Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Defunds Medicaid-Covered Transgender Surgery

President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax and spending budget, lovingly dubbed the “one big, beautiful, bill,” strips Medicaid’s funding for transgender surgeries — a move that will impact a large portion of such procedures if it passes the Senate.

The reconciliation budget, which narrowly passed the House of Representatives early Thursday morning in a 215-214-1 vote, would have initially prohibited Medicaid from covering “gender transition procedures” for children, until a late Wednesday amendment struck the words “minors” and “under 18 years of age” from that section, the Independent reported.

Gender transition treatments that would no longer be covered include puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and surgeries.

A 2023 study by gynecologists from Columbia University and the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, revealed that a staggering 25 percent of so-called “gender-affirming” surgeries in the United States are covered by Medicaid.

Out of the 48,019 patients identified in the report who underwent such surgeries, over 12,000 were Medicaid recipients. (Read more from “Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Defunds Medicaid-Covered Transgender Surgery” HERE)

Photo credit: Flickr

Trump Forces Country’s President To Watch Video Of Leaders Calling For Genocide

By Daily Caller. President Donald Trump forced the President of the Republic of South Africa to watch videos of the country’s leaders calling for the genocide of white farmers during a meeting in the Oval Office on Wednesday.

South African president Cyril Ramaphosa visited Trump for a bilateral meeting as well as a private lunch. In the middle of their public conversation, Trump ordered his staff to dim the lights and play videos of “genocide in South Africa” for attendees of the meeting.

The video montage showed different clips of political leaders from the minority party in South Africa calling for killing the Boers — a term that means “farmers” and refers to white South Africans — and supporters chanting along. Another clip showed what Trump said were a thousand burial sites of deceased white farmers in South Africa and their families lining up to pay their respects. For most of the footage, Ramaphosa faced forward or glanced at Trump instead of looking at the screen, which was to his right.

“Burial sites. Right here. Burial sites. Over a thousand white farmers and those cars are lined up to pay love on a Sunday morning. Each one of those white things you see is a cross. And there is approximately a thousand of them. They are all white farmers, the family of white farmers. And those cars aren’t driving. They are stopped there to pay respects to their family member who was killed,” Trump said.

(Read more from “Trump Forces Country’s President To Watch Video Of Leaders Calling For Genocide” HERE)

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Trump Did Something That Left the South African President Aghast

By Townhall. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa’s meeting with President Donald Trump was tense. It wasn’t a screaming match. Mr. Ramaphosa was calm and collected, but Trump showed the African leader footage of farm attacks and leaders of opposition parties clamoring about killing white farmers.

Trump assured Ramaphosa that he wasn’t trying to make him look bad, but the South African leader was aghast. He did try to push back on the claims of white genocide, said his government is strongly opposed to any race-based violence, and attempted to clear the air about the new legislation that aims to strip land from farmers.

(Read more from “Trump Did Something That Left the South African President Aghast” HERE)

Southwest Surprises Customers With Strict New Policy — the First of Its Kind in the Industry

. . .Southwest Airlines is implementing a surprising new restriction on portable chargers to keep these notoriously incendiary devices from bursting into flame mid-flight.

Starting May 28, passengers will be required to keep their power banks in plain sight, making the budget carrier the first to roll out a policy of this kind.

“Using portable charging devices while stored in a bag or overhead bin will no longer be permitted,” a Southwest spokesperson told Business Insider. “Nothing is more important to Southwest than the safety of its customers and employees.”

The airlines will, however, allow passengers to keep the devices in their carry-on bags when not in use.

The logic is that the portable phone juicers run on lithium-ion batteries that can overheat and ignite, so keeping them in plain sight allows flight attendants to identify and extinguish the hazard before it’s too late.

“In the rare event a lithium battery overheats or catches fire, quick access is critical and keeping power banks in plain sight allows for faster intervention and helps protect everyone onboard,” a Southwest rep said, according to Fortune. (Read more from “Southwest Surprises Customers With Strict New Policy — the First of Its Kind in the Industry” HERE)

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First Black Member of Secret Service Finally Testifies to JFK Committee, Details Chicago Assassination Plot

The man John F. Kennedy called “the Jackie Robinson” of the Secret Service finally got to testify before a Congressional committee Tuesday — alleging fellow agents were often drunk on the job and there was a so-called “Chicago plot” to kill the president before his 1963 assassination in Dallas.

His head bowed, Abraham Bolden, 90, spoke with difficulty into a microphone when he addressed the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform by Zoom from his home in Chicago. The committee is probing the assassination of the president.

But the audio cut off immediately as Bolden began to speak, effectively muting his testimony on the live stream.

“On June 6, 1961, I walked into history,” said Bolden, according to a transcript obtained by The Post. “I was assigned to the White House detail in Washington, DC to assist in protecting the life of the president. And I never met a more human and fair-minded person than President Kennedy.”

The Trump administration released tens of thousands of previously classified documents with respect to the assassination of John F. Kennedy, his younger brother Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. (Read more from “First Black Member of Secret Service Finally Testifies to JFK Committee, Details Chicago Assassination Plot” HERE)

US Accepts $400M Jet From Qatar, Will Be Used as Trump’s Official Plane

The United States has accepted a 747 jetliner as a gift from Qatar and the Air Force has been asked to determine a way to rapidly upgrade it for use as a new Air Force One, US media outlets reported Wednesday.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth accepted the $400 million Boeing-made jet and has tasked the Air Force to figure out how to quickly upgrade it for use as President Trump’s official plane, according to the New York Times, which first reported the deal.

Legal experts have questioned the scope of laws relating to gifts from foreign governments that aim to thwart corruption and improper influence.

Democrats have also sought to block the handover. (Read more from “US Accepts $400M Jet From Qatar, Will Be Used as Trump’s Official Plane” HERE)

4 Common Handwashing Mistakes That Could Be Making Many Americans Sick

Proper handwashing could save a million lives a year, according to an expert — and yet many people are doing it improperly, often due to misconceptions surrounding the practice. . .

The NFID 2025 State of Handwashing Report, recently released by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, provides details on Americans’ handwashing habits (and mistakes). . .

1. Only using hand sanitizer

“We have to recognize that there are a number of important infections that hand sanitizers are not effective at preventing,” Hopkins said.

2. Just coughing into your sleeve

When people cough or sneeze into their sleeve, they could still spread germs afterward.

“If you cough into your sleeve … go ahead and wash your hands with soap and water as well,” Hopkins advised. (Read more from “4 Common Handwashing Mistakes That Could Be Making Many Americans Sick” HERE)

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US Military Man Accused of Fake Bomb Threat Against Hawaiian Airlines Flight

A Hawaiian Airlines flight from San Diego to Honolulu was stopped after a U.S. military service member said the person next to him had a bomb, police said.

The pilots of Hawaiian Airlines flight 15 had pulled away from the gate Tuesday and were getting ready to depart when passenger John Stea, 35, told a flight attendant that a passenger next to him had a bomb, the Port of San Diego Harbor Police Department said.

The port police, San Diego Fire Department personnel and federal agencies came and searched the aircraft, but turned up nothing. Everyone on board had to deplane, and specialized service dogs cleared all carry-on and checked baggage, port police said.

Police identified Mr. Stea as a member of the military but did not specify the branch to which he belongs. He is an electronics technician 1st class with the Navy, according to NBC News.

Mr. Stea faces charges of making a false bomb threat and false report of a security threat. (Read more from “US Military Man Accused of Fake Bomb Threat Against Hawaiian Airlines Flight” HERE)

Leftists Cry ‘Islamophobia’ as France Looks to Ban Veiling of Girls Over Muslim Brotherhood Sharia Plot

French President Emmanuel Macron’s political party has called for a ban on young girls wearing Islamic veils in public and a new law against “Islamist entryism” after a bombshell government report found that the Muslim Brotherhood has waged a multi-generational campaign to infiltrate institutions and control Islamic communities in service of instituing Sharia law to the West.

Former French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, who leads President Macron’s Renaissance party in the National Assembly, proposed on Wednesday that the ban on wearing veils in public be extended to girls under the age of 15. France became the first European country to impose such a ban for adults in 2011.

However, Attal argued that the government must go further in the wake of the publication of a government report, which found that the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood has sought for at least seven decades to subvert France and other European nations through clandestinely entering institutions and taking control over various facets of Muslim communities to promote Sharia practices to Islamise the West.

According to the report, the movement has seized upon supposed social justice campaigns through its various Muslim association proxies against “Islamophobia” — a term coined by the Muslim Brotherhood — and the veil ban to create a veneer of legitimacy in public discourse and to rally Muslim communities to their cause.

Meanwhile, local arms of the Brotherhood, in which trained Islamist activists are installed as managers at community shops, sports groups, private education, financial services, dating sites and elsewhere, have been established to control all aspects of life within Islamic communities and enforce strict Muslim practices, such as forcing the veil on women and girls. (Read more from “Leftists Cry ‘Islamophobia’ as France Looks to Ban Veiling of Girls Over Muslim Brotherhood Sharia Plot” HERE)

Elon Musk Fires Back at ‘Huge Liar’ Bill Gates: ‘I Wouldn’t Want That Guy to Babysit My Kid’

In a scathing attack, Tesla CEO Elon Musk lashed out at Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, bringing up his ties to infamous sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Musk was responding to Gates’ attack over cuts to USAID led by the SpaceX owner’s DOGE.

Mediaite reports that the feud between tech billionaires Elon Musk and Bill Gates escalated to new heights on Tuesday, with Musk delivering a blistering critique of Gates during an appearance at the Qatar Economic Forum. Speaking via satellite with BBC journalist Mishal Husain, the Tesla boss did not mince words when responding to recent criticisms leveled at him by Gates.

The contention between the two moguls stems from Gates’ comments in a CNN interview, where he blasted Musk’s gutting of USAID, claiming it would lead to “millions of deaths.” Musk fired back, calling Gates a “huge liar” and stating, “That’s terrible.”

However, Musk didn’t stop there. He proceeded to take a personal shot at the Microsoft co-founder, referencing Gates’ controversial association with infamous sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. “Who does Bill Gates think he is to make comments about the welfare of children given that he was close friends with Jeffrey Epstein?” Musk questioned, adding, “I wouldn’t want that guy to babysit my kid, I can tell you that.”

The scathing remarks from Musk are the latest development in an increasingly bitter public rivalry between the two tech titans. Previously, the Microsoft billionaire had criticized Musk in a discussion with the Financial Times, painting a grim picture of “the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children.” Gates also described Musk’s support of conservative politicians in America and sovereigntist parties in Europe as “insane shit.” (Read more from “Elon Musk Fires Back at ‘Huge Liar’ Bill Gates: ‘I Wouldn’t Want That Guy to Babysit My Kid’” HERE)

Activists Deface Iconic National Park

A group of transgender activists raised a transgender pride flag Tuesday on the rock formation El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, California on Tuesday, according to a press release obtained by the Daily Caller.

The pride flag, at 55 feet by 35 feet, was the largest flag to be flown over the iconic rock formation, the project, called “Trans is Natural,” said. The action was done as an “act of solidarity” by a group of “transgender, queer, and ally climbers.”

A video published by a self-identified “environmentalist & drag artist” who goes by the name Pattie Gonia shows a group of rock climbers bringing the transgender pride flag up El Capitan and unfurling it over a crevice in the formation.

“Some carry hate; we carry the largest trans pride flag ever flown in a national park and unfurled it on the side of El Cap to prove a point,” Gonia says in the video while wearing a drag costume of a park ranger with the word “Gay” on the name tag.

Gonia explained the purpose of the demonstration was to show that “trans is natural.” (Read more from “Activists Deface Iconic National Park” HERE)