MMN Editor

Most people treat their phone flashlight like a basic on and off switch. You tap it when you drop something under the couch or walk through a dark parking lot. That’s it.But with the latest software updates, both iPhone and Samsung phones have quietly turned the flashlight into something much more useful. You can control how bright it is. On some devices, you can even change how wide the beam spreads.Once you know where to look, it feels like you just upgraded your phone without spending a dollar.10 IOS 26 TRICKS THAT HELP YOU GET MORE OUT OF YOUR IPHONEYour iPhone flashlight does more than turn on and off, and a few hidden controls can completely change how you use it.On almost all iPhones:This has been around for years, but many people still tap instead of holding. That’s where the real control lives.This is the feature most people have never seen. On newer Pro iPhones running the latest software:You can go from a narrow, focused beam to a wide flood of light.That means:This feature was introduced in iOS 18 and is still available in iOS 26.4, but it only works on iPhone 14 Pro and newer Pro models, including iPhone 15 Pro and later versions. You won’t see it on standard models.You don’t even need to unlock your phone:It turns on instantly, which is faster than digging through menus.You can say:It’s one of the fastest hands-free options when your hands are full.Your iPhone can use the flashlight as a visual alert:Your flashlight will blink for calls and notifications, which helps if your phone is on silent or in a noisy place.Samsung takes a different approach and, in some ways, gives you more flexibility right out of the box.Note: Settings may vary depending on your Samsung device model and One UI version.On most Samsung Galaxy phones:Many people miss this because a quick tap only turns the flashlight on or off. The brightness controls appear after you press and hold, giving you more control depending on your situation.If you use Google Assistant:It works well when your hands are full or when you need quick access.10 INCREDIBLY USEFUL IPHONE AND ANDROID TRICKS THAT MAKE YOUR LIFE EASIERSamsung gives you a few ways to keep the flashlight within easy reach. To keep it in your main Quick Settings panel:Samsung phones can also use the flashlight for visual alerts:You can also turn on Screen flash notification if you want your display to light up instead.This is where it becomes practical:Once you start adjusting the light instead of just turning it on, it becomes far more useful.Think your devices and data are truly protected? Take this quick quiz to see where your digital habits stand. From passwords to Wi-Fi settings, you’ll get a personalized breakdown of what you’re doing right and what needs improvement. Take my Quiz here: Cyberguy.com   The flashlight is one of the most used features on your phone, yet most people never go beyond the basics. Apple improved control with hardware and software, while Samsung focused on flexibility and customization. Both approaches make a simple tool far more capable.Have you ever discovered a hidden feature on your phone that made you wonder what else you’ve been missing? Let us know by writing to us at Cyberguy.comSign up for my FREE CyberGuy ReportCopyright 2026 CyberGuy.com.  All rights reserved. 

Activists were arrested and pepper-sprayed as they attempted to free beagles from a Wisconsin facility licensed to breed them for biomedical testing.

Short-Covering Rally… Or Something More?

Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

▶ WEEK CLOSE:  S&P 500 7,126.06 (+1.2%)  |  Nasdaq 13-Day Win Streak (longest since 1992)  |  Russell 2000 New ATH  |  Brent Crude -9.1%  |  VIX 17.42

What began as a short-covering rally on April 7th has spent the last two weeks proving the bears wrong. Friday’s close at 7,126, the first finish above 7,100 in the index’s history, up 13.1% from the March lows, arrived alongside one of the most consequential single-session catalysts of the year. Iran declared the Strait of Hormuz “completely open.” Brent crude collapsed 9.1%. The Russell 2000 logged a new all-time high. The short-covering rally that skeptics said would exhaust itself in days has now run for three weeks and taken every major index to record territory.

The question every investor is asking right now isn’t whether to believe in the rally. The price action is undeniable, but the question is what kind of rally this actually is, and what investors who missed the initial short-covering rally should do about it.

The answer, as of Friday’s close, has shifted meaningfully. This no longer looks like a purely mechanical short-covering rally. The data is starting to point to something more durable. Here’s why that distinction matters, and what it means for your portfolio.

As we discussed in the #DailyMarketCommentary this past week, the recent price action felt like a release valve being pulled. Goldman’s prime brokerage flows guru, Lee Coppersmith, described a clear pivot toward risk-on, noting that sentiment has shifted toward FOMO among investors who dumped positions amid peak AI disruption fears and rising Middle East tensions.

That pivot makes sense from a mechanics standpoint. Short exposure across U.S. macro products, index futures, and ETFs had climbed to the 93rd percentile over the past five years, with hedge fund gross exposure near an all-time high of 307%. When the Iran ceasefire headlines crossed, that positioning became a coiled spring. Shorts covered, hedges unwound, and global equities were net bought for the first time in eight weeks, with Goldman’s Equity Fundamental Long/Short Performance Estimate rising 4.01%, the best weekly reading since February 2021.

That’s the good news, and we’ve seen this movie before. The build-up of stress in the market gets investors overly bearish, and then “hope” arrives, relieving the pressure. The “hope” causes a rush to gain positioning, short positions unwind sharply, and the headline indices surge.

The trap, however, is confusing the “market squeeze” with a new bull leg higher. Understanding which dynamic is actually driving this market right now is the most important analytical question any investor can ask.

A Review

The S&P 500 peaked at 7,002 on January 27th and spent the next eight weeks coming apart at the seams. The trigger wasn’t an earnings collapse or a credit event. It was a geopolitical shock that repriced three variables simultaneously: oil, inflation expectations, and the Federal Reserve’s flexibility.

When U.S. forces launched Operation Epic Fury in late February, Brent crude surged from roughly $72 per barrel toward a peak of $119–$120 by mid-March. The stagflation trade that the market had been dismissing suddenly had a fundamental basis. JPMorgan cut its year-end price target. Recession probability estimates at the major banks rose from 25% toward 50%. Five consecutive weekly losses followed, with the index falling 7.5% from the January peak to lows near 6,300 by late March. Short interest built to multi-year highs as institutional investors layered on hedges through ETFs. The market was coiled.

What followed was initially a textbook short-covering rally. The ceasefire on April 7th lit the fuse. Trump’s April 13th comment that Iran wants to ‘work a deal’ accelerated it. And Friday’s Strait of Hormuz announcement — combined with oil’s single biggest drop of 2026 — may have completed the transition from short-covering rally to genuine bull market resumption.

The initial move off the lows was textbook, short-covering rally mechanics. Short interest at multi-year highs, extreme bearish sentiment, and oversold technicals created the conditions. All that was needed was a catalyst, and Trump’s April 13th comment that Iran wants to “work a deal” provided exactly that. Now, we have all three pillars in place to determine, potentially, what happens next.

Pillar One: The short-covering rally ignites.  According to AInvest analysis, total S&P 500 component short interest was at elevated levels as the index traded near its lows, creating a concentrated pool of traders who must eventually buy back shares. When the ceasefire news broke on April 7th, the buying cascade began. What followed was a short-covering rally that sent the Nasdaq to its best multi-session run on record. The velocity was characteristic of forced covering rather than fresh conviction buying, which is precisely why the bears initially dismissed it.

Pillar Two: Geopolitical de-escalation extends the move.  A pure short-covering rally typically exhausts itself within a few sessions once the most exposed shorts are covered. What extended this one was sustained improvement in the Iran narrative. Ships began clearing the Strait of Hormuz blockade. The Islamabad negotiations shifted tone from bellicose to cautiously optimistic. Vice President Vance noted the “diplomatic off-ramp is wider than it was a month ago.” That war premium embedded in equity valuations began to dissolve, giving the short-covering rally a fundamental tailwind.

Pillar Three: Earnings season anchors the move.  Goldman Sachs posted EPS of $17.55 against expectations of $16.47. Morgan Stanley beat with $3.43 versus a forecast of $3.02. JPMorgan cleared the bar on nearly every metric. The financials sector handed the market a fundamental anchor at exactly the moment it needed one. As TheStreet contributor James ‘Rev Shark’ DePorre observed: “Investors are betting on the long-term strength of the U.S. economy, with AI as the primary driver. The Iran situation is being treated as a temporary distraction.”

So, who is likely right: the bulls or the bears?

Short-Covering Rally or Something More?

Every investor right now is trying to answer that question.

If there is a single dataset that most clearly distinguishes a short-covering rally from a genuine bull-market resumption, it’s sector rotation. Short-covering rallies tend to be narrow; they lift the most-shorted names while leaving cyclical and economically sensitive sectors behind. Genuine recoveries broaden. The sector data from the wartime selloff (February 27 to March 30) compared to the recovery (April 7 to April 17) tells a very clear story.

Breadth has also improved sharply, but there is certainly more room to broaden.

However, that rotation is exactly what you want to see following a geopolitical shock. Energy, the wartime beneficiary, has given back its gains. Technology has led the recovery. Consumer discretionary has followed, with Friday’s cruise sector surge (Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, Carnival all up 9%+) signaling consumers are betting on normalcy. Industrials and financials have contributed. And the Russell 2000 has outperformed the S&P 500 by a margin that argues for something well beyond a short-covering rally. That’s five of eleven sectors posting meaningful gains with genuine fundamental drivers behind each.

Another important factor right now is earnings. As we noted earlier this week, Goldman Sachs is maintaining its year-end S&P 500 target of 7,600. That target is premised on $309 per share in 2026 earnings and 12% growth, which they describe as “a fundamental floor.” In their view, this is more supportive of a bull market.

“The bull market is maturing, not ending. With 12% earnings growth acting as a safety net, the transition offers a more sustainable path.“

On the other hand, we must also consider the bears’ argument. The argument that this is “just a short-covering rally” with no staying power may be true, but it gets harder to sustain when you study the historical record for geopolitical shocks of comparable magnitude. Across more than 20 major events since World War II, the pattern is consistent: markets recover faster than most investors expect, and the investors who stay disciplined through the short-covering rally phase and into the recovery tend to come out ahead.

The current episode has already outpaced the average recovery time of under 60 days, completing its round-trip to new highs in just 21 days. The speed is notable, comparable to the post-Iraq War recovery of 2003, which went on to produce a 33.7% 12-month return. The COVID comparison (148 days to recover, then +43.6% over six months) is also instructive. What initially looked like a mechanical short-covering rally in April 2020 turned out to be the opening act of one of the most powerful bull markets of the modern era. The key distinction in all these cases is what’s happening beneath the surface, and in 2026, that’s increasingly constructive.

The weight of evidence has shifted. At the start of this week, our scorecard was roughly balanced — three confirmed bull signals against three legitimate bear concerns. As of Friday’s close, the bull case has added three material confirmations: Russell 2000 at a new ATH (breadth), oil’s single-session collapse (geopolitical resolution), and sector rotation into cyclicals (genuine buying, not short-covering alone). The bear case retains one critical point: RSI at 72.3 argues for near-term patience on new entries, not a reversal of the trend.

The verdict: This is no longer a short-covering rally. It was one when it started. It isn’t one anymore. The transition from a mechanical short-covering rally to a fundamental bull market resumption typically happens when:

The shorts have been largely covered,

Breadth expands,

Sector rotation confirms the recovery is economic rather than positioning-driven, and

A fundamental catalyst removes the original trigger for the selloff.

As of Friday, all four conditions have been met.

🔑 Key Catalysts Next Week

The calendar pivots from bank earnings to the consumer and Big Tech, with March Retail Sales, Tesla, and the final pre-FOMC sentiment read all compressed into five sessions. The April 27–28 FOMC meeting looms, with the Fed in its quiet period. That means every data point this week will be interpreted through the lens of what it means for rate policy under new Chair Kevin Warsh (assuming confirmation by then) or lame-duck Powell.

Tuesday’s March Retail Sales is the week’s economic anchor and the first consumer spending report to fully capture the oil price spike at the pump and the tariff pass-through into goods prices. February’s report was already soft. If the control group, which feeds directly into the GDP nowcast, contracts, the slowdown narrative hardens further heading into the FOMC. Pending Home Sales will also tell us whether buyers are pulling back as mortgage rates reverse higher. UnitedHealth reports that morning as well, and with the healthcare cost trend approaching 11% and Medicare Advantage pressure weighing on the managed care sector, a read on both healthcare inflation and corporate margins will be important.

Wednesday is the marquee earnings day. Tesla after the close is the event: Q1 deliveries already missed expectations, margins are under pressure, and the street is trying to price a company that’s spending aggressively on AI and robotaxi infrastructure while the core auto business decelerates. Musk’s macro commentary will move futures. IBM (IBM) reports the same evening that the AI enterprise revenue trajectory is critical following February’s 13% single-day plunge amid fears of disruption from Anthropic. ServiceNow (NOW) is also the SaaS bellwether, with its “Now Assist” agentic AI product now past $600 million in ACV. Philip Morris (PM) that morning tests consumer pricing power with $500 million in guided tariff headwinds.

Friday closes with a one-two punch: Durable Goods Orders for the capex demand signal, and the final UMich Consumer Sentiment reading for April. The inflation expectations embedded in UMich are the last data point the Fed will see before convening. A spike in five-year expectations above 3% would all but guarantee a hawkish hold, while a decline would crack the door for dovish language.

In a nutshell, Retail Sales will tell us if the consumer is breaking. Tesla will tell us whether the growth premium is justified, and UMich will signal the Fed’s next move. All with the FOMC one week away. Position defensively into Wednesday’s close.

What To Do If You Missed The Rally

This is the most emotionally loaded question in the room. If you have been listening to the “Perpetual Purveyors Of Doom,” you watched a short-covering rally turn into an 11% surge and a new all-time high, and now you’re wondering whether to chase it. The instinct is understandable. The discipline required to resist the “negative commentary” is what separates good investors from the rest.

Here’s what history consistently shows: most breakouts that begin as a short-covering rally, and then sustain above key moving averages, offer a secondary entry point within 4 to 6 weeks of the initial move. Markets rarely transition from correction lows to sustained new highs in a straight line. The more common path involves:

An initial surge (the short-covering rally phase),

A consolidation or shallow retest of former resistance, and

Then a continuation move. That retest is your entry.

Therefore, as shown below, depending on how you are currently invested, you can take actions to navigate whatever comes next.

The macro backdrop hasn’t been cleared of all risk, as oil remains above $90 per barrel, inflation is sticky, and the Fed has no near-term rate cuts in the pipeline. The ceasefire is fragile, and the Islamabad negotiations haven’t yet produced a signature. Any deterioration on those fronts is a reason to reduce exposure, not add to it.

What we are watching most closely over the next two to three weeks isn’t the price level, it’s the breadth confirmation. We want to see the percentage of S&P 500 stocks above their 200-day moving average cross back above 60%, then 70%. We want to see volume improve on up-days and dry up on pullbacks. And we want to see earnings season deliver results that justify the multiple, not just the sentiment reset that a short-covering rally provides.

BOTTOM LINE:  The S&P 500’s return to all-time highs is technically significant, but significance and sustainability are not the same thing. Yes, a short-covering rally lit the fuse, but the sustained move above the 200-day moving average, the improving VIX, and the early earnings beats suggest something more durable may be taking shape. History is clear that markets recover from geopolitical shocks faster than almost anyone expects. The investors who come out ahead aren’t the ones who chase; they’re the ones who use pullbacks to build positions in quality names, maintain discipline on stops, and resist the urge to mistake speed for safety. The next two to three weeks of earnings will tell us whether this is a new leg higher or the best exit ramp before a retest.

Trade accordingly.

Tyler Durden
Sun, 04/19/2026 – 12:50

FBI Director Kash Patel announced on Sunday that the FBI has launched a major investigation into the mysterious deaths and disappearances of nearly a dozen high-level U.S. scientists with access to top-secret classified information, many of whom worked on nuclear, aerospace, propulsion, and advanced defense programs.
In an interview on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo, Patel revealed that President Trump was recently briefed on the cases and that the FBI is now centralizing the investigations across multiple jurisdictions to identify patterns, connections to classified material, and possible involvement by foreign actors.
“These missing and killed scientists and former professional members of the Department of Energy vary in a wide range, and we’re working most importantly with our state and local partners who have jurisdiction on each of these cases, whether they be a homicide or a missing person’s case; they have the evidence,” Patel stated.
Patel continued, “What we’re going to do is collectively pull it all into one place. We started this process last week, and then we’re going to look for connections, on whether there are connections to classified access, access to classified information, and or foreign actors, and then we will produce that information to the White House and the world because it’s of such great public importance. And if there are any connections that lead to nefarious conduct or conspiracy, the FBI will make the appropriate arrest.”
WATCH:

NOW: FBI Director Kash Patel CONFIRMS huge investigation into the mysterious death and loss of nearly a DOZEN high-level, top-secret scientists
President Trump recently held a meeting on the investigation
PATEL: “These missing and killed scientists and former professional… pic.twitter.com/sPrGMp09KH
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) April 19, 2026

Patel’s announcement is the most significant confirmation yet that the federal government is treating the strange incidents as a potential national security matter rather than isolated tragedies.
The Gateway Pundit has been closely following the disturbing pattern.
Earlier this week, President Trump publicly stated that the White House had already launched its own review of the cases after being alerted to roughly 10 scientists with access to classified nuclear, aerospace, and defense material who had either gone missing or turned up dead in recent months.
Just two days later, as The Gateway Pundit previously reported, the total had reached 11, with Republican Rep. Eric Burlison demanding a full federal investigation, calling the pattern “too coincidental” to ignore.
‘Too Coincidental’ String of Dead and Missing Scientists Hits 11 as UFO Researcher’s Mysterious Death Comes Under New Scrutiny (VIDEO)

The scientists have worked on highly sensitive projects, including rocket propulsion, nuclear fusion, asteroid tracking and deflection, missile technology, advanced materials, and Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) research.
Several cases involve individuals who vanished while hiking or walking without their phones, wallets, or keys, while others were found shot to death under circumstances that remain unexplained.
The post WATCH: Kash Patel Confirms Federal Investigation into Mysterious Deaths and Disappearances of Nearly a Dozen Scientists, Trump Briefed as FBI Hunts for Foreign Actors and Conspiracy Links appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

With less than two months to go before the kickoff of the 2026 World Cup, Democratic leaders in New Jersey and New York are scrambling to figure out how to get fans to Met Life Stadium. The results would be hilarious if they did not betray such utter incompetence.New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill has astoundingly announced that a train ride to the eight games at the Meadowlands facility, which usually costs $12.90, will cost $150 for footy fans. That has FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, pulling out a red card.FIFA claims that its original agreement stated the locales in which the games take place will pay for transportation, but Sherill claims that agreement was made by the prior, also Democratic, administration in Trenton, and, for some reason, does not apply now.The bottom line is that the Democrats, who have all but hegemonic control of the New York City metro area, have had years to figure out the transportation for the World Cup and have done nothing.NJ TRANSIT CEO EXPLAINS WORLD CUP FARE HIKE AS NJ GOV AGAIN IMPLORES FIFA TO PAY FOR $150 TRAIN TICKETSThere is no possible excuse for this, as a matter of logistics. We aren’t talking about the D-Day landing here. It’s a few soccer games. This should not flummox state leaders.Gotham’s communist mayor, Zohran “Madman” Mamdani, ran ads last year promising cheap World Cup tickets for working-class New Yorkers. Now, the Democrats in charge can’t even get fans to the stadium.It makes no sense. Met Life Stadium hosts almost 20 NFL games a year. It has hosted the Super Bowl, and Taylor Swift did a three-night gig there that brought out 217,000 Swifties. How many people are we expecting for Ghana vs. Uruguay, or whatever?DEMS WHO RAN ON AFFORDABILITY NOW FACE BACKLASH AS COSTS CLIMB IN NY, VIRGINIAWe see it all over the country, wherever Democrats are in charge. Take Maryland, where the rebuilding of the Frances Key Scott bridge, destroyed by a ship last year, was originally slated at $2 billion dollars and set to open in 2028, but now is estimated at $5 billion and won’t carry a car until 2030.Likewise in California, billions are spent by Gov. Gavin Newsom on high-speed rail, animal refuge overpasses and battling homelessness, but there is no train, the wildlife bridge is unfinished and homelessness has never been worse in the Golden State.DHS SHUTDOWN PUTTING AMERICANS AT RISK AS WORLD CUP SECURITY PREP ‘SIGNIFICANTLY BEHIND’: SEN FETTERMANWhen I first moved to West Virginia from Brooklyn there was work being done on an important local bridge. It was a real inconvenience. Then one day, on my car radio, I heard the bridge would be finished a week early and under budget.Amazed, I called a friend who was a New York City councilman at the time and said, “Hey Joe, there’s this bridge construction down here, they say it’s going to be done early and under budget. Do you know what that means?”To which Joe replied, “No, I’ve never heard those words before.” We were joking, but barely.NEWSOM STILL BACKING $114M ‘BRIDGE TO NOWHERE’ FOR MOUNTAIN LIONS AND BUTTERFLIESIt really does feel like the Democrats in our urban areas just throw money around at things like feasibility studies that tend to come back saying that whatever it is, it is not feasible, but might eventually be with more funding for additional studies.But through some magical sorcery of governance, in our rural areas, officials are actually capable of just, you know, fixing stuff.The amount of complete incompetence that urban voters accept from Democrats is truly bizarre. Just look at the rampant fraud in Minnesota’s Somali “Quality Learing Centers,” or California’s fraud-laden hospices where, miraculously, almost every patient recovers.DEMOCRAT STRATEGIST WARNS MAMDANI’S BALLOONING NYC BUDGET PLAN GIVES REPUBLICANS A READY-MADE MIDTERM MESSAGEAnd now, in New York and New Jersey, Democrat leaders are treating the simple and normal task of getting fans across the East River like Moses parting the Red Sea, when this is the very simple kind of thing that city officials could have easily pulled off a century ago.Say what you will about the old school Democratic Party machines that ruled places like New York and Philly in the past, they were corrupt as all get out, but they could also get things done. For example, none of this transit nonsense occurred when Giants Stadium hosted the World Cup in 1994.The sad state of affairs, all over our great nation, from blue city to blue city is that the only thing Democrats seem capable of is spending money, often your money, to manage our urban decline.Maybe one day, citizens of our cities will give Republicans a chance, if Republicans even try, but until then, good luck getting to the soccer game.CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM DAVID MARCUS

Federal authorities arrested an Iranian woman at Los Angeles International Airport on Friday, alleging she brokered deals to sell Iranian-made drones, bombs, bomb fuses, assault weapons and millions of rounds of ammunition to Sudan in violation of U.S. sanctions laws, according to a newly unsealed criminal complaint.”Last night, Shamim Mafi, 44, of Woodland Hills, was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport for trafficking arms on behalf of the government of Iran,” First Assisant United States Attorney Bill Essayli wrote Sunday on X.”She is charged with a violation of 50 U.S.C. § 1705 for brokering the sale of drones, bombs, bomb fuses, and millions of rounds of ammunition manufactured by Iran and sold to Sudan.”If convicted, she faces a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison. Mafi is an Iranian national who became a lawful permanent resident of the United States in 2016. She is expected to make her initial appearance on Monday afternoon in U.S. District Court in downtown L.A. She is presumed innocent until proven guilty in court.”ICE ARRESTS RELATIVES OF SLAIN IRANIAN GENERAL SOLEIMANI LIVING IN US AFTER RUBIO REVOKES THEIR GREEN CARDSProsecutors say Mafi, granted permanent U.S. residency in California under former President Barack Obama, worked with others on behalf of Iran and was preparing to board an LAX flight to Turkey when she was taken into custody, according to a redacted member of the Iran Counterintelligence Squad of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office.The complaint accuses Mafi of conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and says she allegedly brokered a contract worth more than $70.6 million for the sale of Iranian-made Mohajer-6 armed drones to Sudan’s Ministry of Defense.Investigators allege she also helped arrange the sale of 55,000 bomb fuses to the Sudanese military and multiple ammunition deals, including 10 million rounds of AK-47 ammunition and a separate proposed contract for 240 million rounds.”MAFI is a lawful permanent resident in the United States who maintains a residence in Woodland Hills, California, and travels frequently to Iran, Turkey, Oman, and other countries,” the 68-page complaint read. “As set forth below, MAFI executed her illegal weapons brokering scheme from multiple locations, including within the Central District of California.ISRAELI MAN BUILT BOMB LAB FOR IRANIAN PLOT TARGETING EX-PM BENNETT, AUTHORITIES SAYMafi, born in Iran, relocated to Istanbul and eventually ended up in the US where she is not a citizen. She has a sordid history and connection to Iranian government and intelligence.”During interviews with U.S. Customs and Border Control (‘CBP’) officers and the FBI, MAFI acknowledged communicating with an officer of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (‘MOIS Officer-1’),” the complaint alleged.FEDS SAY PAKISTANI NATIONAL BACKED BY IRAN PLOTTED TO ASSASSINATE TRUMP, OTHERS IN MURDER-FOR-HIRE SCHEME”Mafi stated that she is ‘more useful to them [i.e., MOIS] in Iran than in the United States,’ and records obtained pursuant to a search warrant show approximately 62 bidirectional contacts between Mafi and MOIS Officer-1’s phone numbers between December 2022 and June 2025.”According to the FBI affidavit, Mafi and her alleged co-conspirators used an Oman-based company, Atlas International Business LLC, to facilitate the deals and routed payments through Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, which investigators say was intended to evade U.S. sanctions.The filing also alleges Mafi coordinated with figures tied to Iran’s government, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and maintained contact with an officer from Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security.Federal agents said Mafi never obtained the required U.S. licenses to broker such transactions involving Iranian goods or defense articles. The complaint says she was scheduled to depart LAX for Istanbul on April 18 and that investigators believed evidence of the alleged scheme would be found on her person and at her residence.

Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States of America released a powerful statement this weekend after Pope Leo lashed out at Trump last week for ending the notoriously wicked Iranian regime.
Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano
IT is understandable that many Catholics feel offended and scandalized by the statements made by the President of the United States regarding Leo1 , even if one certainly cannot claim that Jorge Bergoglio refrained during his “reign” from launching attacks and provocations against Donald Trump. Moreover, the latter’s intervention is contextualized by the statements orchestrated against him this week on the CBS2 , propaganda program 60 Minutes by three utterly corrupt cardinals: Cupich, McElroy, and Tobin, three prelates who are notoriously ultra-Bergoglian and ultra-progressive, part of the network of the serial abuser Theodore McCarrick, inextricably linked to the radical “woke” Left, and key electors and closest collaborators of Robert Prevost.
When asked by journalists about Donald Trump’s post, Leo replied: “I am not afraid of the Trump administration, nor of boldly proclaiming the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am called to do, and what the Church is called to do.”3 These words, apparently indisputable coming from Prevost, can however shift sharply in meaning depending on how they are interpreted. They may simply mean, “I have no fear of civil power,” thereby asserting the superiority of the Catholic Church’s spiritual authority over any earthly authority. Or, in a diametrically opposite sense, they may mean, “I have no fear of this administration” – implying that, in other instances, he deems it legitimate to feel fear and to refrain from “boldly proclaiming the message of the Gospel.” And immediately, one is reminded of how often we have seen the Vatican “fear” other administrations, both in Washington – especially when the interference of Hillary Clinton and John Podesta went so far as to block in the Vatican banking transactions via the SWIFT network – and in Beijing, where the Holy See is officially involved with the communist dictatorship, through a secret Agreement, not to “forcefully proclaim the message of the Gospel,” rubber-stamping the episcopal appointments of the Chinese Patriotic Association without them being deemed a schismatic act, unlike the Consecrations at Ecône.
In numerous other instances, Prevost, and before him Bergoglio, have seen fit to remain silent of their own accord, perhaps because their acquiescence, if not outright enthusiastic cooperation, was precisely what the Powers That Be expected from the Conciliar and Synodal Church. Indeed, no sooner had the Trump Administration cut off the stream of funds that USAID was channeling to the USCCB and various bodies of the American Catholic Church to facilitate immigration, than an open war erupted on the part of all those cardinals and bishops whom Clinton, Obama, and Biden had, until that moment, showered with money. During those years of plenty, Bergoglio and the entire American Episcopate took great care not to disrupt their idyll with the White House, thanks, in part, to the good offices of then-Cardinal McCarrick, and paid scant heed to the pro-abortion, LGBTQ+, and gender-related policies promoted by “Catholic” Democrats. The mere suggestion of excommunicating “pro-choice” politicians was deemed an intolerable intrusion by a Hierarchy that had itself made it abundantly clear it had no intention whatsoever of taking such a step.
Thus, a single phrase, extrapolated from its context – “I am not afraid of the Trump administration, nor of boldly proclaiming the message of the Gospel” – might appear entirely unobjectionable. Yet, when viewed within a broader, more coherent framework, it leaves one utterly perplexed, for it directly contradicts the very words Leo uttered on that same occasion: “We are not politicians. […] I do not believe that the message of the Gospel should be instrumentalized, as some are currently doing.” And while there are undoubtedly those who instrumentalize “the message of the Gospel” through the pseudo-messianic delusions typical of American televangelists, there are also most certainly those the within the Vatican who do not hesitate to instrumentalize that very same Gospel to lend a veneer of legitimacy and morality to the agenda of ethnic replacement and the Islamization of the West: an agenda doggedly pursued by the globalist elite through the Agenda 2030. This is an Agenda that Trump detests entirely, but which the Holy See, Leo, the USCCB, and a host of pseudo-Catholic charities have elevated to the status of a new globalist totem within their own synodal program. Nor should we forget the doctrinal ratification that Bergoglio bestowed upon the pandemic farce and mass vaccination, just as he did for climate fraud and “sustainable development goals” with his pseudo-encyclical Laudato Si, or the blessing that Prevost imparted to a block of ice specially shipped from Antarctica during a truly cringeworthy ceremony at Castel Gandolfo.
Despite his insistence that he is not a politician, Leo had no qualms about granting a private audience on April 9 to David Axelrod, Barack Obama’s chief strategist and former senior advisor at the White House. One question is more than legitimate: Did Axelrod perhaps come to the Vatican to dictate a specific political strategy to Leo, much as Hillary Clinton and John Podesta had previously interfered to pressure Benedict XVI into abdicating and then facilitate the election of Bergoglio?
The paradox is made manifest by Trump himself: “Leo should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a politician. It’s hurting him very badly and, more importantly, it’s hurting the Catholic Church!” Which is absolutely true, more so than President Trump could possibly imagine.
While the Democratic administrations have repeatedly and improperly interfered in the governance of the Church of Rome, untimely and inappropriate interventions by the Vatican regarding Washington have hardly been lacking either. And while nobody was surprised by the invective of the Jesuit from Buenos Aires, who labeled Trump “unchristian” for declaring his intention to repatriate hordes of illegal immigrants, the pronouncements of the Augustinian from Chicago regarding immigration, and more recently concerning the war, have certainly left observers bewildered: “God blesses no conflict. Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, never sides with those who yesterday wielded the sword and today drop bombs,” Leo said4 . Surely he could have elaborated, as Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger did in 2003: “Given the new weapons that make possible a destruction extending far beyond groups of combatants, today we must ask ourselves whether it is still licit to admit the very existence of a just war.”5 Or, better yet, Leo could have recalled the words of Pius XII: “A people threatened by, or already the victim of, unjust aggression, if it wishes to act in a Christian manner, cannot remain in a state of passive indifference; moreover, the solidarity of the family of nations forbids others from behaving as mere spectators, adopting an attitude of impassive neutrality.”6
But Prevost – and herein lies the true problem – does not speak with the voice of the Church: his words of condemnation against any war whatsoever ultimately serve to legitimize even unjust wars, thereby depriving the victim of aggression of the right to self-defense, given that even a defensive war would be deemed unjust. This error is akin to asserting that all religions are equivalent, that moral precepts must be adapted to contingent circumstances (see Amoris Lætitia and Fiducia Supplicans), or that capital punishment is contrary to the Gospel. For in these instances, too, the one who ought to serve as a point of reference in discerning Good from Evil betrays his own mandate by granting equal rights to error and to Truth, rather than assuming his moral responsibility to condemn the former and defend the latter.
Of course, if Leo ever dared to speak with the authoritative voice of the Catholic Church, he would find himself opposed not only by the pacifist Left (in whose ranks Prevost has served since the 1980s7 , joining the Young Augustinians movement8 , or Augustinians for Peace which was sponsored by the Italian Communist Party), but also by the “theo-con” Right, with which quite a few Catholic conservatives are dangerously aligned. The tolerance that the Conciliar Hierarchy currently enjoys is, in fact, conditional upon its acceptance and promotion not only of the globalist agenda of the UN, the World Economic Forum in Davos, and the Council for Inclusive Capitalism With the Vatican founded by Bergoglio in collaboration with Lynn Forester de Rothschild, but also of the liberal agenda of the Anglo-Zionist lobby. In other words, it depends on two supranational powers operating on seemingly opposing fronts yet pursuing a common objective: the establishment of a New World Order, in which, regardless of which side ultimately prevails in the conflict, the sole victim of persecution will invariably be Catholicism – specifically, that Traditional Catholicism which Rome is striving by every means to destroy or subsume by “conciliarizing” and “synodalizing” it.
According to Trump’s admonition, “Leo should get his act together as Pope […] and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician.” Indeed, the election of an American “pope” from Chicago, steeped in heretical doctrines acquired during his years of ministry in Latin America, devoted to the cult of Pachamama, and ideologically aligned – by his own admission – with the worst progressivism of the infamous Cardinals Bernardin and Cupich, appears to have been deliberately orchestrated to serve as a counterweight to the President of the United States. If his role was intended to be – as has indeed become evident in recent months – that of continuing the conciliar and synodal revolution, it comes as no surprise that Bergoglio meticulously paved the way for his ecclesiastical ascent, ensuring that he would succeed him and not undo the twelve years of systematic dismantling of the Catholic edifice and total subservience to the globalist establishment carried out by the Argentine Jesuit. In the face of these concrete demonstrations of continuity between Bergoglio and Prevost, the silence of the sparse, moderately conservative minority within the College of Cardinals confirms their complicity and inadequacy.
The unanimous chorus of the mainstream media and the neo-papists serves as proof that Leo is not speaking as a pope but rather as a standard-bearer for anti-Trumpism, so to speak. This is because the accolades come from figures – both within and outside the ecclesial body – who possess nothing of the Catholic spirit, and who would be the very first to crucify Prevost were he to dare express even the slightest doubt regarding the untouchable “dogms”s of the radical Left. Furthermore, this defense of Prevost is motivated precisely by the fact that the “pope” has chosen to play the politician, thereby demonstrating a partisanship that discredits both the Papacy and the Catholic Church in the eyes of the world. For this reason, Leo truly ought to “get his act together as Pope” – a task that is, however, exceedingly difficult for someone like him, who was chosen precisely because his support for the globalist agenda would be not merely coerced, but spontaneous and convinced; and because Leo is being kept under close watch by the emissaries of those Powers who have absolutely no intention of relinquishing the positions they have secured within the Catholic Church, now that they stand so tantalizingly close to the finish line.
When Our Lord Jesus Christ is recognized as King of the Nations, no Antichrist will dare to claim the title of Messiah. And when He is recognized as King and High Priest within the Church, no Vicar of His will dare to subvert His teaching or demolish His Church. If this is happening today, before our very eyes, it is because we are living in eschatological times in which Our Lord has been dethroned from His Divine Kingship by the Nations, and from His Eternal Priesthood by His own Ministers. Therefore, in judging present events, let us not allow ourselves to be beguiled by abstract speculations, nor let us attempt to alter reality to suit our own illusions. Let us view all that is unfolding through a supernatural lens, for this is the only way to preserve, amidst our present tribulations, that peace of soul which the world neither knows how to give, nor can give (Jn 14:27).
+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States of America
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