Tag: taxes

NPR Is Under The Delusion It Has A Constitutional Right To Your Money

NPR filed a delusional lawsuit on Tuesday against the Trump administration, arguing that it has a constitutional right to your hard-earned money.

The suit, brought by NPR and three Colorado-based public radio stations, alleges that Trump’s executive order cutting federal funding to the left-wing NPR and PBS violates their right to free speech, as well as provisions of the Public Broadcasting Act.

“The [Executive] Order’s objectives could not be clearer: the Order aims to punish NPR for the content of news and other programming the President dislikes and chill the free exercise of First Amendment rights by NPR and individual public radios across the country,” the suit states.

But as Texas Rep. Brandon Gill countered in a post on X: “NPR has a right to free speech. It doesn’t have a right to our tax dollars.”

Trump issued an executive order earlier this month directing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to “cease federal funding” to NPR and PBS.

“Americans have the right to expect that if their tax dollars fund public broadcasting at all, they fund only fair, accurate, unbiased, and nonpartisan news coverage,” the order stated, with the White House adding that PBS and NPR “receive millions from taxpayers to spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’”

“No media outlet has a constitutional right to taxpayer subsidies, and the Government is entitled to determine which categories of activities to subsidize,” the order continues.

But NPR argues that it does have a right to your hard-earned dollars.

The suit argues the order is unconstitutional and violates the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. That law established the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) to “‘facilitate the full development of public telecommunications in which programs of high quality’ and ‘creativity’ will be ‘obtained by diverse sources’” among other things. As stated in NPR’s lawsuit, the act explains “how the Corporation must allocate its general appropriation from Congress.” Twenty-five percent of the appropriation goes toward public radio, while 75 percent goes to public television.

According to the suit, “Congress has appropriated $535 million in general funding for the Corporation for Fiscal Years 2025, 2026, and 2027,” while NPR, in fiscal year 2024, spent roughly $11.1 million in total in grants from the CBP.

Trump “is exercising his lawful authority to limit funding to NPR and PBS,” White House spokesman Harrison Fields said in a statement. “The President was elected with a mandate to ensure efficient use of taxpayer dollars, and he will continue to use his lawful authority to achieve that objective.”

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Gavin Newsom Supports Medicaid Changes — Why Don’t Republicans?

To cut federal spending, Republicans should join Newsom in reforming Medicaid.

It says something about congressional Republicans’ unwillingness to reduce Medicaid spending when many of them stand well to the left of Gavin Newsom — I repeat, Gavin Newsom — on the subject. The California governor, a Democrat, recently put forward proposals that would reduce program spending and enrollment.

Newsom won’t win awards for courage when it comes to reforming Medicaid; an ongoing budget crisis, as opposed to policy principle, prompted his volte-face. But the problems in California speak to the larger dynamic Washington will face if it doesn’t get serious about curbing Medicaid’s problems.

Restrictions on Undocumented Immigrants’ Coverage

In his revised budget, Newsom proposed freezing enrollment for undocumented immigrants. Children would be permitted to join the state’s Medicaid program, but no more adults could enroll. Those adults who remain enrolled would face a $100 monthly premium, beginning in 2027.

The Medicaid expansion to those in the country illegally has remained a source of controversy. For starters, that program came in billions of dollars over budget earlier this spring, forcing Newsom’s office to seek emergency bailouts for the Medicaid program. That bailout came after Newsom used a legally questionable accounting scam to have Washington help fund this program — even though federal tax dollars generally do not cover Medicaid coverage for the undocumented. The reconciliation bill before Congress would prevent future use of this accounting loophole by states, saving an estimated $34.6 billion over ten years.

Given that Newsom helped expand California’s Medicaid coverage to the undocumented to begin with, let’s not kid ourselves that he acted out of deep-seated principle in proposing an enrollment freeze and premium charges. Instead, his state faces yet another cash crunch, and the governor was forced to react. Which could well describe what will happen in Washington once foreign governments get tired of financing our ever-increasing debt.

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DOGE: Social Security Officially Removes 12.3 Million Individuals Listed Age 120+

Social Security has removed from its rolls 12.3 million individuals listed as 120 years old or older, according to the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

The discrepancies in the Social Security figures and the alarming ages of some of the individuals listed have garnered national attention over the last several months.

As a result, in March DOGE began to update the American people on the massive cleanup begun by Social Security. In a March 18 update, DOGE said Social Security had marked 3.2 million social security number holders aged 120 or older as deceased, warning that there was still more work to be done.

Over one month later, on April 24, DOGE provided another update, revealing that a stunning 11 million individuals listed as age 120+ were now marked as deceased.

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Democrats Hate that New Bill Requires People to Work for Benefits

President Trump’s new budget proposal, the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” is already drawing fire from Democrats, who claim it robs the poor to enrich the wealthy. In reality, the bill delivers substantial tax relief for working families, without handing out money to the rich. It also introduces a simple requirement: some individuals receiving government benefits will need to work in order to qualify.

Critics claim that over 13 million people will lose Medicaid coverage under the new bill. But that figure is cumulative over ten years, not immediate. The bill doesn’t “take healthcare away from the poor”; it raises the bar for eligibility. Able-bodied adults under 65 will be required to complete a minimum number of hours each month in employment, job training, education, or, in some cases, community service to qualify for certain benefits. This requirement does not apply to the vulnerable, children, the elderly, pregnant women, the disabled, or full-time caregivers of young children are all exempt.

Importantly, those affected aren’t being denied care; they’re losing access to free, government-funded coverage under Medicaid due to updated qualifications. Many are expected to return to work and obtain insurance through employers or private plans. Others may requalify and reapply as their circumstances change.

Trump’s big sin here is requiring a portion of recipients to work for the benefits they receive. And Democrats hate any system where people are expected to earn their handouts.

Supporters of work requirements argue that they promote personal responsibility, encourage economic independence, and help control long-term government spending. They also reflect a widely held belief that public aid should be tied to effort, not handed out unconditionally.

Critics counter that such requirements create administrative hurdles that could cause eligible individuals to lose benefits. However, this is a non-issue. If someone qualifies, they will receive aid; if they don’t, they won’t. It’s that simple. If a bureaucratic glitch prevents them from getting their benefits, they can go down to the office, fill out the necessary forms, and request the aid be reinstated.

That shouldn’t be too difficult, after all, they’re not tied up at an office job all day.

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ATO whistleblower Richard Boyle pleads guilty to four charges

Australian Taxation Office (ATO) whistleblower Richard Boyle has pleaded guilty to four charges, including taping private conversations without consent.

The former debt collection officer became an internal whistleblower in October 2017, when he grew concerned about operations in the tax office.

When he felt his complaints were ignored, he went public on Four Corners about the culture at the ATO, including allegations his area was instructed to use heavy-handed tactics on taxpayers who owed the tax office money.

Boyle was originally facing 66 charges, but over time many were dropped.

In South Australia’s District Court on Tuesday, he pleaded guilty to disclosing protected information, making a record of protected information, using a listening device to record private conversations and recording another person’s tax file number.

Boyle had been trying to invoke whistleblower protections to avoid a criminal trial.

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DOGE Has Found $14 Billion in Medicaid Fraud, Waste, and Abuse, Dr. Mehmet Oz Says

Dr. Mehmet Oz, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) administrator, said his agency and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have identified at least $14 billion in fraud, waste, and abuse.

“There’s about $14 billion we’ve identified with DOGE, of folks who are duly enrolled wrongly in multiple states for Medicaid,” Oz told Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures.”

As an example, Oz said: “You live in New Jersey, but you move to Pennsylvania, and which state gets your Medicaid? Turns out both states collect money from the federal government.”

There are other areas, he said, that constitute abuse of the federal health care system. He said some people who are eligible to get a job or seek education are receiving Medicaid. Oz echoed statements made by GOP lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.)., who in recent days said that able-bodied individuals and illegal immigrants have received Medicaid benefits.

Oz urged that Medicaid be cleaned up so that it can provide services to individuals such as people with disabilities and others, suggesting that Republicans keep a work requirement to be eligible for the program.

“I think there’s a moral hazard if we don’t, because you’ve got people who are not working who could work, who should work, and it’s better for them and better for the country if they do,” he said, referring to Republicans’ having added work requirements to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that passed in the House of Representatives on May 22.

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If California’s Marijuana Tax Hike Takes Effect Next Month, Consumers And Businesses Will Suffer—But There’s A Solution

A critical inflection point threatening the world’s largest legal cannabis market currently looms over California’s industry: A scheduled excise tax raise from the current rate of 15 percent to an unprecedented rate of 19 percent is set to take effect on July 1.

When California voters approved adult-use cannabis in 2016, they envisioned a thriving—and equitable—regulated industry. Unfortunately, the reality is that licensed operators are being strangled by regulations that push consumers straight to the illicit market. And despite the legal market generating approximately $7 billion in tax revenue since 2018, this hike would be a devastating blow.

The Reality of California’s Cannabis Market

On the ground in California, the illicit market continues to dominate cannabis sales. According to recent data from the Department of Cannabis Control (DCC), approximately 63 percent of the 3.8 million pounds of cannabis consumed by Californians in 2024 came from unlicensed production—unsurprising when considering the price differential consumers face.

When a consumer purchases cannabis from a licensed retailer, they’re not just paying for the product. They’re paying layers of taxes that can increase the final price by nearly 44 percent in some jurisdictions.

The California Department of Tax and Fee Administration’s (CDTFA) own example shows how a $35 purchase quickly balloons to over $50 due to combined taxes—and that’s before this tax increase. With the planned hike, that same purchase would approach $60.

Not only will consumers feel this increase in each purchase, many small businesses—particularly social equity operators and independent retailers already operating on razor-thin margins—simply won’t survive another tax increase of this magnitude.

Meanwhile, states like Michigan and Missouri are demonstrating steady sales growth thanks to lower taxes and fewer barriers to entry, and they are already exceeding the average per capita cannabis sales of California.

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GOP Senator Calls For Investigation Into $4.7 Trillion In ‘Untraceable’ Treasury Payments

In February, Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) uncovered $4.7 trillion in payments made by the US Treasury that are “almost impossible” to trace – as Treasury Account Symbol (TAS) identification codes were optional in the system. This left billions in payments blank and unable to be traced.

“Of the 1.5 billion payments that we send out every year, they are required to have a TAS, a Treasury Account Symbol. We discovered that more than one third of those payments did not have a TAS number,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services earlier this month.

“In the Federal Government, the TAS field was optional for ~$4.7 Trillion in payments and was often left blank, making traceability almost impossible,” DOGE announced via its X account. Thanks to DOGE, those “optional” days are over. “…this is now a required field, increasing insight into where money is actually going,” DOGE added. 

So while the TAS field is now mandatory, Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) has called for an investigation into where the untraceable payments have been going.

“There’s so much waste. There’s so much fraud, There’s so much abuse in our government,” Schmitt told Fox News. “I’m glad there was a laser-like focus on it. We ought to make many of those reforms permanent, but there probably ought to be some investigations here about where this money actually went. I mean this is taxpayer money. People work hard.”

In March. Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) introduced a bill – the LEDGER Act – requiring the Treasury Department to track all payments.

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Green Agenda Has Cost British Households £220 Billion Since 2006: Study

British consumers have paid nearly £220 billion more on their energy prices over the past two decades as a result of Westminster’s radical green agenda schemes, a report from a leading energy consultancy firm has found.

The UK public has been “seduced by narratives that renewables are cheap,” however, according to a study conducted by Watt-Logic’s Kathryn Porter presented by Lord Offord, the Shadow Energy Minister in the House of Lords, has found that the opposite is true, with the green agenda not only siphoning off taxpayer cash subsidies but also driving up energy costs for consumers.

“That renewables are not cheap should be clear, based both on the evidence that after 35 years of subsidies, we are yet to see any benefits through lower bills,” the report found.

According to Porter’s calculations, if the British government had not embarked upon its so-called green energy transition programme, British households would have saved £218 billion since 2006.

The report found that the direct cost of net zero policies in 2023-24 accounted for £17 billion in additional costs on consumer energy bills, and it predicted that this would continue to rise to more than £20 billion in 2029-30.

Porter acknowledged that gas prices were impacted by the Ukraine War and broader Western conflict with Russia, however, she noted that this would not explain why energy prices have steadily risen for the two decades prior to the 2021-23 gas crisis in Europe.

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President Trump Threatens to Take $3 Billion of Grant Money from Harvard and Give It to Trade Schools Across the US

Another brilliant idea from President Trump.

On Memorial Day morning, President Donald Trump posted a warning on TRUTH Social that he may take $3 billion in grant money from Harvard and redistribute it to trade schools across the US.

Trump’s really backing the they/them crowd into a corner!

What a great move that would be! And he wouldn’t be funding the whiny young communists at Harvard.

President Trump then let the country know that Harvard is withholding foreign student lists from the administration so that the government can figure out how many of the radicalized lunatics, troublemakers, should not be let back into the country.

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