Month: July 2023

Commentary: Tax Relief Is Coming to Millions of Red-State Residents in Ohio, Connecticut, and More

Georgia Star News Staff

July marked the beginning of Fiscal Year 2024 for 46 of the 50 states. It also closes the books on most state legislative sessions in what was an incredible 2023 for hard-working taxpayers.

In recent years, we’ve seen significant income tax relief in the states. Notably, 10 states – Kentucky, West Virginia, Montana, Utah, Arkansas, North Dakota, Indiana, Nebraska, Connecticut, and Ohio – have cut personal income taxes (PIT) in 2023. With the new addition of West Virginia, North Dakota, and Connecticut, 22 states have cut personal income taxes since 2021, with several of these states cutting taxes multiple times during that period.

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After Facing Censorship in Congress, RFK Jr. Plans Roundtable Discussion on Censorship

M.D. Kittle

After Democrats threatened to censor him during last week’s House committee hearing on censorship, Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. plans to hold a “Roundtable on Censorship” next month.

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Commentary: Montana Leaves Marxist-Led American Library Association

Georgia Star News Staff

Local libraries have become a fierce battleground in the cultural revolution sweeping America.

“Drag Queen Story Hour” and the promotion of pornographic materials in children and teens sections have prompted parents around the nation to push back—and some families to withdraw entirely.

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‘See You in Court:’ Texas Gov. Greg Abbott Responds to Biden’s Legal Threats Over Floating Border Barrier

Georgia Star News Staff

Republican Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas sent a letter Monday to President Joe Biden, formally responding to threats of legal action from the Department of Justice (DOJ) over his states floating buoy barrier installed in the Rio Grande River.

Abbott defended his authority to have the floating buoy barrier built, accusing Biden of flouting U.S. immigration law with his border policies and violating the constitutional rights of states to protect themselves from an “invasion,” the letter read. The DOJ sent a letter Thursday to Abbott, accusing him of breaking the law, according to CNN.

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Hunter Biden Sold $1.3M in Art – and One Buyer Was a Dem Donor ‘Friend’ Joe Appointed to a Prestigious Commission: Report

Admin

The New York Post First son Hunter Biden’s novice artwork has raked in at least $1.3 million — with buyers including a Democratic donor “friend’’ who his dad named to a prestigious commission, a report said Monday. Elizabeth Hirsh Naftali, a Los Angeles real-estate investor and philanthropist, bought one of…

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Haley Says She Would Support Trump If He is 2024 GOP Nominee

Just the News

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley on Monday said she would support former President Donald Trump if he becomes the GOP nominee for the 2024 presidential election.

However, Haley also said she does not think Trump is capable of winning the general election.

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Commentary: ‘Free Speech Protection Act’ Takes Center Stage in The Fight for the Soul of America

Georgia Star News Staff
Tennessee Star - Constitution Series

“If the allegations made by Plaintiffs are true, the present case arguably involves the most massive attack against free speech in United States’ history.” 

That is what federal judge Terry Doughty wrote in his decision ordering a number of Biden administration officials and agencies from communicating censorship requests to social media companies.

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Commentary: Why Is Big Media Pushing to Label ‘Sound of Freedom’ Film a ‘QAnon’ Hoax?

Georgia Star News Staff

For good reasons the box office hit movie Sound of Freedom has brought in over $100 million as it tells the true story of undercover federal agent Timothy Ballard and his suspenseful mission to rescue children being sex trafficked in Colombia.

Central to the movie’s plot is the story of a bright-eyed, 11-year-old girl named Rocío, whose childhood innocence is quickly morphed into a nightmare of sexual exploitation when she is recruited into a child sex trafficking ring.

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College Towns Across America See Massive Democratic Shift: Report

Georgia Star News Staff

College towns across the United States have come to overwhelmingly support Democrats, which is damaging the Republican Party’s ability to win elections in key swing states, according to a new report.

The American Communities Project (ACP), which has sought to develop a demographic profile of every county in the United States, has cataloged the voting patterns of 171 “college towns,” where major colleges or universities are situated and account for much of their economic activity, according to a report released by the project this year. The towns have seen a dramatic increase in Democratic support since the 2000 presidential election, with over two-thirds now being expressly Democratic, per the report and analysis by Politico.

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Censorship Case Involving State Collusion with Social Media Companies Could Be Heard by the Supreme Court

Georgia Star News Staff

The Supreme Court could hear a case questioning a California agency’s coordination with Twitter to censor election-related “misinformation.”

O’Handley v. Weber, which concerns the California Secretary of State’s Office of Election Cybersecurity’s work with Twitter to monitor “false or misleading” election information, was appealed to the Supreme Court on June 8. The case raises questions similar to those posed in the free speech lawsuit Missouri v. Biden, now being appealed in the Fifth Circuit: Can the government lawfully induce private actors to censor protected speech?

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Companies Are Throwing Thousands of Diversity Officers Overboard: Report

Georgia Star News Staff

Top companies are laying off thousands of diversity-focused workers, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Major companies that have championed diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, like Netflix, Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, recently announced the exit of high-profile DEI executives, and thousands of employees working in diversity-related positions have been laid off since last year, according to the WSJ. Employee opinions about the importance of DEI and the funding for related initiatives are changing too, with many workers not seeing it as important.

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Commentary: Climate Alarmists Are Finally Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud in Their Agenda

Georgia Star News Staff

The Los Angeles Times published an op/ed Friday in which it perhaps unintentionally poses the central proposition of the mythical energy transition: “whether our expectations should evolve in the name of preventing climate catastrophe.”

The op/ed is appropriately titled, “Would an Occasional Blackout Help Solve Climate Change?” It is a headline that tacitly admits a truth about the transition that boosters of renewable energy have been careful not to publicize: That the notion that generation sources with extremely low energy density like wind and solar cannot hope to be viable alternatives to generation with extremely high energy density like natural gas, nuclear and coal. It is a notion that defies the laws of thermodynamics and physics, and those are laws, not suggestions that can be discarded as a matter of convenience or, as in this case, in pursuit of a hyper-political agenda.

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Congress Investigating Allegation Border Patrol Official Retaliated Against After Testimony

Just the News

Congressional investigating are probing whistleblower allegations that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency may have retaliated against a top agency official after he testifying before lawmakers.

House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., and Rep. Mark Green wrote in a letter Friday that they have been told by a whistleblower that El Centro Border Patrol Sector Chief Gregory Bovino was relieved of his command after he finished a transcribed interview with two congressional committees earlier this month.

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Biden Admin Proposes New Rule to Jack Up Prices for Oil and Gas Leases

Georgia Star News Staff

The Biden administration unveiled a new oil and gas leasing rule proposal Thursday that would jack up prices at nearly every stage of the public land leasing process.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), a subagency of the Department of the Interior (DOI), issued the rule proposal Thursday in an effort to adopt a “more transparent, inclusive and just approach” to federal oil and gas leasing on public lands and “[provide] a fair return to taxpayers,” Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management Laura Daniel-Davis said, according to a Thursday DOI press release. The rule nominally aims to boost land conservation efforts, but it would do so by massively increasing minimum bid thresholds and required per-acre fees for energy interests and developers to pay.

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GOP Representative Considers Challenging Lindsey Graham in 2026 Senate Primary: Report

Georgia Star News Staff

South Carolina GOP Rep. and House Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman is weighing a 2026 Senate bid to challenge Sen. Lindsey Graham in the Republican primary, according to Politico.

Graham has served in the upper chamber since 2003 and has repeatedly beat out primary challengers, but was booed on July 1 by his own constituents at a rally for former President Donald Trump. Conservatives now see an opportunity for another Republican to emerge in 2026 and have been discussing a potential bid with Norman, a source familiar with the matter told Politico.

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Commentary: Fox News’ ‘Conservative Stance’ Belies Hidden Liberal Agenda

Georgia Star News Staff

The longshoreman turned homespun philosopher Eric Hoffer is semi-forgotten today. But his book The True Believer (1951) is full of pertinent aperçus. One that has recurred to me often of late is the observation that “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”

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Secret Service Vet on White House Cocaine: ‘Somebody’s Stopping This from Being Thoroughly Investigated’

Just the News

A security expert who worked with the Secret Service for over 20 years says he’s “surprised” the agency is closing the investigation into how cocaine was found at “one of the most secure buildings in the world” without identifying any suspects.

In briefing Congress earlier this month about the July Fourth weekend discovery at the White House, the agency said it did not conduct interviews as part of its internal investigation, citing the roughly 500 potential suspects, and that it planned to close the probe in the coming weeks.

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Despite White House Rhetoric, U.S. Wildfires Are Burning Less Land This Year

Georgia Star News Staff

U.S. wildfires have burned nearly 75% less land so far this year compared to the same date in recent years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC), despite White House rhetoric alleging that wildfires have intensified.

Just 777,732 acres of land have been burned as of Friday, roughly 2.3 million acres less than the average of around 3.1 million acres burned by the same date between 2013-2022, according to the NIFC, which helps coordinate the U.S. government’s response to wildfires. The White House has repeatedly referenced the “growing wildfire threat” driven by climate change in various press releases and other statements issued in the past several months.

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Illegal Alien from Cuba Who Beheaded Girlfriend in Minnesota Conviction Overturned, Found Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity

Admin

Breitbart News An illegal alien from Cuba, released into the U.S. in 2012 from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, and convicted of murder earlier this year after the public beheading of his girlfriend has now been found not guilty due to his mental illness. As Breitbart News reported, Alexi Saborit-Viltres was…

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Biden Admin Takes Another Step to Diminish Americans’ Standard of Living in the Name of ‘Climate’

Admin

Fox News The Biden administration unveiled a regulatory proposal late Friday targeting water heaters, the latest in a string of energy efficiency actions cracking down on home appliances. The Department of Energy (DOE) said its proposal would ultimately “accelerate deployment” of electric heat pump water heaters, save Americans billions of dollars and…

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Gov. Abbott: Texas Has the Sovereign Authority to Defend Its Borders

The Center Square

Texas has a right to defend its own border, Gov. Greg Abbott said on Friday in response to the U.S. Department of Justice demanding the state remove marine barriers placed in the Rio Grande River in the Eagle Pass area of Texas.

“The State of Texas’s actions violate federal law, raise humanitarian concerns, present serious risks to public safety and the environment, and may interfere with the federal government’s ability to carry out its official duties,” the DOJ wrote to Abbott in a letter on Thursday. The DOJ gave Abbott until Monday to agree to remove the barriers. If he didn’t agree or reply, the DOJ said it would sue.

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Catholic Counselor Asks SCOTUS to Reverse Decision Allowing States to Limit Speech Outside Abortion Clinics

Georgia Star News Staff

A Catholic sidewalk counselor petitioned the Supreme Court Friday to reverse a prior ruling that permits states to enforce laws targeting pro-life counseling outside abortion clinics.

In response to the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade in June 2020, Westchester County, New York passed a law creating a 100-foot “buffer zone” outside abortion clinics where it is illegal to approach another person to engage in “oral protest, education, or counseling” without consent. The law is similar to one the Supreme Court upheld in its 2000 Hill v. Colorado decision, which sidewalk counselor Debra Vitagliano, backed by Becket Law, now asks the justices to overrule.

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Italian Pageant Bars Males from Competition, Will Not Participate in ‘Glittery Bandwagon of Trans Activism’

Georgia Star News Staff

The Miss Italia beauty pageant will not allow male contestants, the contest’s curator told Italian outlet Radio Cusano.

The pageant’s curator, Patrizia Mirigliani, told Radio Cusano that only biological women are allowed to participate in the beauty competition. Weeks earlier, a man who identifies as transgender drew international headlines after winning the Miss Netherlands beauty pageant.

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Commentary: The Solution to Pandemic Learning Loss Is Less Schooling, Not More

Georgia Star News Staff

The latest data dump from the Nation’s Report Card reveals declining academic performance among US students. As with previous releases showing the same trend, especially over the past three years, the solution proposed by many education reformers and advocates is to double-down on the amount of schooling and school-like activities students get.

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Commentary: The Man Behind the Movie ‘Oppenheimer’

RealClearWire

This weekend, thousands of Americans will go to movie theaters across the country to watch Christopher Nolan’s newest film, “Oppenheimer.” A star-studded cast of talented actors, including Cillian Murphy, Florence Pugh, Matt Damon, and Emily Blunt, will bring to the big screen the life of Robert Oppenheimer, the brilliant theoretical physicist often called “the father of the atomic bomb.”

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Commentary: The Storied Past and Clouded Future of Pro Golf

RealClearWire

Riding the train from London to Liverpool, I’m filled with anticipation. Tomorrow is the first round of golf’s British Open – or, as they make a point of calling it here – just “The Open Championship.” It’s the final so-called “major” tournament of the year, the last chance for the 156 players teeing off to etch their name in golf history. With the exception of Tiger Woods, every player who has dominated the game of golf since I started paying attention will be teeing off.

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Republicans Move to Defund John Kerry’s Climate Envoy Office

Georgia Star News Staff

On Wednesday, over two dozen Republicans in the House of Representatives introduced a bill that would cut all funding for John Kerry’s newly-established “climate envoy” office at the State Department.

As Fox News reports, the No Taxpayer Funding for Climate Zealots Advancing Radical Schemes Act would forbid the use of any federal funds from being appropriated for the purpose of funding Kerry’s office, including for such purposes as travel, administrative, and salary expenses. Biden first created the office specific

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg Gave $1 Million to Unknown Groups

Georgia Star News Staff

After receiving a $1 million prize from a left-wing foundation, the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg vowed to donate the money to numerous different charities; to this day, it is unknown where the money went.

According to the Washington Free Beacon, Ginsburg was awarded the prize money by the Berggruen Institute, founded by left-wing billionaire Nicolas Berggruen, at its annual Philosophy & Culture Award dinner in December 2019. Ethics experts at the time pointed out that the amount was far greater than the $2,000 maximum that Judicial Conference regulations placed on honoraria, thus raising the likelihood of conflicts of interest for Ginsburg.

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January 6 Security Footage: Secret Service Brought Kamala Harris Within Yards of Undetected DNC Pipe Bomb

Just the News

U.S. Capitol complex security footage shows the Secret Service brought Vice President-elect Kamala Harris into a garage at the Democratic National Committee headquarters on Jan. 6, 2021, just a few yards from where a pipe bomb had been planted the night before by an unidentified suspect.

The video footage, obtained by Just the News and released on Friday, raised immediate concerns with experts on presidential security and top lawmakers in Congress on how the explosive device was overlooked during security sweeps.

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Inflation Tanks Small-Dollar Donations to 2024 Campaigns

Georgia Star News Staff

As prices across the country remain high, small-dollar donations have decreased for 2024 political campaigns, Politico reported Friday.

Although inflation fell in June, prices are still above pre-pandemic levels, and candidates who previously reaped the benefits of grassroots donations are not receiving them at the same degree, according to Politico. The campaign arms of House Republicans and Democrats, as well as presidential candidates, saw a drop in small-donor donations compared to previous cycles.

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‘The Chosen’ Overtakes Mainstream Shows in CW Network Broadcast TV Premiere

Susan Berry, PhD

The 90-minute broadcast-TV debut Sunday of faith-based series The Chosen on The CW Network averaged “a far mightier audience” than other CW shows, such as Riverdale and Nancy Drew, which aired at the same times the week before, TVLine reported.

While The Chosen “averaged 520,000 viewers and a 0.1 rating, 200,000 viewers watched Riverdale and 400,000 viewed Nancy Drew, SpoilerTV also reported.

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National Pro-Life Group Condemns Democrats and Media Allies for Encouraging Abortionists to Illegally Mail Abortion Drugs to Pro-Life States

Susan Berry, PhD

A national pro-life group is shaming Democrats for encouraging abortionists to mail dangerous abortion-inducing drugs into pro-life states after the Washington Post touted such actions are legal.

“Mailing abortion pills into pro-life states is not legal, no matter how the Democrats and their media cheerleaders want it to be,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of Susan B. Anthony (SBA) Pro-Life America, in a statement sent to The Star News Network. “And the strong majority of Americans agree it is not safe.” 

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White House Plans for Zero-Emission Federal Fleet by 2035 Off to Slow Start

The Center Square

President Joe Biden’s executive order to convert the federal fleet of automobiles to all zero-emission vehicles by 2035 is off to a slow start, according to a new report. 

The U.S. Government Accountability Office found that federal agencies subject to Biden’s executive order replaced or acquired about 45,000 vehicles in fiscal year 2021. About 260 of those 45,000 were considered zero-emission vehicles. That’s 0.58% of the total. While many federal agencies have started planning for an all-electric future, they face challenges such as limited vehicle availability, costs and limits on the ability to charge vehicles at federal facilities, some of which are leased, according to the Government Accountability Office report.

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Zuckerberg’s Twitter Clone Continues to Crash in Popularity: Report

Georgia Star News Staff

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s Twitter rival Threads has plummeted in popularity for a second consecutive week, according to market intelligence company Sensor Tower, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The so-called “Twitter Killer” has experienced a substantial fall in engagement, down to 13 million daily active users, which is a 70% drop from July 7, according to Sensor Tower estimates, the WSJ reported. Meanwhile, billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s Twitter steadily maintains around 200 million active daily users, who spend an average of 30 minutes on the platform.

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More than 191,000 Georgia Voter Records Removed from Voter Roll Ahead of 2024 Election

Kaitlin Housler

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger recently announced the removal of 191,473 voter registration records that have been in an “inactive” status for two general elections and have failed to update their records within that time.

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Federal Lawsuit Targets Race-Based Government Grant Decisions Alleged to Discriminate Against White and Other Business Owners

M.D. Kittle

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling striking down affirmative action in college admisssions, a San Antonio-based government program that allegedly uses race-based preferences to hand out federal grants faces a federal discrimination lawsuit.

The lawsuit, filed this week by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL), could spark a national re-examination of such taxpayer-funded, race-focused initiatives.

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Delaware Court Blocks Release of Biden’s Senate Papers

The Center Square

Delaware’s highest court has blocked a request by conservative groups seeking to access President Joe Biden’s Senate papers at a state university. 

The July 6 ruling by the Delaware Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision that sided with the University of Delaware in denying a request from Judicial Watch and another group seeking access to the records, which Biden gifted to the public university in 2012. 

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Commentary: Bidenomics Is Behind Jerome Powell’s Woke Turn

Battleground State News Staff

In February 2021, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told Congress, “We are not climate policymakers here who can decide the way climate change will be addressed by the United States. We’re a regulatory agency that regulates a part of the economy.” When Powell said that, less than a month into the Biden administration, inflation was 1.6%.

Just eight months later, in remarks on November 22, 2021, President Biden said Powell – then up for renomination and facing stiff opposition from congressional progressives – “made clear to me: A top priority will be to accelerate the Fed’s effort to address and mitigate the risks – the risk that climate change poses to our financial system and our economy.” At that time inflation was 6.8%, on its way up to a 40-year high of 9.1%.

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