Month: August 2022

Catholic Group Unveils Ad Slamming Biden for ‘Failure’ to Protect Churches, Pregnancy Centers from Attacks

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CatholicVote, a Catholic advocacy organization, released a seven-figure ad campaign Wednesday targeting President Joe Biden for failing to protect Catholic churches and pregnancy resource centers from escalating attacks since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

There have been 64 incidents against pro-life organizations and 69 against Catholic churches since the court’s decision to overturn Roe was leaked May 2, according to CatholicVote. The ad shows a clip of Biden, who is Catholic, encouraging pro-abortion protesters alongside a video of John F. Kennedy, America’s only other Catholic president, condemning attacks on churches.

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Church Sues Police Department, City for Taking Its Weed and Shrooms

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A religious organization in Oakland, California, that celebrates controlled psychedelic mushrooms and marijuana use is suing the city, the police department and one of its officers for allegedly violating its First- and 14th-Amendment rights in connection with a 2020 raid that seized substances from its building, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Oakland police raided Zide Door Church of Entheogenic Plants that year, taking cash and roughly $200,000 in mushrooms and cannabis following claims it was running an unpermitted cannabis dispensary, the outlet reported. The church is accusing authorities and one particular officer of discriminating against its religious beliefs.

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Commentary: Green Fascists Are Destroying the World

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Earlier this summer, the CO2 Coalition was banished from LinkedIn. The CO2 Coalition, with only three full-time employees and an annual budget of under $1 million, had committed the unpardonable sin of sharing contrarian perspectives on climate science. Its work, produced by a network of volunteers that includes dozens of distinguished scientists, offers indispensable balance on a topic that requires honest debate now more than ever.

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Florida’s Job Growth Continues Surge as Unemployment Rate Hits Historic Low

Florida Capital Star Staff

Florida’s job growth continued to surge in July while its unemployment rate also dropped to an historic low 2.7%.

“Florida continues to outperform the nation because freedom first policies work,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said. “July’s job numbers represent one of the largest month’s job gains over the past generation and Florida continues to outpace the nation in labor force growth.”

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Commentary: The Top Five Cities with the Highest Inflation in America

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My wife and I recently were out for our morning walk and she commented on how weird inflation is. Some prices are sky high, she observed, while others have barely budged.

A carton of eggs is up 33 percent over the last year, while tomatoes haven’t changed at all. Airline flights are through the roof, but the cabin we rented on our last vacation was several hundred dollars less than in previous years. Our electric bill is soaring, but her personal care products and my son’s new sneakers were about the same (or less) than what she had previously paid.

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Commentary: America Needs Help for Its China Addiction

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With China’s decision to close negotiations with the U.S. following House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Taiwan visit, it’s fair to ask how the U.S.’s rapport with the People’s Republic got to this tense point in the first place.

The actor Dennis Quaid said his involvement with cocaine had three stages: “the fun, the fun with problems, and then just the problems.”

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Republican Governor Sues Biden Admin for Refusing to Clean Up Native Americans’ Contaminated Lands

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Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy of Alaska filed a complaint in Alaska’s United States District Court to compel the Department of the Interior (DOI) to take responsibility for hundreds of contaminated areas that the federal government transferred to Alaska Natives.

Dunleavy and the state of Alaska filed the lawsuit in mid-July as a last resort after the DOI allegedly ignored calls to identify and clean up 650 former federal military installations, oil drilling sites and other projects that are contaminating Native Alaskan lands, according to court filings. Despite the Biden administration’s emphasis on securing “environmental justice” for minority communities, the DOI’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM), nor any other associated federal agency, is taking responsibility, the lawsuit alleges, allowing pollution and toxic waste to creep into natives’ food and water systems.

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China Rations Energy Supplies Amid Severe Drought

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China imposed sweeping power cuts to households and factories in Sichuan province, including those belonging to major electronics companies where drought conditions have strained the region’s hydropower-based energy production capacity.

Water levels at hydropower reservoirs that supply the province of 94 million people have fallen by as much as 50% in August as China faces its largest heatwave since 1961, the AP reported, citing data from the Sichuan Provincial Department of Economics and Information Technology. After the provincial government ordered solar panel, cement, electronics and fertilizer factories to reduce power consumption, many shut down or reduced operations.

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Federal Court Allows Biden to Once Again Pause Oil and Gas Drilling

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The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday threw out a lower court’s order that would have stopped the Biden administration’s moratorium on new oil and gas leasing on federal lands, according to court filings.

The 5th Circuit court appeals court vacated the Louisiana district court’s decision to block the Interior Department’s (DOI) leasing pause after Louisiana and a dozen other states filed a lawsuit against the administration, arguing that they would suffer injury from the policy, according to legal documents. The federal court determined that the lower court’s directive does not specifically outline what the Biden administration is and is not permitted to do.

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Judge Chastises DoD, Marine Corps in Order Granting Class Action Status in Vaccine Mandate Case

The Center Square

U.S District Court Judge Steven Merryday issued a blistering rebuke of the Department of Defense and Marine Corps for refusing to grant religious accommodation requests to service members.

Merryday did so when issuing a 48-page ruling Thursday in which he granted class action status for all active and reserve U.S. Marine Corps service men and women in a lawsuit filed against the Secretary of Defense over the department’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.

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White House Equity Initiative Celebrates ‘B.L.A.C.K. to School’ Event to Recruit and Retain Black K-12 Teachers

Susan Berry, PhD

The White House Initiative on Advancing Educational Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunity for Black Americans is featuring a “roundtable” event that seeks to promote K-12 public school systems that recruit and retain black teachers.

The invitation for the event, scheduled for Tuesday, August 23, says “B.L.A.C.K. to School” seeks to support “Black school, district, and state educational leaders and creating K12 systems that effectively recruit and retain Black teachers.”

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Planned Parenthood to Spend $50 Million on 2022 Midterm Elections

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On Wednesday, the far-left pro-abortion group Planned Parenthood that it would be spending a record total of $50 million on the midterm elections this year, with the stated goal of electing as many pro-abortion candidates to office as possible.

The Daily Caller reports that the statement was released by Planned Parenthood Votes, one of the political advocacy groups in the broader orbit of the main Planned Parenthood organization. The statement declared that the historic sum would be “strategically used to elect abortion rights champions” in the aftermath of the decision earlier this year by the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, which returned the issue of abortion back to the individual states to be decided.

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Commentary: Ahead of Midterms, 14 States Improve Election Integrity Laws

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by Jack Fitzhenry and Hans von Spakovsky   With primaries underway and with midterms and other fall ballot contests looming, multiple states are demonstrating a commitment to ensuring that their elections remain worthy of public confidence. Since 2021, The Heritage Foundation has been tracking the content of every state’s laws…

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Commentary: What We Know about the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago Raid (So Far)

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“There’s so much we don’t know!” says any liberal losing an argument about the dramatic FBI raid last week on Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s Palm Beach residence and private club.

There are, indeed, some things that we do not know, but what we do know is already quite revealing. We know that the raid – which involved 30 FBI agents and three Justice Department lawyers – lasted over nine hours and was by day’s end reclassified as a “search” by all government agencies and the entire legacy media. We know that this supposed “search” was personally ordered not by FBI Director Christopher Wray, but by Attorney General Merrick Garland, a highly partisan Biden Administration appointee who has implied that parents objecting to critical race theory in public schools are domestic terrorists, and who refused to provide home security protection to Supreme Court justices in the majority of the recent ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade. 

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Biden Administration to Stop Buying COVID Vaccines, Treatments and Tests

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The Biden administration plans to stop buying vaccines, treatments and tests as early as this fall, with the hope of full commercialization of the products in 2023, White House Covid-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha revealed on Tuesday.

Speaking at an event sponsored by the US Chamber of Commerce Foundation, Jha said that the administration needs to get past the crisis phase of the Covid-19 pandemic in order for this to happen.

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FDA Approves Most Expensive Drug in History

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Wednesday approved a gene therapy for a rare blood disease which is set to reach the market at a record $2.8 million for a single dose, according to a press release by the therapy’s creator, Bluebird Bio.

Beta-thalassemia is an inherited blood disorder that causes a patient’s blood to fail to circulate oxygen through the body, according to the FDA press release concerning the approval. Bluebird’s new therapy, Zynteglo, infuses patients with cells that have a working copy of the gene responsible for the disorder, allowing the patient to produce blood that functions properly, according to a Bluebird press release.

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Report: Americans Spend Thousands to Get Their Names Written on Ukrainian Munitions

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Americans are spending as much as $3,000 to get their names on Ukrainian weapons and munitions, according to a report by the Washington Post.

Ukrainian forces will scrawl messages on munitions used against Russian forces invading the country for as little as $30 on an 82mm mortar round, the Post reported. $3,000 could earn the donor a Ukrainian T-72 main battle tank named in their honor.

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Florida A&M University Pushes Policies in Tension with the State University System’s ‘Statement on Free Expression’

Florida Capital Star Staff

According to official Florida A&M University (FAMU) student residential policy, “[b]ehavior and/or activities that are considered offensive to others that do not constitute ones freedom of expression is prohibited, while in public areas of the residential facilities.”

This is just one of a multitude of FAMU policies that, according to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), are in tension with the freedom of speech and expression at the school.

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Pro-Transgender Groups to Sue Florida over Medicaid Ban on Gender-Altering Procedures

Florida Capital Star Staff

In Florida, a coalition of far-left groups is preparing to sue the state government over a directive that orders the state’s Medicaid regulator to ban coverage of so-called “gender-affirming” procedures.

According to Politico, the Southern Legal Counsel’s Transgender Rights Initiative announced on Wednesday their plans to file their case in federal court, where they will seek a preliminary injunction to prevent the ban from going into effect.

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Lawmakers Worry Amtrak Potentially Helping Illegal Immigrants Cross Border

The Center Square

Lawmakers sent a letter to Amtrak Wednesday requesting a briefing as well as all documents related to how taxpayer subsidized Amtrak may be used to transfer illegal immigrants across the border.

The Republicans on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee signed the letter, led by railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Subcommittee Ranking Member Rep. Rick Crawford, R-Ark.

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Commentary: People Warning of a Pending Civil War Are the Most Likely to Incite One

Florida Capital Star Staff

As Joe Biden’s polls stagnate and the midterms approach, we are now serially treated to yet another progressive melodrama about the dangers of a supposed impending radical right-wing violent takeover. 

This time the alleged threat is a Neanderthal desire for a “civil war.”  

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New York Attorney General Sends Threatening Letter to Church Suggesting Their ‘ReAwaken America Tour’ Is ‘Extremist’ and ‘Racially Motivated’

Susan Berry, PhD

A letter sent by New York Attorney General Letitia James to Cornerstone Church in Batavia, New York, threatened the church, in advance of its hosting a ReAwaken America Tour event this past weekend, with investigation and prosecution of “acts of violence, intimidation, threats, or harassment” toward others based on “a belief or perception” of characteristics including “race,” “national origin,” “gender,” and “sexual orientation.”“national origin,” “gender,” and “sexual orientation.”

“As New York’s top law enforcement officer, I have significant concerns that the ReAwaken America Tour’s upcoming event at the Cornerstone Church in Batavia, New York on August 12 and 13 could spur extremist or racially motivated violence,” James said in the letter sent to Clay Clark, organizer of the tour, and General Michael Flynn, who travels with it, in care of the church.

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South Carolina Supreme Court Temporarily Halts Heartbeat Law

Susan Berry, PhD

The South Carolina Supreme Court has temporarily blocked continued enforcement of the state’s Heartbeat law, which bans abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected.

The court’s order Wednesday grants abortion providers an emergency motion that will halt enforcement of the law which has been in effect since June 27, several days after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

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Commentary: Peter Strzok Remains Exhibit A of the FBI’s Politicization

Florida Capital Star Staff

Before the Trump era, members of official Washington who held ostensibly nonpartisan positions of public trust made some effort to conceal their biases. Indeed, many of these figures would hold themselves out as uniquely apolitical and dispassionate. But sheer hatred of Donald Trump has made them throw off that mask. Turn on MSNBC or CNN at almost any hour of the day and you will hear their liberal ranting.

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DeSantis to Rally with Vance in Ohio and Mastriano in Pennsylvania

Bradley Vasoli

Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) is coming through western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio on Friday, August 19, to speak at two rallies, one for Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano and the other for Ohio Senate candidate J.D. Vance. 

The conservative activist organization Turning Point Action is hosting the events. In a statement, turning Point founder and president Charlie Kirk expressed his gladness to facilitate the rallies and his hope that DeSantis’s endorsement will “unite conservatives” around Mastriano and Vance.

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Commentary: Soros’ Claim About Leftist Prosecutors Is Big Lie

Florida Capital Star Staff

George Soros must be feeling the heat of rising crime rates. 

The leftist billionaire recently penned an opinion column in The Wall Street Journal explaining why he financially supports progressive prosecutors. Cloaked in platitudinous language devoid of substance, Soros asserts that “reform-minded prosecutors” have an agenda that promotes safety and justice and are “popular and effective.” 

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Old Case Over Audio Tapes in Bill Clinton’s Sock Drawer Could Impact Mar-a-Lago Search Dispute

Florida Capital Star Staff

When it comes to the National Archives, history has a funny way of repeating itself. And legal experts say a decade-old case over audio tapes that Bill Clinton once kept in his sock drawer may have significant impact over the FBI search of Melania Trump’s closet and Donald Trump’s personal office.

The case in question is titled Judicial Watch v. National Archives and Records Administration and it involved an effort by the conservative watchdog to compel the Archives to forcibly seize hours of audio recordings that Clinton made during his presidency with historian Taylor Branch.

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Commentary: Good Riddance, Liz Cheney

Florida Capital Star Staff

Bush Republicanism, that zombie political persuasion which in its heyday did for the GOP and the conservative movement what Jimmy Carter and Mike Dukakis did for the Democrats, might not quite be dead. But rigor mortis set in several years ago to be sure.

Just ask Liz Cheney, whose political career was zombified in January 2021 when she opted to not just turn on Donald Trump in a public fashion — Cheney was always a Never Trumper; she just didn’t out herself as one until she thought the coast was clear — but to harp on the question.

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Black Mom Called ‘Token’ by Florida School Board Member Plans to Sue

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A black conservative mom called a “token person” by a Florida school board member plans to take legal action, according to documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Elizabeth Andersen, a Duval County School Board member, called Tia Bess, a black woman and member of Moms For Liberty, a group that advocates for parental rights in education, a “token person” when referring to how the group promotes Bess and her disabled son, according to a clip of the now-deleted April 2022 video. Bess and her attorney, Nicholas Whitney, sent an Aug. 14 letter to Andersen requesting an apology and now plan to sue Andersen, according to documents obtained by the DCNF.

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Nearly 5 Million Illegal Aliens Have Entered America Illegally Since Biden Took Office

The Center Square

Since President Joe Biden took office and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas altered federal immigration policies, roughly 5 million people from over 150 countries have entered the U.S. illegally.

This includes 3.9 million who have been apprehended entering the U.S. illegally nationwide and 3.4 million at the southern border. It also includes a minimum of 900,000 gotaways, those who’ve intentionally entered the U.S. illegally and evaded law enforcement who haven’t made asylum or immigration claims. The number of gotaways is significantly higher than what is reported and believed to be well over 1 million, Border Patrol agents and law enforcement officials have told The Center Square.

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Expert Says Restaurants and Barber Shops Are the Real IRS Targets

Florida Capital Star Staff

Grover Norquist, founder of Americans for Tax Reform, said on Fox News Tuesday that the expanded Internal Revenue Service wouldn’t just go after billionaires and large corporations.

“They are targeting people that they keep telling us they think are – restaurants and barber shops and so on,” Norquist told “America Reports” guest host Gillian Turner. “That’s their target, and we know this because every single Democrat in the Senate voted against, to defeat an amendment which said this law will not allow any increase in audits on people making less than $400,000 a year.”

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