Tag: politics

Consumer Advocate: Dick Durbin, Roger Marshall Looking to Take Away Your Credit Card Rewards

Richard Hunt, the executive chairman of the Electronic Payments Coalition (EPC), said at a Breitbart News policy event last week that Sens. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Roger Marshall (R-KY) are trying to take away your credit card rewards with their credit card legislation.

Hunt explained that the EPC represents a diverse group of organizations, including credit unions, community banks, large banks, and unions. He warned that two senators, Durbin and Marshall, are moving to take away credit card rewards, which many Americans use for cashback or even to pay for travel for vacation.

Marshall and Durbin have been pushing the Credit Card Competition Act (CCCA) for years. Hunt dubbed it the “Credit Card Cancellation Act,” noting that some large retailers have backed the bill.

Advocates for the bill believe that they can inject more competition into payment processing by requiring banks to work with at least one alternative payment network besides Visa and Mastercard, the dominant players in the industry.

Under the current system, if a merchant accepts credit cards, it is “locked in” to whatever payment network that credit card runs, usually Visa or Mastercard, and thus must pay whatever the fee that payment network charges for transactions.

Durbin and Marshall believe that by passing the bill, more competition among payment networks would drive down merchants’ credit card costs, and the retailers would pass on that savings to consumers. Critics of the bill contend that it would, in addition to compromising the security of payment processing, likely kill credit card reward programs, just as previous Dodd-Frank legislation eliminated debit card rewards.

Hunt told Breitbart New Economics Editor John Carney that Americans used to receive rewards on debit cards and used to get free checking accounts. However, this ended when Durbin managed to get the Durbin Amendment included in the post-2008 financial crisis financial bill known as Dodd-Frank.

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Democrats Plan to Spend Tens of Millions of Dollars to Fund Hundreds of Content Creators

Democrats are planning to spend tens of millions of dollars to spin narratives on social media as part of a $110.5 million fundraising effort, according to images of slides from a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) donor event obtained by Breitbart News.

Under a heading “Urgent Off-Year Funding Needs” on one slide, it states the DCCC looks to raise $10 million for social media and content creation, $20 million for “Accountability work,” $15 million for “Voter Registration,” $5 million for “Recruitment” and “Primary Engagement,” and $2 million for “Research” and a “Rapid Response Infrastructure.”

One goal is to enlist at least 667 content creators, with the aim of reaching 83 million Americans and drawing 6.6 million engagements, per another slide that focuses on content creation. The program aims to engage at least 167 “Non-Political Creators” and 8 “Vetted Creators for ads in every target state.”

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House Dem Leader Hakeem Jeffries Accuses Republicans of Trying to ‘Steal’ the 2026 Midterm Elections

The 2026 midterm elections are more than a year away from now, but Democrat House Leader Hakeem Jeffries is already accusing Republicans of trying to ‘steal’ the elections because of the redistricting efforts in Texas.

Democrat controlled states like California, Illinois and New York have been gerrymandered like crazy but that is different for some reason.

What this reveals is that Democrats are really worried about their chances in the midterms.

Breitbart News reports:

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said Monday on MSNBC’s “Ana Cabrera Reports” that Republicans in Texas are attempting to steal the 2026 midterm elections with their redistricting effort.

Jeffries said, “The Texas governor is a cowardly fake bully. He was ordered by Donald Trump to convene a special session of the legislature in order to gerrymander the Texas congressional map and try to rig the midterm elections.”

He continued, “This is a cowardly move by Republicans in Texas. And I’m so appreciative of the courage, the character and the conviction being shown by Texas democrats from the legislature.”

Jeffries added, “Democrats are going to respond from coast to coast and at all points in between to this effort to steal the midterm elections.

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Texas Democrats’ Walkout Over Redistricting Endangers Hemp Ban Legislation

Texas Democratic House lawmakers are leaving the state to prevent a vote on redrawing the state’s congressional district map in Republicans’ favor—a move that could lead to a stalemate on a Senate-passed bill to ban hemp products containing any THC.

The cannabis legislation moved through the Senate on Friday and is now in the House’s court. But without a quorum, the chamber won’t be able to conduct legislative business as Democratic lawmakers flock to other states such as Illinois and New York—a strategy that’s produced mixed results in the past.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has threatened to remove those legislators from the House if they fail to show back up, and he also said members who received any financial support to leave the state could be subject to prosecution for felony bribery violations.

But in any case, time is running short in the special session the governor convened to address a series of outstanding issues, including legislation related to hemp cannabinoid products. Abbott vetoed an earlier version of the controversial ban, and he recently outlined what he’d like to see in a revised version of the bill.

The special session started on July 21. Under the state constitution, special sessions cannot last longer than 30 days, meaning a quorum would need to be reestablished before August 20 if any bills are to move. Of course, nothing prevents the governor from calling another special session once that deadline passes.

“The path forward for legislation during this special session is unclear, including whether or not a THC ban could advance,” Heather Fazio, director of the advocacy group Texas Cannabis Policy Center, told Marijuana Moment on Monday.

“The status quo is certainly better than THC being banned outright, but we hope the legislature can sort through their differences and find a way to pass common sense regulations that restrict youth access, at minimum,” she said. “We are continuing our advocacy and working with those remain in the building to ensure they understand, the issue can make good decisions when the time comes. That could be later during this first special session or during the next one.”

Austin Zamhariri, executive director of Texas Cannabis Collective (TCC) said that “Texans have been fighting a total hemp consumable ban since it was announced by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) in December of last year.”

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Woke Gestapo Target ‘Registered Republican’ Sydney Sweeney for Thoughtcrime

The Woke Gestapo in the far-left entertainment media are targeting Sydney Sweeney for a career blacklisting.

So far, Sweeney’s committed two cardinal sins. The first is daring to be sexy and appealing in an American Eagle blue jeans ad. You see, Sweeney had the temerity to be normal-beautiful, not fat/trans/tattooed “beautiful.”

After five years of Normal People being grossed out by an “inclusive standard of beauty” and “body positivity” — which is nothing more than an affirmative action program that allows ugly people to appear in Swimsuit Editions and underwear ads — Sweeney dared to be her sensual, appealing, all-American self in a campaign that even included her own Ford Mustang.

The campaign was a massive success (duh), the blue jeans sold out (duh), and then the left did what it always does in the face of Normal succeeding: they freaked out and screamed “Nazi”. And no, it wasn’t just nobodies on TikTok melting down. Disney staffers at ESPN declared the ad “fascist.” MSNBC said it was “fair” to attack the ad as “Nazi propaganda.”

American Eagle, to its great credit, appears to understand that social media is not real life. Obviously, the ad is a rousing success. Obviously, Normal People appreciate this return to Normalcy. Obviously, though this ad, American Eagle has earned the goodwill of a vast majority of the people who long ago tired of staring at fat women in bikinis… So American Eagle has already told the Woke Gestapo to suck it.

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Gov Abbott Says He Will REMOVE FROM OFFICE Democrat Lawmakers Who Fled Texas to Block GOP Congressional Redistricting

Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) threatened to remove from office Democrat lawmakers who fled to Illinois to block GOP Congressional redistricting.

Texas Democrats fled the state to block the Republicans in the legislature from holding a special session and to block a redistricting vote on Sunday.

The Texas Democrats reportedly fled to Illinois to break quorum to block the Texas House from holding a vote in a special session.

The new congressional map will add five GOP House seats.

The Texas Democrats pulled a similar stunt back in 2021.

Governor Abbott is not messing around.

“Democrats hatched a deliberate plan not to show up for work, for the specific purpose of abdicating the duties of their office and thwarting the chamber’s business. That amounts to an abandonment or forfeiture of an elected state office,” Abbot said.

Full statement from Governor Abbott:

Governor Greg Abbott today released the following statement outlining the legal consequences that House Democrat members face for breaking quorum, including the potential loss of their seats and felony violations. This letter is also being sent directly to the individual members who have fled Texas. The Governor’s full statement is as follows:

Real Texans do not run from a fight. But that’s exactly what most of the Texas House Democrats just did. Rather than doing their job and voting on urgent legislation affecting the lives of all Texans, they have fled Texas to deprive the House of the quorum necessary to meet and conduct business.

These absences are not merely unintended and unavoidable interruptions in public service, like a sudden illness or a family emergency. Instead, these absences were premeditated for an illegitimate purpose—what one representative called “breaking quorum.” Another previously signaled that Democrats “would have to go by an extreme measure” of a quorum break “to stop these bills from happening.” In other words, Democrats hatched a deliberate plan not to show up for work, for the specific purpose of abdicating the duties of their office and thwarting the chamber’s business.

That amounts to an abandonment or forfeiture of an elected state office. When the Governor calls a Special Session, our Constitution provides that the “Legislature shall meet.” TEX. CONST. art. III, § 5 (emphasis added). It’s not optional. It’s a duty. The absconded Democrat House members were elected to meet and vote on legislation—not to prevent votes that may not go their way. Every session, legislators on both sides of the aisle find themselves on the losing side of a legislative vote. And every session, most of those legislators find a way to disagree agreeably and behave like adults, rather than going AWOL.

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Democracy Dies in a Charter Jet: The Great Texas Walkout

Democracy Dies in a Motel 6: Texas Democrats Flee the Floor Again

Modern politics shares a particular irony that only it can deliver. In case Dems have forgotten how our system of government works, here’s a reminder. There are things called “elections,” where U.S. citizens vote for people to serve as their lawmakers, who then represent the people.

I know, it’s Civics 101, but it’s becoming a nasty habit for Democrats when they decide against serving democracy by fleeing—not rhetorically, but in a physical sense, packing their bags and crossing state lines to break a quorum.

Once again, Democrats in the great state of Texas are refusing to play a game they’ve lost at the ballot box. Rather than demonstrating integrity and character by accepting the election results, they are revealing their true colors by fleeing to prevent Republicans from passing a redrawn congressional map backed by President Donald Trump, which was expected to favor GOP candidates in at least five seats.

What the Democrats are doing isn’t new, bold, and it sure as hell isn’t noble. It’s political cowardice wrapped in just enough self-righteousness to impress only news readers and party donors.

Running From Responsibility, Again

In the state where this expression fits wonderfully, this ain’t their first rodeo. In 2003, redistricting. 2021, voting integrity. Now in 2025, the charter buses are fired up (EV buses?) and loaded as though they’re some sad cover band stuck on their only remotely famous song, “We Ran So We Wouldn’t Lose. Again.”

Their problem this time is a congressional map backed by Trump’s post-reelection push to solidify Republican control of the House ahead of the 2026 mid-term elections. 

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New York City’s Ranked Choice Voting System Favors Socialist Mamdani

New York City’s mayoral race uses a unique system called ranked choice voting, which fundamentally alters how winners are determined. Unlike traditional elections where voters select a single candidate, New York voters can rank up to five candidates in order of preference on their ballot.

If no candidate receives more than 50% of the first-choice votes, a computerized elimination process begins. The candidate with the fewest first-place votes is eliminated, and those votes are redistributed to each voter’s next-ranked choice. This process continues through multiple rounds—potentially factoring in third, fourth, and even fifth choice, until only two candidates remain. The final winner is the one with majority support among the remaining ballots, though that may not be the candidate most voters originally preferred.

In the June 2025 Democratic primary, the ranked choice system significantly altered the initial results. Zohran Mamdani led on election night with 43.5% of first-choice votes, but after several rounds of eliminations and redistributions, he was declared the winner with 56%, while Andrew Cuomo finished with 44%.

This system creates a far more unpredictable election environment. Candidates who appear to hold solid leads on election night can end up losing, or winning, once all voter preferences are fully counted and redistributed.

Ranked choice voting can appear unfair because a candidate with fewer first-choice votes may ultimately win the election. A key technical flaw is “ballot exhaustion,” which happens when voters rank too few candidates to remain in the final rounds. If all of a voter’s selected candidates are eliminated before the last round, their ballot is no longer counted in the final outcome.

A 2015 study of 600,000 votes cast in four local elections in Washington State and California found that winners in all four elections received less than a majority of total votes cast. Studies have found exhaustion rates ranging from 9.6 percent to over 27 percent in some elections, meaning the winner may only represent a majority of remaining votes, not all votes cast.

The increased complexity of ranked choice voting is another major issue. It’s absurd that Democrats, who argue voter ID is too confusing for many people, somehow believe voters can understand and navigate ranked choice voting, and remember to rank enough candidates just to avoid having their ballot disqualified early in the process.

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Hochul: I ‘Have a Lot of Alignment’ with Mamdani ‘on Issues Like Affordability’

On Friday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “All In,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) stated that New York City mayoral candidate Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani (D) has “taken a lot of positions that I don’t agree with, but we have a lot of alignment on issues like affordability.”

Host Chris Hayes asked, “In the 45 seconds I have left, the mayoral race is headed towards the general election in New York City. Zohran Mamdani won that quite surprisingly, but quite definitively, that New York City primary. You have not endorsed him as of yet. Other officeholders, Democrats have. What are you waiting for, what are you looking for to make the decision whether you’re going to endorse the Democratic nominee for mayor?”

Hochul responded, “We’ll have more conversations. I already started that. I went and I visited him just a couple of days after the election. He’s taken a lot of positions that I don’t agree with, but we have a lot of alignment on issues like affordability. He supports my efforts to build more housing so it’s not the most expensive purchase, … more supply, the prices go down. I understand what it’s like to be a struggling mom. I was that mom. I had to leave a job with Sen. Moynihan because I couldn’t afford childcare. I know what it’s like, and I’m there with him in dealing with the affordability issues. So, we’ll just have more conversations.”

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Mamdani Already Owes New Yorkers $1.3 BILLION

New York City is crumbling under failing schools, surging homelessness, and unsafe streets. But Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, in his time as a state legislator, decided to sink the state even deeper—by wasting another $1.3 billion on ideological vanity projects with no measurable benefit for ordinary New Yorkers.

As a co-author of the so-called “People’s Budget” proposed by the Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic, and Asian Legislative Caucus, Mamdani has backed spending proposals that read more like activist wish lists than responsible fiscal policy. Every dollar demanded in the name of “equity” is a dollar stripped from basic needs—needs that millions of New Yorkers, especially working-class families, continue to go without.

Take, for example, Mamdani’s push for an $8 million recruitment and training initiative to make New York’s teachers “more diverse.” 

The irony here is hard to miss. In New York City’s public schools—the largest district in the country—Black teachers already make up roughly 42% of the workforce, despite the city’s Black population being only 22%. The goalpost for “representation” has shifted away from proportionality and toward performative politics. 

What Mamdani labels as reform is, in practice, just another unnecessary layer of bureaucracy driven by race-based metrics instead of educational ones.

Mamdani’s caucus also proposed spending $250,000 to promote “racial and cultural inclusivity” in K–12 classrooms—without ever explaining how this helps students learn to read, write, or do math. Another $351,500 was allocated for conventions supposedly designed to help “underrepresented” educators, which is another way of saying the funds will go toward political networking events with no tangible classroom results.

Mamdani also supports an additional $8 million for a Fair Housing Testing Program—money that would go toward “paired testing” for housing discrimination that is already illegal under both state and federal law. 

New York already invests billions in housing and tenant protection. If discrimination occurs, there are legal pathways for enforcement. This new testing program is redundant and unnecessary. 

Meanwhile, New York City continues to face a staggering homelessness crisis. That $8 million would be far better spent building shelters or expanding emergency housing than funding an academic experiment in bureaucratic redundancy.

One of the largest items in Mamdani’s wish list is the $1 billion proposal for climate mitigation and adaptation over five years. This includes $75 million for electric school buses and another $80 million for centralized procurement of zero-emission buses and infrastructure. 

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