pilot was recovered quickly.

The second, the weapons systems officer, evaded Iranian forces for days, surviving intense firefights before being extracted in a daring operation that showcased the unmatched bravery of America’s warfighters.

“As you probably know, we didn’t talk about the first one for an hour, and then somebody leaked something, which we’ll hopefully find that leaker; we’re looking very hard to find that leaker, and talked about there’s somebody missing,” Trump said to reporters on Monday.

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Trump Threatens to Jail Journalists Who Received Leak About US Pilot Downed in Iran

President Donald Trump vowed Monday to find the “leaker” who disclosed that US forces could not locate the second pilot stranded in Iran after their F-15 fighter jet was shot down, threatening to jail unnamed journalists who received the information if they do not reveal its source.

Trump claimed that Iranian authorities did not know that a second pilot of the downed two-seat warplane was missing until after the news report, which made the US rescue mission “much more difficult.”

“We’re looking very hard to find that leaker,” Trump said. “We think we’ll be able to find it out because we’re going to go to the media company that released it and we’re going to say: ‘National security – give it up or go to jail.’”

“The country, Iran, put out a major notice… offering a very big award for anybody that captures the pilot,” Trump continued. “We have to find that leaker, because that’s a sick person. Probably didn’t realize the extent of how bad it was.”

“We’re going to find out,” he added. “It’s national security, and the person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say.”

While the president did not say which “media company” he was talking about, the first widely cited reporting about the missing second pilot was broadcast Friday by CNN, CBS News, and The New York Times.

Israel journalist Amit Segal – who has close high-level links to the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – claimed Monday on his Telegram channel that he was the first to publish information on the second pilot.

“We are about to see Trump’s promise to find and imprison whoever leaked the info about the second pilot vanish into the ether,” US investigative journalist Ryan Grim said on social media Monday in response to Segal’s post.

Both pilots were successfully rescued. Some critics mocked Trump for presuming that Iranians would not know that the two-seat F-15 is crewed by multiple pilots.

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Israel kills three journalists in south Lebanon after strike on press vehicle

The Israeli army killed veteran Al-Manar correspondent Ali Shoeib, Al-Mayadeen journalist Fatima Ftouni, and her brother, photojournalist Mohammad Ftouni, during a double-tap drone strike on a press vehicle in southern Lebanon on 28 March.

The Israeli attack wiped out the entire media team traveling together to deliver coverage of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon’s south. Media officials confirmed the team was inside a clearly marked “PRESS” vehicle when it was bombed.

Images show the car was moving along a forested road in the town of Jezzine with very little traffic due to the forced displacement of residents, confirming a deliberate targeted strike.

The area was then targeted again with a second strike after people attempted to provide aid. The Israeli military broadcast video of the attack, claiming that Shoeib was a “terrorist in the intelligence unit of Hezbollah’s Radwan Force.”

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SCOTUS Rejects Citizen Journalist’s Case Against Officials Who Arrested Her for Asking Police Questions

Priscilla Villarreal built a following in the way modern news often grows now. Not through printing presses or broadcast towers, but through a Facebook page that drew more than 200,000 people into its orbit.

In Laredo, Texas, under the name La Gordiloca, she reported quickly, conversationally, sometimes uncomfortably close to the raw edge of events.

In 2017, she texted a police officer to confirm the identities of two victims, one from a suicide, one from a car accident. She received answers. She published them.

Months later, she was arrested.

The law used against her had been sitting unused for 23 years. It makes it a felony to solicit nonpublic information from a government official “with intent to obtain a benefit.”

In Villarreal’s case, authorities argued that the benefit was popularity, more followers, more attention, more reach.

In other words, doing well at the job became the job’s alleged crime.

A state judge dismissed the charges, finding the statute too vague to stand. That might have sounded like a resolution, the system correcting itself in the end.

Instead, it became the beginning of a second act.

Villarreal filed a civil rights lawsuit against the officials involved in her arrest. The response was immediate and familiar within legal circles: “Qualified immunity.”

The doctrine protects government officials from liability unless there is already a court decision declaring nearly identical conduct unconstitutional.

No case had ever addressed the idea of arresting a journalist for asking a question over text.

A three-judge panel initially sided with Villarreal, stating, “If the First Amendment means anything, it surely means that a citizen journalist has the right to ask a public official a question, without fear of being imprisoned. Yet that is exactly what happened here: Priscilla Villarreal was put in jail for asking a police officer a question. If that is not an obvious violation of the Constitution, it’s hard to imagine what would be.”

The clarity of that statement did not last.

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Pentagon Wants It to Be Illegal for Reporters to Ask “Unauthorized” Questions

A judge last week struck down the Pentagon’s restrictions on journalists seeking “unauthorized” information, siding with the New York Times in its lawsuit against the government. In response, the Pentagon on Monday added some meaningless window dressing and essentially reissued the same restrictions. The administration pledged to “immediately” appeal the decision on the original policy, and on Tuesday, the Times filed a motion to compel the administration to comply with the judge’s order. 

As alarming as the Pentagon’s antics are, the Times’ lawsuit is not the only case about whether reporters have the right to ask questions. It’s not even the only one in the news this week. 

In 2017, police in Laredo, Texas, arrested citizen journalist Patricia Villarreal under an obscure and never previously used law making it a felony to ask government employees for nonpublic information for personal benefit. Her supposed crime was asking a police officer about two local tragedies — a suicide and a deadly car wreck.

Her arrest was widely ridiculed, and a judge quickly threw out the charges. When Villarreal sued over her arrest and mistreatment by officers, the legal question wasn’t whether the charges against her were permissible but whether they were so obviously bogus that she could overcome qualified immunity, the unjust and expansive legal shield that protects government employees from liability for all but the most blatant violations. That issue went to the Supreme Court twice, but on Monday, the Court declined to review a federal appellate court’s ruling that the officers were shielded from liability. 

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