Newsbusters

MSNBC continued their never-ending obsession with every little action of the Trump administration Tuesday, and, true to form, they weren’t squeamish about throwing around groundless accusations of foul play. On The 11th Hour that night, Stephanie Ruhle hosted a panel which discussed Trump’s recent termination of two Democratic members of the Federal Trade Commission, and the allegation was made, with no evidence, that Trump did it for his own illegal personal gain.

 

Ruhle first turned to Rohit Chopra, formerly of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She neglected to mention off the bat that Chopra was not exactly an impartial source, but rather a Democratic Party apparatchik who had held several partisan posts and was a career left-wing activist. She asked him for his thoughts on the layoff, to which Chopra responded:

Well. Why on Earth are they getting fired? Is it because they were the ones that were taking on subscription scams? Is it because they were taking on children’s privacy? Because they were going after Amazon, Facebook, some of these big companies violating the law? I don’t understand what the reason is. And the only thing that makes sense, is maybe someone is calling the shots to get rid of people who were trying to enforce the law for consumers.

 

Chopra had just, with no evidence, accused the president of breaking the law, and had completely ignored the possibility that the termination could have been for any conceivable completely legitimate reason.

As though Chopra had just made a solid point, rather than a groundless accusation, Ruhle then moved on to MSNBC correspondent John Harwood, who happily played along with the conspiracy theory that was being freshly spun right there on the air:

Well, I think I know why he did this, Steph, and I think it relates to many of the other ways in which he’s tried to, in effect, take personal control of the government. By firing the Democratic members of the FTC Donald Trump puts it all in his hands. Those Republican commissioners are going to do whatever he tells them. Donald Trump is a very transactional guy. So there’s a huge opening for corruption here, with people who might have been in the sights of the FTC coming to Trump and saying, ‘Hey, do this for me, and I’ll do that for you.’ I think that Donald Trump, by holding all the levers of government in his own hands, has tremendous opportunity for self-dealing.

Harwood had just made up a purely hypothetical scenario in which, with no basis in fact, he accused the president of crooked dealings. Again, Ruhle just rolled with it, and agreed, “The glory days of payday lending will be back again.”

Evidently, MSNBC had no plans of toning down the evidence-free drivel that by their standards passed for news anytime soon.

To view the full transcript, click “expand” to read:

MSNBC’s The 11th Hour
03/18/2025
11:24 PM

(…)

[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: TRUMP FIRES DEMOCRATS ON FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION]

STEPHANIE RUHLE: I got to go to Rohit first. You served on the FTC. What do you think about this?

ROHIT CHOPRA: Well. Why on Earth are they getting fired? Is it because they were the ones that were taking on subscription scams? Is it because they were taking on children’s privacy? Because they were going after Amazon, Facebook, some of these big companies violating the law? 

I don’t understand what the reason is. And the only thing that makes sense, is maybe someone is calling the shots to get rid of people who were trying to enforce the law for consumers.

RUHLE: John, what do you think about this? You know, it’s ironic, in theory, businesses might say, ‘Great, there’s no rules. Let’s rush, you know, as many M&A deals as we can get through.’ But the truth is I just spoke to an investment banker tonight who said first quarter M&A is disastrous. 

There’s no deals out there because people don’t know how to plan their business in the Trump administration.

MSNBC WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT JOHN HARWOOD: Well, I think I know why he did this, Steph, and I think it relates to many of the other ways in which he’s tried to, in effect, take personal control of the government. 

By firing the Democratic members of the FTC Donald Trump puts it all in his hands. Those Republican commissioners are going to do whatever he tells them. Donald Trump is a very transactional guy. 

So there’s a huge opening for corruption here, with people who might have been in the sights of the FTC coming to Trump and saying, ‘Hey, do this for me, and I’ll do that for you.’ I think that Donald Trump, by holding all the levers of government in his own hands, has tremendous opportunity for self-dealing.

RUHLE: The glory days of payday lending will be back again. 

(…)

As the media furor over the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) dies down, so, too, does the frequency of DOGE-related reports across the evening news. Nonetheless, those reports are still coming out. The latest such report, via NBC Nightly News, suggests that DOGE will ruin VA care for veterans in Wyoming 

Watch as correspondent Stephanie Gosk pitches doom for veterans and their loved ones:

STEPHANIE GOSK: The politics in Wyoming are pretty clear cut: 71% of the Cowboy State voted for Donald Trump, but veterans we’ve been speaking to say they don’t want this to be about politics. And with cuts to the VA looming, some of them are feeling a real sense of unease. Last week, two federal judges ruled the firing of probationary federal employees was unlawful, but the VA has set a goal of cutting up to 60,000-80,000 more jobs.

DOUG COLLINS: We’re going to accomplish this without making any cuts to health care or benefits to veterans and VA beneficiaries.

GOSK: Tripp says he would welcome more efficiency, but he hopes decision makers will visit Wyoming first.

TRIPP: I think getting that personal touch would make a difference.

GOSK: The government, he says, needs to honor its contract with veterans.

This is but the latest in an ongoing series of reports intended to scare viewers into thinking that DOGE will worsen their lives in a myriad of ways. DOGE will alternately, per reports, get you eaten by bears, and ruin your Yosemite vacation (if the bears don’t get to you first). The best comparable of these stories is the one about DOGE causing people in hurricane-affected areas to potentially receive worse care from FEMA.  

The VA, like FEMA, has long been derided for the quality of care they provide to their customers. And it is time to be efficient while providing that care.

In the case of the VA, there is no guarantee that preserving existing funding levels would magically provide our brave veterans with the care they need and deserve. Certainly, the agency is not a sympathetic victim of DOGE cuts. 

Perhaps the agency can improve after cuts are made, but there is no guarantee. The VA has a long history of mishaps that have harmed and, on occasion, resulted in the death of our Veterans.

Beyond doomcasting off of care for veterans, the report served absolutely no purpose.

Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned report as aired on the NBC Nightly News on Wednesday, March 19th, 2025:

LESTER HOLT: As part of its cuts to the federal government, the Trump administration plans to slash up to 80,000 jobs at the VA. Stephanie Gosk reports from Wyoming about the potential impact on the 9 million veterans who rely on the agency for critical care.

STEPHANIE GOSK: In a windswept field just outside Cheyenne, Wyoming, there’s a small national cemetery, part of the VA’s outreach to rural communities. 

How would you characterize the need here in Cheyenne, and Wyoming?

JUSTIN TRIPP: I think we have a lot of needs. Suicide is an issue, especially in Wyoming. I recently lost a friend to suicide.

GOSK: A friend that Justin Tripp served withduring his 13 years in the U.S. Navy. Now Tripp is the state commander for the VFW.

TRIPP: That transition into civilian life, that’s where we lose a lot of people to suicide.

GOSK: The veteran suicide rate in Wyoming is 50% higher than the rest of the country. In Cheyenne, there’s a small VA center dedicated just to mental health. On February 24th, the office manager was fired. A Marine veteran, she was one of the thousands of probationary federal employees fired by email for their performance. But a recent review obtained by NBC News was glowing. Her manager writing: “as a veteran herself, she listens with empathy, she is the first person our clients come into contact with.”

TRIPP: I would be concerned with positions that are frontline positions that touch veterans every day.

GOSK: She was at the front door.

TRIPP: Exactly. And that’s where I have concern.

GOSK: The politics in Wyoming are pretty clear cut: 71% of the Cowboy State voted for Donald Trump, but veterans we’ve been speaking to say they don’t want this to be about politics. And with cuts to the VA looming, some of them are feeling a real sense of unease. Last week, two federal judges ruled the firing of probationary federal employees was unlawful, but the VA has set a goal of cutting up to 60,000-80,000 more jobs.

DOUG COLLINS: We’re going to accomplish this without making any cuts to health care or benefits to veterans and VA beneficiaries.

GOSK: Tripp says he would welcome more efficiency, but he hopes decision makers will visit Wyoming first.

TRIPP: I think getting that personal touch would make a difference.

GOSK: The government, he says, needs to honor its contract with veterans. 

Why is it this country’s responsibility to take care of those veterans?

TRIPP: Because we served when called. We raised our hand when other people wouldn’t. 

GOSK: Stephanie Gosk, NBC News, Cheyenne, Wyoming.

 

Karoline Leavitt announced she’s not attending the White House Correspondents Dinner next month, which looks like an even better decision after the journalists ripped Trump and Musk and Hegseth at the “Gridiron Club” dinner. The Washington Post reported PBS anchor Judy Woodruff “opened up the room with jokes about Mr. Musk’s fathering so many children and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s drinking.” Woodruff also wisecracked about “Big Balls,” a young Musk DOGE worker.

The New York Times headline on the dinner was “At Gridiron Dinner, Jokes About Trump, Musk and Russia Abound.” The reporters are still yukking it up on the Russian collusion references.

Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg — a major Obama fan — introduced the coterie of ambassadors from Denmark, Mexico and Canada as the “rebel alliance,” which makes Trump sound like Darth Vader. “Obviously, there’s much about this that’s archaic,” Goldberg told the Post, once he’d returned to his seat, about the Gridiron event. “But I like tradition, and I think these traditions have a civilizing purpose.”

Journalists complain about Trump “curtailing media access,” which is ludicrous compared to how little access reporters were given to President Biden.

In an article on the forthcoming White House Correspondents Dinner, an anonymous reporter complained to The Washington Post:  “I think there’s a growing sentiment among the press corps that we should not be having the dinner this year….It never has looked great, but now especially, are we really going to be mingling in our tuxes and our ball gowns with members of an administration that is curtailing press access, that is banning the Associated Press over word choice, that are blowing up the pool system and handpicking friendly outlets to replace independent journalists? And we are going to go and party with them? Yeah, that seems like a terrible idea.”

That sentiment goes both ways. There’s no need to seek a spirit of unity with people who paint you constantly as a Threat to Democracy. They equate themselves and their leftist tilt with democracy, and “independent journalism.” 

Enjoy the podcast below, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

During the past presidential election season, abortion stories were a hot ticket across the network evening news. The networks did everything in their power to try to make the issue a dispositive one, in the hopes of tilting the election to Vice President Kamala Harris. With the election now behind us, abortion stories are largely out of view. But the CBS Evening News changed that, at least for tonight.

Watch as CBS gives sympathetic treatment to a midwife accused of illegally performing abortions in the state of Texas:

SHAMLIAN: Court documents charge that Rojas provided medication to induce an abortion in March, and allege she told her patient her pregnancy was likely nonviable. She allegedly performed another abortion on a different patient in January. The method is unclear. A search warrant found misoprostol in Rojas’ car and one of her clinics. The medication can be used for a variety of medical purposes, including to induce abortion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced the arrest. He said in a statement, “Individuals killing unborn babies will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.” Mary Ziegler is a law professor who studies abortion-related issues.

MARY SIEGLER: Attorney General Paxton was trained to find someone who was not a licensed physician, to argue that providers posed a threat to Texans in general.

SHAMLIAN: Sherman says she is worried about how Rojas is doing.

SHERMAN: In my mind, she’s a hero, she helps people.

SHAMLIAN: You see her that way?

SHERMAN: Yes, definitely.

Who is this “hero” that “helps people”? More detail than was disclosed in Janet Shamlian’s report was found on CBS News dot com:

(Texas Attorney General Ken) Paxton said that Maria “Dr. Maria” Rojas is a known midwife in Northwest Houston and was taken into custody in Waller County. She is accused of performing illegal abortions, which violates the Texas Human Life Protection Act. The law bans abortion after six weeks.

During an investigation, the attorney general’s office found that Rojas owned and operated multiple clinics under the names Clinica Waller Latinoamericana in Waller, Clinica Latinoamericana Telge in Cypress, both northwest of Houston, and Latinoamericana Medical Clinic in Spring, just north of Houston. 

The press release from Paxton’s office alleged that Rojas’ clinics employed unlicensed people who “falsely presented themselves as licensed medical professionals.” 

Shamlian’s report only mentions a clinic where Rojas freelanced at, while omitting the three clinics she owned and operated. Naturally, the character witness is going to speak only as to whatever happened at her own clinic- with shock that the good midwife would deign to perform an abortion.

The framing is such that the truest, purest victim of the Texas abortion law is the noble illegal abortion provider. Election season may be over for the time being, but the death cult marches on- aided and abetted by the corporate media.

Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned report as aired on the CBS Evening News on Wednesday, March 19th, 2025:

JOHN DICKERSON: Texas has one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country.

MAURICE DuBOIS: Last night we told you that a midwife and her associate had been arrested for violating that law. Well, tonight, Janet Shamlian takes a closer look at the case.

JANET SHAMLIAN: 48-year-old Maria Rojas is a certified nurse midwife charged with forming illegal abortions and practicing without a medical license. A man who worked for her was also charged. According to the arrest warrant, Rojas ran three clinics near Houston. Her patients called her “Dr. Maria”, but she is not a licensed physician.

HOLLY SHERMAN: I can’t picture her doing this. I don’t believe that she did.

SHAMLIAN: You don’t think she performed abortions?

SHERMAN: No, I do not.

SHAMLIAN: She didn’t do that in any capacity for you?

SHERMAN: No. Midwives don’t do that, period.

SHAMLIAN: Holly SHERMAN owns the Tomball Birth Center and employed Rojas as a midwife once a week. She’s known her for eight years.

SHERMAN: She was a doctor in Peru, an OB, came to America and America doesn’t recognize, you know, physicians from other countries, so then she became a midwife.

SHAMLIAN: Has she ever presented herself as far as you know as a medical doctor?

SHERMAN: No, never.

SHAMLIAN: Court documents charge that Rojas provided medication to induce an abortion in March, and allege she told her patient her pregnancy was likely nonviable. She allegedly performed another abortion on a different patient in January. The method is unclear. A search warrant found misoprostol in Rojas’ car and one of her clinics. The medication can be used for a variety of medical purposes, including to induce abortion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced the arrest. He said in a statement, “Individuals killing unborn babies will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.” Mary Ziegler is a law professor who studies abortion-related issues.

MARY SIEGLER: Attorney General Paxton was trained to find someone who was not a licensed physician, to argue that providers posed a threat to Texans in general.

SHAMLIAN: Sherman says she is worried about how Rojas is doing.

SHERMAN: In my mind, she’s a hero, she helps people.

SHAMLIAN: You see her that way?

SHERMAN: Yes, definitely.

DICKERSON: And Janet Shamlian joins us now from Houston. So Janet, what is next in this case?

SHAMLIAN: Well, tonight, Rojas is still in jail. Her bond is set at $700,000. Both of the charges against her are felonies. The abortion charge is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, and there are potential civil penalties, as well. The attorney general is also asking for a restraining order. He wants to close her 3 clinics. 

DICKERSON: All right. Janet Shamlian for us in Houston, Texas. Thank you so much, Janet.

 

Chris Hayes showed some of the lengths he would go to to tow MSNBC’s party line, on Tuesday, when he was so desperate to cover for Hamas that he defended the terror organization putting weapons under civilian centers, seemingly arguing Gaza was too small to put them anywhere else. In his interview that night on All In, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Hayes felt the need to scoff at the Senator’s condemnation of the practice.

Schumer, himself a two-state-solution advocate and no fan of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, expressed deep concern about the spike in overt anti-Semitism in America since the beginning of the war, and how little issue had been made of it.

 

 

Hayes, though, said that the thing that “struck him” was the “conflation between” October 7 and Israel’s reaction:

[T]here’s these sort of two periods here. There’s the trauma of October 7th, which is the worst mass-killing of Jews since the Holocaust, and, just horribly traumatic (…) And then there’s what happens afterwards in the protest movement. And it just seems to me there’s a little conflation between what I think was shown in the polling and generally a very, very small active support for Hamas in the wake of that. And then the protest movement that grows up as 50,000 people, including 15,000 children, are killed with American bombs.

Hayes was already ignoring the very strong, overt anti-Semitic element that had never ceased to be prevalent in the leftist protest movements on college campuses, but, while saying he “ached for” innocent civilians who were suffering.

On top of that, Schumer reminded Hayes of Hama’s well-documented use of human shields:

[W]hat’s underplayed totally is the role of Hamas in that tragedy, even afterwards. Hamas uses, by doctrine, the innocent Palestinians as human shields. They put rockets in hospitals, they put schools there… The late head of Hamas said these Palestinians who were killed are necessary sacrifices. His words. The media doesn’t play it up, and the world doesn’t realize the difficult position Israel is in, trying to make sure that Hamas doesn’t come back… I don’t know any other country that has used people as human shields the way Hamas has (…)

Hayes deflected the point by broadly asserting that any insurgent army would have done that, because, he said “They’re always amongst the populace.”

“Never the same way,” Schumer responded; noting that it’s an integrated part of Hamas’s fighting doctrine:

It’s not a policy the way it is with Hamas- rockets in hospitals, and using humans as human shields. But what I’m saying is, the media, they showed, every day, pictures of Palestinians being hurt, and we ache for that. They almost never mentioned that a lot of these were human shields, a lot of them.

Rather than just breaking down and conceding that using civilian schools and hospitals as military shields was bad, all Hayes could do was scoff: “What does that even mean? The size of Gaza is less than- it’s basically Manhattan and it’s got 2 million people in it.”

His analogy wasn’t even correct either. Manhattan was 22.66 square miles, while Gaza was almost seven times larger at 141 square miles.

Apparently, Chris Hayes’ allegiance to MSNBC’s status quo ran so deep that he would resort to outrageous mental gymnastics to rationalize a terrorist group’s barbarism even against their own people. 

To view the full transcript, click “expand” to read:

MSNBC’s All In With Chris Hayes
03/18/2025
8:33 PM

 

[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: CHUCK SCHUMER ON ANTI-SEMITISM IN AMERICA]

CHRIS HAYES: But here’s- here’s the thing that struck me in reading your book, is that, it seems to me there’s these sort of two periods here. There’s the trauma of October 7th, which is the worst mass-killing of Jews since the Holocaust, and, just horribly traumatic both- if it were any people happening with no 5000-year history, and extra-traumatic with the 5000-year history. 

SENATE MINORITY LEADER CHUCK SCHUMER: Right. 

HAYES: And then there’s what happens afterwards in the protest movement. 

And it just seems to me there’s a little conflation between what I think was shown in the polling and generally a very, very small active support for Hamas in the wake of that- 

SCHUMER: Well- 

HAYES: And then the protest movement that grows up as 50,000 people-

SHUMER: But let me-

HAYES: -including 15,000 children, are killed with American bombs.

SCHUMER: And I ache for them. I see this kid- picture of a kid with no legs. I ache, I see this little girl whose parents were killed, Palestinian- I ache. 

But, what’s underplayed totally is the role of Hamas in that tragedy, even afterwards. Hamas uses, by doctrine, the innocent Palestinians as human shields. They put rockets in hospitals, they put schools there-

HAYES: Right-

SCHUMER: Wait. The head of- The late head of Hamas said these Palestinians who were killed are necessary sacrifices. His words.

HAYES: They’ve said it-

SCHUMER: The media doesn’t play it up, and the world doesn’t realize the difficult position Israel is in, trying to make sure that Hamas doesn’t come back, because we know what Hamas would do again, because Hamas has been so- 

I don’t know any other country that has used people as human shields the way Hamas has at least-

HAYES: Isn’t any insurgent- Vietcong- any insurgent army-

SCHUMER: Never the same way. Never the same way. 

HAYES: Really?

SCHUMER: I don’t believe so. I don’t believe so. Insurgent armies sometimes run into trouble that way. But it’s not about-

HAYES: But they’re always amongst the populace. That’s the way-

SCHUMER: But it’s not a policy-

HAYES: That’s the way an insurgent army operates.

SCHUMER: It’s not a policy the way it is with Hamas- rockets in hospitals, and using humans as human shields. 

But what I’m saying is, the media, they showed, every day, pictures of Palestinians being hurt, and we ache for that. They almost never mentioned that a lot of these were human shields, a lot of them.

HAYES: What does that even mean? If there’s- the size of Gaza is less than- it’s basically Manhattan and it’s got 2 million people in it. 

SCHUMER: But Chris, but Chris, all I’m saying is, a good amount of the blame for the tragedy here, which we hate- 

I think Israel didn’t have the right policies in certain areas, and I was not- took- I criticized them regularly, you know. 

But no one seems to mention- When I see these protesters, I say: Well what about Hamas? They ignore them. Ignore them. 

So there’s only one side to this, and that’s not fair.

For only the second time since the week of January 26, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt held a second briefing of a week. Along with our friend Katie Pavlich of Townhall having the chance to sit in the “new media seat,” she and other conservative reporters showed the liberal reporters it’s not that hard to ask real questions of your own “side” on issues ranging from crime to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to immigration to the judiciary.

Pavlich kicked things off with a question about whether flights to El Salvador of alleged illegal immigrant gang members would continue:

She also invoked Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-NY) derogatory comments about taxpayers on ABC’s The View:

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said yesterday that he was united with Democrats and working against Americans who “their attitude is, I made my money all by myself. How dare your government take my money from me,” or “I built my company with my bare hands. How dare your government tell me how to treat my customers.” What is the President’s response to this given his upcoming tax agenda and need to work on Capitol Hill?

Leavitt took it in stride, suggesting Democrats join the Trump agenda on tax reform since they “clearly need a boost from the American public” with “[t]heir approvals…at an all-time record low.”

NBC’s Garrett Haake came next and, shockingly, said he would follow up on Pavlich’s first question:

Oh, so conservative reporters do ask good questions?! Who knew!

In a response to Haake, Leavitt provided an astonishing statistic on Trump’s legal record: “67 percent of all of the injunctions in this century have come against which president? Donald J. Trump…and 92 percent of those have been from Democrat-appointed judges.”

Fox’s Jacqui Heinrich also pulled on this thread:

After a follow-up citing concerns from National Review writer and Fox News contributor Andrew McCarthy about due process for these alleged Tren de Aragua members, Heinrich wrapped with a question about the attacks on Tesla owners as, in addition to the fires, there’s “a website that’s trying to dox Tesla owners across the country and saying they’re only going to take down personal information when — people show that they’ve sold their cars.”

Leavitt called this “despicable” with “[t]he violence that has taken place” and argued Democrats should “come out and condemn this heinous violence that we have seen, and I believe the Attorney General has said she’s investigating these incidents as acts of domestic terrorism.”

Later, our friend Mary Margaret Olohan of the Daily Wire was the only reporter to mention an escalation within the federal bureaucracy of resistance to DOGE. This time, it’s at the Institute of Peace (whose headquarters was completed in 2011 at an astounding cost of $186 million)

Olohan switched gears to wondering if the administration will work to find the leaker of the Dobbs opinion from the Supreme Court. Immediately following Olohan, the Daily Signal’s Elizabeth Mitchell brought up a Justice Department complaint filed by an Illinois mother whose daughter allegedly had to share a locker room with a biological male (click “expand”):

OLOHAN: And just really quick on the Supreme Court, I know it’s been almost three years now since the leak of the draft Dobb’s opinion to Politico, actually — a leak which sparked protesting outside the homes of the justices, and even brought on one attempted assassination attempt. I know Justice Alito said that it made the justices targets for assassination. But yet, the Supreme Court has not tracked down any leaker. Does the White House have interest in finding out who that leaker was and can you comment on that at all?

LEAVITT: I know generally speaking, the president has an interest in finding leakers, and he believes it’s unacceptable and it’s the position of this administration you’ve seen the Secretary of Homeland Security has taken tough action at her agency. Leaking is unacceptable to this President and to the leaders across the board in this cabinet, especially when it puts people in harm’s way. [TO MICHELL] Sure.

MITCHELL: Thank you, Karoline. A mom whose daughter was forced to change in the locker room with the biological male at school filed a complaint with the DOJ. How will the Trump DOJ deal with violations of President Trump’s orders women and girls like this?

LEAVITT: I would defer you to the Department of Justice on that specific case, but the President has made it incredibly clear that it is the policy of this administration that there are only two genders, male and female, only two sexes rather, male and female, and that we are not going to tolerate such behavior by men pretending to be women. The President will continue to strongly stand for the rights of women and girls, not just in sports and on athletic fields, but also in private spaces like locker rooms and bathrooms.

The liberal journalists were actually called on too. ABC’s Rachel Scott twice tried to ask (including below) whether the White House would publish more details on the illegal immigrants flown to El Salvador, including here:

CNN’s Jeff Zeleny implied he believed President Trump was setting “a dangerous precedent” by criticizing the Obama-appointed District Judge that attempted to block the TdA flights, James Boasberg:

Real Clear Politics’s Philip Wegmann tried to get answers from Leavitt on a different Zeleny topic concerning discrepancies between Russia and U.S. readouts of Tuesday’s call between President Trump and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin:

Before closing out with Politico and The Wall Street Journal, Leavitt called on Newsmax’s Mike Carter (who brought up gas prices and Minnesota Democrat Governor Tim Walz’s smear of Tesla) and Daily Caller’s Reagan Reese (who circled back to the Tesla attacks) (click “expand”):

 

 

CARTER: The White House said yesterday that gas prices across the U.S. have fallen for the fourth straight week. 34 states now seeing gas under $3 a gallon. This limited ceasefire with Ukraine regarding oil refineries, energy, will that affect gas prices here in the U.S.?

LEAVITT: Well, it’s certainly the President’s hope that gas prices will continue to fall, and he’s working every single day to ensure that we do. As you just mentioned, there’s been very encouraging data. Inflation is cooling and gas prices are falling. The President has established a national energy dominance council and it’s ultimately the President’s goal and this administration is working hard on it every single day to increase our energy production right here in the United States of America to have it Trump energy boom like we saw in our first term, which will not only lead to lower fuel prices here at home, but also lessen the rate of inflation that was created by the previous administration

CARTER: And one more on Tesla, Karoline. Tim Waltz — Governor Waltz saying last night he frequently checks Tesla stock in doing so, to “give me a little boost during the day.” How should Americans view politicians who take pride in the downfall of an American car company?

LEAVITT: I think that’s quite sad, but I think Governor Waltz, unfortunately, is living a sad existence after his devastating defeat on November 5. [TO REESE] Reagan. Reagan, go ahead.

REAGAN REESE: Oh! Thank you, Karoline. Across the country, Tesla cars are being lit on fire. Dealerships are being shot up. Molotov cocktails are being used. There was a website posted yesterday that shared the addresses of private Tesla owners and reportedly have cash Patel’s information on it. AG Bondi has called this acts of domestic terrorism. Does the White House have any indication that this is some sort of coordinated movement that’s being funded by some outside group, and do you know if the investigation by the DOJ is being investigated. as incidents of organized terror?

LEAVITT: I believe the Attorney General has made her comments clear on that. She is investigating these events as acts of domestic terrorism, and we fully condemn them, and as I said earlier to Jacqui’s question, we think it’s despicable what is happening to not just this American company, but also their innocent employees and again, innocent Americans who drive these vehicles. We condemn it wholeheartedly.

Again, these aren’t softballs. Rather, they’re about topics affecting voters and of interest to their audiences.

To see the relevant transcript from the March 19 briefing (including even more questions), click here.

On CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip, Democrat apparat and failed Biden OMB nominee Neera Tanden tried to conflate the leftist terror attacks against Tesla vehicles and facilities with the January 6th Capitol Riot. Conservative commentator Scott Jennings had none of it.

Watch the exchange in its entirety, as Tanden realizes about halfway through that she walked into a buzzsaw (click “expand” to view transcript):

I’m sure that Neera Tanden thought her bothsidesing the Tesla terror attacks with J6 was a cute take until Scott Jennings tore the bark off of her. Rattled her so hard she dropped her coffee mug pic.twitter.com/saBZMpdwV3
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) March 19, 2025

CNN NEWSNIGHT WITH ABBY PHILLIP

3/18/25

10:42 PM

SCOTT JENNINGS: So- doubtful it’s Republicans attacking Tesla dealerships around the country. It’s pretty wild, actually. The other night, Donald Trump said, “these are domestic terrorists.” Everybody laughed about it and scoffed at it. That video looks like terrorism to me. I mean, it’s obviously an organized, coordinated effort, however people are- are communicating with each other to do this to people around the country who chose to buy a Tesla at some point in the past, many of whom I’m sure are Democrats who bought them in the first place. All because their entire political worldview is ruled by their emotions. And that’s the American left right now. It is one angry mob after another, willing to take things into their own hands up to and including keying, firebombing, and otherwise vandalizing cars and car dealerships and charging stations. It’s outrageous. It is terrorism. People ought to be put in jail and left there for a very long time and be taught a lesson.

NEERA TANDEN: So when they do it to a Tesla dealership, it’s really bad. But when they do it to the halls of Congress, we should pardon them. Is that your position?

JENNINGS: No. I’ve never…I don’t support…

TANDEN: Are we okay with the January 6th pardons?

JENNINGS: I know, I know, I know, I know you haven’t been around for a while, so let me educate you about my position about January 6th.

TANDEN: I’m so- I’m so sorry. You don’t need to….

JENNINGS: Let me educate. Let me educate you.

TANDEN: …you don’t need to patronize me.

JENNINGS: No, no- you don’t need to…you don’t, you don’t- and you don’t need to be condescending to me. 

TANDEN: I’m just saying…I’m not condescending.

JENNINGS: So let me educate you about my position. You want to attack me? Let me. Let me finish. Let me finish it. Just let me finish it.

TANDEN: I’m just asking you a question.

JOHN BERMAN: Guys. Guys. Let’s do this- January 6th. And then Neera.

TANDEN: I’m just asking you a question. I’m sorry you’re getting emotional. 

JENNINGS: Yeah. I’m sorry you’re a condescending person who hasn’t been paying attention to what I do, so…

ASHLEY ALLISON: Okay. Okay.

BERMAN: Stop, guys.

JENNINGS: So here’s- so here’s the issue. I didn’t support what happened on January the 6th and was one of the first Republicans to call it out. I don’t support the pardons. I have repeatedly, just like my friend Ashley here, said that no violence in our political system is acceptable. But this right here, what’s going on with a guy who helps our country, who runs successful companies, who doesn’t have to be doing this, and now one of his companies is under systematic terroristic threat and violence all over the country and people seem to be laughing about it or fine with it. It’s outrageous. I’ve sat at this table and had people say we should cut Elon Musk from the government totally. He rescued our astronauts today. Is that what we want? The treatment of this guy is outrageous. These people who are doing this need to be found, put in jail, and made an example of. That’s my point.

TANDEN: Anyone who commits violence against Tesla or Congress or anyone else should be put in jail 1,000%, but that should not stifle dissent or opposition from Elon Musk…

JENNINGS: Of course. Give it a little lip service. Give it a little both-sides. Go ahead.

(CROSSTALK)

TANDEN: Oh, no. Oh, yeah. We’re so both-sides here. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry to say that people are legitimately upset. They are legitimately upset at Elon Musk.

JENNINGS: And that- they- Legitimate???

TANDEN: And they’re doing it on their own. But there is no reason to have violence in the country. But I just wish all of us would support criticism of- would support punishing people who are violent wherever they are.

Credit to CNN’s John Berman, who subbed in for host Abby Phillip and let Jennings and Tanden have it out with minimal intervention. Like a good MMA referee, Berman checked in and cleaned the exchange up a little bit but otherwise let them go. Phillip, on the other hand, would’ve bailed Tanden out about 5 seconds into Jennings’ response to her smug January 6 whatabouting of the Tesla firebugs.

Tanden, who upon discovering she didn’t have the votes for OMB went on to serve as Biden’s staff secretary, had no real response for Jennings beyond the tie ins to January 6th. As it is, her arguments crumbled once Jennings rightly tore into her for incorrectly assuming his stance on the J6 pardons. At one point, Tanden gets so frazzled that she drops her coffee mug on the floor, which broke the tension at the table.

There is no justification for violence in response to viewpoint differences. Tanden failed to articulate that, and got rightly ripped for it.

 

The liberal ladies of ABC’s The View were eating each other alive during Wednesday’s episode. Viewers probably had to turn down the volume on their TVs as they yelled at each other and argued over whether or not Democrats were infighting about how they should have shut down the government. One yelled about how there was no infighting at all, while one acknowledge that they themselves were doing it. The shrieking went on for nearly five minutes before they had to go to a commercial.

Before the main bought kicked off a few minutes later, right-leaning co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin quipped about how former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “backed that bus over” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for his vote to keep the government open. Farah Griffin also said she was “kind of stunned by how much Dems are infighting over this.”

The View’s infighting started with co-host Joy Behar and Sunny Hostin clashing and yelling over whether or not Democrats were even infighting themselves (Click “expand”):

BEHAR: Why don’t the Democrats go out there and march and stop fighting with each other! I’m sick of it!

HOSTIN: I don’t know, Joy, that they’re fighting with each other.

BEHAR: They are! They are!

HOSTIN: They are not fighting a unified fight. That is the problem.

BEHAR: No! No! No! The fact that Nancy is now out there criticizing Schumer! Stop it already!

HOSTIN: You know why she’s criticizing him? Because he should have been fighting for that veteran! He should have been fighting for the people of America that are feeling the way that they are feeling!

Behar grew tired of listening to Hostin and exclaiming, “All right. Let’s not beat the dead body! The body is dead!”

But beat the dead body Hostin did as she proceeded to spew evidence-free claims about Republicans hating veterans: “They’re taking money away from vets! They’re taking — they’re going to take money from Social Security, take money, take money, take money! So, let them hold the water for them. Let them hold the bag!”

 

 

“Okay. So, it would have been worse if he didn’t concede … [Schumer] did not have the votes, he could not get the votes,” pretend independent Sara Haines jumped into the fray.

Despite Haines trying to explain how Schumer was possibly providing cover for the Democrats to oppose funding the government, Hostin didn’t want to listen to any form rationality. As a result, Hostin and Haines started yelling at each other, with Haines yelling about how Democrats were in the minority and couldn’t afford to do the wild things Hostin wanted them to (Click “expand”):

HOSTIN: He gave coverage to the GOP to do whatever the heck they want to do!

HAINES: They didn’t! Nobody is fooling themselves! It’s a minority! They don’t have the math! It’s just basic math! There are facts there! It’s not an opinion! They cannot avoid this! And if they bent the knee and pushed back just to show the public they were fighting, we would have ended up worse off. They would have gutted it even more.

HOSTIN: They’re going to do it anyway!

Haines seeming to have said her peace and bowed out. But from there, a three-way yelling match between Behar, Farah Griffin, and Hostin ensued (Click “expand”):

FARAH GRIFFIN: And by the way, in a shutdown, veterans would be harmed. They wouldn’t get their VA benefits!

HOSTIN: They’re already being harmed! No one is fighting for the American people and it’s feckless and it’s weak.

FARAH GRIFFIN: Shutting down the government is not fighting for the American people.

BEHAR: Give it a minute! Give it a minute!

FARAH GRIFFIN: It costing the economy billions of dollars.

BEHAR: This guy has done so much in one month! Give it a minute!

HOSTIN: Give him more time to shut stuff down?!

BEHAR: No, I think that the Democrats are going to pull themselves together now. I do believe it.

FARAH GRIFFIN: As we speak, the courts actually –

HOSTIN: I don’t agree.

Without evidence, Behar claims “every day” President Trump commits “an atrocity.” She gave insight into her fractious mental state by admitting that, “Every day I wake up, ‘what did he do today?!’”

Moderator Whoopi Goldberg finally stepped in to squash the squabbling and warning them all to “be careful, because this is what they want. They want this fighting. They want this infighting.”

She then called on them and their viewers to give the Democrats reinforcements:

What’s happening now, Democrats don’t have what he need to get what they want done, so, again, people have to get out and you have to march. You have to start making noise. This is now coming back to us. The only way people a going to hear how angry you are is if you get out there.

“It is now on us. We have to do it. You want to save your Social Security? You got to get up and you got to start screaming!” the ABC News moderator demanded.

The transcript is below. Click “expand” to read:

ABC’s The View
March 19, 2025
11:03:13 a.m. Eastern

(…)

ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN: Well, she backed that bus over him. I’m kind of stunned by how much Dems are infighting over this. I mean, it was striking to me when Hakeem Jeffries basically declined to say that Chuck Schumer should be the leader, and now Nancy Pelosi who worked hand in glove with Schumer when she was speaker now openly criticizing him.

(…)

11:06:25 a.m. Eastern

JOY BEHAR: And I can almost cry today for these people, these vets who are losing everything. Why don’t the Democrats go out there and march and stop fighting with each other! I’m sick of it!

HOSTIN: I don’t know, Joy, that they’re fighting with each other.

BEHAR: They are! They are!

HOSTIN: They are not fighting a unified fight. That is the problem.

BEHAR: No! No! No! The fact that Nancy is now out there criticizing Schumer! Stop it already!

HOSTIN: You know why she’s criticizing him? Because he should have been fighting for that veteran! He should have been fighting for the people of America that are feeling the way that they are feeling! The Americans that I’ve spoken to, people that approach me almost every single day, say they don’t feel like the party is fighting for them! This is not about –

BEHAR: Well, that’s what I’m saying. Go out and fight for them.

HOSTIN: Well, he had the opportunity to fight for them. Chuck Schumer caved to the GOP and got nothing! This was actually —

BEHAR: All right. Let’s not beat the dead body! The body is dead!

HOSTIN: But Joy, the choice was not between a no vote on the partisan GOP spending bill and a possible shutdown! It was a choice between a no vote and forcing Republicans to explain why they walked way from that possibility of a bipartisan agreement! And the core disagreement was around a willingness to fight even if that meant convincing the public the harm from a shutdown was the fault of Trump and the Republicans!

Because they are going to do exactly what they are doing! They’re taking money away from vets! They’re taking — they’re going to take money from Social Security, take money, take money, take money! So, let them hold the water for them. Let them hold the bag!

Democrats in the House were prepared for that fight! Chuck Schumer caved –

FARAH GRIFFIN: Well, they didn’t have the votes in the House.

HAINES: Okay. So, it would have been worse if he didn’t concede. It would have been worse and that’s what was surprising about Pelosi saying that. Because she knows from her experience as speaker of the House that the negotiator told Chuck Schumer he did not have the votes, he could not get the votes. He shut it down.

And one thing that changed my mind is: yesterday I called him on the carpet and said how are you leadership when you only get nine Democrats to follow you. But then someone shared something that made me change a little of my perspective. They had exactly the number they needed to not shut down. So, he gave cover to a ton of Democrats that probably, in commonsense terms, knew their voters would backlash if they shut the government down. And honestly —

HOSTIN: He gave coverage to the GOP to do whatever the heck they want to do!

HAINES: They didn’t! Nobody is fooling themselves! It’s a minority! They don’t have the math! It’s just basic math! There are facts there! It’s not an opinion! They cannot avoid this! And if they bent the knee and pushed back just to show the public they were fighting, we would have ended up worse off. They would have gutted it even more.

HOSTIN: They’re going to do it anyway!

HAINES: Legally so, though.

BEHAR: They can’t.

HAINES: So, right now we’re –

HOSTIN: Yes, they can!

HAINES: We have more than two dozen cases because of DOGE and Elon Musk. I believe in the courts system, I believe in the judges, I believe the one stopgap will be that moment. But when they cave and say, “well, they’re not listening to the rules anyway,” well you’re giving them a shutdown which legally allows them to do exactly what they’re doing right now.

FARAH GRIFFIN: And by the way, in a shutdown, veterans would be harmed. They wouldn’t get their VA benefits!

HOSTIN: They’re already being harmed! No one is fighting for the American people and it’s feckless and it’s weak.

FARAH GRIFFIN: Shutting down the government is not fighting for the American people.

BEHAR: Give it a minute! Give it a minute!

FARAH GRIFFIN: It costing the economy billions of dollars.

BEHAR: This guy has done so much in one month! Give it a minute!

HOSTIN: Give him more time to shut stuff down?!

BEHAR: No, I think that the Democrats are going to pull themselves together now. I do believe it.

FARAH GRIFFIN: As we speak, the courts actually –

HOSTIN: I don’t agree.

BEHAR: Every day there is an atrocity going on! Every day I wake up, “what did he do today?!”

FARAH GRIFFIN: The courts just ruled that more than 20,000 federal workers have to be reinstated because what DOGE did was not lawful.

GOLDBERG: So, you know, listen, be careful, because this is what they want.

BEHAR: Fighting. Infighting.

GOLDBERG: They want this fighting. They want this infighting.

What’s happening now, Democrats don’t have what he need to get what they want done, so, again, people have to get out and you have to march. You have to start making noise.

BEHAR: That’s right.

GOLDBERG: This is now coming back to us. The only way people a going to hear how angry you are is if you get out there.

We’ve done it when people were being sent over to Vietnam disproportionately, we got out there and we made noise and we made a difference. We made a difference. We made a difference when it came to women’ rights. We made a difference when it came to black people’s rights. If we don’t get up and get out there and start making the noise we have to make, it’s not going to change!

BEHAR: Stand up for the veterans.

GOLDBERG: So, I appreciate –

[Applause]

You know, you know, I love Chuck Schumer, I love all these people who dedicate themselves, but this is — It is now on us. We have to do it. You want to save your Social Security? You got to get up and you got to start screaming!

BEHAR: Before those checks stop coming!

GOLDBERG: Because the only way – Because the only way they’re going to understand that you’re not going to put up with it is if you don’t put up with it! That’s the way it’s going to work!

Chuck Schumer is running scared from his own party.

He can’t even hit the road to promote his new book, “Antisemitism in America: A Warning,” for fear of protests.

The Senate minority leader had to postpone his publicity tour on account of what a spokeswoman calls “security concerns.”

Progressive Democrats, furious Schumer passed a Republican spending bill to avoid a government shutdown, are getting up close to show him how angry they are.

They’re demonstrating outside his home in Brooklyn, and wherever he might have gone to hawk his book, protesters were ready to follow.

So, to dodge embarrassment or worse, Schumer beat a retreat.

Such is life at the top of the Democratic Party these days.

Because Schumer couldn’t outmaneuver President Donald Trump in the budget showdown, his own team considers him not just a loser but a traitor.

House Democrats have even begun encouraging Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to launch a primary challenge against him.

The 74-year-old senator isn’t up for reelection until 2028, which is too long for Democrats to wait, according to The Nation — the progressive magazine’s Jeet Heer is calling for Schumer to resign immediately, both from leadership and the Senate.
                                    
No wonder CNN’s latest poll shows Democrats with a record-low favorability rating of 29%: The party is at war with itself, and Democratic voters themselves increasingly dislike what they see from their elected officials and leaders like Schumer.

Yet the CNN survey shows only 16% of Democrats think their party is too extreme.

Schumer knows better — that’s why he’s lying low instead of out selling his book.

The issue he wrote his book about shows just how adrift the Democrats are.

Schumer is publishing a warning about antisemitism at the same time he’s embroiled in the party’s infighting over Israel, Palestine, and campus protests that have targeted Jews.

He’s taken a weaker stand against campus antisemitism than the Trump administration has, and he opposes deporting Mahmoud Khalil, a Syrian immigrant studying at Columbia University, for his anti-Israel activism.

Yet Schumer outraged progressive opinion again on Sunday, when answers he gave in an interview with The New York Times led critics on the left to accuse him of essentially agreeing with Trump’s decision to withhold $400 million in federal funding from Columbia because of its lackluster record in combating antisemitism.

Late last year, however, a report by the House Education and Workforce Committee — under Republican control, it should be noted — claimed Schumer had told Columbia’s then-president, Minouche Shafik, not to worry about a reckoning over antisemitism if Democrats took control of the Senate.

The university’s “political problems are really only among Republicans,” Schumer was alleged to have said — though a Schumer spokesman denied those were his words and called the report “hearsay.”

Schumer is a shifty politician with an acute problem in this moment: The more he tries to appear moderate, the more progressives in his party identify him not with centrism but with Trump.

Stopping a government shutdown?

That’s Trumpism.

Telling The New York Times when a campus protest “shades over to violence and antisemitism, the colleges had to do something, and a lot of them didn’t do enough”?

That’s Trumpism.

In the eyes of his party’s activists, Schumer isn’t a moderate — he’s a coward, handing Trump victory after victory, when what Democrats need most is the will to resist the president.

Yet to anyone who’s not a Democrat, Schumer’s pretense of moderation is belied by the simple fact he’s a leader of a party that’s nowhere near the center.

And Schumer isn’t alone in his agony.

Other prominent Democrats, such as California Gov. Gavin Newsom, are finding it just as hard to distance themselves from the left without winding up too close to Trump for the comfort of the Democratic base.

Newsom’s sin has been to have MAGA masterminds like Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk and former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon on his podcast.

The California governor, still dreaming of higher office, has also “evolved” on the question of allowing transgender participation in women’s sports — that is, he’s come around to a view closer to Trump’s, because that’s where he senses the commonsense center is today.

The Democratic base wants the party to be defined by vehement opposition to the president — while clever and unprincipled Democratic leaders know the smart play is to become more like him.

Last year, Trump defeated the Democrats; this year, he gets to watch them defeat themselves, as protesters who might once have picketed him now turn their ire on Sen. Schumer.

Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review. To read more by Daniel McCarthy, visit www.creators.com.

Between the decision not to endorse Kamala Harris and CEO Jeff Bezos’s move to restrict the opinion page to only columns that support free markets and personal liberties, there has been a heavy amount of weeping and gnashing of teeth among liberals over the fate of the Washington Post and how Bezos has sold out to Donald Trump. Such claims are hysteria, as evidenced by a Wednesday op-ed entitled What is a trans woman, really? That the article was written by PEN America President Jennifer Finney Boylan, a transgender individual, tells the reader all they need to know about just how Trumpy the Post is, or, more accurately, isn’t.

After spending several paragraphs alluding to various fictional characters who had alter egos or disguises or real people who had alternative names, Boylan appropriated womanhood:

These questions matter to me, as a transgender woman, because the Trump administration’s attacks on us are, in some ways, founded on the supposition that women like me are ‘really’ men. Whenever I hear, for instance, the simplistic edict that there should be ‘no men in women’s sports,’ my first instinct is to agree. Because transgender women are not ‘really’ men. We are women. We may have different histories than other women, but then, every woman has her own history.

Boylan continued by lamenting:

Donald Trump’s election has released a tide of vitriol against transgender people (and women in particular; most of our nemeses seem oblivious to the existence of trans men). The silence of our alleged allies this last month has been stunning to me, and some of our allies have even volunteered to throw us under the bus in hopes of rebranding themselves as mainstream. Does Gavin Newsom — who came out against trans women in sports last week — really think that the MAGA base will embrace him now? Or is it possible that conservatives will see him as ‘really’ a liberal? Hmm, let’s think.

Logic has never been a strong suit for the transgender movement and Boylan was no exception, “It is worth observing that many of the people scolding me about God not making mistakes are wearing glasses. Or hearing aids. Or have pacemakers. So far as I know, no one accuses someone wearing glasses or hearing aids of fraudulence, or sees the existence of someone saved by a heart-monitoring implant as an affront to divine intentions.”

Because God never decried medical advancement. While some people may come to view their conditions as God’s plan for their individual life, nobody would ever argue that God’s plan for humanity is bad vision. If it were, He wouldn’t have given us eyes. Boylan isn’t arguing for the gender equivalent of glasses, but rather eye gouging.

Boylan concludes by writing:

The greatest obstacle for us is a lack of imagination.

By which I mean, only a person without imagination could think that Superman is ‘really’ Clark Kent. Only a person without imagination could think that a butterfly is “really” a caterpillar. Or that a trans woman is ‘really’ a man.

Without imagination, it is easy to believe in things that are simple, and superficial, and wrong.

With it, we can begin to understand the lives of those who are different from ourselves — and respond to their struggles with compassion, and kindness and grace.

The human mind constantly battles between logic and imagination. Logic without imagination is a lunatic asylum where conspiracy theorists are convinced of their correctness because people contradicting them is proof that the conspiracy is real, but what Boylan is arguing—imagination without logic—is believing that there is no such thing as truth or that Superman is a real being.