Uncensored Free Speech Platform

US troops blasted through steel doors 'like it was like papier-mache' to snatch Maduro, Trump says
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.

President Donald Trump recounted the military's strength during the successful operation to capture Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro during an event in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Friday honoring U.S. special forces and their families for their roles in the capture. 
"It was in a matter of minutes before (Maduro) was on a helicopter being taken out of there. They had to go through steel doors," Trump said Friday afternoon. "The steels were like it was like papier-maché. You know what papier-maché is? That's weak paper."
U.S. special operations forces carried out the successful capture of Maduro and his wife on sweeping narcotics charges. Trump celebrated that the mission did not kill any U.S. military personnel or damage U.S. military equipment in a nation that is heavily militarized, with Maduro himself living on a protected military base.
STATE DEPT CONFIRMS 'LIMITED NUMBER' OF PERSONNEL IN CARACAS WORKING TO RESUME VENEZUELA DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS
"These guys blasted through every door," Trump continued Friday. "They got up to him before he got to the big safe. But that wouldn't have worked either, because they had equipment that was going to knock that out in a matter of minutes, but he never got there. It went so fast."
Trump continued that the operation was "precise" and "incredible."
HEGSETH SIGNS OFF ON WOUNDED US TROOPS KEEPING BULLETS, SHRAPNEL REMOVED FROM THEIR BODIES AFTER MADURO RAID
"Think of it in a matter of minutes," he continued. "When people realize what happened, they're looking up and there's the helicopter heading back to the aircraft carriers. So that night, the entire world saw what the full military might the U.S. military is capable of. And that was an unbelievable operation, but that was a smaller operation." 
WIFE OF FORMER AMERICAN DETAINEE RELEASED AFTER MORE THAN A YEAR IN VENEZUELAN PRISON
Maduro was whisked off on a helicopter, before he was brought to the U.S., where he faces federal charges, including narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine-trafficking conspiracy and weapons-related offenses. He’s being held in federal custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in New York City. 
First lady Melania Trump joined the president on the trip to North Carolina, with Trump joking that they enjoy the area so much, they might move there in the future. 
"Maybe I'll maybe I'll move here with our great movie star," Trump quipped, giving a nod to Melania Trump's new documentary, "Melania." "We'll move here with our first lady. We'll move to Fort Bragg. Would you like that, darling?  She loves you. It's a possibility."

Ohio Bill Would Protect Parents for Refusing to Go Along With Transgender Ideology
Who's accountable for the results?

A bill from Republican Ohio state Reps. Josh Williams and Gary Click looks to continue Ohio Republicans’ fight against transgender ideology.

The legislation introduced this week, titled the Affirming Families First Act, “is about protecting families from government overreach and ensuring parents are not punished for raising their children consistent with biological reality.” Williams told The Daily Signal.

“No parent should lose custody, face state intervention, or be deemed unfit simply for affirming a child’s sex,” the Ohio lawmaker added.

? BREAKING: I just introduced legislation in the Ohio House to BAN state agencies from taking action against parents who refuse to allow their children to change their gender.

While states like California are turning themselves into "refuges" for children with gender dysphoria,…
— Rep. Josh Williams (@JoshWilliamsOH) February 11, 2026

What’s in the Bill?

The two Ohio Republicans argue this bill is necessary to protect parental rights.

A press release from Click’s office explains that the bill “prohibits a parent’s affirmation of a child’s biological sex from constituting the basis to restrict access to the child, deny the child’s return, limit decision-making authority over the child’s physical or mental health care or withhold information about the child.”

The bill also prohibits “investigating a report of abuse or child neglect if the sole basis for the report is the parent’s or guardian’s affirmation of the child’s biological sex.”

The Heritage Foundation’s Laura Hanford was present for the bill’s introduction. She also co-authored a report titled “States Must Refuse to Define ‘Abuse’ as Raising a Child According to His or Her Sex.”

“For decades, ideologues have worked behind the scenes to weaponize Child Protective Services in the states,” Hanford warned in her report. This “includes accusing parents of ‘abuse’ if they fail to affirm their child’s discordant ‘gender identity.'”

Hanford explained how the government has attempted to weaponize gender identity in an interview with The Daily Signal.

“There is no scientific evidence or marker for ‘gender identity,’ yet parents from coast to coast have lost their children for refusing to adopt this belief system that a child can be born in the wrong body,” Hanford said. “Incredibly, in the upside-down universe of gender ideology, it is ‘abuse’ not to sterilize, castrate, or use wrong-sex pronouns for one’s child.”

“Parents can suddenly find themselves facing a hostile phalanx of ideologues in courts, schools and child welfare systems, who have spent minutes with their child but are suddenly the ‘safe adults’ while parents who have spent a lifetime loving and caring for their children are deemed ‘abusers,'” Hanford continued.

Williams and Click have offered what Hanford terms “a critically important bill” that “is the most comprehensive in the country on this issue,” and “sets a new national standard for protecting children and families from the ideological weaponization of child protective systems.”

The Center for Christian Virtue Policy Director David Mahan was also present for the bill’s introduction and spoke …

Trump pushes Michael Whatley’s North Carolina Senate bid during Fort Bragg troop visit
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.

President Donald Trump used a Friday visit with special forces members at North Carolina‘s Fort Bragg to promote his hand-picked candidate for the state’s U.S. Senate seat up this fall.

Trump traveled to the military base to honor the special forces members who took part in January’s raid to capture former Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro. Billed as a celebration of the military, including a closed-door visit with special forces operators, Trump did not shy away from midterm politics. The president even pulled former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley, his endorsed candidate to succeed retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), onto the stage.

“You saw what happened in the last election,” Trump said. “We won everything, and this is a man that was in charge of this state. He did so well here, there was nobody else that I even considered to run the RNC.”

Whatley, who is set to square off against former Gov. Roy Cooper in the general election come November, called Trump “the best president.”

“I am thrilled that he has asked me to run for Senate in North Carolina and is giving me an opportunity to represent you and to fight for you and every other base that we have in this great state, to protect our interests, to make sure that America and our allies are going to be protected,” Whatley said.

The North Carolina Senate seat is considered one of the key toss-ups of 2026. Whatley was courted by Trump to jump into the race after Tillis, 65, opted against seeking a second term. A centrist Republican, Tillis has broken with Trump on national security and the Justice Department’s inquiry into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.

Underscoring the importance that veterans and military families played in helping Trump carry the state three times, Friday’s remarks focused heavily on military policies. Trump, in particular, noted his administration changed the name of the Defense Department back to the War Department, boosted federal spending for military families, bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities, and conducted the Maduro operation in Venezuela.

Trump also leaned into the 2025 killing of Iryna Zarutska, a flashpoint issue for Republicans in North Carolina. Zarutska, an immigrant from Ukraine, was murdered on a Charlotte-area light rail train, allegedly by a man with a lengthy criminal record. Republicans pointed to a criminal justice reform bill signed into law by Cooper as being responsible for the killing.

Cooper “allowed this man to get out …

Don Lemon pleads not guilty to charges for storming Minnesota church
Equal justice apparently isn't equal anymore.

Former CNN anchor Don Lemon pleaded not guilty on Friday to federal charges stemming from his presence at a January protest inside a St. Paul, Minnesota church that authorities say disrupted religious worship and targeted a pastor over alleged ties to federal immigration enforcement.

Lemon, 59, appeared in federal court Friday afternoon just after 12 p.m. local time. He was indicted alongside eight codefendants in connection with the Jan. 18 incident at Cities Church. Prosecutors allege the group entered the church during services as part of a coordinated demonstration against Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in the region, and Lemon was charged for joining in while documenting it as a freelance journalist.

Journalist Don Lemon enters the courthouse in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Vancleave)

The Justice Department has charged Lemon and eight others in the case with conspiracy against rights and with injuring, intimidating, or interfering with the exercise of religious freedom at a place of worship under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. The statutes are typically used in cases involving alleged obstruction of religious services or threats tied to worship activities, or efforts to obstruct entry into abortion clinics.

Outside the courtroom, several protesters and supporters of Lemon gathered, holding signs. One of them stated “Free Speech Free Press,” while others held up anti-Trump administration posters with slogans including “abolish ICE.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi has described the incident as a “coordinated attack on Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota,” signaling the administration’s intent to treat disruptions of religious institutions as federal civil rights matters rather than routine protest activity. During her testimony to Congress this week, she reiterated her commitment to protecting houses of worship from any kind of disruptions, such as the storming that occurred early last month.

Lemon was arrested Jan. 30, days after the protest, in a move that quickly drew backlash from press-freedom advocates and some media organizations, which argue the case risks criminalizing newsgathering. Supporters of the prosecution contend Lemon was not merely observing but actively participating in conduct that disrupted worshippers.

According to court filings, protesters accused the church’s pastor of working with federal immigration authorities.

Lemon’s role had been live-streaming the …

Catholics, conservatives cheer ouster of ex-Miss California from WH religious panel after hijacking hearing
Who benefits from this decision?

The Trump administration swiftly removed Carrie Prejen Boller, a former Miss California winner, from a White House religious council amid accusations she worked to "hijack" a hearing on antisemitism, earning applause from religious leaders and conservatives. 
"Carrie Prejean was thrown off the Religious Liberty Commission, and thank God," a former Trump White House official told Fox News Digital in reaction to the ouster. "These commissions exist to advance the President’s agenda, not to serve as a personal Jew-hating platform." 
Prejean Boller was ousted from the White House Religious Liberty Commission after she worked to "hijack a hearing" held Monday regarding antisemitism in the U.S. to promote her "own personal and political agenda on any issue," according to chair of the commission, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. 
Prejean Boller is the 2009 Miss California USA winner who was stripped of her crown over allegations of breaching contract. She gained nationwide attention in 2009 for speaking out against legalizing gay marriage from the pageant's stage. 
MAMDANI’S ANTISEMITISM CZAR ONCE SLAMMED POST CONDEMNING HAMAS TERROR ATTACKS
Trump owned the Miss Universe Organization at the time and defended Prejean Boller, then Carrie Prejean. 
Trump established the religious liberty commission in May via an executive order directing the Department of Justice to provide support to the newly formed body focused on upholding "Federal laws that protect all citizens’ full participation in a pluralistic democracy, and protect the free exercise of religion."
The commission held a hearing Monday at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., on combating antisemitism and upholding religious freedom, where Prejean Boller wore a Palestinian flag pin and got into tense exchanges. 
Prejean Boller converted to Catholicism from evangelical Christianity in April and invoked her Catholic faith in comments rejecting Zionism during the hearing. 
TARGETED FOR THEIR FAITH OVERSEAS, PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS GET A WHITE HOUSE WELCOME UNDER TRUMP
"I am a Catholic, and Catholics don’t embrace Zionism," she said. 
Catholic League President Bill Donohue swiftly called for her ouster in an opinion piece published on his organization's website, underscoring that she did not represent Catholics in her remarks. 
"Prejean Boller is a former Miss California and a convert to Catholicism," he wrote Wednesday. "She does not run a Catholic organization, has no Catholic credentials as an author or instructor, and indeed represents no one but herself. For her to say, without qualification, that …

Jeffries and Schumer Denounce Trump’s ‘Racist’ Video–but Who Are They to Complain?
Same show, different day.

On President Donald Trump’s social media platform, someone in the administration–the White House offered different versions of how this happened–posted a 62-second cartoon video set to the song “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”

This was posted on a Thursday night and, following cries of “racism,” was removed by noon the following day. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the reaction “fake outrage.” Trump said: “I guess during the end of it, there was some kind of picture people don’t like. I wouldn’t like it either, but I didn’t see it. I just, I looked at the first part, and it was really about voter fraud.”

Asked by a reporter, if he condemns the racist part of the video, Trump said, “Of course I do.”

The video shows Trump’s head attached to a lion confidently strolling through the jungle. Other animals dance as the Trump lion saunters through. On the heads of the other animals are well-known Democrats, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, former President Joe Biden, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, former Vice President Kamala Harris, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and others.

Near the end for about one second, the video showed the heads of former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama on the heads of monkeys. A screenshot of the Barack and Michelle heads on apes went viral. That Biden’s face was on that of a banana-eating orangutan did not seem to disturb anyone.

The outrage was predictable. “Racist” Donald Trump strikes again! Those crying out included Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer.

Jeffries said, “He definitively needs to apologize. It was a disgusting video … even a handful of Republicans … finally showed some backbone in pushing back against the president’s malignant, bottom-feeder-like behavior.”

But Jeffries has his own record of “malignant, bottom-feeder-like behavior.” As a college student, Jeffries praised two of the country’s most prominent antisemites — his uncle and City College of New York professor Leonard Jeffries, who compared Jews to “dogs” and “skunks” and claimed “rich Jews financed the slave trade, and Nation of Islam’s Louis Farrakhan, who has a decadeslong record of antisemitism.

Hakeem has long insisted he only “vaguely remembers” defending them. But, in 2023, CNN reported the Binghamton University Black Student Union, of which Hakeem was a leader, invited Uncle Leonard to speak. When Jewish students protested, Hakeem “led a press conference” to defend his uncle, despite later saying that “he did not recall any press coverage” of the controversy.

CNN said Jeffries’ 1992 op-ed undermines claims he wasn’t aware of uncle’s antisemitic controversy. Hakeem wrote that his uncle challenges the “existing white supremacist educational system and long-standing distortion of history. His reward has been a media lynching complete with character assassinations and inflammatory, erroneous accusations.”

In a research paper called “Dr. Jeffries and the Anti-Semitic Branch of the Afrocentrism Movement,” Kenneth Stern with the American Jewish Committee wrote, “… Leonard Jeffries was …

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: New Official Data Make Clear that Tariff-Led Inflation Claims Remain Pretty Weak
How is this acceptable?

This week’s been a really bad week for Trump, Trump-onomics, and tariff haters economically – meaning it’s been a good week economically for the country at large.  Because today, on the heels of good official jobs numbers and a good official initial jobless claims release came an equally good official consumer inflation report today.  

According to the U.S. Labor Department, keeper of the inflation statistics, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) set several multi-months bests in January and presented at worst mixed evidence that the tariffs imposed by President Trump in his second term have added much to upward price pressures.

Headline CPI rose in January at an annual rate of 2.39 percent – not only cooler than December’s 2.65 percent, but the slowest pace since last May’s 2.38 percent.

On a monthly basis, headline CPI was up just 0.17 percent – only about half as slow as the December read of 0.30 percent and its best showing also since last May (0.10 percent).

The core inflation results strip out food and energy costs because they’re supposedly volatile for reasons having little to do with the economy’s underlying vulnerability to inflation.  Their January yearly increase of 2.51 percent was an improvement on December’s 2..65 percent pace and the most sluggish rate since the 1.65 percent recorded back in March, 2021.

One setback – on a monthly basis, core inflation worsened by 0.30 percent, faster than December’s 0.23 percent.

The new January release also confirms that the second Trump 2.0 administration’s record on overall affordability still tops the Biden performance despite the former’s tariffs that were supposed to send prices sky high.

So far during Trump 2.0 (and starting last February – the first full month of the president’s second term), headline CPI has increased by 2.16 percent.  The figure for the comparable final eleven Biden months?  This cost of living measure climbed by 2.57 percent.  

That 2.16 percent Trump figure for January is actually higher than December’s 1.96 percent.  But it’s still very close to the two percent annual inflation target set by the Federal Reserve ((the U.S. government’s main inflation-fighting body) (according to a separate living cost measure).  

The Biden-Trump core inflation comparison favors Mr. Trump even more strongly.  Between February, 2025 and last month, such prices rose by 2.25 percent.  That’s also worse than the December figure of 1.96 percent.  But it’s considerably better than the rate during the same preceding Biden months (2.88 percent).

And the post-“Liberation Day” results, which most economists and pundits were certain would be much hotter because of the slew of multi-decade-high tariffs imposed by the president last April?  Nothing of the kind is visible from the numbers.

Between April, 2025 and last month, consumer prices advanced by 1.96 percent.  During the comparable final pre-tariff Biden months of April, 2024 through January, 2025, they were up just a slightly better 1.85 percent.  And the gap narrowed between last December and January.

Even better from a Trump-ian and tariff-y standpoint has been the behavior of core inflation since Liberation Day.  During the …

New biography traces Justice Alito’s rise and influence on the Supreme Court
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.

I work in publishing and wanted to flag that a full biography of Justice Alito by Mollie Hemingway is coming out, April 21
One of the interesting angles is how it traces the development of his jurisprudence from his early career through the current Court. For people following debates about his influence, it might add some useful background.

Trump's CDC is canceling $600M in HIV and STD funds to four Democrat-led states
This deserves loud pushback.

A judge issued a temporary block on these cuts on the grounds that the states' attorneys general claims that these cuts had "arbitrary, capricious, or unconstitutional rationales" were likely to be upheld in court.

The Trump Administration claims the cuts were because those "states [are] fraught with waste and mismanagement," but haven't presented substantive evidence supporting that this claim justifies an action of this magnitude and impact.

Transgender lawmaker teams up with Hillary Clinton for girls’ rights forum
Is this competence or optics?

America’s first transgender member of Congress and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are joining forces to highlight girls’ fundamental rights at the Munich Security Conference.

Rep. Sarah McBride (D-DE), a transgender woman, will speak on a panel moderated by Clinton on Saturday, labeled “Girls Just Want to Have Fundamental Rights: Fighting the Global Pushback.”

McBride’s office confirmed to the Washington Examiner that the first-term representative would be in attendance, even though official congressionally-paid travel to the conference was canceled due to a looming funding lapse of the Department of Homeland Security.

Both McBride and Clinton have pushed legislative agendas that support women’s rights. Clinton has a longtime track record of advocacy on the topic across her time as first lady, senator from New York, secretary of state, and 2016 Democratic Party presidential nominee.

“Women’s rights are human rights,” Clinton said at the Fourth World Conference on Women in China in 1995.

DEMOCRATS WANT INVESTIGATION OF BONDI’S ‘SPYING’ ON LAWMAKERS’ EPSTEIN SEARCH HISTORY

Since being sworn into Congress last year, McBride has co-sponsored legislation to expand access to abortion, including the Women’s Health Protection Act, the Access to Reproductive Care for Service Members Act, and the My Body, My Data Act.

A handful of lawmakers from both chambers are expected at the Munich Security Conference, despite the partial government shutdown that will begin Saturday after Congress failed to reach a deal on DHS funding.

Texas’s ban on ballot harvesting upheld by appeals court
Transparency shouldn't be controversial.

A federal appeals court ruled that a Texas law banning ballot harvesting is constitutional, reversing a lower court’s ruling and handing the Lone Star State a key victory for one of its major election integrity laws.

A three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled in favor of Texas over the portion of Senate Bill 1, a 2021 law with various election provisions, that banned paid canvassers from submitting mail-in ballots for voters. The panel’s opinion, written by U.S. Circuit Judge Edith Jones, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, stated that the lower federal district court erred by ruling the law was unconstitutional on its face.

“Shoddy hypothetical analysis is not what our federalist system requires. ‘Under the federalist structure of the United States, the states are responsible for regulating the conduct of their elections,'” Jones wrote. “A federal district court’s intrusion on a state’s constitutional prerogative cannot be supported by mere speculation.”

“A challenger bears the weighty burden of demonstrating that the law is ‘impermissibly vague in all of its applications,'” Jones added. “The plaintiffs’ vagueness challenge fails this threshold test. As the district court conceded, applying the statute to ‘prevent paid partisans from haranguing Texas citizens while they fill out their mail ballots’ is not vague or unconstitutional.”

The panel also found the law is constitutional under the First Amendment, ruling it is “narrowly tailored to advance Texas’s compelling interests in election integrity.”

The appeals court panel had halted the district court’s ruling in October 2024 pending appeal, roughly two weeks after the lower court had struck down Texas’s ballot harvesting ban.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) celebrated the legal victory by saying the state “will win the fight to stop illegal voting & cheating at the ballot box,” while Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is running for Senate in the GOP primary, called it a “major victory for election integrity.” The Republican National Committee, which intervened in the lawsuit supporting Texas, also celebrated the ruling.

“Voters should not have to fear coercion or abuse when receiving assistance casting their ballot. This ruling is another big win for statewide secure elections and for all Texas voters,” RNC chairman Joe Gruters said in a statement after the ruling.

SUPREME COURT URGED TO WEIGH IN ON PENNSYLVANIA’S MAIL BALLOT DATING LAW

The ruling marks the …

Democrat claims SAVE Act would block married women from voting; Republicans say that's wrong
Transparency shouldn't be controversial.

Rep. Hillary Scholten, D-Mich., is claiming that under Republican-led voter integrity legislation, married women would find themselves unable to vote unless they changed their birth certificate to match other government-issued ID.
"Nearly 70 million married women in this country have changed their last name, but their birth certificates don’t reflect that," Scholten said at a press event, explaining her opposition to the SAVE America Act.
"In Michigan’s third district alone, 167,000 women could find themselves unable to register simply because when they got married, they didn’t change both their ID and their birth certificate."
SCHUMER FACES BACKLASH AFTER CALLING SAVE ACT 'JIM CROW' DESPITE PREVIOUS ALLEGATION FALLING FLAT
However, under Michigan law, marriage isn’t listed as one of the reasons to correct a birth certificate.
According to the state’s Department of Health and Human Services, citizens may only change their birth certificate to correct a birth record, change a sex designation, correct a place of birth, or amend a parental record.
Scholten, like many Democrats, has voiced opposition to the SAVE America Act — a bill that would require federal voter registrants to present government-issued photo ID to verify their citizenship.
The bill would also require a photo ID to vote.
HAKEEM JEFFRIES PRESSED ON DEMOCRAT OPPOSITION TO VOTER ID
In their view, the bill creates too many obstacles for voters to participate in federal elections.
"Republicans are trying to sell the SAVE Act as a way to stop non-citizens from voting, but we know that’s already illegal. What this bill really does is make it harder for citizens to vote, especially women," Scholten said when the House considered an earlier version of the legislation last year.
Although the bill lists a birth certificate as one way voters can confirm their identity, it does not specify a last-name match requirement in the manner Scholten described.
Instead, voters can use "a certified birth certificate issued by a state in which the applicant was born … [that] includes the full name, date of birth, and place of birth of the applicant" to supplement other forms of identification.
A senior GOP staffer confirmed that the SAVE Act does not come with the requirements Scholten described.
"That is not right at all and simply another Democrat propaganda talking point," the staffer said. "Every married woman should have their marriage license."
The office of Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, one of the many who has helped champion the SAVE Act, pointed to an analysis of the bill laid out by the Federalist Society, …