Tennessee Bomb Factory Explosion Leaves as Many as 19 Feared Missing or Dead

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As many as 19 people are missing and feared dead after a “devastating blast” leveled a Tennessee bomb factory Friday, according to officials.

The massive explosion was reported around 7:45 a.m. local time at the Accurate Energetic Systems plant at the Hickman-Humphreys County line, west of Nashville.

Humphreys County Sheriff Chris Davis confirmed there were “some” fatalities and that there are people still missing, without providing numbers — though he referred to the 19 people working in the building at the time of the tragedy as “souls.”

“There’s nothing to describe. It’s gone,” Davis said. “It’s the most devastating scene that I’ve seen in my career.”

The blast impacted “one whole building” of the McEwen property, he said. The factory, which makes and tests explosives for the government, is located miles away from any residences and businesses. (Read more from “Tennessee Bomb Factory Explosion Leaves as Many as 19 Feared Missing or Dead” HERE)

You Won’t Believe What Shocking Thing the Pope Just Told a Room Full of Reporters

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. . .Pope Leo XIV denounced the “degrading” online media practice Thursday during a Vatican conference with dozens of journalists.

“Communication must be freed from the misguided thinking that corrupts it, from unfair competition and the degrading practice of so-called clickbait,” the pope declared to roughly 150 members of the newswire group Minds International.

Along with condemning clickbait — a form of sensationalist headline writing designed to rope in readers — as practice, the head of the Catholic Church praised the work reporters are doing from the war-torn front lines of Gaza and Ukraine.

“Free access to information is a pillar that upholds the edifice of our societies, and for this reason, we are called to defend and guarantee it,” he said. (Read more from “You Won’t Believe What Shocking Thing the Pope Just Told a Room Full of Reporters” HERE)

Trump Gives New Details on Mideast Trip as Hamas Frees Hostages

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President Trump said Friday that he plans to speak to Israel’s Knesset and then visit Cairo as he travels to the Middle East and Hamas releases its final 20 Israeli hostages.

“I’ll be going to Israel. I’ll be speaking at the Knesset, I think early on, and then I’m also going to Egypt. They were terrific,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.

Trump will be on the ground in the region when Hamas releases the remaining captives seized in the Oct. 7, 2023, surprise attack that started the war.

The president is expected to participate in a formal peace-deal signing while in the Egyptian capital, formalizing the first phase of implementation of his 20-point peace plan.

“Gaza is going to be rebuilt,” Trump said, citing anticipated financing from wealthy Arab neighbors. (Read more from “Trump Gives New Details on Mideast Trip as Hamas Frees Hostages” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Tech Billionaires Seem to Be Doom Prepping. Should We All Be Worried?

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Mark Zuckerberg is said to have started work on Koolau Ranch, his sprawling 1,400-acre compound on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, as far back as 2014.

It is set to include a shelter, complete with its own energy and food supplies, though the carpenters and electricians working on the site were banned from talking about it by non-disclosure agreements, according to a report by Wired magazine. . .

Asked last year if he was creating a doomsday bunker, the Facebook founder gave a flat “no”. The underground space spanning some 5,000 square feet is, he explained, “just like a little shelter, it’s like a basement”. . .

Then there is the speculation around other tech leaders, some of whom appear to have been busy buying up chunks of land with underground spaces, ripe for conversion into multi-million pound luxury bunkers.

Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, has talked about “apocalypse insurance”. This is something about half of the super-wealthy have, he has previously claimed, with New Zealand a popular destination for homes. (Read more from “Tech Billionaires Seem to Be Doom Prepping. Should We All Be Worried?” HERE)

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Trump White House Begins Substantial Federal Workforce Reduction as Shutdown Continues

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White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought on Friday said the Trump administration has started layoffs of federal bureaucrats after Democrats shut down the government.

“The RIFs have begun,” Vought wrote on X, referring to reductions in force that would dramatically reduce the size of the federal bureaucracy.

An OMB spokesperson told Breitbart News that the RIFs have begun and they are substantial.

Eric Teetsel, the CEO of the Center for Renewing America, noted that a RIF is a permanent elimination of a position rather than a temporary furlough. . .

About 300,000 federal civilian workers will leave their jobs this year as part of President Donald Trump’s efforts to reduce the size and scope of the federal government. (Read more from “Trump White House Begins Substantial Federal Workforce Reduction as Shutdown Continues” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Department of State Officer Fired After He Was Caught Hiding His Romantic Relationship with Daughter of Chinese Communist Party Affiliate

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Daniel Choi, a Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. Department of State, was fired after he was caught on hidden camera admitting to having a secret romantic relationship with the daughter of a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) affiliate, who he said “could have been a spy.”

“I defied my government for love,” Choi told one of James O’Keefe’s undercover journalists while on hidden camera. Choi’s admission was then made public by O’Keefe Media Group (OMG).

Watch Below:

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio responded by recommending Choi’s termination to President Donald Trump, who approved the decision.

“After Presidential review and approval, the Secretary of State has terminated a Foreign Service Officer (FSO) who concealed a romantic relationship with a Chinese national with ties to the Chinese Community Party,” the State Department said on Wednesday. (Read more from “Department of State Officer Fired After He Was Caught Hiding His Romantic Relationship with Daughter of Chinese Communist Party Affiliate” HERE)

In Cell Where Jeffrey Epstein Died, a Scene of Disarray That Never Underwent Thorough Inspection, Experts Said

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By CBS News. The federal investigation into the death of convicted sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein was marred by significant lapses, experts told CBS News, including the failure by investigators to interview potential witnesses, properly preserve certain evidence and run basic forensic tests.

Nearly two years passed before investigators interviewed the two key corrections officers on duty the night Epstein died in his cell in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown New York City, in what was later ruled a suicide, according to court documents. One of those officers was the only person to attest to seeing Epstein hanging by a bedsheet from his bunk.

And details pulled from 90 photos of the cell and other evidence collected in the hours after Epstein’s death — but before FBI agents arrived to process the scene — appear to show a succession of basic oversights, ranging from an absence of evidence markers to items being moved, experts told CBS News.

“The FBI literally has all of the best tools. I mean, spared no expense. They have every tool you can imagine. And they used none of it as far as we can tell,” forensic analyst Nick Barreiro said after reviewing the photos, many of which have never been published. “How are there not way more people pointing out the absurdity of this?”

The images were previously obtained by 60 Minutes. After the recent release of surveillance video from the night Epstein died, which appeared to show details that contradicted official reports, CBS News reviewed them and other documents with several forensic experts. (Read more from “In Cell Where Jeffrey Epstein Died, a Scene of Disarray That Never Underwent Thorough Inspection, Experts Said” HERE)

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Epstein bank records sought by top House Democrat from Jamie Dimon, other CEOs

By CNBC. A top House Democrat asked four major bank CEOs to share a slew of financial records related to Jeffrey Epstein, pushing forward an investigation into the notorious sex predator, after the lawmaker’s effort to subpoena the banks for the documents was blocked by Republicans.

House Judiciary Committee ranking member Jamie Raskin, D-Md., in letters to the CEOs obtained by CNBC, asked how Epstein and his co-conspirators could have conducted a reported $1.5 billion in suspicious transactions “for years without ever being caught.” . . .

The letters came as the Trump administration continues to face pressure — from Democrats and from some of President Donald Trump’s Republican supporters — over its handling of matters related to Epstein.

The wealthy financier and sex offender, who was once a friend of Trump’s, died by suicide while in jail facing federal child sex trafficking charges in 2019.

In his letters, Raskin bluntly asked each CEO if their bank will “help reveal the truth” about Epstein and his co-conspirators, or if they would “choose to be part of the cover-up for this massive, international sex trafficking ring that victimized more than 1,000 women and girls?” (Read more from “Epstein bank records sought by top House Democrat from Jamie Dimon, other CEOs” HERE)

MTG Blames GOP Leadership for Shutdown

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U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene blamed Republican congressional leadership for the ongoing government shutdown during an interview Thursday on CNN, calling on her party to fully fund the government. . .

“It shouldn’t be something we dangle — the American people or military pay — we shouldn’t be dangling it in front of them,” Greene said.

The Georgia congresswoman said she opposes a short-term funding bill and instead wants Congress to pass a full appropriations package, which she called its constitutional duty.

“I am a Republican and I support the President, so I voted for the continuing resolution,” Greene said. “I want to pass our appropriates. That’s our constitutional duty.” . . .

“We control the House. We control the Senate. We control the White House. I’ve been vocal saying you can use the ‘nuclear option’ in the Senate,” Greene said. “This doesn’t have to be a shutdown.” (Read more from “MTG Blames GOP Leadership for Shutdown” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

New York Attorney General Letitia James Indicted

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A federal grand jury indicted Letitia James on Thursday on allegations of bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution.

The two-count indictment was obtained by Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia Lindsey Halligan.

“This is nothing more than a continuation of the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system,” James said in a video responding to the indictment. “He is forcing federal law enforcement agencies to do his bidding all because I did by job as the New York state attorney general. These charges are baseless.”

President Donald Trump appointed Halligan in September after Erik Siebert, under pressure from Trump to bring charges, resigned.

(Read more from “New York Attorney General Letitia James Indicted” HERE)

Circumcision ‘Highly Likely’ Linked to Autism, RFK Jr. Wildly Claims

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Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stunningly claimed Thursday there may be a link between circumcision and autism – due to distribution of Tylenol to infants following the procedure.

“There’s two studies which show children who are circumcised early have double the rate of autism, it’s highly likely, because they were given Tylenol,” Kennedy told President Trump during a cabinet meeting.

Kennedy didn’t specify the research to which he was referring, but a 2015 study out of Denmark that tracked nearly 343,000 Gen Z boys suggested that circumcised males were more likely to develop autism before the age of 10 compared to their non-circumcised peers.

Researchers hypothesized that pain and stressful surgery early in life can increase the risk of neurodevelopmental, behavioral or psychological problems later on.

However, some critics called the research “flawed” and said the study authors should have examined other painful conditions such as urinary tract infections, which are common in young children. (Read more from “Circumcision ‘Highly Likely’ Linked to Autism, RFK Jr. Wildly Claims” HERE)