Commentary Culture Investigations

Disbursements from Eric Swalwell’s campaign accounts corroborate the allegations leveled by a woman who says the former congressman sexually assaulted her in 2018, raising the prospect that Swalwell used campaign contributions to facilitate his alleged sexual misconduct.
Beverly Hills model Lonna Drewes filed a criminal complaint Tuesday alleging that she and Swalwell were supposed to go to a “political event” in 2018 when, instead, the then-congressman put a drug in her drink and took her to a hotel room in West Hollywood, where she says he raped her and choked her while she was incapacitated. The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said the alleged incident “occurred in July of 2018 in a business in the 900 block of Hammond Street, in the City of West Hollywood.”
That description matches a pair of Swalwell campaign disbursements reported to the Federal Election Commission showing the congressman spent $361 in “travel expenses” at the Montrose West Hollywood, located at 900 Hammond Street, on July 18, 2018.
Paul Kamenar, an attorney with the National Legal and Policy Center, an ethics watchdog, told the Washington Free Beacon that the campaign payments could expose Swalwell to more legal headaches as the ex-congressman faces an ongoing criminal investigation. Kamenar noted that the records show Swalwell may have violated federal campaign laws by using campaign funds for recreational activity.
The campaign payments and their apparent connection to Drewes’s allegation could also lead to financial revolt from what remains of Swalwell’s donor base. One Swalwell donor wrote in a letter to the editor of the Los Angeles Times that she felt “defrauded” and signaled she would demand a refund from his campaign.
“ActBlue, I want my money back,” wrote the donor, Cheryl Younger. “I’m not interested in electing someone who won’t keep his hands in his pockets and his pants zipped when he is representing us and we are paying the tab.”
Five women, including several former Swalwell staffers, have come forward since Friday accusing Swalwell of sexual misconduct, leading him to abandon his bid for California governor on Sunday and resign from Congress on Tuesday. Swalwell also faces a separate criminal probe by the Manhattan district attorney into allegations he sexually assaulted one of his former staffers in New York City in April 2024.
Swalwell’s attorney, Sara Azari, said in a statement Tuesday that the allegations are “false” and part of a “calculated and transparent political hit job designed to destroy the reputation of a man who has spent nearly twenty years in public service.”
Swalwell emphatically denied having any sexual contact with employees as recently as last Tuesday: “There has never been an allegation and there has never been a settlement,” he said.
But now Azari says the issue at hand is the nature of the sexual engagements Swalwell may have had with staffers, declaring Tuesday that “regret is not rape.”
“I don’t care if you are passing judgment because of inappropriate sex or immoral sex,” Azari said on NewsNation. “The issue that we’re talking about here is whether it was unconsensual sex that is criminal sex. And, you know, adults consenting, which is our position, is not against the law.”
Azari did not return a request for comment.
Law enforcement officials at the Department of Homeland Security are also investigating complaints filed against Swalwell in recent weeks accusing him of using campaign funds to hire a Brazilian national without a legal work authorization to serve as his stay-at-home nanny, Politico reported Sunday.
The post Swalwell Accuser’s Allegations Corroborated by Campaign Disbursements, Raising Fresh Legal Questions appeared first on .

A coalition of Republican senators led by Rick Scott (Fla.) is pushing a bill that would prohibit the United States from funding a Hamas-tied U.N. agency, according to a copy of the bill obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
Scott on Wednesday introduced the Stop Support for UNRWA Act of 2026 to completely ban U.S. taxpayer funding for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, a body that employed several individuals found to have participated in Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel. In addition to legally enshrining the Trump administration’s move to freeze U.S. support for UNRWA, the legislation would prevent the United States from funding any successor organization that may arise in UNRWA’s place.
The legislation, which has eight GOP cosponsors as of Wednesday afternoon, comes amid an investigation into the agency and other U.N. bodies that the Office of Inspector General in USAID—an investigative entity separate from USAID—has conducted over the past several months. Federal investigators have identified three current or former UNRWA employees who participated in the Oct. 7 attack and another 14 otherwise affiliated with Hamas.
Another provision in the Stop Support for UNRWA Act would strip the agency of its diplomatic immunity under U.S. law, clearing the path for lawsuits against the body to proceed. Israeli victims of the Oct. 7 attack sued UNRWA in 2024, alleging that it ran “a billion-dollar money laundering operation that funded Hamas,” and the bill may prompt U.S. citizens affected by the Hamas attack to bring their own suits.
The bill would also stop the U.S. government from engaging with any U.N. agency, body, or commission run by a country known to support “acts of international terrorism.” Countries like Iran, the world’s foremost sponsor of terrorism, are frequently appointed to lead U.N. groups. The Islamic Republic was selected as the vice-chair of the U.N. Commission for Social Development, which focuses on issues including women’s rights, in February. States like Syria and Cuba have also held positions on U.N. bodies like the Human Rights Council and a committee on crimes against humanity.
Though the Trump administration has already frozen U.S. funding for UNRWA indefinitely, the Stop Support for UNRWA Act would ensure that a future Democratic administration could not reverse that decision. When the Biden administration temporarily paused additional funding for UNRWA in early 2024 following allegations that agency employees had participated in Oct. 7, a group of 50 Democratic lawmakers called for a full renewal of U.S. support. The U.N. agency ramped up its lobbying efforts in Washington, D.C., last month, seeking to bolster its support within the Democratic Party and push the U.S. government toward restoring its funding.
Scott introduced a second bill Wednesday as part of a package targeting international organizations that undermine U.S. interests. The IGO Boycott Act, which has six GOP cosponsors, would amend existing law to ensure that U.S. businesses and persons cannot join boycotts of countries friendly to the United States. The 2018 Anti-Boycott Act originally prevented U.S. individuals and corporations from engaging in economic boycotts against U.S. allies backed by foreign governments, which in practice prevented those people and companies from joining the Arab League’s boycott against Israel. The new legislation would extend the law to apply to boycotts supported by international governmental organizations like the United Nations and European Union, with an eye toward the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, imposing financial penalties for U.S. entities that join.
A version of the IGO Boycott Act passed through the House of Representatives in 2024 with bipartisan support, but the Senate’s then-Democratic majority did not take up the bill. With Republicans now controlling both chambers of Congress and Scott shepherding the bill in the Senate, it is likely that House members will once again rally behind the effort.
Scott told the Free Beacon that the legislation he introduced will prevent U.S. taxpayer dollars from ending up in the hands of organizations that work against U.S. interests.
“Every single American tax dollar we spend should be making America safer, stronger, and more prosperous,” he said. “There should be absolutely no funding from the U.S. going to entities that support terrorism, undermine our interests, or target our allies. These bills will ensure that American policies actually line up with America’s needs and interests—not those of foreign government organizations like UNRWA or the U.N.”
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Duke University suspended and froze funding for its campus Students for Justice in Palestine chapter after the anti-Israel organization shared an illustration flagged for “antisemitic imagery,” the Duke Chronicle reported Wednesday.
The student organization advertised an event last month in an Instagram post featuring an illustration of two pigs, one labeled as “Zionism” and depicted holding a Star of David, and the other as “U.S. Imperialism” holding the Statue of Liberty’s torch.

A university official informed SJP leadership that the university’s Office of Institutional Equity received 10 student complaints about the image, which was originally published in the Black Panther Party’s newspaper in 1970. The university’s Student Affairs office suspended the group and revoked its funding over “alleged harassment under the Policy on Prohibited Discrimination, Harassment and Related Misconduct,” the Chronicle reported.
SJP officials told the Chronicle that the illustration “was never intended to be antisemitic” and that anti-Zionism is “not the same as targeting Jewish people.”
Noah Hamid, a leadership member of Duke’s Students Supporting Israel chapter, told the Washington Free Beacon in a statement that “the suspension of Students for Justice in Palestine feels like a long-overdue acknowledgement of what many of us have been experiencing for years.”
“This is not about one protest, one chant, or one controversial flyer,” he said. “It is about a pattern—one that has too often crossed the line from political advocacy into something that isolates, intimidates, and, at times, openly targets Jewish students.”
Duke’s SJP chapter has shared social media posts excusing Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel. In one Instagram post from July 2024, the group shared a graphic claiming that the Hamas attack was “a reaction and resistance to decades of oppression,” adding that “to insinuate otherwise reveals a deep lack of historical knowledge, a lack of empathy for the daily lived reality of Palestinians, or both.”
On Sept. 11, 2024, the group posted another graphic on its Instagram page that compared Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas to 9/11.
The Duke SJP chapter began justifying the Hamas attack on Oct. 7 itself. In an Instagram post that day, the group wrote, “Hamas explains their attack was in retaliation to [sic] the continuation of Israeli oppression and the damage done to the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
“It is important to consider the long history of systematic oppression Israel has placed upon Palestinians for the past several decades when looking at mainstream media,” the post continued.
The post Duke Suspends Students for Justice in Palestine Chapter Over Illustration Depicting ‘Zionism’ as Pig Holding Star of David appeared first on .

The governor of New York and the mayor of New York City are joining together in America’s 250th birthday year to back a plan for taxation without representation—precisely the injustice that the United States of America was founded to oppose.
Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat who some had hoped would serve as a moderating influence on Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old socialist, used the April 15 tax filing deadline to announce a tax on people who own property in New York City but who are not New York City residents for income tax purposes.
“This is a targeted surcharge on second homes and investor-owned apartments worth over $5 million; homes that in many cases sit vacant for a large part of the year,” Hochul said. “Those people are not part of our city.”
“The people who own these pied-à-terres are not contributing in the same way that the 8.3 million New York residents do,” Hochul claimed.
The people who own these properties are not New York City voters or in some cases even New York State voters, though they do pay property taxes already; if their primary residence is in Florida and they vote there, they don’t even have the ability to elect the New York politicians who are imposing taxes on them. That was precisely the same position that the North American colonists were in in the 1760s and 1770s when the British Parliament—where the colonies were not represented—were imposing taxes on the colonists. The colonists likened it to slavery and fought a revolution over it. The Declaration of Independence issued in July 1776 referred to it as “imposing Taxes on us without our Consent.”
Details on the proposal were scant. A press release from the mayor’s office said, “It is projected to generate $500 million in annual revenue.” That’s less than what the mayor needs to close an existing budget gap, let alone to fund his plans for new programs such as “free” buses and “free” childcare. I put “free” in scarequotes because these programs aren’t actually free, they are expensive. That is why New York, already the worst state out of 50 in the Tax Foundation’s 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index, is busy finding taxes to increase rather than ones to reduce.
Mamdani went so far as to attack by name a Florida-based businessman, Ken Griffin, who has been purchasing New York City real estate. “Yesterday I was standing in front of I think it’s 220 Central Park West. Ken Griffin owns a penthouse that he bought I think for $228 million. …This is the kind of wealth that is being stored in the city and it is a residence that is so often empty,” Mamdani said at his own April 15 event, managing to get Griffin’s address wrong while vilifying an entrepreneurial and patriotic job-creator. Griffin, who left Chicago for Florida while criticizing Chicago’s business climate, was also singled out for demonization by name in the mayor’s press release.
Mamdani’s event featured left-wing economists Gabriel Zucman of UC Berkeley and Columbia’s Joseph Stiglitz and was moderated by the city’s Commissioner of International Affairs, Ana María Archila, who before joining the Mamdani administration was co-director of the Working Families Party, a far-left alternative to the Democratic Party.
Collecting a tax on second homes and investor-owned apartments in New York City poses potential practical challenges from an enforcement perspective. Some New York City apartment buildings are organized as cooperatives; the co-op building pays the tax, and the shareholders in the co-op pay maintenance, a portion of which goes to pay the building’s taxes. In the case of condos, a couple or family could designate a lower-income family member as a New York City resident, and as the apartment owner, for tax purposes, and file a separate tax return for that person. The tax also might be subject to legal opposition on the basis of retroactivity or equal protection, though those efforts might face steep challenges. People could choose to sell the properties, accelerating the flight from New York.
A tax lawyer at Hodgson Russ LLP who has written about the issue, Timothy Noonan, told the Washington Free Beacon that without seeing the text of the new law, it’s hard to determine if there’d be any workarounds. He was skeptical of the spouse solution, “since spouses are generally presumed to have the same resident status under New York’s residency rules.”
“My view generally is that any attempts to circumvent a tax like this will be difficult, and that the main way to get around the tax will actually be a lot simpler: taxpayers with this potential problem will just get rid of their place!” he said. “But in general, I do think it’s possible that a tax measure that provides preferential treatment to City residents and is targeted specifically to nonresidents could be subject to a legal challenge, perhaps on the privileges and immunities clause, for essentially imposing a penalty on a taxpayer for living somewhere else.”
Advocates of higher taxes acknowledged the chance people would sell but suggested that’d be okay. “If a couple of billionaires were to leave New York or Massachusetts, is that a problem? That’s not clear,” Zucman said on stage at the CUNY Graduate Center before a large “Tax the Rich” backdrop.
As is typical in such situations, the anti-rich, high-tax politics and the anti-Israel politics mix easily together. Zucman touted an upcoming meeting in Barcelona convened by Spain’s president, Pedro Sánchez, who has been hostile to Israel. The meeting, which Zucman said would attract 15 heads of state, is to impose a two percent global wealth tax on billionaires. Mamdani denounced what he called “images of our country bombing girls’ schools in Iran.”
And Stiglitz claimed that America is spending “on weapons that don’t work against enemies that don’t exist, killing people” “more like a billion dollars in just ordnances every day, in, you know, the bombs.” Though some early estimates were in that range, much of the costs relate to missile and drone defense—not “killing people” or “weapons that don’t work” but defending precious economic, military, and civilian assets against Iranian attacks. And costs declined as Iranian air defenses were defeated, making it easier for the U.S. to use cheaper and more common bombs that could be dropped from overhead rather than shot from afar. Anyway, it was telling that Mamdani and his favorite Columbia and U.C. Berkeley economists couldn’t even stay on message at a “tax-the-rich” event, they had to find some way to drift into criticizing the war effort. It’s all connected, and, watching, one got the sense that if Mamdani, Stiglitz, and Zucman had been around in 1776, they’d have been busy whining about the cost of muskets and powder instead of volunteering in the glorious cause of freedom.
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The Elitist Media continue to treat the exchanges between President Trump and Pope Leo XIV as an opportunity to try to drive Catholics from the President’s coalition ahead of the midterms. And absolutely no one is more ham-handed about it than ABC News.

Watch Rachel Scott’s report rehashing the controversy, with a sprinkling of Vice President JD Vance’s remarks at a Turning Point USA Event in Georgia, as aired on ABC’s World News Tonight on Wednesday, April 15th, 2026 (click “expand” to view transcript): 

WATCH: @ABCWorldNews continues to ham-handedly try to pry Catholics away from President Trump’s coalition.
DAVID MUIR: Tonight, Vice President JD Vance now warning the Pope to, quote, “be careful.” What Vance was talking about as President Trump lashes out against Pope Leo. And… pic.twitter.com/ffS1oyOuwY
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) April 16, 2026
embed

DAVID MUIR: Tonight, Vice President JD Vance now warning the Pope to, quote, “be careful.” What Vance was talking about as President Trump lashes out against Pope Leo. And tonight on The Hill, the leading Republican in the Senate now saying the focus should be on the economy, gas prices and not going after the Pope. Here’s Rachel Scott.

RACHEL SCOTT: Tonight, the backlash after Vice President JD Vance told Pope Leo, the spiritual leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics, he needs to be careful when talking about matters of theology.

JD VANCE: I think that it’s important in the same way that it’s important for the Vice President of the United States to be careful when I talk about matters of public policy, I think it’s very, very important for the Pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology.

RACHEL SCOTT: The Pope has spoken out during the war on Iran, criticizing President Trump’s rhetoric about destroying a civilization, declaring on Palm Sunday, “Jesus does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.” Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, takes issue with that.

VANCE: Was God on the side of the Americans who liberated Holocaust camps and liberated those- those innocent people from, you know, those who had survived the Holocaust? I…I certainly think the answer is yes.

SCOTT: The Vice President doubling down on his criticism of the American Pope.

VANCE: If you’re going to opine on matters of theology, you’ve got to be careful. You’ve got to make sure it’s anchored in the truth.

SCOTT: Tonight, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops pushing back, saying: “When Pope Leo XIV speaks as supreme pastor of the universal Church, he’s not merely offering opinions on theology. He is preaching the gospel.” The Pope himself had nothing to say about the Vice President’s comments. He was in Algeria, an overwhelmingly Muslim country where he visited a mosque.

POPE LEO XIV: Although we have different beliefs, we have different ways of worshiping, we have different ways of living. We can live together in peace.

SCOTT: The Pope calling that message something the world needs to hear today. 

Back here in Washington many lawmakers, including some Republicans, are not happy with what the President and the Vice President have been saying about the Pope. In fact, the top Republican in the Senate with this message to the administration saying focus on the pocketbook issues and, quote: “let the Church be the Church,” David.

MUIR: Rachel Scott at The White House tonight. Thank you, Rachel.

ABC is doing everything in their power to keep this beef alive and going. And they stand alone in doing so as CBS and ABC have already moved on.Their putting all this effort into pretending to care what Catholics think about the issues of the day is almost cute to watch- in a “bless your heart” sort of way. 

The report itself clocked in at about 2 minutes and 17 seconds. Scott threw everything and the kitchen sink at Vice President JD Vance as he addressed the controversy at the TPUSA event. Scott even went on to note that Vance converted to Catholicism in 2019. That observance stands as an implicit and unexpressed “how dare this new convert question the Pope” dog whistle.

And yet the question remains: when did ABC ever care about what Catholics think? The answer is that they really don’t outside of whatever The Narrative™ might be on any given day. The Pope is getting all this run because he’s expressed opposition to the Iran operation and has spoken out against immigration enforcement- both positions contrary to policy put forth by the Trump administration. But you never saw this same concern when the Obama Administration sued the Little Sisters of the Poor in order to force them to pay for abortifacients, when Kamala Harris persecuted David Daleiden for exposing Planned Parenthood’s sale of baby parts, or when the Biden Administration locked pro-lifers up under the FACE Act.

Likewise, you never hear the media covering Democrat criticisms of the Pope when he speaks out against abortion or same-sex marriage or the ordination of women. The Elitist Media recoil at those expressions of faith.

This report was little more than ABC doing a long-form version of the meme with the smug liberal saying, “No I’m not a Christian and I have nothing but contempt for your backward religious beliefs so yeah, this argument wouldn’t work on me but maybe if I use it on you, you’ll do what I want.” These fake appeals to authority ring hollow and persuade no one.

I expected more political violence in the last ten years than we have seen.

National Review is a superb place to work, and I am incredibly proud to have called the place home for the past couple of years.

It was an open secret among the political class—except, apparently, to those who knew him best.
Democrats who once described their closeness with former Rep. Eric Swalwell (D., Calif.) now say they are shocked by the string of sexual misconduct allegations against him—including rape—that ended his gubernatorial campaign and led to his resignation from Congress. The professions of ignorance come as reporters, former Capitol Hill staffers, and other political insiders say Swalwell’s alleged treatment of women has been an open secret in the nation’s Capitol.
“The whole thing is just shocking and deeply upsetting and I think he made the right decision to resign,” said Sen. Adam Schiff (D., Calif.), who endorsed Swalwell’s gubernatorial campaign in February, describing the California congressman as “my friend.” Schiff chaired the House Intelligence Committee from 2019 to 2023 at a time when Swalwell served as a member of the panel.
“I know the Golden State will be in good hands with Eric Swalwell,” Schiff said in the video.
Billionaire Stephen Cloobeck was a close friend and roommate of Swalwell’s who just weeks ago described the disgraced ex-congressman as a “little brother” in an interview, scoffing at rumors of his inappropriate conduct with women.
Cloobeck and Swalwell have known each other for a decade, Cloobeck said on his podcast last year.
“We became fast friends. Like, fast friends,” Cloobeck told listeners.
“You’ve taught me a lot. I hope I’ve taught you a few things,” Swalwell added.
“You’ve taught me a couple of things, too,” Cloobeck replied. “We’ve learned a lot from each other. Our families are very close. Very, very close.”

In 2024, Cloobeck paid over $30,000 for Swalwell’s private flights to Nice, France, according to Swalwell’s finance disclosure. It is unclear who accompanied the pair on the trip. Cloobeck did not respond to a request for comment.
Cloobeck said Tuesday that he was “blown away” by the allegations and claimed to have told Swalwell, while evicting him from his mansion, “I’m disappointed and disgusted, now get the fuck out of here.”

NEW: Billionaire Stephen Cloobeck says he threw Rep. Eric Swalwell out of his Beverly Hills home after “busting his trust” — amid sexual assault allegations Swalwell denies.
Swalwell has since dropped out of the governor’s race and resigned.
“You don’t exist in my life.” pic.twitter.com/TzFzfMvx5K
— Matthew Seedorff (@MattSeedorff) April 14, 2026

In addition to kicking Swalwell out of his mansion, the billionaire is now seeking to claw back the $1 million he donated to an outside group that supported Swalwell’s gubernatorial campaign.
Sen. Ruben Gallego (D., Ariz.), whom Swalwell called his “best friend in the world,” claimed to have no knowledge of Swalwell’s behavior. He acknowledged that he had heard rumors that the California Democrat was merely “flirty” with women.
“Eric Swalwell lied to all of us—lied to the most powerful people in this country—and they trusted him,” Gallego said at a press conference Tuesday.
“Look, we socialized. We went out. But I never saw him engage in any of the predatory behavior, harassment, sexual assault or even like anything that,” Gallego said. “I’m sorry that we didn’t listen closer.”
Gallego, who divorced his first wife when she was nine months pregnant, added: “I let this man into my family … it hurts me that this man hurt a lot of people.”
Some Republicans cast doubt on Gallego’s denial. Rep. Mike Lawler (R., N.Y.) noted on social media that Swalwell and Gallego were roommates for several years in Washington.
“Are we to seriously believe that you didn’t know or witness anything about the ‘double life’ [Swalwell] was living?” asked Lawler.
Swalwell and Gallego traveled together on a 2021 lobbyist-funded trip to the oil-rich Gulf monarchy of Qatar, where they were photographed shirtless riding camels in Qatari desert.

Other well-connected Democrats who maintained close ties to Swalwell have also said this week they were completely unaware of the allegations.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), who has maintained a close relationship with Swalwell and facilitated his ascension in the Democratic Party, said this week she had no knowledge of Swalwell’s alleged sexual misconduct even after she defended Swalwell in 2020 following revelations that he had a years-long sexual relationship with Fang Fang, a Chinese intelligence officer.
“I don’t have any concern about Mr. Swalwell,” she said in December 2020. Pelosi, then speaker of the House, reappointed Swalwell in March 2021 to the House Intelligence Committee, overriding Republican calls to remove him from the panel over national security concerns.
(Win McNamee/Getty Images)
In January 2021, Pelosi appointed Swalwell to serve as one of nine House members to preside over impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump.
Swalwell’s attorney, Sara Azari, said in a statement Tuesday that the allegations are a “calculated and transparent political hit job designed to destroy the reputation of a man who has spent twenty years in public service.”
“Eric Swalwell categorically and unequivocally denies each and every allegation of sexual misconduct and assault that has been leveled against him,” Azari said. “These accusations are false, fabricated, and deeply offensive.”
District attorneys in Los Angeles and Manhattan launched criminal probes this week into the allegations.
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America welcomes you — but only under American rules.
The post State Lawmakers Nationwide Erect Firewalls Against Sharia Law appeared first on Frontpage Mag.

One million Catholics shrank to 8,000 through mass murder.
The post Pope Leo Celebrates Christian Genocide in Algeria appeared first on Frontpage Mag.