The WILDEST deep-state story the mainstream media won’t tell you



On paper, the U.S. Institute of Peace does exactly what its name suggests: It promotes peace and conflict resolution in global conflict zones.

But dig a little deeper into its operations, and it becomes clear that the quasi-governmental, quasi-private agency is a deep-state snake pit. According to newly appointed acting President Darren Beattie, the USIP pushed to restore the opium trade in Taliban-run Afghanistan, had former Taliban member Mohammad Halimi on its payroll, and attempted to destroy evidence during a chaotic takeover by the Department of Government Efficiency.

Beattie recently joined Glenn on “The Glenn Beck Program” to share the shocking details.

When the DOGE infiltrated the USIP in March of this year, the agency erupted into chaos.

“They barricaded themselves in the offices. They sabotaged the physical infrastructure of the building. There were reports of there being loaded guns within offices. There was one hostage situation where they held a security guard under basically kind of a false imprisonment-type situation,” says Beattie.

“In the course of all of that, they tried to delete a terabyte of data, of accounting information that would indicate what kind of stuff they were up to, what kind of people they were paying.”

Thankfully, the DOGE was still able to uncover a major scandal: “One of the people on their payroll was this curious figure who had a prominent role in the Taliban government,” says Beattie, referring to Halimi.

On top of that, the DOGE discovered that “that one of the U.S. Institute of Peace's main policy agendas was basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade had dissipated under Taliban leadership.”

“They had multiple reports coming out basically saying 'this is horrible that the opium trade has diminished under the Taliban. We need to find some way to restore it,'” says Beattie.

When ProPublica got hold of Halimi’s story, it published a twisted piece titled “DOGE Targeted Him on Social Media. Then the Taliban Took His Family,” in which authors Avi Asher-Schapiro and Christopher Bing argued that Halimi was an “exiled Afghan scholar” victimized by Elon Musk and the DOGE, alleging that the payments he received from USIP were for legitimate work.

“I'm not an expert on this particular person's history, but what's very clear is he was a former Taliban guy, and he was probably one of these people who was playing all sides,” says Beattie.

He points out that the USIP’s hostile behavior upon the DOGE’s arrival stands in stark contrast to ProPublica’s narrative. If the payments were legitimate and Halimi had nothing to hide, then why the scrambling to delete data?

“This is the real deep-state stuff that I think bothers people so much,” says Glenn. “We expect our CIA to do stuff … but when it's in the State Department, when every department is pushing out money to NGOs to overthrow governments and everything else, it's out of control.”

To hear more details from the story, watch the video above.

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Trump, Gold Star families commemorate Abbey Gate tragedy: 'One of the darkest days'



President Donald Trump honored the fallen soldiers from the Abbey Gate attack of 2021, commemorating their service and bravery alongside the Gold Star families.

On Monday, Trump signed a proclamation on the fourth anniversary of the attack when terrorists carried out a suicide bombing, killing 13 service members at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. The proclamation called the bombing "one of the darkest days in our Nation's history," arguing that former President Joe Biden's botched withdrawal from the region only "empowered" the terrorists to attack.

'One of the most shameful and heartbreaking moments in our Nation's collective memory.'

"As our Nation remembers this atrocious attack, we honor the memory of every brave warrior who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country," the proclamation reads.

"We join in grief with the families who senselessly lost a loved one, and we renew our solemn pledge to our 13 fallen patriots — we will never forget you; we will never forsake you; and your memory will live on forever."

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Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

The proclamation went on to criticize Biden's lack of leadership that led up to the attack. Biden first began to withdraw from Afghanistan in July 2021 but failed to alert Afghan National Defense and Security Forces, leaving many service members defenseless and empowering the Taliban to free "thousands of bloodthirsty terrorists and criminals" from Bagram prison.

One of those prisoners who was set free went on to detonate a suicide bomb at the airport in Kabul, killing 13 American service members, wounding 45, and injuring over 160 civilians. The tragedy led to one of Biden's most notorious political blunders when he checked his watch while the fallen soldiers were returned to American soil.

"In what will be remembered as one of the most shameful and heartbreaking moments in our Nation's collective memory, Joe Biden checked his watch — and time stood still — as a Sailor, Soldier, and 11 Marines returned home in flag-draped coffins, solemnly escorted by their brothers and sisters in arms."

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Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

"We're so proud of you. We're so proud of your loved ones for giving their lives for our country," Vice President JD Vance told Gold Star families in the Oval Office on Monday.

"The fact that the president of the United States lost your loved ones through incompetence but never acknowledged it ... we correct that wrong today."

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State Department isn't buying ProPublica's sob story about Taliban alumnus whose funding was exposed by DOGE



ProPublica — an investigative journalist outfit that has received donations from Laurene Powell Jobs and her leftist Emerson Collective, from George Soros' Foundation to Promote Open Society, and from Crankstart Foundation, Lincoln Project donor Michael Moritz's family foundation — ran a sob story on Friday about a so-called "Afghan scholar" whose receipt of American funds through the U.S. Institute of Peace was exposed earlier this year by the Department of Government Efficiency.

The liberal publication tried to paint former Taliban official Mohammad Qasem Halimi as a victim, the work he did as "routine" yet "ambiguous," DOGE's publicization of Halimi's financial link to the U.S. as irresponsible, and the DOGE worker who briefly controlled USIP as inept.

The game the establishment media is playing is 'an insult to our nation.'

ProPublica's concern-mongering has not found resonance at the Trump State Department, which is aware that Halimi was part of the regime that harbored the terrorists who attacked America on 9/11.

In a Monday statement to Rikki Ratliff-Fellman, executive producer for Glenn Beck, the department defended cutting off Halimi, reiterated that he was indeed a former Taliban member, and underscored that the game the establishment media is playing is "an insult to our nation."

Quick background

President Donald Trump issued an executive order on Feb. 19 aimed at reducing the scope of the federal bureaucracy.

Among the federal entities that the Trump administration subsequently worked to shutter or scale down was the USIP, a think tank with an apparent problem with political bias and a budget last year of $55 million.

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Taliban extremists in Kabul. Photo by WAKIL KOHSAR/AFP via Getty Images.

The Trump administration canned 10 voting members of the USIP board of directors along with the institute's president, former Clinton official George Moose; terminated nearly all of the institute's staff and activities around the world; had elements of the DOGE take over the institute's headquarters; and transferred USIP's property to the General Services Administration.

Fired members of the board sued on March 18 to prevent a housecleaning at the USIP, claiming the wind-down was a "lawless assault." Although an Obama judge declared in May that the changes at the federal entity were "null and void," the D.C. Court of Appeals stayed the lower court's ruling.

DOGE highlights Taliban link

Following its takeover of USIP headquarters and just hours after notifying Halimi of his contract's termination, the DOGE shared some of its findings in March 31 on X, noting, "USIP contracts (now cancelled) include: — $132,000 to Mohammad Qasem Halimi, an ex-Taliban member who was Afghanistan's former Chief of Protocol."

According to Halimi's bio on the Doha Forum site, "he is the former Minister of Hajj and Religious Affairs in Afghanistan" and "was assigned as a Deputy Justice Minister of Technical and Professional Affairs in 2017."

That bio omits any mention of Halimi's arrest and detention by American forces from 2002 to 2003 at Bagram Air Base or his time with the Taliban.

Deutsche Welle reported that Halimi went to work for the Taliban in 1998, working first in its foreign ministry, then becoming chief of protocol.

'This is real. We don't encounter that in most agencies.'

"I don't deny that I supported the Taliban," Halimi told DW. "I had a very good time in the Foreign Office. It was really the best time in my life. Back then, Afghanistan really needed the Taliban."

Halimi spoke glowingly about Mullah Mohammad Omar, the first leader of the Taliban who offered sanctuary to Islamic terrorist Osama bin Laden both before and after the 9/11 attacks, stating, "I cannot say it any differently today than I said it back then: Afghanistan needed Mullah Omar back then."

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Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images

Speaking to DW in 2017, Halimi stated, "To this day I still have friendly relations with the Taliban" — an organization Secretary of State Marco Rubio is looking at for a possible foreign terrorist organization designation.

Halimi reportedly switched sides after his release by American forces.

The USIP contract for this friend of the Taliban was mentioned again in an April 1 post on X, which was shared by Elon Musk and ultimately went massively viral.

The caption on the corresponding post read: "With help from the FBI and Metro Police DOGE was able to access the agency and discovered massive fraud, waste and abuse-including payments to Taliban and Iraq."

The following month, a DOGE staffer told "Jesse Watters Primetime" in a May 1 group interview, "We found that [USIP] were spending money on things like private jets, and they even had a $130,000 contract with a former member of the Taliban. This is real. We don't encounter that in most agencies."

Tears for the Taliban

According to ProPublica, Taliban security forces allegedly beat and temporarily imprisoned members of Halimi's family just days after news of his USIP funding was brought to light.

Blaze News has reached out to Afghanistan's Ministries of Interior Affairs and Foreign Affairs for comment.

While the alleged violence was perpetrated by Halimi's former comrades, the liberal publication characterized the Trump administration's public recognition of Halimi's Taliban link and exposure of his supposedly benign USIP contract as an "attack" — an attack that former State Department and White House officials supposedly said was "not only absurd, but also dangerous."

ProPublica, which downplayed Halimi's Taliban past and highlighted his work with the former Karzai government, complained that after this "attack," Halimi is now without work and "wonders how he will support his wife and children and whether there’s any chance he can clear his name."

'An overwhelming majority of Americans would agree that the Federal Government should not be funding former members of the Taliban when our country is $36T in debt.'

"Why would one of the richest men in the world commit such an act of injustice?" Halimi said to ProPublica. "Sometimes I think that if Elon Musk himself were fully informed about this matter, he would likely be deeply ashamed."

Whereas the liberal publication proved eager to portray the former Taliban official as a sympathetic character, the publication alternatively characterized Nate Cavanaugh — the former DOGE staffer who worked ardently to expose the rot at USIP, briefly served as its president, and canceled Halimi's contact — as a privileged incompetent.

The publication noted, for example, that Cavanaugh: is a "28-year-old college dropout"; "had nothing in his background to suggest he would be chosen to wind down an international conflict-resolution agency"; started two companies that haven't "successfully" taken off; and "comes from a wealthy family."

Cavanaugh — whom Blaze News has reached out to for comment — apparently made no apologies for carrying out the task President Donald Trump mandated him to do.

"An overwhelming majority of Americans would agree that the Federal Government should not be funding former members of the Taliban when our country is $36T in debt," said Cavanaugh.

Cavanaugh's successor similarly appears not to be panged by ProPublica's sympathies for the Taliban alumnus.

Darren Beattie, undersecretary for public diplomacy at the State Department and acting president of USIP, said in a statement to Ratliff-Fellman, "Under President Trump's February 19 Executive Order, the United States Institute of Peace was directed to reduce operations to its statutory minimum — ending, among other things, a contract with former Taliban member Mohammad Qasem Halimi."

"The idea of funding former Taliban members on one hand, and publicly lamenting the Taliban’s success in reducing Afghanistan’s opium production on the other, highlights the schizophrenic and dangerous approach to 'conflict resolution' adopted by USIPs previous leadership," continued Beattie. "The fact that the establishment media defends using taxpayer dollars this way is an insult to our nation and the heroes who have fought to protect it."

Beattie added, "Above all, this underscores President Trump’s resolve to end the weaponization of government, cut off funding to adversaries, and shut down reckless so-called peace-building programs that end up undermining our national security."

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Why the right turned anti-war — and should stay that way



After the COVID lockdowns, the Western global leadership class had little credibility left. So it seemed insane when they immediately pivoted to a new crisis — but that’s exactly what they did.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered demands from elites in Europe and America for NATO-aligned nations to involve themselves in the conflict. Many Republicans were initially on board, with Fox News and CNN marching in lockstep behind intervention. But the Republican base quickly soured on the war once it became clear that U.S. involvement didn’t serve American interests.

If the situation really is dire, let the Trump administration make its case to the people. Present the evidence. Debate it in Congress. Vote.

In a strange inversion, the right became anti-war while the left championed military escalation.

That reversal matters now, as some in the GOP look to drag the country into another long conflict. We should remember what Ukraine taught us.

When Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded, many conservatives instinctively aligned with Ukraine. The Soviet Union had been an evil empire and a clear enemy of the United States. It was easy to paint Russia as an extension of that threat. President Biden assured Americans that there would be no boots on the ground and that economic sanctions would cripple Russia quickly.

But the war dragged on. Hundreds of billions of dollars flowed to Ukraine while America entered a painful economic downturn. Conservatives began asking whether this was worth it.

Putin was no friend of the U.S., and conservatives had valid reasons to distrust him. But suddenly, anyone questioning the war effort was smeared as a Russian asset. Opposition to the war became an extension of the left’s deranged Russiagate conspiracy, which painted Donald Trump as a blackmailed Kremlin agent.

Some Republican politicians kept pushing the war. Fox News stayed hawkish. But much of the conservative commentariat broke ranks. They knew that the boys from Appalachia and Texas — exactly the kind of red-state Americans progressives despise — would again be asked to die for a war that served no clear national purpose.

From that disillusionment, conservatives drew hard-earned lessons.

They saw that U.S. leaders lie to sustain foreign conflicts. That politicians in both parties keep wars going because donors profit. That Fox News can become a mouthpiece for military escalation. That you can oppose a war without betraying your country. And that American troops and taxpayer dollars are not playthings for globalist fantasies.

“America First” began to mean something real: Peace through strength didn’t require constant intervention.

Unfortunately, many of those lessons evaporated after the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7.

That attack was horrific. No serious person denies the brutality of Hamas or questions Israel’s right to defend itself. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has treated the attack as a green light to target longtime adversaries, including Iran. As a sovereign nation, Israel can pursue its own foreign policy. But it cannot dictate foreign policy for the United States.

In 2002, Netanyahu testified before Congress that Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear weapons. He said toppling both the Iraqi and Iranian regimes would bring peace and stability. He was wrong.

He wasn’t alone, of course. Many were wrong about weapons of mass destruction and the Iraq War. But Netanyahu’s track record is highly relevant now. While conservatives once fervently supported the Iraq invasion after 9/11, many — including Tucker Carlson and Dinesh D’Souza — have since apologized. They admit they got it wrong.

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Blaze Media Illustration

Afghanistan, while flawed, had clearer justification. The Taliban had harbored Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. But the lies about weapons of mass destruction and failed nation-building in Iraq turned that war into a conservative regret.

In March, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard testified that Iran had not resumed efforts to build a nuclear weapon. Gabbard, like Trump allies Robert Kennedy Jr., Kash Patel, and Pete Hegseth, was chosen precisely for her skepticism of the intelligence bureaucracy. Trump remembers how his first term was sabotaged by insiders loyal to the status quo. This time, he selected appointees loyal to the voters.

Gabbard’s assessment contradicts Netanyahu, who claims Iran is months away from having a bomb. That’s a massive discrepancy. Either Iran hasn’t restarted its program, or it’s on the brink of building a nuke.

So which is it?

Did U.S. intelligence fail again? Did Gabbard lie to Congress and the public? Or did she simply say something the ruling class didn’t want to hear?

Trump, Gabbard, and Vice President JD Vance understand how Iraq went wrong. They know Americans deserve evidence before another war — especially one that risks dragging us into a region we’ve already failed to remake at great cost.

Yet the war hawks keep repeating the same lie: This time, it’ll be quick. The United States is too powerful, too advanced, too economically dominant. The enemy will fold by Christmas.

Biden said the same about Ukraine. And hundreds of billions later, we remain in a grinding proxy war with Russia.

Now, while still financing that war, Americans are told they must back a new war — this one initiated unilaterally by Israel. The U.S. faces domestic strife, crippling debt, and an ongoing open-border crisis. Involvement in yet another conflict makes no sense.

Israel may be right about Iran. Tehran may indeed have developed a nuclear program behind the world’s back. But if Israel wants to wage a war, it must do so on its own.

The Trump administration has made clear that it wasn’t involved in Israel’s pre-emptive strikes and didn’t approve them. If Israel starts a war, it should fight and win that war on its own. America should not be expected to absorb retaliation or commit troops to another Middle Eastern project.

These wars are never short, and they are always expensive.

Even if Iran’s regime collapses quickly, the aftermath would require a long, brutal occupation to prevent it from descending into chaos. Israel doesn’t have the capacity — let alone the political will — for that task. That burden would fall, again, to America.

So before conservatives fall for another round of WMD hysteria, they should recall what the last two wars taught them.

If the situation really is dire, let the Trump administration make its case to the people. Present the evidence. Debate it in Congress. Vote.

But don’t sleepwalk into another forever war.

Taliban Earning Billions, Giving American Weaponry to Terrorist Groups as Afghanistan Once Again Becomes Jihadi Hotbed: Report

The Taliban took in $3.4 billion in revenue over the last year, boosting its cash supply by 14 percent amid the return of Afghanistan as a central safe haven for terrorist organizations across the Middle East, according to a U.S. government watchdog group.

The post Taliban Earning Billions, Giving American Weaponry to Terrorist Groups as Afghanistan Once Again Becomes Jihadi Hotbed: Report appeared first on .

The Communist-Islamist Axis Rears Its Head in South Asia. Plus, Israel Plots Military Expansion in Gaza.

An unhappy marriage: Radical Islam and communism "are strange bedfellows," writes the Hudson Institute's Mike Watson. "Nonetheless, across much of Asia, an increasing number of countries are welcoming both," as this week's jihadist attack in Kashmir makes clear.

The post The Communist-Islamist Axis Rears Its Head in South Asia. Plus, Israel Plots Military Expansion in Gaza. appeared first on .

American Freed After Two Years in Taliban Custody, State Department Says

The Trump administration has secured the release of Taliban captive George Glezmann, an American citizen whom the Biden administration failed to designate as "wrongfully detained" for nearly a year, the State Department announced Thursday.

The post American Freed After Two Years in Taliban Custody, State Department Says appeared first on .

Biden Admin Quietly Spent $15 Mil To Distribute 'Contraceptives and Condoms' in Afghanistan—and Said Doing So Would Take 'Some Coordination' With Taliban

The Biden administration quietly awarded $15 million in taxpayer funds to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan to help distribute "oral contraceptives and condoms," a non-public congressional funding notice reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon shows. In doing so, the administration acknowledged that "some coordination" with the Taliban would be "necessary for programmatic purposes."

The post Biden Admin Quietly Spent $15 Mil To Distribute 'Contraceptives and Condoms' in Afghanistan—and Said Doing So Would Take 'Some Coordination' With Taliban appeared first on .

DNC Frontrunner Wanted Trump Charged With ‘Treason’—Which Carries the Death Penalty

One of the frontrunners to lead the Democratic National Committee once called for Donald Trump to be put on trial for treason and accused the Republican of causing the deaths of American soldiers, all based on an unfounded allegation that even the Biden administration disputed.

The post DNC Frontrunner Wanted Trump Charged With ‘Treason’—Which Carries the Death Penalty appeared first on .

EXCLUSIVE: Biden Tells Wife Of American Held By Taliban He Isn’t Bringing Her Husband Home

'Haunted by Afghanistan'