Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has signed into law a Republican plan to make the state’s congressional district map “more red” ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
“Today, I signed the One Big Beautiful Map into law,” Abbott announced in a Friday afternoon video post on X.
The Republican redistricting plan adds five new GOP-opportunity congressional districts.
Republicans currently hold 25 of the state’s 38 U.S. House seats.
Recent legal decisions cleared the way for Texas Republicans to redraw district boundaries based on partisan political performance and increase the party’s advantage in future elections to reflect voting shifts seen in 2024, when President Donald Trump won support from unprecedented numbers of minority voters.
To explicate those “recent legal decisions” for readers coming into this story tableau rasa: Democrats launched the Petteway v. Galveston County lawsuit trying to save one Galveston County commissioner’s seat, whereupon the Supreme Court ruled that those black/Hispanic coalition minority districts carved out to benefit the Democratic Party were unconstitutional. So Democrats have hoist themselves on their own petard, and nobody should have the slightest bit of sympathy for them.
Abbott said the new map “ensures fairer representation.”
The governor also thanked “all of the legislature who stayed in the Capitol and got this law to my desk.”
Texas lawmakers passed the Republican redistricting plan last week on party-line votes, after House Democrats delayed the inevitable by breaking quorum for two weeks.
Thrice Democrats have used the quorum break tactic in an effort to thwart redistricting, and thrice they have failed. Other than vainglorious virtue signaling, you wonder what they get out of the tactic and why they keep deploying it.
“Texas is now more red in the United States Congress,” said Abbott after signing the measure, known as House Bill 4.
Several Democrat-aligned groups filed legal challenges to the new congressional map before it was signed into law.
Organizations suing include the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), and the Mexican American Legislative Caucus (MALC). A group of Texas residents is also suing.
Plaintiffs claim the new map is racially gerrymandered to eliminate majority-minority districts required by the Voting Rights Act, unconstitutionally diluting the voting strength of minority voters, and is “intentionally discriminatory.”
The author and sponsor of HB 4, State Rep. Todd Hunter (R–Corpus Christi) and State Sen. Phil King (R–Weatherford), assured lawmakers that the map is “legal under all applicable law” and meets the requirements of “one person, one vote” and compactness.
Both Hunter and King repeatedly emphasized that the new district lines were drawn based on partisan political performance, which the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled permissible, not racial data.
State Sen. Adam Hinojosa (R–Corpus Christi) said the map represents a political shift in the state, including South Texas, which he represents.
“This is not a racial shift. This is a values shift, and no amount of shouting ‘racism’ is going to change that,” argued Hinojosa on the Senate floor.
Despite all the talk of lawsuits, Democrats are already announcing which of the new districts they’ll be running for, and the chances of lawsuits overturning them, the occasional rogue judge notwithstanding, would seem to be extremely slim. Indeed, the Supreme Court seems more likely to sweep away all creaky Voting Rights Act considerations of race as unconstitutional than to toss districts drawn in a colorblind manner aside because they don’t elect enough Democrats.
The problem with so many gun control advocates is not their ignorance per se, as ignorance can be cured by study. The problem is their amazing proud ignorance, as if actually bothering to learn the basics of how the firearms they seek to ban operate would somehow sully the purity of their morally superior soul.
Such seems to be the case with Minneapolis’s Democrat mayor Jacob Frey: “Minneapolis Mayor Warns Of “Assault Rifles That Can Reel Off 30 Clips In Conjunction With A Magazine.”
MAYOR FREY: “We have these assault rifles that can reel off 30 clips, in conjunction with a magazine.” 🤡pic.twitter.com/tZePgzQMiY
If he had merely confused a clip with a magazine, one could understand, as they both feed rounds of ammunition to the gun, and sometimes you see that confusion in popular culture. But no magazine in the history of firearms ever let a gun fire “30 clips.”
One wonders whether Frey has trouble finding the carburetor on his Tesla.
This is probably the most embarrassing example of a gun grabber displaying ignorance since USA Today famously invented the “chainsaw bayonet” for AR-15s.
Ironically, this now exists.
The irony is that gun grabbers could easily avoid such excruciatingly stupid mistakes if they just spent a couple of hours at the local gun shop or shooting range familiarizing themselves with firearms basics. But no, their irrational hopolophobia seems to make them feel that guns are so evil that merely touching one would allow that evil to infect them.
And so they continue to display their amazing ignorance of firearms basics over and over again…
The Trump Administration guts two lefty slop buckets of graft, Israel lights up the Houthis big time, crazy tranny shooter might have been in satanic cult too crazy for the Church of Satan, Ukraine bombs the snot out of Russia’s oil infrastructure (again), Scotland and Germany continue to favor unassimilated Muslim immigrants over their own citizens, a secret Spinal Tap concert, and the full weight of Plano ISD comes down on a nefarious…a choir booster club?
It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!
Another court win for Trump47. “Supreme Court Rules 5-4 That Trump Can Slash $783 Million In DEI Research Funding.”
The Trump administration is free to eliminate hundreds of millions of dollars worth of research funding on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) following last week’s ruling by the United States Supreme Court.
In a 5-4 vote, the justices lifted an order from a federal court judge in Boston that blocked $783 million in cuts made by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on health research grants that were being used to advance DEI efforts as well as “gender ideology extremism.”
The Supreme Court was split on the 5-4 decision which marks another win for President Trump and clears the way for his administration to move forward with canceling hundreds of grants after U.S. District Judge William Young ordered the health-related grants restored in June.
Chief Justice John Roberts was among the dissenters in the high court’s decision and Justice Amy Coney Barrett voted with conservative majority to let the administration stop the grant funding.
Roberts and Barrett did land on the side of the dissent and allowed to stand a portion of the lower judge’s order that voided a number of NIH policies that targeted DEI programs at the direction of the White House.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick canceled an Biden administration agreement Monday to distribute billions of dollars for semiconductor research through a nonprofit set up and staffed by former political appointees, according to a letter obtained by The Post.
The 2022 CHIPS and Science Act provided for $11 billion in semiconductor research and development funding to be given out by the Commerce Department’s National Semiconductor Technology Center.
“Rather than establishing these operations within the Department, however, Biden Administration officials spent significant time, effort, and resources creating an unaccountable, outside entity–Natcast–to administer taxpayer funds,” Lutnick wrote Natcast CEO Deirdre Hanford.
Four days before Biden left office on Jan. 20, Lutnick noted, the Commerce Department agreed to set aside $7.4 billion in “advance payments” to Natcast after spending nearly two years setting it up and tapping administration officials, advisers and allies to fill out positions.
That arrangement both effectively removed the incoming Trump administration from being involved in the process and provided “virtually all” of Natcast’s funding — prompting incoming Departments of Justice and Commerce officials to take another look at the Sunnyvale, Calif., nonprofit.
“These actions do not just give the appearance of impropriety; they flout federal law,” Lutnick told Hanford, pointing out that no provisions in the CHIPS Act authorized an outside entity like Natcast to distribute semiconductor research funds.
“The GCCA [Government Corporation Control Act] plainly prohibits agencies from establishing a corporation to act as an agency without specific authorization, and the January 16, 2025, agreement does nothing other than set forth the terms of the Biden Administration’s attempt to do just that.”
Natcast’s selection committee included Biden White House alums like Jason Matheny, former deputy director for national security in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; and Kendra Wilkerson, the CEO of a nonprofit that “promotes greater equality for women and nonbinary professionals in technology fields,” according to the Biden Commerce Department.
Donna Dubinsky, another Natcast executive, worked as senior counselor to former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and signed off on the nonprofit’s 501(c)(3) status.
Susan Feindt, the Biden Commerce Department’s vice chair of its CHIPS Act advisory committee, is now the senior vice president of ecosystem development at Natcast.
Jeremy Licht, the former chief counsel on semiconductor incentives at the Biden Commerce Department, is now the general counsel at Natcast.
They weren’t robbing Peter to pay Paul, they were robbing you to line their own pockets. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller told reporters Monday that the Trump administration has uncovered a “massive scandal” in Washington D.C. involving the doctoring of crime statistics.
He said the alleged corruption is currently under investigation and said details of the corruption will soon be brought to light.
“The results will stun you,” he said.
Miller made the remarks in the Oval Office after President Trump signed a slew of new executive orders to end cashless bail throughout the United States and in the District of Columbia, prosecute the burning of the American flag, and additional measures to address crime in Washington D.C.
Miller said D.C. already had the worst crime statistics in the United States when “honestly measured,” but those stats “dramatically understated how bad it was.”
The White House advisor told reporters that murders and homicides were allegedly being reported as accidents instead of murders.
“This is how severe the manipulation of the crime data has been in the city and it will all be uncovered and it will all be brought to light,” he said.
For the past two weeks—since the D.C. crime crackdown began—the city has not seen a single murder or homicide.
“No police officer working in the city can remember a time in their lives when there has been no murders,” Miller asserted.
He said police officers have told him that members of the public have been thanking them for making D.C safe again.
“For the first time in their lives, they can use the parks, they can walk on the streets, you have people who can walk freely at night without worrying about being ribbed or mugged,” he said. “They’re wearing their watch again, they’re wearing jewelry again, they’re carrying purses again.”
Miller explained that D.C. residents had been forced to “change their who lives for fear of being murdered, mugged or carjacked.”
He added that Trump had freed the 700,000 residents of the city from “the rule of criminals and thugs.”
Miller credited Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Administrator Terrance C. Cole with discovering that street criminals in Washington D.C. have been “doing business directly with the transnational criminal cartels,” which are foreign terrorist organizations.
“So not only was the city being run by these criminal thugs, but they were working with some of the most dangerous terrorist organizations on the planet to traffic weapons and drugs into this city,” he explained.
Israel’s military conducted airstrikes on Yemen’s Houthi-controlled capital, Sanaa, on Sunday, targeting high-profile sites in a significant escalation of hostilities.
The strikes hit areas near the presidential palace, the Asar and Hizaz power plants, and Houthi facilities suspected of housing artillery, including ballistic missiles, according to regional reports.
The operation was a direct response to recent Houthi attacks on Israel, including projectile launches on Friday, a military source told the Jerusalem Post. While Israel has previously targeted Houthi infrastructure, its strikes have largely focused on the strategic port city of Hodeida, a critical economic and military hub. The shift to Sanaa signals a broader and more aggressive approach to the conflict.
At least two people were killed and five others injured, Al Masirah, a Houthi-affiliated media outlet reported, according to Al Jazeera.
“The attacks were carried out in response to repeated attacks by the Houthi terrorist regime against the state of Israel and its citizens, including the launch of surface-to-surface missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles towards the country’s territory,” the Israeli military said in a statement.
There’s video:
The exact moment Israel vaporized the entire leadership of Yemeni Houthis 👇
“Westman’s videos, posted hours before the shootings, may only suggest he used ‘very similar to the symbolism used by violent global satanic cults called Order of 9 Angles and 764.'” I reached out to a “left-hand path” guy I knew from science fiction for background, and he offered the following:
Many years ago Dr. Anton LaVey asked Micheal Aquino to write two “Lovecraftain Pieces” for the _Satanic Rituals — “Th Cermony of the Nine Angles”and “The Call to Cthulhu”.
Then back in the 1990s a weirdo (named Myall back in the day) claimed that family knew the REAL SECRET of the nine angles. It was mainly Neo_Nazy stuff — “Kill a Jew for Satan” The guy claimed 100s of followers and had several Orders he was running –my favorite was the “lesbian: Order of the Sapphic Satanists. He tried to join Islam and run an atisemetic Islamic Runic brotherhood that worshipped Azathoth. It did not go well. The ONA shows occasionally with anti-Jewish slogans.
According to this piece last year, 764 is a global Satanic child predator network.
The likely next mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, is, as President Donald Trump put it, a “100% Communist lunatic,” and so you won’t exactly be dumbfounded to learn that his advisors are a rogue’s gallery of political hacks and psychopaths the likes of which have not been seen since Chairman Mao sat down for a tete-a-tete with his fellow cultural revolutionaries. It’s clear that one way or another, once this clown moves into Gracie Mansion, New York City is in for it: skyrocketing crime, an inundation of illegal migrants, bankruptcy, the destruction of the city’s economic base — all that and more is on the table.
Fox News reported Thursday Mamdani’s “growing circle of influence is littered with activists who have espoused anti-Israel views and socialist principles as he attempts to dispel the narrative that he is too ‘radical’ to run the nation’s largest city.” Yeah, these advisors show that he is indeed far too radical to be mayor of New York, but that’s not likely to keep him from being elected.
Among those advisors is Murad Awawdeh, president of the New York Immigration Coalition (NYIC), which advocates ending “state support for detention, deportation, and mass incarceration.” Awawdeh insists that illegal migrants “deserve” healthcare, presumably at the expense of the American taxpayer. He has also ranted: “NO LISTEN… SEEKING ASYLUM AT THE BORDER IS A LEGAL RIGHT. ASYLUM SEEKERS ARE FLEEING FOR THEIR LIVES FROM VIOLENCE, PERSECUTION, & IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE. THE U.S. HAS A LEGAL OBLIGATION TO PROVIDE REFUGE. #WelcomeWithDignity”
A legal obligation to provide refuge for anyone fleeing any kind of difficulty? Do tell. Anyway, NYIC has “taken in $175,000 from the sprawling George Soros nonprofit network,” and if that connection of Soros to Mamdani is too tenuous for you, there is plenty more. Fox News reported on Aug. 14 that “A former top executive for liberal billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations (OSF) between 2017 and 2020 is back in the spotlight amid reports highlighting his involvement with Zohran Mamdani’s New York City mayoral campaign and connecting Obama world to the campaign.”
The Soros exec in question is Patrick Gaspard, an old political hand on the left; the first campaign he worked on was Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential run. Gaspard “has served in several high-profile political positions, including advising former President Barack Obama’s historic 2008 campaign, serving as the Democratic National Committee’s executive director, and being tapped as the Center for American Progress (CAP) president in 2021.”
Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, the co-founder of the Sinaloa cartel, is set to face the rest of his life behind bars as the Trump administration ramps up its efforts to dismantle cartels.
Zambada, 75, confessed in a Brooklyn, New York, courtroom Monday that he had coordinated with Mexican officials to smuggle drugs into the U.S. for decades — and ultimately pleaded guilty to serving as principal leader of a continuing criminal enterprise and racketeering conspiracy.
The Trump administration has pledged to take down the cartels — and experts predict Zambada’s guilty plea paves the way for the Justice Department to launch more indictments against high-profile cartel members moving forward and exerts additional pressure on Mexico to comply with U.S. requests.
Russia may not have an oil industry at all when this war is over. Ukraine just hit two more oil refineries, Kuybyshevskiy in Samara and Afipsky in Krasnodar. “Multiple swarms hit this refinery, which makes Russia’s air defense look even more incompetent than usual.” It was also 1,000km away.
They also hit the Ust-Luga gas processing terminal near St. Petersburg with ten drones. “This terminal is responsible for processing stable gas condenscent in naphtha jet fuel fuel oil and distillates.” The location makes me wonder if a goodly portion was intended for the export market.
The map of Russian refineries reveals a key strategic problem. The main processing capabilities are in the European part of the country, whilst fuel consumption is rising in the far east. Fuel logistic chains for eastern regions span thousands of kilometers, creating additional costs and risks. Kilometer-long queues in cities are a direct result of the imbalance between western production and eastern consumption.
Harris County’s District Attorney Sean Teare has charged Yunhai Li, a 35-year-old former MD Anderson Cancer Center researcher, with attempting to steal and take proprietary cancer-related research back to China. This comes after multiple warnings about research security in Texas higher education.
While the Department of Transportation has owned the historic station since the 1980s, it has allowed a nonprofit, the Union Station Redevelopment Corporation, more control over the station year after year.
Now, the Department of Transportation says it plans to use a new deal with Amtrak and USRC to fund improvements to elevators, lighting, security and other repairs to the roof and several major systems.
“Scottish Girl Arrested For Using Knife And Axe To Ward Off Migrant Stalker.” She was defending her 12-year old sister from unassimilated would-be Muslim statutory rapists, so of course the police had to arrest her…
Last week, a Houston resident foiled a home invasion attempt by a couple criminals trying to impersonate the police. According to the news article:
“Police said the men told the homeowner they were serving a warrant. They were wearing bullet-proof vests, had badges around their necks and were wearing ski masks.”
The homeowner ended up shooting and killing both offenders.
There are many more tips in the article, but police don’t wear ski masks while serving a warrant…
“Texas Teacher Arrested on Federal Child Porn Charge…Robert Jerome Custer, 56, was arrested on a federal charge of accessing child sexual abuse material, commonly called child pornography. Custer previously worked as an educator and counselor in Palestine, Barksdale, Kingsville, and Abilene, according to a statement from the Texas Department of Public Safety.”
The German welfare state is no longer financially sustainable, Friedrich Merz said on Saturday.
The chancellor argued for a fundamental reassessment of the benefits system as spending continues to soar past last year’s record of €47bn (£40bn).
In a state-level party conference meeting on Saturday, Mr Merz said: “The welfare state as we have it today can no longer be financed with what we can economically afford.”
Once the export champion of Europe, Germany’s economy has slowed dramatically since 2017, with GDP growing by only 1.6 per cent since then versus 9.5 per cent for the rest of the eurozone.
Germany’s economy shrank by 0.2 per cent last year following a 0.3 per cent dip in 2023 – the first time since the early 2000s the economy has retreated two years in a row.
Industrial production fell under the Left-leaning “traffic light” coalition of Olaf Scholz and continues to slide under the new government, with GDP declining by 0.3 per cent in the second quarter of 2025.
Meanwhile, spending on social welfare has exploded, and is set to increase further this year as Germany’s population ages and unemployment rises. Although the majority of benefit recipients are German, large numbers are non-German citizens.
German elites will do anything to support its welfare state…except stop importing unassimilated Muslim immigrants. Just like all the rest of Europe’s elites. (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)
A decade after the radical left first started shoving tranny bathrooms down the public’s throat without debate, Texas is finally limiting bathrooms to biological sex.
“Mark Teixeira, Longtime Major League Baseball Player, Launches Texas Congressional Bid.” He’s running as a Republican for the 21st Texas Congressional District, where incumbent Chip Roy is running for Attorney General.
Having a meth habit is going to be disqualifying for a lot of jobs. Like District Attorney for Mariposa County. Thus it’s no surprise that DA Mike McAfee resigned…
Another electric bus company goes bankrupt. “Quebec-based Lion Electric, which the Biden administration awarded $159 million ‘to manufacture 435 school buses between 2022 and 2024,’ has fallen into bankruptcy.” (Previously.)
This is a weird story. “Moms Arrested for Running North Texas Choir Booster Club. Cleared of charges, moms still lost choir booster club money to the school district.”
Local authorities in Collin County, including a school district, have harassed three moms in a quest to control a school booster club and its funds, even going so far as to arrest them.
Plano Independent School District targeted the Jasper High School Choir Booster Club for control of its bank account after the mothers charged with running the independent organization insisted that the district pay for Jasper High School’s stage—as was the district’s responsibility.
The district had the Plano police arrest the booster club’s founders—Laura Cervantes, Krisinda Lingenfelter, and Maria Luisa King. Yet, after a Collin County grand jury failed to find enough evidence to prosecute these moms, a Plano municipal judge recently awarded the club’s bank funds to Plano ISD.
Also this: “Oral arguments were held on May 30 before Judge Paul McNulty, chief judge for the Municipal Court of Plano. Texas Scorecard was in attendance. Recording devices were banned from the trial and the booster club was denied its request to bring a court reporter.” Also, another judge involved in the case, Lisa Bronchetti, evidently wrote a bad check to the club but still failed to excuse herself.
Like I said, weird…
Newark Airport sucks. Objectively. One major culprit? God.
For those unaware of her, Taylor Lorenz is a crazy, left-wing social justice activist masquerading as a journalist, as well as an accused lizard person.
In a private group chat in June, dozens of Democratic political influencers discussed whether to take advantage of an enticing opportunity. They were being offered $8,000 per month to take part in a secretive program aimed at bolstering Democratic messaging on the internet.
But the contract sent to them from Chorus, the nonprofit arm of a liberal influencer marketing platform, came with some strings. Among other issues, it mandated extensive secrecy about disclosing their payments and had restrictions on what sort of political content the creators could produce.
In their group chat, influencers debated the details.
“Should we send a joint email (with all of our email addresses) … or, are we just going to send things separately and hope they change everything for everyone?”
Laurenzo, a nonbinary creator in Columbus, Ohio, with over 884,000 TikTok followers, asked the group.
Some joked about collective bargaining. “Any Newsies fans here?” Eliza Orlins, a public defender and reality TV star known for her appearances on Survivor, posted in the group. “‘We’re a union just by sayin’ so!’”
The influencers in the chat collectively had at least 13 million followers across social platforms. They represented some of the most well-known voices online posting in support of Democrats, and they’re key to wherever the party moves next. But ultimately, the group didn’t make much progress.
“Reading through this revised Chorus contract like: you win some, you lose some,” a reproductive justice influencer named Pari, who posts under the handle @womeninamerica, responded later in the thread. “I also think there’s at least 4 other things that should change 🤣but the vibe I got from their email was that there would be minimal, if any, changes.” (Laurenzo, Orlins, and Pari did not reply to requests for comment.)
“I don’t feel strongly about pushing tbh,” Aaron Parnas, a Gen Z news influencer who has been called the Gen Z Walter Cronkite and has been lauded in legacy media outlets, posted to the chat. “They aren’t going to modify it anymore. Seems like a take it or leave it.” (Parnas declined to comment.)
A search for “the Gen Z Walter Cronkite” only turns up links to the Lorenz piece, so let’s slap a big old [[citation needed]] on this claim.
“I believe we are in Stage 5: Acceptance,” Pari responded. Creators began signing on to the deal.
For years, Democrats have struggled to work with influencers. In 2024, President Joe Biden’s White House snubbed several prominent content creators after they lightly criticized the administration over its policies on climate change, Covid, Gaza, and the TikTok ban. Content creators who challenged Kamala Harris—including Hasan Piker, a well-known influencer on the left—were similarly unwelcome at campaign events.
After the Democrats lost in November, they faced a reckoning. It was clear that the party had failed to successfully navigate the new media landscape. While Republicans spent decades building a powerful and robust independent media infrastructure, maximizing controversy to drive attention and maintaining tight relationships with creators despite their small disagreements with Trump, the Democrats have largely relied on outdated strategies and traditional media to get their message out.
Mild correction: While there are some “independent media outlets” on the right that were born as “Republican” projects (National Review, Town Hall, etc.), the vast majority of “independent media outlets” were born of the efforts of a host of individuals with multitudes of individual agendas (or no agenda at all) that coalesced into a battleswarm (to not coin a phrase) to combat the disasterous direction the Democrats were taking the country. And they were later joined by a host of not-Republican figures (Joe Rogan, Bret Weinstein, etc.) who thought they were on the left but had to step up in reaction to the disasterous infection of social justice on the left.
Just for the record, I am unaware of any similar program on the right, and I have never received a dime from any Republican group or program, only PayPal donations from individual readers.
Now, Democrats hope that the secretive Chorus Creator Incubator Program, funded by a powerful liberal dark money group called The Sixteen Thirty Fund, might tip the scales. The program kicked off last month, and creators involved were told by Chorus that over 90 influencers were set to take part. Creators told WIRED that the contract stipulated they’d be kicked out and essentially cut off financially if they even so much as acknowledged that they were part of the program. Some creators also raised concerns about a slew of restrictive clauses in the contract.
The goal of Chorus, according to a fundraising deck obtained by WIRED, is to “build new infrastructure to fund independent progressive voices online at scale.” The creators who joined the incubator are expected to attend regular advocacy trainings and daily messaging check-ins. Those messaging check-ins are led by Cohen on “rapid response days.” The creators also have to attend at least two Chorus “newsroom” events per month, which are events Chorus plans, often with lawmakers.
Elizabeth Dubois, an assistant professor and university research chair in politics, communication, and technology at the University of Ottawa who has researched the ways influencers are reshaping the US political system, says that “we are seeing influencers being pulled into these dark campaigns or shadow campaigns, where the legal aspect is murky at best.”
“Sometimes it is actually clear that influencers are being used to, for example, evade spending limits,” she says. “I think that we need to remember that for democracy to thrive, we do need transparency around who is paying for political messages.”
Snip.
In 2018, The Sixteen Thirty Fund provided $141 million to more than 100 left-leaning causes in order to bolster Democratic support during the midterms, according to a tax filing obtained by Politico. In 2020, the fund distributed more than $400 million, according to the organization’s public tax filing, which Politico said was used in “efforts to unseat then-president Donald Trump and Republicans’ Senate majority.” In 2022, The Sixteen Thirty Fund spent $196 million backing state ballot measures on abortion rights heading into the midterms, according to NBC. Just four donors accounted for close to two-thirds of the fund’s revenue in 2023, according to its tax filing. The largest donor gave the group $50.5 million, with others donating $31.4 million, $21.8 million, and $13.6 million.
“The Sixteen Thirty Fund, which is not required to disclose its contributors, has for years been a major funding source for liberal and progressive causes and groups, including those that spend in elections,” says Walker Davis, a research director for the open-government group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “Though their recent tax returns indicate that they have pulled back from the eye-popping sums they raised and spent in 2020, the organization is still one of the top-spending politically oriented nonprofits in the country.”
Chorus, which is described in contracts reviewed by WIRED as a “project of” The Sixteen Thirty Fund that handles operations for the creator program, launched in November 2024 as a nonprofit arm of Good Influence, a for-profit influencer marketing agency aimed at helping content creators connect with social-good campaigns. Good Influence was founded in October 2020 by Stuart Perelmuter, the former communications director for representative John Yarmuth of Kentucky. Seeing an opportunity after Kamala Harris’ loss last November, Perelmuter cofounded Chorus with Democratic influencer Brian Tyler Cohen, who has over 4.6 million subscribers on YouTube and leads messaging check-ins for the creator cohort on “rapid response days.” According to records reviewed by WIRED, Chorus claims that its initial creator cohort has a collective audience of more than 40 million followers with more than 100 million weekly viewers and that the organization has “hundreds of creators signed up” and “ready to amplify” messaging.
Why come up with your own opinions when shadowy dark money groups are willing to secretly slip you cash to become another mouthpiece to do The Will Of The Party?
And now you know that a whole lot of “independent” leftwing “influencers” can be bought for the low, low price of $8000.
If your “church leader” makes you work for free and sleep in his call center, you might be in a cult.
Two leaders of Kingdom of God Global Church were arrested Wednesday for their alleged roles in a forced labor and money-laundering conspiracy across multiple states, including Texas, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
The JMMI Global “Campus for Harvest”, a property owned by Kingdom of God Global Church, was raided early Wednesday morning in Houston.
According to the DOJ, David Taylor, 53, was arrested in North Carolina, and Michelle Brannon, 56, was arrested in Florida.
The indictment charges them with conspiracy to commit forced labor, forced labor and money laundering conspiracy.
According to the DOJ, Taylor and Brannon are the leaders of Kingdom of God Global Church, formerly known as Joshua Media Ministries International.
Taylor reportedly operated call centers in Michigan, Florida, Texas and Missouri to solicit donations for KOGGC/JMMI. The DOJ says they received millions of dollars every year through the call centers.
Taylor and Brannon are accused of compelling their victims to work at the call centers and work as Taylor’s “armor bearers,” his personal servants.
According to the DOJ, the victims’ lives were controlled by Taylor and Brannon, they slept in the call center facility or in a ministry house, and they were not allowed to leave without permission.
Taylor allegedly had his armor bearers transport women from ministry houses, airports, and other locations to Taylor’s location and ensure the women took Plan B emergency contraceptives.
Doesn’t sound very godly, does it?
“In addition, according to the indictment, Taylor and Brannon required victims to work in the call centers long hours without pay or perform other services for Taylor. Taylor set unobtainable daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly monetary donation goals for victims working in the call centers and required victims to follow the orders he created without question. If victims disobeyed an order or failed to reach his monetary goals, Taylor and Brannon punished the victims with public humiliation, additional work, food and shelter restrictions, psychological abuse, forced repentance, sleep deprivation, physical assaults, and threats of divine judgment in the form of sickness, accidents, and eternal damnation,” the DOJ wrote in a news release.
I am not a lawyer, but I’m pretty sure a bunch of those are illegal under both state and federal law.
Not to mention the Thirteenth Amendment.
According to the allegations, Taylor and Brannon used much of the money to buy luxury properties, luxury vehicles and sporting equipment like a boat, jet skis and ATVs. The DOJ says Taylor has received around $50 million in donations since 2014.
In the northeast Houston-area, federal agents have raided a hotel owned by JMMI Global, a ministry led by David E. Taylor. FOX 26’s Sherman Desselle has more information on the raid.
FOX 26 was on the scene of an FBI search warrant execution at the JMMI Global Campus for Harvest in the 14000 block of North Freeway in Houston early Wednesday morning. According to property records, the property has been owned by Kingdom of God Global Church since 2023.
According to Taylor, the former hotel would be used as a Bible school, campus, and housing center for missionaries and students.
At the scene, officers could be heard on a loudspeaker announcing the FBI had a search warrant for the location and for anyone inside to come out.
Several men and women were escorted out by officers, some handcuffed. According to sources, 17 individuals, nine men and eight women, were removed from the building.
All of this sounds (sex abuse, slavery) like classic cult behavior. if any of this is happening to you, you need to find a new church and call the police.
Following redistricting, a whole lot of 2026 races are heating up, so let’s do a Texas election news roundup.
Following Rep. Chip Roy’s entry into the Attorney General’s race, Sen. Ted Cruz and current AG Ken Paxton have issued dueling endorsements.
The early favorite for the most interesting 2026 race in Texas is the campaign for the state’s attorney general, and two new endorsements have ramped the intrigue up to 11.
Four candidates are vying for the spot: state Sens. Joan Huffman (R-Houston) and Mayes Middleton (R-Galveston), former Department of Justice appointee Aaron Reitz, and Congressman Chip Roy (R-TX-21).
Last week, Roy jumped into the race after a couple months of speculation — the same day that polling showed 73 percent undecided in the then-three person field.
Middleton remains far and away the frontrunner on the money front, being able to self-fund with an initial $10 million investment — and the intent to put another $10 million in if need be. He also has the backing of a large number of Republicans in the Texas House, where he served two terms before winning his Senate seat.
But each of the candidates has their own competitive advantages, making the race one of the most interesting to watch in the state so far.
Over the weekend, two established GOP figures broke their impartiality in the race and endorsed competing candidates. First, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) backed Roy, his former chief of staff, saying, “There are several excellent candidates right now in the race for Texas Attorney General. All of them are friends of mine, and all of them have been strong supporters of mine for many, many years. Texas is blessed to have an abundance of strong conservatives stepping forward to lead, in such a time as this.”
“I am proud to endorse Chip Roy for Attorney General of Texas. As my very first chief of staff, Chip has been a close friend and ally of mine for over 12 years. We have been in more fights together than I can count, and I know Chip will always, always, always fight for conservative values.”
Reitz, whose campaign had picked up serious momentum since he launched in June, had served as Cruz’s chief of staff before taking a job in the Department of Justice under the second Trump administration earlier this year. The former Cruz staffer had also been seriously considering running for Roy’s congressional seat in light of the congressman’s entry into the attorney general race.
But Reitz decided to stay in, and unloaded his own top shelf endorsement on Monday. “One of the most frequent questions Texans ask me is: ‘Ken, who should succeed you as Attorney General?’ My answer is now definitive: Aaron Reitz,” Paxton said in a press release.
“Aaron Reitz is the only candidate who is fully vetted, battle-tested, proven, and ready to be Attorney General. He is loyal, fearless, trusted, and relentlessly committed to the Rule of Law. He has already proven himself as a defender of Texas, of Texans’ rights, and of the Constitution. That’s why President Trump called him a ‘true MAGA attorney’ and a ‘warrior for our Constitution’ — and I could not agree more.”
Cruz isn’t the only one who endorsed Roy in the race, as Gun Owners of America sent out out an email endorsement that I’m not seeing on their website yet:
As a member of Congress, Chip Roy has been a steadfast ally for gun owners: he has opposed federal gun control, fought executive overreach, and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with GOA to defend your freedoms.
Chip’s record on the Second Amendment is rock solid. As a member of the powerful House Rules Committee, responsible for deciding which bills are sent to the House floor, Chip has been a brick wall to anti-gunners who aim to infringe on the Second Amendment. Chip will call out RINOs who compromise on the Second Amendment or empower the unconstitutional ATF.
Not only does Chip talk the talk, he shows it with sponsoring and cosponsoring pro-gun legislation!
Since January alone, he:
Sponsored H.R. 962 — Defending Veterans’ Second Amendment Rights Act (Prohibits VA from disarming veterans with fiduciaries)
Cosponsored H.R. 3228 — Constitutional Hearing Protection Act (Removes suppressors from the definition of firearms)
Cosponsored H.R. 1643 — SAFER Voter Act (Reduces the age to buy a handgun from an FFL from 21 to 18)
Cosponsored H.R. 1041 — Veterans 2nd Amendment Protection Act (Prohibits VA from disarming veterans with fiduciaries)
Cosponsored H.R. 563 — No REGISTRY Rights Act (Directs ATF to delete their illegal gun owner registry and certify to Congress that they have complied with the law)
In 2021, when Democrats attempted to insert unconstitutional red flag laws for our service members, it was Chip Roy along with key allies in Congress who prevented that from being signed into law.
The gap between Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) in the 2026 U.S. Senate race is narrowing, according to new polling from Texas Southern University.
Cornyn trails five points behind Paxton in the GOP primary, according to a poll conducted by the Barbara Jordan Public Policy Research and Survey Center at Texas Southern University — the same survey which had the senator nine points behind Paxton three months prior.
The survey polled 1,500 likely 2026 Republican primary voters and 1,500 likely 2026 Democratic primary voters, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.53 percent.
Various polls in the field have gauged Cornyn and Paxton in a head-to-head primary scenario, generally showing the latter to be in a comfortable lead. The Senate Leadership Fund estimates it to be about a 17-point gap, after averaging 13 polls taken over the past six months.
However, data from an Emerson College poll on Friday, alongside this most recent Texas Southern poll, paint a different picture for Cornyn’s odds. Emerson had Cornyn in the lead by one point with 30 percent, Paxton at 29 percent, “someone else” at five percent, and “undecided” at 37 percent.
Congressman Wesley Hunt (R-TX-38), who’s been flirting with a bid against Paxton and Cornyn through a number of campaign-style ads running across the state, was also measured in the poll. In a three-way matchup, Hunt collected 22 percent of the votes, contrasted with Paxton’s 35 percent and Cornyn’s 30 percent.
Congressman Ronny Jackson (R-TX-13), Hunt’s colleague who’s also lightly tested the waters, was also thrown into a three-way mix alongside Paxton and Cornyn. He garnered 15 percent of the vote, behind Cornyn’s 33 percent and Paxton’s 38 percent.
When faced against one another, Cornyn collected 43 percent of the vote against Jackson’s 35 percent. When placed against Paxton, Jackson got 33 percent while the attorney general led with 44 percent.
Hunt received 36 percent when faced against Paxton, who led with 43 percent — while 21 percent voted as “unsure.” Cornyn led with 43 percent against Hunt, while the latter received 36 percent. A similar 22 percent marked themselves as “unsure.”
Taking the usual poll caveats and triple them for a poll this far out. The caveat to the caveat is that the sample size is bigger than some previous polls, and Cornyn has been dropping media ad spends (an unusual move this early), so I can well imagine that he’s been able to close some of the gap. But all the polls have shown Paxton leading, which can’t be comforting for a four term incumbent. Remember, when Cornyn was first elected to the senate, Barack Obama was still an Illinois state senator…
Democratic Congressman Al Green, the current incumbent in the recently redistricted 9th U.S. Congressional District, is waiting for the 18th Congressional District Special Election to declare he’s running for the 18th in 2026.
Congressman Al Green (D-TX-09) has all but officially declared his candidacy for Congressional District (CD) 18, which largely holds his prior constituency following Texas’ mid-decade redistricting.
Green stated during a press conference on Tuesday afternoon that if he “made an announcement today, then there would be mass confusion about where I am. I’m serving the people of the 9th Congressional District,” after outlining how the “new” CD 18 more closely resembles his current CD 9.
“I live in the new 18 — I’m not moving into the new 18. I’ve lived in this house for more than 30 years. This is my home,” Green stated.
“So to those who say I am moving into the 18th Congressional District to run for office, not so. All I’m doing is staying where my constituents are.”
The Texas Legislature passed its new Republican-favored congressional map on August 20, following a two-week quorum break by members of the Texas House Democratic Caucus to prevent the vote. While Green’s CD 9 isn’t one of the five districts expected to flip from blue to red, as requested by President Donald Trump, a majority of CD 9 is now folded into the existing Democratic stronghold CD 18 — a move Green categorized as intentionally racist, as local Democratic lawmakers have also stated. Republicans argue that they are instead reworking the districts due to and in order to increase partisan performance.
“I have no relationships politically with the people in the new 9th Congressional District. The new 18th Congressional District is where I have my home and my constituents,” Green said.
He noted the passing of first Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee in 2024, then Lee’s successor, Congressman Sylvester Turner, this March, as well as referencing the special election which will be held in November to determine the candidate to represent CD 18.
“It’s important for people to know I’m not going to be in that special election,” Green continued.
“I’m not going to be in that special election for a multiplicity of reasons, but here is one: because if I chose to get in it, and should I win it, I would have to then vacate the 9th Congressional District.”
Finally, down in fringe candidate territory, Valentina Gomez, who is running against incumbent John Carter for the Texas 31st Congressional district, made headlines by burning a Quran, giving a whole new meaning to “hot Latinas.” Sorry, I’m just not down with book burning (not that I want her to be charged with blasphemy laws either). Democrats should be asked: Which is worse, burning a flag or burning a Quran…
Oh the glories of Intersectionality! Up in Ottawa, pro-Palestinian protestors blocked a gay pride parade.
Ottawa’s annual Pride parade was cancelled Sunday after being disrupted by pro-Palestinian protesters.
A group called Queers for Palestine – Ottawa had organized a rally to coincide with the Pride parade.
Queers for Palestine is every bit as logical as Cattle for Burger King.
Elected officials and other groups boycotted last year’s parade after Capital Pride released a statement expressing solidarity with Palestinians, but the statement has since been removed from the organization’s website.
A video posted online today shows a protester calling for Capital Pride to recommit to solidarity with the pro-Palestinian cause and for elected officials who boycotted last year’s parade to apologize.
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, who attended Sunday’s parade, says it was “deeply regrettable” that the group of activists chose to block the event.
I bet ordinary Canadians think it “deeply regrettable” that you’re such a spineless pussy that you let activists block a legal parade and do nothing about it.
Asmongold has some video:
“‘No Pride in Genocide.’ I’m going to be real, that’s a pretty good one.”
“Basically it’s two caterpillar Karens getting in a fight with each other about whose cause is more oppressed.”
“The left is cannibalizing itself. Oh, it will. The reason why is that it has no mechanism to rein in extreme actors.”
“Being a left-wing person is like living in a Russian nesting doll of infinitely many purity tests. And if you say no to any of those, you’re instantly a Nazi.”
“Virtue signaling civil war.”
“Muslims outrank LGBT.” Do they? Does anyone have an intersectionality chart that actually answers victimization on the head of a pin questions like this?
While there’s a question as to which social justice victimhood identity politics sect outranks which, there’s none as to how devout Muslims regard homosexuals They are to be stoned. Execution is explicitly authorized as punishment for homosexual acts in many Muslim countries, including those of Hamas benefactor Iran. In Palestinian-controlled territories, the killings appear to be “extra-judicial,” which I’m sure is a great comfort to the gays being murdered there.
“Social justice” is an unstable ideology design to cram disparate groups who otherwise have nothing in common together for the purpose of promoting far leftwing ideology and raking off government graft. It’s a deeply unstable mixture that can (and should) explode at any time…
Back before The Simpsons conquered television, Matt Groening’s Life in Hell comic strip would publish a yearly “List of Forbidden Words” strip to start the year. Now Democratic think tank Third Way, realizing that their brand is less popular than Akbar & Jeff’s Cryogenics Hut, have produced their own list of words Democrats should forbid themselves from saying if they ever want to win back the normies.
privilege
Privilege
Violence (as in “environmental violence”)
Dialoguing
Othering
Triggering
Microaggression/assault/invalidation
Progressive stack
Centering
Safe space
Holding space
Body shaming
Subverting norms
Systems of oppression
Critical theory
Cultural appropriation
Postmodernism
Overton Window
Heuristic
Existential threat to [climate, the planet, democracy, the economy]
Radical transparency
Small ‘d’ democracy
Barriers to participation
Stakeholders
The unhoused
Food insecurity
Housing insecurity
Person who immigrated
Birthing person/inseminated person
Pregnant people
Chest feeding
Cisgender
Deadnaming
Heteronormative
Patriarchy
LGBTQIA+
Latinx
BIPOC
Allyship
Intersectionality
Minoritized communities
Justice-involved
Carceration
Incarcerated people
Involuntary confinement
Not a bad list, though a few of those (Overton window, heuristic, existential threat in reference to enormous objects like dinosaur-killing asteroids or the U.S. national debt) are still useful in other contexts. But there are a whole lot of additions needed:
Climate change
Decarbonize
Decolonization
DEI
Equity (outside of finance, and as opposed to equality)
White supremacy (for talking about anything in this century)
See, the problem with the modern woke mind-virus, social justice-infected Democrat Party doesn’t begin, or end, with their obfuscating academic jargon. Their need to Orwellize the language is a result of the deeply unpopular, racist, bigoted, anti-borders, anti-reality policies social justice democrats have been promulgating. Their language is bad because their ideas are bad.
Their ideas of discrimination on the basis of race, misandry, open borders, radical transsexism and pro-crime policies will remain deeply unpopular no matter how many times they try changing the names.
A Republican plan to redraw Texas congressional districts ahead of the 2026 midterm elections is on its way to the governor’s desk after passing the Senate early Saturday morning, paving the way for a shake-up in the state’s U.S. House delegation.
Senators passed the congressional redistricting plan on a party-line, 18-11 vote, following hours of debate and a threatened filibuster that fizzled.
The new map, drawn to improve Republican political performance, adds five new GOP-opportunity seats.
State Sen. Phil King (R–Weatherford) sponsored the redistricting plan, House Bill 4 by State Rep. Todd Hunter (R–Corpus Christi), which the House passed on Wednesday.
“The area of redistricting law is very robust and gets very complex, very quickly,” King opened Friday morning. “We’re not in a courtroom today.”
Yet throughout the day, Democrats pressed King on specific redistricting legalities and made clear they intend to challenge the map in court.
King said HB 4 is “legal under all applicable law” and meets the requirements of “one person, one vote” and compactness.
He repeatedly emphasized that the map was drawn based on partisan political performance, which the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled is permissible, not racial data.
“In contrast to the complications that are involved with race-based redistricting, political performance is really a pretty easy map to draw, and it’s absolutely permissible as a basis for drawing electoral districts,” said King.
The map flips five congressional districts from Democrat- to Republican-leaning: CD9 in Houston, CD28 in the Rio Grande Valley, CD32 in Dallas, CD34 in coastal South Texas, and CD35 in San Antonio.
I analyzed the effects of district movement on their incumbents here.
“There’s no question Democrats are not in favor of this map… because it elects more Republicans,” said King. “It was also very clear from testimony that a lot of people want us to create maps that reflect specific percentages of ethnic groups, and that’s illegal. We can’t do that.”
State Sen. Adam Hinojosa (R–Corpus Christi), the first Republican to hold Senate District 27 since Reconstruction, said the new map—which increases majority-minority voting districts—gives South Texas Hispanics “a voice that reflects their values, not outdated assumptions about race or party.”
“This is not a racial shift. This is a values shift, and no amount of shouting racism is going to change that,” said Hinojosa.
For over half a century, Democrats have used the Voting Rights Act as a tool to racially gerrymander themselves legislative majorities. More recently, Republican have flipped the script on them, concentrating minority voters in deep blue urban districts to make other districts more favorable to Republicans while fulfilling the letter of the Voting Rights Act. Then Democrats launched the Petteway v. Galveston County lawsuit trying to save one Galveston County commissioner’s seat, whereupon the Supreme Court ruled that those black/Hispanic coalition minority districts carved out to benefit the Democratic Party were unconstitutional.
Depending on only partisan affiliation date, Texas Republicans have now produced districts that are notably more compact than logical than many Democratic Party racially gerrymandered maps. Texas Republicans have garnered five additional Republican seats and helped America move closer to colorblind society. I count that as a win-win.
