Biden wants to put a gloss on his foreign policy failures — these failures included



President Joe Biden, apparently keen to rewrite history before fading into it, will reportedly seize on the opportunity Monday to once again characterize his disastrous presidency and foreign policy blunders as successes.

According to the the Associated Press, the deeply unpopular 82-year-old Democrat is expected to claim in his capstone address regarding his foreign policy legacy that he and his administration restored American credibility on the world stage and strengthened critical alliances supposedly strained by his predecessor's prioritization of American citizens. Biden is reportedly also planning to suggest that he provided the world with a "steady hand" during his four scandal-plagued years in office.

Biden's Monday speech at the State Department's headquarters will bookend his first major foreign policy speech on-site where he suggested on Feb. 4, 2021, both that "the muscle of democratic alliances ... have atrophied over the past few years of neglect and, I would argue, abuse" and that the U.S. under President-elect Donald Trump had ceased to stand "shoulder-to-shoulder with our allies and key partners."

In addition to promising to advance the security of the American people ahead of letting well over 10 million foreign nationals steal into the homeland, Biden said that he would be effective in dealing with Russia and counter communist China's "aggressive, coercive action," as well as end the war in Yemen, which is covered in the Obama administration's fingerprints.

Biden, Democratic lawmakers, and their devotees in the liberal media emphasized at the outset of his presidency that the "adults [we]re back in charge," President-elect Donald Trump serving as the point of comparison.

Trump, embracing Ronald Reagan's "peace through strength" approach in his first term, previously

  • brokered the formal normalization of diplomatic relations between various Arab states and Israel;
  • made good on past administrations' promises to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem;
  • whacked Iranian Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani and ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi;
  • signed an executive order temporarily banning nationals from six Islamic terrorism hotbeds from traveling to the U.S.;
  • pressured NATO allies to meet their financial obligations in the way of defense spending;
  • put North Korea’s Kim Jong-un on notice with the threat of "fire and fury like the world has never seen";
  • negotiated a new trade agreement with South Korea and an updated version of NAFTA with Canada and Mexico;
  • withdrew from the 2015 Paris climate accord and United Nations Human Rights Council;
  • largely defeated ISIS in Syria;
  • pulled out of the Iran nuclear agreement;
  • reoriented the U.S. national security apparatus from a Middle Eastern focus to instead a focus on competing with communist China;
  • levied tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Chinese goods;
  • re-established the Quad partnership with Australia, India, and Japan; and
  • managed various other foreign policy successes, including breaking from his predecessor's longstanding custom of starting a new war.

With his alternatively "steady hands" on the reins, Biden steered Americans into danger and American foreign policy through embarrassment after embarrassment.

For instance, Biden botched the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. Amid the confused exit during which the U.S.-backed Afghan government imploded, an Islamic terrorist — who reportedly had been released amid the chaos just days earlier from the Parwan prison at Bagram Air Base — detonated a suicide bomb on Aug. 26, 2021, at Abbey Gate, the last route open for Afghans into the Hamid Karzai International Airport, killing 11 U.S. Marines, a soldier, a sailor, and hundreds of Afghans, and leaving 45 other U.S. service members wounded.

Beside endangering service members and leaving multitudes of Americans behind, Biden also left the Taliban with over $7 billion worth of military equipment.

One intelligence assessment estimated that among the hardware left behind for the Islamic extremist regime were 2,000 armored vehicles and 40 aircraft, including UH-60 Black Hawks, scout attack helicopters, and ScanEagle military drones.

Biden proved unable or unwilling to extend a steady hand to the hundreds of thousands of Christian Armenians of the former Republic of Artsakh, also known as Nagorno-Karabakh, who were violently displaced in recent years by the Islamic Azerbaijani regime.

Azerbaijan, which the Biden administration has provided with military assistance despite its alleged war crimes and torture of Armenian prisoners, launched a blitzkrieg on the Armenian enclave in September 2023, killing hundreds of people, destroying churches, and forcing the Christian population to flee, in many cases on foot.

The apparent ethnic cleansing took place within days of a State Department official suggesting that the U.S. would not "countenance any action or effort, short-term or long-term, to ethnically cleanse or commit other atrocities against the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh."

'The United States is in a worse geopolitical position today than it was four years ago.'

Azerbaijan was not the first aggressor nation to realize that Biden was big on talk and light on action.

Despite Biden's "steady hand" and foreknowledge of an imminent "incursion," Russia invaded Ukraine under the Democratic president's watch, this time on a scale far exceeding its previous invasion of Crimea during the Obama-Biden years. Biden has slapped Russia with numerous sanctions, poured over $175 billion into the occupied nation, and risked a direct shooting war with Russia by authorizing Ukraine's use of long-range American missiles, yet an armistice in the region remains out of his reach.

During a press conference ahead of the invasion where Biden suggested that Russian President Vladimir Putin "does not want any full-blown war," the Democratic president stressed that Putin "is trying to find his place in the world between China and the West." It appears that with the Biden administration's persistent nudging, Putin has found a close friend in communist China — constituting another major foreign policy blunder.

Brahma Chellaney, professor emeritus of strategic studies at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, noted last year that:

It is U.S. President Joe Biden's foreign policy that has helped turn two natural competitors into strategic collaborators. A forward-looking approach would have avoided confronting Russia and China simultaneously, lest it drive the two nuclear-armed powers into an unholy alliance. But Biden has managed to lock horns with both Moscow and Beijing simultaneously, though it should be noted that his China policy is comparatively softer and more conciliatory.

Like other critics, Chellaney noted that U.S. sanctions on Russia have effectively transformed Beijing into Moscow's banker and more than doubled trade between the two nations.

Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi said in October 2024 that Beijing's relationship with Moscow would be strengthened in the coming months, as Russian gas exports to China continue to surge and the BRICs organization continues to grow in strength relative to American-led economic organizations.

Just a year into Biden's presidency, Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) noted that "the president's weakness on the world stage has only emboldened our adversaries to become more aggressive in their rhetoric and their actions."

Over the past four years, China, America's preeminent adversary, has ramped up its attacks on American cyber infrastructure and sovereignty, evidently thinking little of Biden and his occasional tough talk.

The Wall Street Journal revealed in September, for instance, that the Chinese state-sponsored hacking group Salt Typhoon compromised at least eight American telecommunications companies, including AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the FBI said in a joint statement, "We have identified that PRC-affiliated actors have compromised networks at multiple telecommunications companies to enable the theft of customer call records data, the compromise of private communications of a limited number of individuals who are primarily involved in government or political activity, and the copying of certain information that was subject to U.S. law enforcement requests pursuant to court orders."

Chinese hackers with ties to the communist government also stole at least 60,000 emails from State Department accounts during Biden's tenure; gained access to the computer networks of a major American transportation hub; and compromised Treasury Department computers.

Brushing Biden's "steady hand" aside, Beijing has also sent spy craft over the mainland U.S.; operated illegal police stations on American soil; threatened diplomats; and dispatched agents to execute espionage and political destabilization missions.

"The United States is in a worse geopolitical position today than it was four years ago," Stephen Wertheim, a historian and senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, recently told CBS News. "The United States is immersed in a massive war on the European continent with serious escalation risks; it's back to bombing the Middle East with no end in sight; and it has entered into a full-spectrum strategic rivalry with China."

"The United States cannot expect to prioritize China while remaining the leading military power in Europe and the Middle East. If the United States truly wants to prioritize China, it needs to pull back elsewhere," added Wertheim.

Biden told USA Today in an interview last week, "I hope that history says that I came in and I had a plan how to restore the economy and reestablish America's leadership in the world."

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Democratic strategist begs Kamala Harris not to run again



Kamala Harris' first attempt to secure the White House was a colossal failure. While struggling to break out of the single digits in early state polls, Harris learned that a majority of Democrats in her home state of California wanted her to call it quits. She obliged them in December 2019. Years later, she supplanted the candidate who single-handedly salvaged her career only to suffer an even more humiliating defeat, burning through over $1.5 billion for the privilege of losing in the Electoral College by a landslide.

Apparently, the 60-year-old leftist thinks the next time might be different and has signaled an interest in trying again. On Tuesday, Democratic strategist Theryn Bond begged the vice president to throw in the towel on her presidential ambitions.

Last week, a Morning Consult survey indicated that 43% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents would now vote for Harris in a presidential primary of the kind effectively voided by the party earlier this year. A recent Echelon Insights snap poll indicated that 41% of respondents would vote for Harris in a Democratic primary held today.

'Please don't.'

Politico reported Monday that Harris, likely aware that a great many Democrats are willing to overlook her repeated failures, "has been instructing advisers and allies to keep her options open — whether for a possible 2028 presidential run, or even to run for governor in her home state of California in two years."

Harris has repeatedly told reporters, "I am staying in the fight."

Five individuals in the vice president's inner circle who spoke to Politico on the condition of anonymity suggested that Harris will think over her political options with family members over the Christmas season.

On Tuesday, within hours of Democrats releasing a bizarre and widely ridiculed video of Harris, Theryn Bond urged the vice president on Newsmax's "National Report" "not to run again in 2028. Please don't."

'If they're dumb enough to run her again, I can't wait.'

"I can't really speak for governor of California. Californians seem to support her significantly. We haven't yet been able to measure what that support looks like after this current run she just had," said Bond.

The Democratic strategist suggested that a gubernatorial bid might "make sense for her to consider, but another shot at the presidency — I hope she doesn't. And if she is relying on those same advisers that advised her this cycle, that's not who I would listen to."

Conservative political strategist Luke Ball largely agreed with Bond's assessment, noting that in California, Harris would have "high name ID, but if she ran anywhere else in the country, I don't think she'd be able to get elected to dog catcher."

Conservative filmmaker Robby Starbuck noted, "Wow. This Echelon poll asked Democrats who they'd vote for in the 2028 Presidential primary and 41% said Kamala Harris. If they're dumb enough to run her again, I can't wait."

Conservative commentator Michael Knowles said that Harris, "who lost in a massive landslide, who allowed the Republican to win the popular vote for the first time in 20 years — the Republican who we had all been told was Hitler incarnate, who was running for an implausible nonconsecutive second term — that woman wants to run again in 2028? I strongly encourage this. I might donate to the Kamala primary campaign."

A Democratic strategist granted anonymity by Politico said, "I can't conceivably imagine the party turning to her a second time."

Speculation now abounds about the possibility that another failed Democratic presidential candidate might try her luck again in 2028.

After the the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported Wednesday that Bill and Hillary Clinton will give speeches in Little Rock in December to help mark the Clinton Presidential Center's 20th anniversary, senior Trump adviser Jason Miller responded, "SHE'S RUNNING!"

"Just when I thought I couldn't be more thankful," tweeted Donald Trump Jr.

Elon Musk replied to the prospect of a third Clinton campaign with a laughing emoji.

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Democrats blame Harris' colossal failure on the man they kicked to the curb



After Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election, she and her allies refused to accept responsibility and instead blamed former FBI director James Comey, Russian President Vladimir Putin, former President Barack Obama, Wikileaks, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), supposed sexism, and, of course, "millions of white people."

Having just lost the 2024 election to President Donald Trump by an even greater margin, Kamala Harris, her campaign, and allied Democrats are similarly looking for someone or something else to blame.

Rather than admit that Harris ran a bad campaign with a weak and amorphous message or acknowledge that her radicalism, lack of transparency, alienation of key voter blocs, difficulties communicating, disenfranchisement of Democratic primary voters, prioritization of vibes over policy, complicity in Biden's failures, and collusion with a dishonest media likely turned off voters — or that Trump simply made the better pitch to Americans — they have instead settled on a scapegoat: President Joe Biden, the man they spent years pretending was fit for office then unceremoniously kicked to the curb.

CNN's senior White House correspondent Min Jung Lee told Wolf Blitzer Wednesday, "Obviously there will be a lot of soul-searching and a lot of questions in the coming days about what, if anything, could Democrats and the Harris campaign have done differently. One thing we are clearly already starting to see take place is finger-pointing and the blame game, and a lot of that is going to be directed at President Biden."

'The biggest onus of this loss is on President Biden.'

Lee added that the efforts to blame Biden are "even coming from some folks inside of the Harris campaign. One senior official I just talked to said, 'Biden will hold a lot of blame for it,' and frankly, they said, 'He should.'"

Before deleting his X account Wednesday, David Plouffe, senior adviser to the Harris campaign, insinuated that Biden left Harris in a lurch, writing, "We dug out of a deep hole but not enough. A devastating loss."

Biden — who consistently polled better than Harris — did the vice president no favors by calling millions of Trump supporters "garbage," letting the vice president humiliate herself during Hurricane Helene, and donning a Trump 2024 hat after a 9/11 memorial in Pennsylvania. However, Harris' allies appear to be primarily upset over Biden's decision to run in the first place, having signaled years earlier he would only serve one term.

Several high-ranking Democrats, including three Harris campaign advisers, told the Associated Press that Biden should have thrown in the towel earlier.

Those complaining on the condition of anonymity apparently believe that had Biden not waited until his ejection from the race through what some have called a "coup," Harris or some other Democratic candidate would have been afforded more than 107 days to fabricate a winning personality and agenda.

"The biggest onus of this loss is on President Biden," said failed Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, who endorsed Harris. "If he had stepped down in January instead of July, we may be in a very different place."

Matt Bennett, executive vice president of the Democrat-supporting think tank Third Way, said, "Harris was dealt a really bad hand. Some of it was Biden's making and some maybe not."

"He shouldn't have run," Jim Manley, top aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, told Politico. "This is not time to pull punches or be concerned about anyone's feelings. He and his staff have done an enormous amount of damage to this country."

Democratic strategist Mark Longabaugh similarly suggested that "Biden should have stepped aside earlier and let the party put together a longer game plan."

Democrats appear reluctant to blame Rep. Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), Sen. Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), and the other Democrats who ostensibly forced Harris' more popular boss out of the race.

Biden reportedly called Trump Wednesday to congratulate him on his historic victory and invited him to the White House.

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Internet helps Politico with its amnesia after it claims Vance is trying to 'tether' Biden to Harris



The liberal media has worked hard in recent weeks to help Democratic operatives rehabilitate Kamala Harris' public image. Essential to that effort has been her characterization as competent and capable — a task made all the more difficult by her track record as vice president and border czar over the past three years.

Establishmentarians' desperation to gloss over Harris' complicity in President Joe Biden's various failings and unpopular initiatives was crystallized in a Politico article this week, titled, "'Our corrupt leadership': Vance tries to tether Harris to Biden during Michigan rally."

Critics rushed to note that Vance doesn't have to do what Harris has already done — that there is a hyphen in "Biden-Harris administration" that both serves as a tether and cuts through the absurdity of Politico's framing.

All administration officials refer to the 'Biden-Harris administration' instead of the easier-to-say 'Biden administration.'

In fact, Politico has previously emphasized the existence of this hyphen.

Politico reported in early 2021 that:

For personnel announcements during the transition, officials were told to include quotes from both Biden and Harris. And all administration officials refer to the 'Biden-Harris administration' instead of the easier-to-say 'Biden administration.'

Various federal agencies followed suit, all making sure to tether Harris to Biden. Again, according to Politico, the "Education Department was referring to the 'Biden-Harris administration' on its website from Day 1, with the Treasury Department and the Office of Personnel Management following suit on Jan. 25."

Harris has effectively been tethered to Biden since 2020.

'Fast food industry tries to tie Ronald McDonald to McDonalds.'

Harris' previous presidential campaign was a complete failure — so much so, she didn't even make it to the first vote. The New York Times indicated ahead of the campaign's collapse that Harris "has proved to be an uneven campaigner who changes her message and tactics to little effect and has a staff torn into factions."

After August 2019, when she was briefly polling around 10%, she took a massive nosedive in the polls and never recovered. Shortly after a poll revealed that a majority of Democrats in her own state of California wanted her to call it quits, she did so, bailing out in December 2019.

Biden apparently took pity on Harris, telling reporters, "I have mixed emotions about [her exit]," and calling her a "first-rate candidate." Ultimately, Biden permitted Harris to tether herself to him and together they proceeded to take power.

In the years since, Harris has routinely cosigned Biden's policy initiatives and decisions, including the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, which Harris has boasted signing off on.

Despite Harris' history of working hand in glove with Biden, Politico reported Tuesday, "Former President Donald Trump's running mate tried to tie Harris to the Biden administration's policies — saying at one point that 'Kamala Harris has been calling the shots' — while also warning of China's emergence as an economic superpower that's taking jobs away from the U.S."

Politico's controversial suggestion that Vance is unfairly insinuating a link between Harris and Biden has been met with widespread ridicule as well as a community note on X.

Vance responded to the article on X, tweeting, "The thing is: she's Biden's Vice President."

Former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) posted an image of the Biden-Harris 2024 logo, noting it was "their campaign logo up and until a few weeks ago."

Blaze News social media specialist Ben McDonald quipped, "Fast food industry tries to tie Ronald McDonald to McDonalds."

"I knew the corporate press was shameless but I didn't realize that they were this stupid," wrote anarcho-capitalist author Michael Malice.

Amid the backlash, Politico stealthily changed the title of its article without an editor's note admitting the alteration. At the time of publication, the article was titled, "Vance warns of China’s influence during Michigan rally."

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Biden-appointed Secret Service director won't step down after Trump shooting



DEI and ensuring that women make up at least 30% of the department may be among the U.S. Secret Service's top priorities, but its core function is still ostensibly to "ensure the safety and security of [its] protectees, key locations, and events of national significance."

Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, 53, acknowledged in an interview Monday that her agency failed to execute this core function at the Trump rally over the weekend — where the former president was grazed by one of a hail of bullets and a beloved father of two was slain in the stands.

While Cheatle admitted failure and told ABC News that the "buck stops with me," the director revealed that her ownership of fault effectively means nothing.

Sources close to the Biden family recently told the New York Post that Cheatle, who previously served in the Secret Service for 27 years, then briefly ran global security for PepsiCo., secured the favor of Jill Biden and her advisers, including Anthony Bernal.

"Cheatle served on Dr. Biden's second lady detail and Anthony pushed for her," a Democratic insider told the Post. "Anthony has no national security or law enforcement experience. He should have no influence over the selection of the USSS director."

Another insider said, "I heard at the time [Cheatle] was being considered for director that Anthony had pushed her forward as an option."

"Anthony is obsessed with being DEI-compliant," a third source told the Post.

President Joe Biden appointed Cheatle to lead the agency in 2022.

'What I was seeing was DEI.'

Biden said at the time, "She is a distinguished law enforcement professional with exceptional leadership skills and was easily the best choice to lead the agency at a critical moment for the Secret Service. She has my complete trust, and I look forward to working with her."

It appears that Biden's confidence was again misplaced.

"It was a total security breakdown from start to finish," former FBI Assistant Director Chris Swecker told the Post. "From the total security plan for the rally to the reaction once the shots rang out."

"What I was seeing was DEI," continued Swecker. "The women I saw up there with the president — they looked like they were running in circles. One didn’t know how to holster, the other one didn’t seem to know what to do, and another one seemed not to be able to find her holster. DEI is one thing. Competence and effectiveness is another, and I saw DEI out there."

"It was obviously a situation that, as a Secret Service agent, no one ever wants to occur in their career," Cheatle told ABC News.

When asked who bore most responsibility for the security failure, Cheatle said, "What I would say is the Secret Service is responsible for the protection of the former president."

"The buck stops with me," continued Cheatle. "I am the director of the Secret Service, and I need to make sure that we are performing a review and that we are giving resources to our personnel as necessary."

"It was unacceptable, and it's something that shouldn't happen again," added Cheatle.

Despite admitting responsibility for this "unacceptable" failure, Cheatle said she does "plan to stay on" in her role.

Various lawmakers and officials have called on Cheatle to step down.

'There was a complete breakdown of communication all the way down the line.'

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), for instance, refrained from criticizing the agents on the ground who threw themselves on President Donald Trump when the bullets started flying but insisted that the "head of the Secret Service should resign over this."

Cruz also latched on to Cheatle's characterization of Trump simply as a "former president," noting Trump is "the first in modern history to run for president again, and he has been the focus of several prosecutions and controversies — understatement intentional."

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) told cable news, "There was a complete breakdown of communication all the way down the line, and so that starts at the top. The head of the Secret Service needs to go. That's obvious. But I doubt that will happen."

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) introduced the Secret Service Accountability Act Monday to hold Cheatle accountable "for the agency's incompetence and failure to protect President Trump during the Butler, Pennsylvania, campaign rally."

"Saturday's assassination attempt on President Trump's life was either intentional or the result of gross incompetence by the United States Secret Service," Boebert said in a statement. "Under Director Cheatle's failed leadership, the United States Secret Service has prioritized woke DEI policies over the core responsibilities of the Secret Service, including protecting our nation's leaders. This lack of leadership contributed to the first assassination attempt of a President in 43 years. Director Cheatle has got to go!"

The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability has asked Cheatle to provide information related to the incident, including:

  • a complete list of all law enforcement personnel with roles in protecting Trump at the rally;
  • all audio and video recordings in the possession of the Secret Service related to the rally;
  • all memos and or notices issued by Cheatle to Secret Service personnel regarding the assassination attempt; and
  • other intel and correspondences related to the rally and assassination attempt.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters days after Trump was shot on Cheatle's watch that he has "100% confidence in the director of the United States Secret Service."

Cheatle has in turn expressed her confidence in the security plan for the Secret Service at the Republican National Convention.

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Over $42 billion and 3 years later, Biden's rural high-speed internet plan hasn't connected a single home



President Joe Biden has a tendency to make grand promises he can't make good on.

For instance, ahead of the 2020 election, then-candidate Biden promised the American people in four debates and during his CNN town hall interview that he would build half a million new charging stations across the nation if elected.

After taking the White House, Biden reiterated his promise, stating in November 2021, "We're going to build out the first-ever national network of charging stations all across the country — over 500,000 of them."

Of the 1,200 billion taxpayer dollars blown on the Democratic infrastructure package supported by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), $7.5 billion was set aside to building Biden's promised EV stations.

As of last month, only eight stations had been constructed nationwide.

The Biden administration made another big pledge in 2021: Unserved Americans would soon have reliable high-speed internet. Like the electric vehicle charging stations, this connectivity has failed to materialize.

'We're barreling toward a broadband blunder.'

Brendan Carr, a Republican commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission, noted Friday, "In 2021, the Biden Administration got $42.45 billion from Congress to deploy high-speed Internet to millions of Americans. Years later, it has not connected even 1 person with those funds. In fact, it now says that no construction projects will even start until 2025 at earliest."

The Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program is a federal grant program administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration that supposedly "aims to get all Americans online by funding partnerships between states or territories, communities, and stakeholders to build infrastructure where we need it to and increase adoption of high-speed internet. BEAD prioritizes unserved locations that have no internet access or that only have access under 25/3 Mbps."

Grantees are supposed to receive taxpayer cash to "support broadband planning and related capacity efforts, from mapping, staffing state/territory broadband offices, to outreach and coordination with local communities."

"The Biden Admin's failure to turn even a single shovel's worth of dirt with this $42.45B is not just predictable, it was predicted," continued Carr, referencing an Aug. 18, 2022, letter from a number of U.S. senators, which indicated the initiative might be ill-fated.

The lawmakers noted that there were unnecessary burdens in the NTIA review process and that the Notice of Funding Opportunity process "creates a complex, nine-step, 'iterative' structure and review process that is likely to mire State broadband offices in excessive bureaucracy and delay connecting unserved and underserved Americans."

The Washington Times indicated that as of this month, only nine states and the District of Columbia had secured approval for the BEAD program.

Last year, Republican senators highlighted other issues with the Notice of Funding Opportunity for the BEAD program in a letter to U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Alan Davidson. They noted that it:

  • "actively discriminat[es] against workers in ways that could deny communities ... access to reliable broadband service";
  • it "gives favorable treatment to government-owned networks over private investment," thereby threatening to "divert program dollars to less capable providers — a real risk given municipal broadband's track record of costly failure";
  • "generally prohibits non-fiber projects from receiving BEAD funding despite Congress' technology neutral stance";
  • "falsely suggests that states and NTIA have the authority to regulate rates for broadband service"; and
  • diverts resources away to address the specter of climate change.

Carr added, "The Biden Administration's policy cuts make clear that we're barreling toward a broadband blunder. Rate regulation, thumb on the scale for government run networks, technology bias, union preferences plus many more problems = many of the broadband builders that would normally bid to do this work are not expressing interest in taking these dollars."

The commissioner made clear that the Biden administration has not only failed to deliver, but has kneecapped those who could — revoking "an award to Starlink that would have delivered high-speed Internet to 642K rural locations."

In August 2022, the FCC leadership reversed the agency's previous decision to provide an $885 million infrastructure award to Elon Musk's Starlink, which it had won at an FCC election in 2020.

Fox News Digital indicated that when pressed for comment, the White House wouldn't speak to the failure of the project but cited three states' receipt of federal funding for broadband projects, apparently under other initiatives.

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Oregon governor re-criminalizes drug possession, marking end of another fatal leftist experiment



Oregon's Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek ratified legislation Monday re-criminalizing the possession of small amounts of drugs, bringing a fatal leftist experiment to an end.

Narco state

In 2020, radicals in the Beaver State figured that the best way to tackle addiction and perceived "systems of oppression" would be to enable addicts to openly carry illicit drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamin without legal consequence.

This decriminalization initiative took on the form of Measure 110, which reclassified possession of a controlled substance in Schedule I-IV from a Class A misdemeanor to a Class E violation.

The Democratic Party of Oregon, Multnomah Democrats, several medical unions, the ACLU of Oregon, NAACP Portland, NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon, and various other leftist outfits championed the measure.

The Oregon Association Chiefs of Police, various recovery groups, the Oregon Catholic Conference, and the Washington County Republican Party were among those who understood the decriminalization scheme was a recipe for disaster, reported Ballotpedia.

Naomi Schaefer Riley, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, warned that "such measures lower the risk and the cost of doing business for drug dealers and increase the supply of these drugs on streets across the country. Drugs will be cheaper and easier to get for adults already suffering from untreated mental illness, poverty or abuse. And the effects will be felt most severely by children."

Washington County District Attorney Kevin Barton underscored, "This is a terrible idea. It's disconnected to what's best for Oregonians. It will lead to increased crime and increased drug use."

Measure 110 went to a vote in November 2020 and 58.5% of voters indicated they were on board.

Kassandra Frederique, the executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, touted the result as a "paradigm-shifting win and arguably the biggest blow to the war on drugs to date," adding, "Oregon showed the world that a more humane, compassionate approach is possible."

The law took effect in February 2021.

Fatal failure

It turns out normalizing the use of hard drugs was indeed "a terrible idea." After all, earlier this year, Gov. Kotek, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, and Multnomah County Chair Jessica Vega Pederson each declared a 90-day state of emergency to address the out-of-control overdoses in the state.

Newsweek reported that between 2020 and 2022, overdose deaths in Oregon skyrocketed by 75%. By way of comparison, overdose death increased by only 18% nationally during the same two-year stretch. Opioid overdoses in the Beaver State during this period increased by 101% and meth-involved overdoses increased by 112%.

Violent crime increased by 17% after Measure 110 passed, while public drug use and homeless camps full of junkies became ubiquitous.

Portland remains one of America's seedier cities, ranking 1 on Neighborhood Scout's crime index where 100 is safest.

To make matters worse, as drugs were freely flowing through the streets of Oregon and crime was on the rise, the state also saw one of the largest increases in homelessness in the nation. The Oregonian reported that between 2020 and 2022, the state saw an increase in its homeless population from 3,304 homeless persons to roughly 18,000.

The public quickly soured on the decriminalization scheme, with even radicals like Mayor Ted Wheeler of Portland seeking some return to sanity.

Correcting a 'huge mistake'

Kotek ratified House Bill 4002 on Monday, effectively reversing Measure 110.

Under the law, which had bipartisan support, a court can lock up an individual found in possession of illegal drugs for up to 180 days or sentence them to 18 months of probation. Jail sentences can be reduced "for any day the defendant is on release to a treatment program or previously served in-custody."

The law, which prevents courts from imposing fines or fees for a drug possession conviction, won't go into effect until Sept. 1.

The Statesman Journal reported that during testimony at the state legislature, the Oregon Public Defense Commission indicated it would have to hire 39 new full-time public defenders just to accommodate the glut of incoming suspects charged for drug offenses under the bill.

"We must acknowledge that Oregon's number of unrepresented persons will likely increase due to House Bill 4002," Kotek wrote in a letter to the speaker of the state House and the president of the state Senate.

While critical of Measure 110 and its fallout, Wheeler still appears unwilling to condemn the idea animating the decriminalization movement, telling the New York Times that "the state botched the implementation. ... To decriminalize the use of drugs before you actually had the treatment services in place was obviously a huge mistake."

"The truth is that addiction rates and overdose rates skyrocketed. I personally do not attribute all of that to the passage of Measure 110," added Wheeler. "It was very easy for the public to draw a line between the passage of Measure 110, the decriminalization of hard drugs, the increase in addiction and the increase in overdoses — and criminal activity associated with drugs."

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Biden's minions are sweating it ahead of the New Hampshire primary because he failed to register



President Joe Biden faces a number of significant obstacles going into the 2024 election besides his ostensible decrepitude. For starters, his disapproval rating remains in the high 50s; he has been trailing former President Donald Trump in the polls; and last month, Congress authorized an impeachment inquiry into his many alleged improprieties.

For these and other caltrops to trip him up at the ballot box, he first needs to be on the ballot — something he failed to do in New Hampshire.

With the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary fast approaching, Biden exponents in the state are frenetically trying to make sure enough of the geriatric president's remaining supporters add his name to their ballots. Failing that, the Democratic incumbent is set for yet another major embarrassment.

Strategic failure to file

Iowa and New Hampshire have historically kicked off the nomination process both for the GOP and the Democratic Party. However, Biden's pitiful performance in the 2020 New Hampshire Democratic primary, where he placed fifth, appears to have prompted the geriatric president and the Democratic National Committee to look for greener pastures. They decided to award the top spot in the 2024 primary calendar to South Carolina, a state where Biden had a 29-point win in the 2020 Democratic race but ultimately lost to Trump and would likely lose to Trump again.

The DNC scheduled the South Carolina primary to lead the party's nomination process on Feb. 3, expecting New Hampshire to follow days later, but the Granite State refused to accept the slight. After all, by virtue of its own laws, it couldn't.

New Hampshire passed legislation in 1975 requiring the state to hold its primary before any other comparable contest. Although the law and date could possibly be changed, Republicans in Concord and the secretary of state who sets the date are less than keen to help the Democrats overcome their internal struggles.

After a lengthy standoff with the state, Biden's handlers decided ultimately that he would not file in the state, which is now set to hold its Democratic primary on Jan. 23.

The write-in campaign

Since Biden's name will not be printed on the ballots in New Hampshire later this month, campaigners have been working ardently since October to prompt prospective voters to write in the president's name.

Politico indicated at the outset that veteran Democratic operatives and politicians, including strategist Jim Demers and former New Hampshire Democratic Party chairwoman Kathy Sullivan, were leading the charge on the write-in campaign. Their group filed last year as a political action committee under the name Granite State Write-In.

This so-called "grassroots" group stresses on its website that "it's important to show the world that thousands of New Hampshire voters are supporting President Joe Biden as he stands up for our freedoms, pushes back on the MAGA extremists, keeps us safe and strong around the world, and builds an economy that works for everyone."

Even though the decision not to file was ultimately Biden's, Granite State Write-In blamed "misguided DNC rules" for leaving his name off the ballot.

Struggling to save Biden from another embarrassment

A source familiar with Granite State Write-In's efforts, apparently executed on a tiny budget of $70,000, recently told the New York Post, "A write-in campaign like this is unprecedented and it's very difficult to do."

"There are definitely challenges," continued the source. "And there's no question that because [Biden's] not on the ballot, whatever number he gets at the polls will understate his actual support."

The Post reported that over 1,200 people have so far signed onto the "shoestring effort."

On the day of the primary, volunteers associated with the PAC will reportedly be present at the polls to tell Biden supporters what to do.

While Biden remains the front-runner ahead of the New Hampshire primary, Democratic challenger Rep. Dean Phillips (Minn.), who has focused his energies on the Granite State, has been gaining on him in recent weeks. According to the American Research Group's latest poll, Biden leads Phillips in the state 58% to 21%.

"A sitting American president chose to not be on the ballot in the first-in-the-nation primary state," Phillips told the Post in December. "I think it's a symptom of a much broader disease, and that is a lack of respect for voters all around the country, including here."

The RealClearPolling average for Biden's support nationwide in the 2024 Democratic primary is 68.9%. However, the Post noted that in New Hampshire, his support is presently only at 47.3%.

The difference between those polls and the ballot is that Biden's name won't be printed on the latter.

Perhaps looking to spare Biden another public fall, Massachusetts' Democratic Gov. Maura Healey, a New Hampshire native, tried to give Biden a boost in the Granite State this week. Healey held a call Thursday with leaders of the New Hampshire write-in campaign, encouraging Democratic voters to remember their deeply unpopular president at the polls, reported MassLive.com.

Time will tell if the last-minute scrambles by Healey or Granite State Write-In will pay off for the 81-year-old Democrat.

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Chicago's new leftist mayor sets record with lowest approval rating just six months into his term



Brandon Johnson has only been Chicago's mayor for six months, yet he has already managed to best former Democratic Mayor Lori Lightfoot at chasing away the approval of the electorate.

An Illinois Policy Institute poll conducted from Oct. 18 to 22 by the analytics outfit Echelon Insights found that only 28% of respondents approve of the job Johnson is doing as mayor — the lowest rating for a mayor at this point in the term in the city's modern history. As a point of reference, the same poll found that Lightfoot had a 28% approval rating ahead of her crushing electoral defeat in February.

While Johnson managed a lower approval rating with the Democratic-leaning cohort than Lightfoot in her final days as mayor, she still outdid him in terms of her disapproval rating with 66% to Johnson's 50%.

Johnson's approval rating among voters in the 18-29 age group was 32%. Among voters in the 40-49 age bracket, it was 24%.

While Johnson scored poorly on his handling of the issues across the board, there were three categories where the responses were especially condemning: 66% of respondents said they disapproved especially of his handling of crime and public safety; 63% disapproved of his handling of housing and homelessness; and 64% said they disapproved of his migrant management.

Whereas 59% of respondents noted on Feb. 23 that Chicago, which various big employers were fleeing, was generally headed in the wrong direction under Lightfoot, that number jumped to 65% in the Oct. 23 poll with Johnson in office. When asked whether they'd hightail it out of town if given the opportunity, 34% answered in the affirmative in February; 44% said yes on Oct. 23.

And 69% of respondents indicated that crime was Chicago's greatest issue, followed by high taxes, 31%, and homelessness, 20%.

Crime is out of control in America's most rat-infested city.

According to the Chicago Police Department, as of Nov. 12, there have been 552 murders; 1,848 criminal sexual assaults, up 2% over last year; 9,444 robberies, up 25%; 5,459 reports of aggravated battery, up 4%; 6,479 burglaries; 18,277 instances of theft, up 4%; 25,782 motor vehicle thefts, up 52%; and 2,198 shooting incidents.

The odds of becoming a victim of a violent crime and a property crime are 1 in 115 and 1 in 42, respectively, according to Neighborhood Scout.

While Cook County's jail population has seen its lowest number of inmates in over 40 years, total major crimes, of which there have been roughly 80,000 in 2023, are set to exceed 60% of what they were before the pandemic in 2019, reported Wirepoints.

Illinois Policy indicated that arrest rates fell to their lowest level in a decade in 2022, with less than 12% of all reported crimes resulting in an arrest. By way of comparison, in 2019, the arrest rate was 21.5%. Five years earlier, the rate was 28.9%. This trend appears to have continued well into Johnson's first term.

Newsweek reported that Johnson has argued that well-funded police forces and throwing criminals in jail won't make Chicago safer. Instead, the former teachers' union organizer thinks more money should be dumped into mental health care, schools, and affordable housing. Additionally, he has supported sending social workers and EMTs to respond to various 911 calls instead of cops.

The bodies on the streets are not all victims of Chicago's soaring violent crime. The city's homeless problem is also out of control.

A point-in-time count performed by the city earlier this year indicated that 5,149 individuals were living in homeless shelters; 990 were camped out on the streets.

The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless suggested in a recent report that as of 2021, there were nearly 70,000 people in the city "experiencing homelessness," indicating that number was likely to continue rising. Johnson acknowledged in October that the city's number of homeless was over 68,000.

Johnson's breakout plan to remedy the homeless issue was apparently to approve permanent tent cities and to appoint someone else to figure out a solution or, failing that, take the blame.

On Oct. 3, he signed an executive order to establish a chief homelessness officer so that the city "will have a critical point of contact to coordinate efforts and leverage the full force of government to provide shelter for all people."

The homeless include some of the over 18,500 illegal aliens who have come to the sanctuary city in recent months, costing taxpayers an estimated $255.7 million by Dec. 31, reported the Chicago Sun-Times.

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Biden gets booed in Maui — then makes matters worse by comparing devastating blazes that killed hundreds to nearly losing his Corvette in a fire



As historic wildfires raged across the Hawaiian island of Maui over the past two weeks, claiming hundreds of lives and scorching thousands of acres, President Joe Biden managed to take two vacations, padding his record of over 365 vacation days since taking office.

Facing significant pressure to do so — especially after an early refusal to comment on the disaster — he cut short his second vacation at a billionaire's mansion in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, and made his way to Maui on Monday.

His reception by some survivors of the wildfires was anything but warm.

The environmentally conscious president and his nearly 30-car motorcade went on a five-hour tour of Hawaii, passing disgruntled residents who jeered him, yelling, "Thanks for nothing!" and "Go home, Joe!"

Newsweek reported that other residents who confronted Biden along the way held signs that read "F*** Biden" and "Trump Won." Others held signs near Kapalua Airport, where the president touched down, that read, "It's too late."

The New York Post noted that there were additional signs amid the ash and ruin in Lahaina that said, "Action speaks louder than words" and "FJB," as well as "No comment," in reference to Biden's Aug. 13 refusal to address the tragedy while vacationing in Delaware.

After joking about the ground being hot and a cadaver dog's boots, Biden then delivered a speech in Lahaina in front of the devastated town's ancient banyan tree, which survived the worst of the fires.

While he remembered the name of the island this time around, the 80-year-old president mispronounced the names of multiple Hawaiian officials and called the disaster an "unimaginable travedy."

Biden later addressed another crowd at the Lahaina Civic Center, where he drew a parallel between the deadly inferno, which has reportedly claimed more than 480 lives, and the near-loss of his beloved '67 Corvette as the result of a kitchen fire.

"I don't want to compare difficulties, but we have a little sense, Jill and I, of what it's like to lose a home," said Biden. "Years ago — now 15 years ago — while I was in Washington doing 'Meet The Press.' It was a sunny Sunday, and lightning struck at home, on a little lake that's outside our home — not a lake, a pond."

"To make a long story short, I almost lost my wife, my '67 Corvette, and my cat," added Biden.

— (@)

A restaurant owner in Kihei, Maui, told the Daily Signal that Biden's comparison was "the most despicable thing this president has ever said," adding, "How do you compare almost losing your f****** Corvette to the children burned in their f****** homes, man?"

Kristen Goodwin, a former teacher on the island, similarly expressed contempt for Biden, noting, "I’m not voting for him again — that's for sure. I'll vote for Trump. I will never vote for him again."

Goodwin characterized Biden's visit as nothing more than a "photo op."

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