Conservatives Fear Arizona House Committee Shakeup Could Stymie Election Integrity Bills

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Arizona conservatives had much to celebrate after the dust finally settled on the 2024 election. Not only did voters deliver the Grand Canyon State’s 11 electoral votes to Donald Trump, but they also helped Republicans expand their slim legislative majorities, thus preventing Democrat Gov. Katie Hobbs and Arizona leftists from transforming the state into “California 2.0.”

Numerous policy issues are expected to be tackled during next year’s legislative session. It’s fixing the state’s broken elections system, however, that seems to be top of mind for many Republicans.

Last week, state and local GOP leaders held a call with Florida Secretary of State Cord Byrd to discuss ways Arizona can improve its ballot tabulation process and deliver timely results like the Sunshine State. Delayed production of election results has become a feature of Arizona elections in recent years. The state certified the results of its 2024 presidential election on Monday — almost three weeks after the Nov. 5 contest.

While supportive of attempts to adopt “Florida-style” elections, some Arizona conservatives who spoke with The Federalist expressed concern that a shakeup of the House of Representatives’ elections committee could hinder efforts to pass legislation integral to improving the state’s electoral system.

The list of House committees published last week by Speaker-elect Steve Montenegro revealed that the Municipal Oversight & Elections Committee is no more, with election-related matters now shoehorned into a committee alongside military affairs and federalism issues. State GOP Rep. Rachel Jones told The Federalist she’s worried that including the complex subject of elections into a committee with other important policy matters may jeopardize lawmakers and citizens’ ability to thoroughly screen bills coming through the body. (Read more from “Conservatives Fear Arizona House Committee Shakeup Could Stymie Election Integrity Bills” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Foreign Leader Pays Surprise Visit to President-Elect Trump at Mar-a-Lago Amid Tariff Threats

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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has flown to Florida to meet with President-elect Trump at his Mar-a-Lago club after Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian products.

A person familiar with the matter, according to the AP, said Trudeau will have dinner with Trump. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity. . .

The visit comes days after Trump threatened to impose 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico over failures by both nations to curb the flow of illegal immigrants and illicit drugs from those countries into the U.S.

Trudeau said earlier Friday that he would resolve the tariff issue by talking to Trump.

“We’re going to work together to meet some of the concerns,” he told reporters in Canada’s Prince Edward Island. “But ultimately it is through lots of real constructive conversations with President Trump that I am going to have, that will keep us moving forward on the right track for all Canadians.” (Read more from “Foreign Leader Pays Surprise Visit to President-Elect Trump at Mar-a-Lago Amid Tariff Threats” HERE)

Judge Allows State To Protect Children From Trans Mutilation

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On Monday a Missouri judge upheld a state law banning transgender child mutilation and chemical castration, as well as prohibiting Medicaid from covering these medical interventions.

In a 74-page ruling, Judge R. Craig Carter ruled that the law, passed in 2023, was constitutional in the face of a challenge from three teenagers who claim to be a gender different from their biological sex, some medical professionals, and gay lobbying groups:

Gender dysphoria is classified as a mental disorder. Generally, western medicine treats mental disorders by actually treating the mental aspect, like prescribing Zoloft to treat depression. However, the gender dysphoria treatment prohibited by Missouri uses drugs and surgeries to either inhibit normal healthy human growth or surgically remove and replace healthy human organs. Such an approach to treatment is well outside normal medicine, and medical ethicists are unable to agree on the propriety thereof.

Furthermore, the credible evidence shows that a vast majority of children who are diagnosed with gender dysphoria outgrow the condition. The Endocrine Society guidelines state that approximately 85% of gender dysphoria-diagnosed prepubertal children did not remain gender incongruent later in life. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual holds that around 98% of these children do not remain gender incongruent. Essentially, it seems that all of this untested, non-emergency, possibly unethical, possibly unnecessary care would be performed on children and adolescents when the vast majority of minors would simply outgrow the condition by the time they reach adulthood.

Carter also highlighted the experimental nature of the medical interventions, noting the “almost total lack of consensus as to the medical ethics” and a “disagreement as to whether adolescent gender dysphoria and surgical treatment was ethical at all.” (Read more from “Judge Allows State To Protect Children From Trans Mutilation” HERE)

Fauci Published A New Paper On COVID And No One Is Buying It

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Dr. Anthony Fauci recently published a new paper that touched on both HIV/AIDs and the COVID-19 pandemic — and in it, he not only doubled down on his insistence that COVID had a natural origin but also claimed that President-elect Donald Trump had suggested “bleach injection” as a possible treatment.

Jerry Dunleavy shared several excerpts of the paper via X, commenting, “Fauci is out with a new scientific paper on HIV/AIDS & COVID-19 where he falsely claims Trump told people to inject bleach & where he argues COVID-19 has a natural origin (Wuhan lab leak not even mentioned) by citing the same authors who wrote the infamous Proximal Origins paper.”

In the highlighted sections, Fauci wrote that “abundant evidence from top evolutionary virologists and leading scientists in other fields strongly suggests that the virus jumped species from an animal reservoir to humans at the Huanan Market in Wuhan, China, and then spread throughout China and the rest of the world.”

The former White House medical advisor added, “Trump gave credence to unproven and potentially dangerous substances for COVID-19 prevention and treatment such as bleach injection.” (Read more from “Fauci Published A New Paper On COVID And No One Is Buying It” HERE)

Rumors Explode About Ocasio Cortez Running for President in 2028

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. . .Now there’s talk floating around social media that the next Democrat woman candidate could be Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. . .

It was reported back in 2020 that her name was on a short list for a nomination – at some point. . .

In fact, a report in the Hill “named her as being seriously considered by Democrat strategists,” the report said.

“The left-leaning publication is reporting that not only is AOC a possible candidate, but that she’s becoming a moderate,” the report said.

In fact, the Hill said, “When Democrats talk about the future of the party, the 35-year-old New York congresswoman’s name always bubbles to the top. Democrats have long been impressed with Ocasio-Cortez’s ability to ‘cut through the BS and tell it like it is,’ the second Democratic strategist said. ‘She’s somebody who can cut through the noise and doesn’t talk like Washington.’ Democrats say Ocasio-Cortez would be a magnet for young voters…” (Read more from “Rumors Explode About Ocasio Cortez Running for President in 2028” HERE)

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Defeated Democrat Election Denier Claims Republicans ‘Rigged’ the Vote So He Would Lose

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Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio claimed he lost reelection because Republicans “rigged the system” during a heated interview on CNN Thursday.

Businessman Bernie Moreno defeated Brown, a three-term senator, Nov. 5 by a 50.2% to 46.6% margin. Brown alleged Republicans “rigged the system” after complaining about ads on transgender issues, including one featuring Vice President Kamala Harris which discussed how she pushed “behind the scenes” for transgender prisoners to receive sex changes while she was attorney general of California.

“They lie about it and they put — in this case, they — they spent $40 million on 8 different ads on that issue,” Brown argued, later adding. “They weren’t talking about how to make Ohio a better state. They’re not doing their job on education. They’re not doing their job on health care. They’re not doing their job on creating jobs.”

After CNN reporter Manu Raju pointed out the campaign was successful and Republicans won the election, Brown responded with his claims.

“Yeah, but they’re winning elections in part because they — they’ve rigged the system. They’ve made it harder to vote,” Brown asserted. “They’ve changed ballot language in a draconian, in a dramatic way with the last election. They did that with abortion rights. It didn’t work in that case.” (Read more from “Defeated Democrat Election Denier Claims Republicans ‘Rigged’ the Vote So He Would Lose” HERE)

Oil For Deportation Flights? Trump Reportedly Pushed To Make Deal With Dictator

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President-elect Donald Trump is reportedly being urged to ease economic pressure on Venezuela in exchange for their government helping him achieve his mass deportation objectives.

U.S. oil executives and other businessmen close to Trump are pushing him to forgo his first-term policy of intense pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in return for fewer illegal migrants in the U.S., according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Such a deal is reportedly welcome within Maduro’s inner circle, with his government believing they can help Trump achieve his policy goals by supplying the U.S. with their oil in exchange for resuming deportation flights.

Under the Biden administration, federal immigration authorities and major cities across the country have experienced an unprecedented illegal immigration crisis. Management of this crisis was made more difficult when Venezuela, a major source of illegal immigration, stopped accepting deportation flights in February.

Nearly 8 million Venezuelans have fled the country under Maduro, a leftist authoritarian who has overseen rampant inflation, economic turmoil and political repression. Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan nationals have since flocked to the U.S., largely by unlawfully crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, Customs and Border Protection data show. (Read more from “Oil For Deportation Flights? Trump Reportedly Pushed To Make Deal With Dictator” HERE)

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White House Morale Reportedly In Shambles Due To Biden Stiffing Staffers On Photo Ops

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Morale around the White House is low as staffers complain they won’t get the traditional parting gift of a photo with the president, according to Politico Playbook.

It is tradition in the Biden White House that staffers, once they decide to leave the administration, get a photo with the president as a thank you for their contribution, Politico Playbook reported. But as the president has cancelled the photos for the last few months, staffers are now concerned they might not get the coveted shot despite recent changes, according to the outlet.

The Office of Management and Administration’s employee engagement team recently notified staff that they would be getting a photo on a rolling basis sometime over the next two months, but no additional guests will be allowed in the shot, according to an email obtained by Politico Playbook. This caveat upset staffers, the outlet reported, because family of staffers have typically been invited and would fly down for the occasion and a few minutes with the president.

“Instead of everyone being annoyed by no departure photos, now it’s only half of the people who are annoyed,” one current administration official told Politico Playbook. (Read more from “White House Morale Reportedly In Shambles Due To Biden Stiffing Staffers On Photo Ops” HERE)

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Military Base Offers $15,000 Reward for Information on Stolen M17 Pistols

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Authorities at Fort Moore, a U.S. Army base in Georgia formerly known as Fort Benning, are offering a $15,000 reward for information leading to the recovery of more than 30 missing M17 pistols, believed to have been stolen. The pistols, along with other high-value military equipment, were reported missing earlier this year, raising concerns about the potential security risk posed by the theft.

The M17, which became the Army’s official sidearm in 2017, is part of the Sig Sauer P320 platform. The Army adopted the M17 after a competitive selection process, and the pistol has since become a standard issue for U.S. forces. In addition to the missing pistols, the Army reports that other advanced military equipment, including Enhanced Night Vision Goggles (ENVGs) and an AN/PAS 13D Thermal Optic, are also unaccounted for.

The missing firearms and equipment were first discovered in May, though the thefts could have occurred as early as March. The stolen items are considered sensitive, as they are critical to the Army’s operations and readiness.

The M17 pistol is part of a broader shift in U.S. military sidearms. In 2019, the Army officially adopted the M17 and its compact counterpart, the M18, replacing older models like the Beretta M9, which had been in service since the 1980s. Both the M17 and M18 are part of Sig Sauer’s P320 series, a modular handgun platform designed for military and law enforcement use. The M18, a variant of the M17, was later adopted by the U.S. Air Force in 2020, which began replacing its stock of Beretta M9 pistols with the M18s. The U.S. Marine Corps also started fielding the M18 around the same time.

The missing firearms at Fort Moore are raising alarms due to their potential use in criminal activity or unauthorized military operations. The $15,000 reward is part of ongoing efforts to locate the missing weapons and hold accountable those responsible for the theft.

The Army’s investigation into the incident is ongoing, and military officials are urging anyone with information to come forward. The public’s assistance could be crucial in recovering the stolen items and ensuring they do not fall into the wrong hands.

Fort Moore has not released further details about how the items were stolen or any potential suspects but is encouraging individuals with knowledge of the theft to contact military or law enforcement authorities.

RFK Jr: ‘I Give Thanks to God’ for the Success of the ‘MAHA Movement’

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to serve as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), gave “thanks to God” for his family and the success of the “MAHA movement” on Thanksgiving.

In a holiday Instagram post showing his family, Kennedy wrote, “I give thanks to God for all the extraordinary gifts of a year guided unerringly by Providence: my wife Cheryl, my children including Amaryllis without whom my campaign would have faltered”:

Amaryllis Fox Kennedy, who married Bobby Kennedy III in 2018, served as her father-in-law’s campaign director while he was still running for president, and remains a “proud steward of RFK’s movement to Make America Healthy Again.”

“I’m grateful for the campaign staff who each coalesced from their own spiritual journeys, to the generous donors, and to the thousands of volunteers and supporters who have built the MAHA movement,” the HHS nominee continued in his caption.

(Read more from “RFK Jr: ‘I Give Thanks to God’ for the Success of the ‘MAHA Movement’” HERE)