Tag: transparency

Massie Bill Demands Federal Candidates Reveal Dual Citizenship

Seeking to spotlight federal office-seekers who may have a conflict of interest, Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie has introduced a bill that would require candidates for federal office to disclose any non-American citizenships they hold.  

“Personally, I don’t think dual citizens should serve in Congress, but I ultimately decided to introduce a transparency bill requiring full disclosure of citizenship,” said Massie in a Monday Fox News interview with Will Cain. “Voters can then make the decision.” So far, Massie’s Dual Loyalty Disclosure Act (HR 2356) has attracted four co-sponsors, all of them Republicans: Andy Biggs (AZ-5), Clay Higgins (LA-3), Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA-14) and Nicholas Begich (AK at-large).

While it’s not a provision of his transparency-focused bill that would amend the Federal Election Campaign Act, Massie thinks dual citizens in Congress “should… abstain from votes specifically benefitting those countries,” the libertarian-minded MIT grad said in a press release accompanying the introduction of his bill. “We swear an oath to the Constitution, and the question is, if you’re a citizen of two countries, which oath are you taking more seriously, or can you take them both seriously?” Massie told Fox’s Cain. 

Underscoring the mystery that Massie is seeking to end, it’s unclear how many current members of Congress have citizenship in a foreign country. Indeed, ZeroHedge wasn’t able to identify any members who have disclosed dual citizenships on their own. According to Pew Research, there are 19 foreign-born members of the 119th Congress, but that doesn’t necessarily equate to holding citizenship abroad. Among those 19, the countries of birth are Mexico (4 members), India (3), South Korea (2) Ukraine (2), Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Japan, Peru, Somalia and Taiwan.    

“I’m not picking on any particular country,” said Massie. However, American social media and other discourse regarding US officials’ potential dual citizenship has overwhelmingly focused on Israel, which receives billions of dollars in US military aid every year, in a relationship that foments intense foreign resentments against the United States, and terrorism against Americans. 

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Attorney General Pam Bondi Provides Major Update on Epstein Files — Promises Only Minimal Redactions to Protect Victims

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced a major update on the long-awaited release of Jeffrey Epstein case files — and made it clear that only minimal redactions will be made, strictly to protect the privacy and safety of the victims.

Appearing on Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo, Bondi addressed the tidal wave of speculation and concern surrounding the Epstein files, following reports that up to 1,000 FBI agents and civilians have been pulled from vital national security duties to comb through mountains of evidence related to Epstein’s international sex trafficking ring.

Maria Bartiromo:
A lot of conversation about the Epstein files. And I recognize that when you’re dealing with children, it takes much more time. You’ve got to ensure that what you’re sending out publicly is not revealing any personal information. But can you give us a sense of those two items and whether or not we’ll learn more about them?

Pam Bondi:
Yes, you’re absolutely right, Maria. You know, tens of thousands of pages of documents and hundreds and hundreds of victims of Jeffrey Epstein. So the FBI — they have been working round the clock, at my directive, at Kash Patel.

Now Dan Bongino is there, who is a great asset for all of us at the FBI as well. But yeah, we have to protect their identity, their personal information, to make sure they’re safe.

But other than that, we are releasing all of these documents as soon as we can get them redacted — to protect the victims of him, of all of these horrific crimes that he committed.

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Burchett calls for government transparency on UAPs, spending: ‘We deserve to know’

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) called for the government to reveal what it’s spending taxpayer money on relating to Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) amid growing calls from lawmakers for increased transparency on the issue.

“They’re spending tens of millions of dollars on this subject. And then they turn around tell us they don’t exist,” the Tennessee Republican told NewsNation’s Blake Burman on “The Hill” Friday.

Burchett stressed the need for greater government transparency on extraterrestrial life while discussing the recent hiring of former intelligence officer and UFO whistleblower David Grusch by Rep. Burlison (R-Mo.).

“I think he can help us ask questions that need to be asked, that should be asked, that maybe we’re not asking the right questions because we’re not supposed experts on this,” Burchett said of Grusch.

“I want to know what they’re spending the money on,” he later added.

The topic of UAPs has received greater attention from Congress in recent years, with congressional hearings in 2024 and 2023 diving deeper into whether or not government sectors are withholding evidence from lawmakers.

“They need to they need to disclose everything and do it now,” Burchett said on Friday. “America needs to know. We need to demand that of our elected officials. Quit joking around about little green men and flying saucers. We’re spending tens of millions of dollars on something that, goddamnit, we deserve to know. Give us the information.”

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UK Judges Rule That Docs Revealing Close Ties Between Disgraced Prince Andrew and Alleged Chinese Spy Yang Tengbo Must Be Released in Two Weeks

Another week, another damaging report brought Prince Andrew’s alleged corruption to the forefront of British public opinion.

A London tribunal has ruled that private documents of the correspondence between Andrew’s top adviser and an alleged Chinese spy must be made public in a fortnight.

Dominic Hampshire, an aide and close friend of the Duke, had to submit a witness statement after Chinese businessman Yang Tengbo was expelled and banned from the UK.

The Telegraph reported:

“Mr. Yang was forced to leave the country on national security grounds in March 2023 and unsuccessfully challenged the decision at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission last year. UK authorities have alleged that he formed an ‘unusual degree of trust’ with the Duke and developed relationships with politicians to be ‘leveraged’ by China.”

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Denver mayor and staff used encryption app to discuss migrant crisis, then auto-deleted messages. Trump policies prompted move, says spokesperson

Denver Mayor Mike Johnston and 14 of his top advisors, appointees and lawyers nicknamed themselves “Strike Force” and communicated about the city’s migrant crisis through an end-to end encryption app, CBS News Colorado has learned. The app, Signal, proceeded to automatically delete their initial conversations.

A spokesperson for Johnston said the Signal messaging was prompted by President Trump and how his administration “could have significant impacts on how Denver operates.”

The use of such messaging apps by government officials has been controversial and viewed as a way to avoid public disclosure of government decision making. In Michigan, after state police leaders were found in 2021 to be using Signal on state-issued phones, state lawmakers outlawed the use of encrypted messaging on state phones.

“It’s unlawful and it’s breaking the law,” said Steven Zansberg, a Denver attorney who specializes in First Amendment and open records law, and reviewed some of the records obtained by CBS News Colorado.

Jeff Roberts, director of the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition, characterized what the CBS investigation found as an intentional effort to undermine Colorado’s open records law.

“This is not transparent,” said Roberts.

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House Republicans demand UFO transparency

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and some of President Trump’s most vocal supporters in the House do not agree on much, but they are in agreement that the government is hiding critical information on UFOs — also known as unidentified anomalous phenomena or UAP — from the American public.

Schumer and key House Republicans say that the government must come clean on what it knows about this decades-long mystery, which has seen 80 years of highly credible, consistent, multi-witness reporting of objects exhibiting extreme performance characteristics.

On Feb. 11, House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) announced the establishment of the Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), a member of the bipartisan UAP Caucus, will lead the effort.

Comer and Luna sent letters to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and CIA Director John Ratcliffe requesting a briefing on all UAP-related records in their possession, with the ultimate goal of “deliver[ing] transparency to the American people.”

Notably, Rubio and Ratcliffe, along with National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and Trump himself, have made remarkable statements about UAP in recent years.

Ditto for Schumer. Shortly after Trump signed an executive order declassifying all government records on the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., Schumer challenged Trump to extend the same transparency to UAP.

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Trump demands full disclosure on assassination attempts, citing withheld information

President Donald Trump issued a directive to the Secret Service on Friday, Feb. 7, demanding a complete and unfiltered disclosure of information regarding two individuals who attempted to assassinate him last year.

Speaking to the New York Post, Trump expressed frustration over the delayed release of details, asserting that he has the right to know.

The incidents, which occurred in July and September 2024, have raised significant questions about the motives and potential foreign connections of the would-be assassins. The first attempt took place at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where 19-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks fired a rifle shot that struck Trump in the ear. Crooks was fatally shot by law enforcement at the scene. Federal investigators later discovered that Crooks possessed six cell phones and accounts on encrypted messaging platforms linked to Belgium, Germany and New Zealand, casting doubt on whether he acted alone.

The second attempt involved 59-year-old Ryan Routh, who was apprehended near the Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, Florida. Routh, armed with a rifle, had been lying in wait. Authorities revealed that he had previously served as a recruiter in Ukraine and authored a self-published book on Amazon calling for Trump’s assassination. Routh is currently awaiting trial in September and faces the possibility of life in prison.

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Anna Paulina Luna to lead task force on declassification of JFK assassination records, Epstein client list

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., will lead a new task force focused on the declassification of federal secrets – including records related to the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and other documents in the public interest, Fox News Digital has learned. 

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., appointed Luna to chair the “Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets.”

Luna is expected to focus on examining the declassification of materials in the public interest, including the client list of Jeffrey Epstein, and files relating to Sept. 11, 2001, COVID-19 origins, UFOs and more. 

Fox News Digital has learned that Comer and Luna are sending letters to necessary agencies to kick off the declassification investigations.

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“I’m Entitled to Know” — President Trump Orders Secret Service to Provide “Every Bit” of Information on His Two Would-Be Assassins

The American people are going to finally know the full truth about what really happened regarding the two attempts on Trump’s life last year.

President Trump told the New York Post on Saturday that he has ordered the Secret Service to provide “every bit” of information regarding the two people who tried to kill him last year: 19-year-old Thomas Crooks and 59-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh. He said he sent out instructions to disclose this information on Friday.

“I entitled to know,” Trump told the New York Post’s Miranda Devine.

“I want to find out about the two assassins,” he added. “Why did the one guy have six cell phones and why did the other guy have (foreign) apps?”

Trump went to rightfully blame Joe Biden for the Secret Service holding back information from the public.

“No more holding back because of Biden,” Trump stated. “I’m entitled to know. And they held it back long enough.”

“No excuses.”

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RFK Hearings – Why Are Politicians So Afraid of Transparency

Faith in anything related to public health is rightly at an all-time low and despite the incredible mandate that the election provided to MAHA, most Democrats and a handful of RINOs are dead set against the transparency Bobby has promised to provide. This is a man who has vaxxed his kids and promised not to ban anything. He’s not a radical. He’s promoting overall health and very sensible policies. He’s a lawyer and simply want’s people to have the evidence necessary to make good decisions. So why is a call for transparency such a threat? After all, who hides things unless there is something to hide?

Tom Renz’s Newsletter is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

The answer is honestly similar across the board – money or political realities. Big pharma largely owns Congress (both parties) but the political reality of Trump embracing MAHA forces the hands of many. Despite this, there are a number of absolute RINOs and big pharma sellouts (I’m looking at you Elizabeth Warren, Lindsey Graham, and Mitch McConnell) but I’m not wasting space on them in this article. Instead, I want to talk about a few people we hope we can help to see truth.

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