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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION

50 STATES AND DC, CONGRESS AND THE PRESIDENT

Christopher F. Rufo, Ryan Thorpe Gavin Newsom Sipped Cabernet While Los Angeles Burned The California governor attended a luxury wine-tasting during the recent riots.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/los-angeles-riots-california-governor-gavin-newsom-wine

As riots engulfed Los Angeles and mobs vandalized public buildings, incinerated vehicles, and assaulted law enforcement officers, California governor Gavin Newsom was enjoying a swanky wine-tasting party in Napa Valley.

The wine-tasting was held on the afternoon of June 7, 2025, at the Odette Estate Winery, which Newsom co-founded in 2011. Dubbed “Vineyard Vibes,” the event was a fundraiser for the PlumpJack Foundation, founded by Newsom’s sister, and featured “contemporary yet sophisticated” wines, live jazz music, and locally made pizza and smash burgers. “It’s the perfect kick-off to summer fun,” read promotional language. “The fete will take place on the Winery Crushpad, where we’ll gather for music, food, conversation, and delicious wine!”

A source who photographed Newsom at the event expressed shock that the governor was in attendance, given that riots had broken out in Los Angeles the day before. “I couldn’t believe it,” the source said. “He was just walking around like this was an everyday occurrence.” Newsom was at the wine party for at least 90 minutes, according to the source, who said that when the governor finally left, he appeared to retreat to the inner rooms of his winery.

Court Rules on Trump’s LA National Guard Deployment Catherine Salgado

https://pjmedia.com/catherinesalgado/2025/06/20/breaking-court-lets-trump-keep-natl-guard-in-la-n4940982

An appeals court has once more ruled that the president of the United States does have the authority to keep the National Guard deployed in Los Angeles to put down the dangerous, and even deadly, anti-ICE riots.

A federal appeals court issued the decision in favor of Donald Trump late Thursday, blocking District Judge Charles Breyer’s order to put California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has largely sided with the anti-immigration crazies, back in control of the National Guard in LA. Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney shared screenshots of the decision and noted that it was unanimous, with a Joe Biden appointee joining in with two Trump appointees on the decision.

The decision stated, “We also conclude that the other stay factors — irreparable harm to Defendants, injury to Plaintiffs, and the public interest — weigh in Defendants’ favor. Thus, we grant the motion for a stay pending appeal.”

The judicial panel found Newsom’s claims of the National Guard escalating the situation and interfering with law enforcement were “too speculative.” The lack of proof for the complaints against Trump led the judges to rule in Trump’s favor.

The Big Lie: ‘Stolen Land’ Welcome to the bastardization of history. by Bruce Thornton

https://www.frontpagemag.com/the-big-lie-stolen-land/

Mob violence recently took place in L.A. and hundreds of other cities over Donald Trump’s efforts to obey the Constitution and “faithfully execute” the duties of the president, and carry out the laws by deporting illegal aliens. At the same time, Israel began a massive attack on Iran’s weapons and leaders in order to prevent that regime from acquiring nuclear weapons––which Iran now has a “zero- breakout-time” for achieving–– and fulfill the jihadists’ genocidal oath to “wipe Israel off the map,” as Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in 2003.

What links these events is the “big lie” of “stolen land,” indulged by the leftist Democrats in L.A., and Israel’s enemies everywhere. Leftists and jihadists both adhere to the precept “any means necessary,” which validates violence. But as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has said, the “big lie” is codependent with violence, “since it can conceal itself with nothing except the lie, and the lie has nothing to uphold it save violence.” Marxism is famous for both.

From the beginning, Karl Marx boasted of Marxists’ embrace of violence. In 1843 he threatened the Prussian government, “We are ruthless and ask no quarter from you. When our turn comes, we shall not disguise our terrorism.” The next year he publicized his “plan of action,” and stated, “Far from opposing the so-called excesses, those examples of popular vengeance against hated individuals and buildings which have acquired hateful memories, we must not only condone these examples but lend them a helping hand.” This, of course, foreshadows today’s leftist Dem politicians who support violent protests and riots, and those governors and congressmen who encourage and support the rioters.

True to Solzhenitsyn’s observation, Marxists have employed propaganda and “big lies” to legitimize their violence. This affinity for lying, which George Orwell’s phrase from 1984, “2+2= 5,” epitomized, was endemic among the Bolsheviks and their propaganda that penetrated every dimension of society and politics. Pierre Pascal, an apostate from Soviet communism, in 1924 wrote in his journal, No regime has ever been a regime of lies to this extent.”

Another repentant true believer, Boris Souvarine––anticipating Orwell––wrote of the Bolshevik’s public discourse, “Not one fact, not one quotation, not one idea, not one argument: only impudent affirmations with a half-dozen interchangeable words come from the ‘heights.’” We who have witnessed during the last decade the regime media repeating endlessly the same preposterous talking points, often word for word, know what Souvarine is talking about.

No Kings, Except In California

https://issuesinsights.com/2025/06/20/no-kings-except-in-california/

Last weekend’s No Kings rallies were yet another real-time illustration of psychological projection by the political left. Meanwhile, a West Coast governor who wants to be president so badly that his hair hurts continues to act as if he’s a sovereign accountable to no one.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is a pen-and-phone chief executive. In 2020, while Californians were suffocating under his cruel COVID restrictions, the politician groomed by the San Francisco political syndicate issued an executive order outlawing internal-combustion engine automobiles in the state. Beginning in 2035, all new cars sold in California will have to be of the zero emission variety, which means battery-powered electrics since there are no realistic alternatives.

Newsom caught a bit of flak from legislators who felt that his “law” should have gone through the legitmate policymaking process. But the complaints soon faded because, after all, his order was perfectly in line with the Democrats’ eco-militant agenda. A one-man diktat is no vice in the pursuit of progressive rule.

Two years after Newsom single-handedly enshrined his EV mandate, the California Air Resources Board tried to provide him cover. It voted unanimously to approve his executive order, regarding the mandate “codified” by its endorsement. That’s a cheeky claim from a board that is not elected but appointed – chiefly by the governor.

Newsom’s excess was recently restrained by Congress and President Donald Trump through the proper lawmaking process. Trump signed a bill that he said “will kill, totally kill” California’s EV mandate “forever.”

Newsom’s response was not only to sue, which is certainly within the scope of his position, but to also behave as if, again, he is accountable to no one. He defiantly shot back on June 12 with an order that “reaffirms” the state’s “commitment to accelerate the deployment of zero-emission technologies, including passenger, medium and heavy-duty vehicles.” He recognizes no one’s authority but his own.

‘When the Judges Ruled, There Was Famine’: Bible by Alan M. Dershowitz

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21691/rule-by-judges

Under Article 3 of the United States Constitution, judges are supposed to play a critical role in checking and balancing the excesses of the other branches. Their central responsibility is to enforce the procedural safeguards of the Bill of Rights, most particularly those assuring due process, equal protection and the right of dissent. They have no legitimate business interfering with the substantive policies of the executive or legislative branches.

Judges look harder to find procedural objections to policies and actions of which they disapprove.

[Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis] consistently voted to uphold laws and practices with which he had strong substantive disagreements, so long as they did not clearly violate express provisions of the Constitution. That is the proper role of unelected judges in a democracy.

The people — not the judges — should rule the land.

The Book of Ruth begins with an ominous warning: “In the days when the judges ruled, there was famine in the land.”

History shows that judges make poor leaders. Thomas Jefferson understood this when he tried to limit the influence of the “midnight judges” appointed by John Adams. Andrew Jackson refused to implement a Supreme Court decision that he believed undercut his policy toward Native American tribes. Abraham Lincoln responded to what he regarded as the overreaching of judges by suspending the writ of habeas corpus. Franklin Roosevelt threatened to pack the Supreme Court when the justices tried to dismantle his congressionally-enacted New Deal.

Now, many district court judges are determined to thwart the policies of President Donald Trump. Judicial efforts to thwart executive and legislative actions have occurred frequently in our history, as have executive and legislative responses to such judicial activism.

Under Article 3 of the United States Constitution, judges are supposed to play a critical role in checking and balancing the excesses of the other branches. Their central responsibility is to enforce the procedural safeguards of the Bill of Rights, most particularly those assuring due process, equal protection and the right of dissent. They have no legitimate business interfering with the substantive policies of the executive or legislative branches.

GOOD AND EVIL: SYDNEY WILLIAMS

“In each of us, two natures are at war – the good and the evil. All our lives the fight goes on between them, and one of them must conquer. But in our hands lies the power to choose – what we want to be, we are.”

                                                                                                                Robert Lewis Stevenson (1850-1894)

                                                                                                                The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, 1886

Just like good, evil lurks in all of us. It is our responsibility – to the extent possible – to contain it, to smother it, to let goodness overwhelm it. “Wisdom,” wrote John Cheever in his Journals, “is the knowledge of good and evil…” In The Gulag Archipelago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote, “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us…But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart.” This is a subject that has been on my mind, with Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and as I have been reading Jonathan Horn’s new book, The Fate of the Generals. It is difficult to reconcile the vile treatment of American and Filipino prisoners by the Japanese, with the Japanese I knew in business and socially. Two generations ago, German Nazis were gassing Jews. Today, they are an ally of Israel. In his 1860 novel The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins wrote: “The best men are not consistent in good – why should the worst men be consistent in evil?”

Today, evil is manifested in the anti-Semitism that has infested much of the West. Do college students, born sixty years after the genocide of Jews in Europe and who now accuse Israel of practicing genocide on Palestinians, have any knowledge of history? Battles between forces of good and evil, are as old as mankind. The Bible tells us that Jesus, as the son of God, is inherently good, while man is flawed, so must avoid temptations. Most of my generation have read Stephen Vincent Benét’s short story, The Devil and Daniel Webster, of Webster’s defense of Jabez Stone who sold his soul to the devil in return for seven years of good luck. The message: In moments of weakness, good people can make bad decisions.

This battle between good and evil is not limited to people. On March 8, 1983, President Reagan correctly referred to the Soviet Union as an “evil empire.” Evil manifests itself in nation’s where authoritarian leaders control their populations. In the past century, one can think of Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao Zedong. Today Ali Hosseini Khamenei Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong Un serve that role, as their governments deny citizens their natural rights – “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Prohibited Access: A Cache of FBI Corruption? A secret FBI document cache—“Prohibited Access”—may hold explosive evidence of political cover-ups, misconduct, and a decade of justice corrupted from within. By John D. O’Connor

https://amgreatness.com/2025/06/19/prohibited-access-a-cache-of-fbi-corruption/

We recently learned of a previously concealed tranche of documents likely to shed new light on the past decade of American political controversies. This potentially earth-shaking information is known as “Prohibited Access.”

It was only recently discovered that the FBI’s information system, called Sentinel, had a level of access previously unknown to anyone outside the Bureau and known only to a select few inside. In essence, this was a concealed cache used to hide documents the FBI wanted hidden from discovery.

There is one part of the Sentinel system that is devoted to classified and confidential information, termed “Restricted Access.”

It turns out there is a higher, more secretive level called “Prohibited Access.” To any outside observer or investigator, it would appear that there was no record of Prohibited Access information, even though the existence of Restricted Access documents would be shown.

Accordingly, when prosecutors like John Durham or investigators such as Congressman James Comer were investigating various potential misdeeds, they would not have learned of the existence of documents relevant to their investigation that were kept in Prohibited Access.

Although it remains unclear, there is reasonable suspicion that even FBI Inspector General Michael Horowitz was not aware of this document cache. Alternatively, Horowitz may have known about it but also may have agreed to keep its existence secret, a dismaying possibility for one charged with enlightening Congress and the public.

Logic tells us that, broadly, there could be only two related purposes for this concealed tranche because it prevents those investigating the FBI or its favored parties from even knowing about the existence of the documents; such suggests concealment of information inculpatory to the senior levels of the FBI and/or its favored politicians, as well as exculpatory information about the targets of its biased investigations.

If, by way of a wild hypothetical example, James Comey and Andrew McCabe broke laws to make an innocent Donald Trump appear guilty of “Russian Collusion,” they would not wish a trail of their ugly misconduct to see the light of day, nor reveal proof of Trump’s innocence.

Can the Left Ever Stop Its Craziness? The more the left rages, the more Trump rises—while Democrats trade policy for tantrums and canonize chaos in place of compromise. By Victor Davis Hanson

https://amgreatness.com/2025/06/19/can-the-left-ever-stop-its-craziness/

California Senator Alex Padilla recently crashed a press conference by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. He deliberately wore no identification. He gave no advance warning that he would disrupt her briefing.

Instead, Padilla barged forward to the podium, shouting about the deportation of illegal aliens.

Immediately, Padilla got his media moment wish—once Secret Service agents, who had no idea who Padilla was, forcibly removed him.

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) recently attempted a pseudo-filibuster, speaking nonstop for 25 hours straight—not to delay legislation, but to fixate on Donald Trump.

South Carolina Democratic state Representative Julie von Haefen just posted on social media an image of a bloody guillotine. It bore the title “In these difficult times, some cuts may be necessary” and was juxtaposed with an image of a hanging, beheaded Trump, who, a year ago, was the target of two failed assassination attempts.

The more Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and California Governor Gavin Newsom scream at Trump for nationalizing the California Guard to stop LA’s nightly violent anti-ICE protests, the more the two appear on the side of those who riot, destroy property, and attack police.

Yet who really wants to side with illegal aliens who spit on and burn American flags while waving Mexican flags?

Recently, some Democrats and leftists have romanticized Kilmar Abrego Garcia—an illegal alien, accused domestic abuser, gang member, and alleged human trafficker.

They also canonized illegal alien Mahmoud Khalil. But that pro-Hamas “student” helped organize and defend sometimes violent and antisemitic demonstrations at Columbia.

Memo To Tucker: This Is Not Iraq War II

https://issuesinsights.com/2025/06/19/memo-to-tucker-this-is-not-iraq-war-ii/

Tucker Carlson, the TV personality who currently enjoys an enormous gap between the size of his audience and his intellectual abilities, has decided to declare war on the Trump administration for the sin of taking Iran’s nuclear ambitions seriously.

President Donald Trump hit back with a post on Truth Social saying “Somebody please explain to kooky Tucker Carlson that, ‘IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON!”

Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene jumped in with Carlson saying, “Anyone slobbering for the U.S. to become fully involved in the Israel/Iran war is not America First/MAGA.”

The mainstream media is loving all this because they delight in anything that undermines Trump. But from our perspective, Carlson hasn’t come close to making his case.

Carlson seems to think, without much evidence, that this is a repeat of the Iraq fiasco, wherein the U.S. justified war based on a false belief that Saddam Hussein had a vast arsenal of weapons of mass destruction.

At the time, there was good reason to believe Hussein did, if only because he was so defiant about allowing international inspectors, per the ceasefire agreement he signed at the end of the Gulf War, to verify that he wasn’t building or storing WMDs.

The losers and lunatics battling it out to lead the Democrats This rogues’ gallery suggests the Dems are determined to lose the next election. Joel Kotkin

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/06/18/the-losers-and-lunatics-battling-it-out-to-lead-the-democrats/

In today’s Democratic Party, nothing succeeds like failure. According to a recent poll tracker, the preferred candidates to contest the 2028 presidential election are a host of proven losers. Kamala Harris is the No1 choice, followed by Pete Buttigieg, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cory Booker and, of course, the slickest of all the failures, California governor Gavin Newsom.

Far less popular, it seems, are candidates who might appeal beyond the party faithful. Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, who has cross-party support in his state, registered less than a quarter of the support banked by Harris among Democrats nationally. Other Democrats with a greater potential for success include Kentucky governor Andrew Beshear and Maryland’s Wes Moore, yet both of them failed to even break into the poll.

For most Democrats, as Ruy Teixeira notes, ‘the progressive moment’ has not ended, despite all evidence to the contrary. This has been made clear by their reluctance to denounce the recent riots in Los Angeles. A recent poll found that Ocasio-Cortez – who simultaneously downplayed the riots and blamed them on Donald Trump – is most likely to be considered the ‘face’ of the Democratic Party, followed by Bernie Sanders and foul-mouthed Texas congresswoman Jasmine Crockett. This sounds like a potential dream team… for the Republicans.

Democrats pose as upholding ‘fundamental values’, as Newsom puts it. Essentially, this means forsaking public safety and defending criminals and violent protesters. Harris has even insisted, contrary to all evidence, that those LA protests were ‘overwhelmingly peaceful’. Even though most who participated only exercised their rights, the demonstrations provided cover for the keffiyeh-wearing, Mexican-flag-waving mob. In the bizarro world of the current Democratic Party, the police (in 2020) and the National Guard (in 2025) are responsible for the unrest, rather than the politically driven militants.

So far, the only internal pushback from this fraught stance comes from senator John Fetterman and some newly elected Democratic mayors, like San Francisco’s Daniel Lurie. Unlike most Democrats, this small group is aware of the primacy of law enforcement as a pillar of democratic order, and they know that to be seen to be embracing violence, particularly from people in the US illegally, is electorally disastrous outside the deep-blue lunatic zones. Yet if current trends are anything to go by, their relative sanity will condemn them to an unsuccessful career in the Democratic Party.

The reigning queen of upwards failure is Kamala Harris.