WND

Topline: Every November, OpenTheBooks’ auditors head to PaymentAccuracy.gov to review annual data about improper payments: money the government sends to the wrong person or for the wrong amount.

Apparently, not everyone in Washington D.C. is doing the same. Multiple Congressional staffers are “completely or somewhat unfamiliar with the existence of the website,” according to a Jan. 23 report from the Government Accountability Office.

Congress controls the purse strings, but how can legislators do so effectively without tracking where the money goes?

Key facts: The federal government has lost $3.4 trillion to improper payments since 2004, adjusted for inflation. OpenTheBooks was able to calculate the number because the Payment Integrity Information Act requires most federal agencies to post their mistaken spending online.

Not every Congressional employee knows where to find the data, the GAO reported. Some staffers said they use agency financial reports and other sources to track improper payments, but the GAO pointed out those sources usually only contain a “brief statement indicating that more detailed information could be found on the website.”

Other Congressional staffers said they tried to use PaymentAccuracy.gov for their oversight work, but pop-up windows and glitches obscured some numbers.

Background: Inspectors general review almost every federal agency’s submissions to PaymentAccuracy.gov to make sure they are accurate and complete. Ten agencies were recently found to be noncompliant in 2022, the GAO reported. They must now develop written plans for tracking their improper payments and appoint a new official who is responsible for accuracy.

Nine of those agencies were also noncompliant in 2021. They must now include their written plans in the president’s next budget request to Congress, expected this February.

Search all federal, state and local government salaries and vendor spending with the AI search bot, Benjamin, at OpenTheBooks.com. 

Critical quote: “The absence of explicit information in agency financial reports specifying that plans to come into compliance are available on PaymentAccuracy.gov, lack of congressional awareness about the information included there … could compromise Congress’s ability to obtain key payment integrity information needed to conduct effective oversight of improper payments,” GAO auditors concluded.

Summary: The executive branch’s transparency with improper payments is impressive, but it’s all for naught unless Congress uses it to make actionable changes.

The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com

Days after Louisiana officials indicted a New York abortionist for illegally mailing abortion pills to a minor in the state, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has signed a new law that allows abortion pill providers to anonymously prescribe the pills to out-of-state users, by keeping their name off pill bottles.

According to Hochul’s office, the law allows abortion pill prescribers to request that the name of the abortionist’s practice — rather than the prescribing doctor’s name — be printed on the prescription label for the chemical abortion drugs mifepristone, misoprostol, and their generic alternatives. Additionally, “the new measure … requires notice to the patient, and ensures that pharmacies assist with this protective measure.”

The new law strengthens the state’s existing abortionist shield law, which protects abortionists who commit abortion-related crimes in other states. It carries the potential to make it more difficult for officials in those other states to pinpoint the abortionist responsible for breaking the law or injuring a patient by way of the abortion pill.

“Reproductive freedom will always be protected in the State of New York and I’ll never back down from this fight,” Hochul said in a press release. “I’m taking action to strengthen protections for health care professionals and their patients, ensuring New York is a safe haven for anyone providing or receiving reproductive care.”

Flanked by a number of lawmakers at a signing ceremony, Hochul affirmed that the law was signed specifically in response to Louisiana’s indictment of Dr. Margaret Carpenter, who has been charged with a felony crime of criminal abortion by means of abortion-inducing drugs for mailing the drugs into a state where induced abortion is illegal.

“If I don’t stand up and protect this doctor, who the hell will?” Hochul said.

Carpenter reportedly mailed the abortion pill drugs to a woman in Louisiana, who then coerced her teenage daughter into taking them against the teen’s will. The teen was injured so badly by the abortion drugs that she had to be transported to the hospital by ambulance, for what prosecutors say was life-saving care. Instead of outrage over her injuries or concern for the obvious flaws in a system that allows such dangerous injuries to occur, New York officials have instead rushed to protect the abortionist responsible.

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by Live Action News.]

Three pro-life activists who received pardons from President Trump on January 23 recently spoke with Fox News ‘Outnumbered’ host Kayleigh McEnany about their experiences.

Will Goodman, Paulette Harlow, and Jean Marshall (who is Harlow’s sister) joined McEnany, along with Harlow’s husband John. Goodman, Harlow, and Marshall were all present at the late-term abortion facility Washington Surgi-Clinic in Washington D.C., on October 22, 2020. Video footage shows them and six other pro-life activists singing “Ave Maria” inside the abortion facility while sitting in chairs.

They are said to have used chains, bike locks, furniture, and their bodies to prevent abortions from being committed — all common and historic non-violent acts of protest. The pro-lifers, however, were accused of acting violently, were arrested, and were charged with violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act and conspiracy against rights. “These defendants conspired to use force to prevent fellow citizens from exercising rights protected by law,” claimed U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves for the District of Columbia in a press release. “People cannot resort to using force and intimidation to prevent others from engaging in lawful activity simply because they disagree with the law.”

Weaponization of the law

“The thing is, there is absolutely no violence,” Harlow told McEnany. “I have been in the pro-life movement for a long time. I have never ever, ever seen any violence on the part of pro-life people.”

Complaints from both the pro-lifers and pro-life legislators have alleged that laws were weaponized against pro-lifers specifically in retaliation for the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. For instance, the conspiracy against rights charges stemmed from the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, known as an “Act to enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and for other Purposes,” which was meant to curb racist violence. The FACE Act was made law in 1994 under the pro-abortion Clinton administration.

Goodman told McEnany that both laws were weaponized against pro-lifers.

“It was weaponization, like President Trump says, and here they’re using this conspiracy law that they used on Ku Klux Klan – violent – Ku Klux Klan members and racists to use against us when we’re trying to save lives, it’s like totally flipping reality,” he said.

Harlow noted that Attorney General Merrick Garland appeared to be focused on prosecuting peaceful pro-lifers while pro-abortion advocates firebombed and spray-painted pro-life pregnancy centers. He testified that it was tougher to catch the pro-abortion advocates because they were acting “at night in the dark.”

“I was appalled watching Garland,” said Harlow. “He was isolating us and targeting us because of our pro-life stance and especially, he was targeting Catholics and he just went to Congress and lied.”

Targeted for their beliefs

The pro-lifers believe they were targeted for both their pro-life stance and their personal religious beliefs. In fact, Harlow’s attorneys requested permission for her to attend Mass while she was under house arrest, but the federal court would not allow it.

“What I was surprised at is that this was really targeting my religion, my faith, because if they had just given me an ankle monitor, I could go within three miles of my house,” she said. “They just didn’t want me to go to church.”

She added, “There were several things that were said to us. One was that this trial was not about abortion — which was sort of ridiculous, because that’s the reason that we were there — to stop abortions and to love the mothers and the children, but primarily to see if we could intervene and save the life of the babies — and then saving the life of the baby often saves the life of the mother as well.”

Working for His good

Prison life had its share of difficulties for the pro-lifers, but faith is what got them through. As Marshall explained, “[The shackles] felt like razors on my ankles. And nobody told me to wear socks or pants so that they wouldn’t cut into my skin. It felt like my skin was being cut.”

Goodman explained that he was placed in a unit that “had been condemned.”

“We went over two weeks without toilet paper,” he said. “And some of the guys mentioned that some of the men who were there with gender dysphoria, wearing dresses, could get mascara, lipstick, and perfume — but we couldn’t even get toilet paper or basic needs. So there was a lot of neglect.”

Even with the hardships, the imprisoned pro-lifers found positive moments.

In addition, Goodman experienced a terrifying accident — and many, including him, saw his survival as miraculous.

“I was on a high steel top bunk of a bunk bed that’s about five, five and a half feet up and I was saying my prayers in bed and I fell asleep and I managed to roll over in my sleep and go right over the edge of the bed,” he explained. “And I was bleeding quite a bit. I was unconscious, but one of the guards even told me later, when they turned the lights on, it looked like a homicide scene. There was so much blood. But when I came back after 11 hours in the emergency room and some of the Hispanic guys in my unit and others were seeing me, they were making the Sign of the Cross and they were shocked because everyone had thought I had died … God saved me. I believe so.”

Their faith, hope, and optimism got them through until, on January 23, Trump pardoned Goodman, Marshall, and Harlow along with 20 other pro-life activists. Some of those activists were in prison, some had been released, and others were still awaiting their sentences. But all were now free to return to their lives.

Goodman said that when news broke that he was being pardoned, his fellow inmates were excited for him. When he heard that Trump was signing the pardon, he explained, “Well, as fast as I could with my concussion, I made it up the three flights of stairs into the TV room, and there, all the guys were watching Fox News and they said, ‘You just got pardoned!’ And they’re shaking my hand. Sixty guys in the unit all start cheering and applauding, and I was like, this is just a joyful experience and many of the guys in there were full of joy too.”

As for Marshall, despite the hardships she endured as the result of living out her pro-life convictions, she said she is “so thankful to God that He could use me.”

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by Live Action News.]

PALM BEACH, Florida – President Donald Trump says his desire to make Canada America’s 51st state is not all talk, but actually a “real thing.”

Trump made the disclosure to Bret Baier of Fox News during a pre-recorded interview that aired Sunday afternoon during the pre-game show of Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans.

Baier asked Trump directly: “The prime minister said this weekend to a group of Canadian businessmen – it was a private meeting – he said that your wish for Canada to be the 51st state is a real thing. Is it a real thing?”

“Yeah, it is,” Trump responded.

“I think Canada would be much better off being a 51st state because we lose $200 billion a year with Canada and I’m not gonna let that happen. It’s too much.

“Why are we paying $200 billion a year? Essentially a subsidy to Canada. Now. If they’re a 51st state, I don’t mind doing it.”

WATCH: Trump says his wish for Canada to be America’s 51st state is a ‘real thing’

‘We lose $200 billion a year with Canada and I’m not gonna let that happen’ pic.twitter.com/dr0984XXWk

— WorldNetDaily (@worldnetdaily) February 9, 2025

Trump also said his recent tariff announcements on Canada and Mexico for border security and drug interdiction were not enough.

“Something has to happen. It’s not sustainable,” he indicated.

On a lighter note, Baier said to Trump, “You are the most recognized person in the world, likely the most imitated person in the world. Every comedian has a Donald Trump imitation. Every one.

“But now you have UFC fighters winning fights, NFL players doing the Trump dance. Did you ever think that was gonna be a thing?”

“No, I didn’t,” Trump replied.

“I mean, we do these rallies. They’ve always been great but they got really great.

“It’s just, I don’t know what it is. I try and walk off sometimes without dancing and I can’t. I have to dance because it’s just got something special about it.”

Trump admits: ‘I have to dance’

‘I don’t know what it is. I try and walk off sometimes without dancing and I can’t. I have to dance because it’s just got something special about it’ pic.twitter.com/ik1w795KIG

— WorldNetDaily (@worldnetdaily) February 9, 2025

The remainder of Baier’s interview with Trump is set to air Monday on Fox News.

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Amid a raging, mainly partisan battle over President Trump’s plans to slash foreign aid, Vice President J.D. Vance is set to address a summit of religious leaders and advocates looking to him for reassurance that the administration won’t abandon the lessons learned since the Holocaust.

Vance is set to speak Tuesday morning to the International Religious Freedom Summit, a bipartisan gathering of U.S. religious and coalition leaders, nonprofits, and human-rights activists supporting the right of all individuals worldwide to worship in the faith of their choice or not to worship at all.

The vice president will take the stage at the gathering in Washington, D.C., as the jittery group of religious and nonprofit leaders brace for a massive restructuring and deep staffing and budget cuts for U.S.-funded humanitarian assistance. The remarks have taken on heightened significance after Trump froze foreign assistance for 90 days, a move he argued was necessary to eliminate waste, abuse, and what he, Elon Musk, and many Republicans have derided as “woke” and “insane” programs at the U.S. Agency for International Development, which is devoted to administrating foreign aid.

Some of the most flagrant examples of USAID waste, Trump, Musk, and others have cited include: $1.5 million to advance DEI in Serbian workplaces, $70,000 for the production of a DEI musical in Ireland, $47,000 for a trans opera in Colombia, and $32,000 for a trans comic book in Peru. The agency also sent millions to EcoHealth Alliance, which was involved in research at the Chinese state-controlled Wuhan lab that the CIA now says is likely responsible for the release of COVID-19.

USAID’s budget nearly doubled from the beginning of Trump’s first term in 2017 to the end of President Joe Biden’s term, rising from $20.5 billion in 2017 to $42.4 billion in 2023. The increase was largely to account for aid to Ukraine after Russia’s invasion, though for decades, global healthcare was its largest expenditure. The healthcare budget dramatically increased in 2004 with a new program aimed at curbing AIDS, and again after 2020, with emergency assistance to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.

Many of those stocks of medicine are deteriorating without refrigeration in another massive waste of taxpayer funds.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday announced that he will serve as acting USAID administrator, a move he said would precede the State Department’s takeover of the humanitarian agency and efforts to align its operations with Trump’s “America First” agenda and the national interest. Agency officials, he argued, were uncooperative and insubordinate, refusing to comply with the policy agenda of the new Trump administration.

In a letter to lawmakers Monday, Rubio said he had delegated authority to Pete Marocco, a Trump appointee who is heading the State Department’s Office of Foreign Assistance. Marocco served as a USAID political appointee in the president’s first term but was pushed out by other agency officials over his abrasive approach, according to several sources.

Congressional Democrats, who have spent the last several days protesting outside USAID’s offices in D.C., accuse Trump and Musk, who heads the Department of Government Efficiency, of unlawfully shuttering the agency. This week Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, and several other colleagues staged protests outside USAID’s offices that were reportedly taken over by DOGE officials.

Republicans and conservative nonprofits and advocates for some humanitarian assistance, including some evangelical Christian leaders and nonprofits usually aligned with GOP leaders, are deeply divided. While there is near-unanimous agreement on cutting wasteful spending, bitter disagreements remain on whether USAID should be folded into the State Department, allowed to remain its own agency with a narrowed mission and smaller budget, or eliminated entirely.

Many of the faithful who gathered at the International Religious Freedom Summit where Vance is set to speak on Tuesday expressed hope that Trump and the new Congress would provide more support for the religious freedom cause than the Biden administration had done. Others viewed the clash over the future of USAID as an inflection point.

Advocates of faith-based liberty argue that eliminating many U.S. humanitarian programs that help foster religious pluralism will only lead to more extremism, persecution, and instability in the world.

Sam Brownback, former governor of Kansas who served as the ambassador-at-large for International Religious Freedom during the first Trump term, in opening statements argued that religious freedom is the “God-designed human right of the soul that must be protected, guaranteed by all governments and honored for there to be authentic human flourishing of the whole person.”

“Imagine a world, then, where there is religious freedom for everyone, everywhere – no more genocides, because most genocides happen to religious minorities,” said Brownback, who serves as the gathering’s co-chair. “Fewer clashes of civilizations because most of these clashes are rooted in religious differences being exploited, not protected.”

In freezing foreign aid, Rubio said any future expenditures would need to meet Trump’s “America First” priorities of helping to increase America’s security and prosperity.

Panelist Scott Flipse, director of policy and media relations of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, pointed to U.S. foreign assistance grants aimed at countering extremism and religious violence.

“I think the president not only wants to end conflicts, I think he also wants to be a peacemaker,” he said. “…I don’t want to be Pollyanna-ish, but there is a role here for religious groups, religious organizations and people to build peace.”

When the panelists were asked to offer advice to Rubio, Flipse argued that “personnel is policy” and encouraged the secretary of state to “get people into positions in the bureaus as quickly as possible to carry out whatever reevaluations are going on but also to carry out some of the priorities that we all know he has, and he spoke about at his confirmation.”

Annie Boyajian, co-president of the human-rights group Freedom House, stressed that it was a pivotal time, that religious freedom advocates face a “tremendous challenge, but also tremendous opportunity.” A recent study, she said, shows that the number of countries where faith-based liberty doesn’t exist or is severely restricted has grown from 27 to 40.

Countries that provide such freedoms are the most stable and are usually the best partners for trade and economic prosperity, she said.

“And so, it’s an incredible opportunity to reassess policies that can be used to move religious freedom forward,” Boyajian said. “And I think in this exact moment one of the most immediate things that we can do is make sure that the funding freeze that is in place is lifted for that support of religious freedom.”

While new presidents have the right to reassess how taxpayer funds are spent, Trump may have accidentally caught religious freedom programs in the DOGE dragnet. Many programs benefiting religious freedom and people of all faiths have been temporarily frozen under the Trump administration, she said, even though Trump, during his first administration with Brownback, did a “tremendous job of protecting, defending and raising these rights.”

“We certainly think there’s a great opportunity to continue to do that,” she added.

Freedom House has long worked with Rubio, whom Boyajian described as a “man of faith” and a champion of the cause.

“I would just urge him, as he undertakes his review, not to throw the baby out with the bath water,” she said. “There is so much excellent work on religious freedom being done – very, very critically important that it makes it through an expeditious review because lives really are on the line.”

Longtime champions of the cause said they initially welcomed Trump’s second term as an opportunity to return to a commitment to religious freedom that the Biden administration had treated as only one of many human rights concerns instead of a top priority. The freeze on foreign assistance, however, is creating new uncertainly, they warned.

Katrina Lantos Swett, who chairs the bipartisan International Religious Freedom Summit, is the daughter of the late Rep. Tom Lantos, a California Democrat, the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, and an ardent human rights champion.

“The international religious freedom community is looking with great hope and anticipation to this new administration because we feel like there’s some really strong allies,” she told RCP. “They’re viscerally strong. People really feel it and believe it. But it’s that old line, ‘Put your money where your mouth is.’”

While she agrees with the efforts to ferret out the “excessive” waste, fraud, and abuse, she too worries that the new administration can jettison the good with the bad.

Lantos Swett said she has heard from numerous “incredibly earnest and brave human-rights advocates” in the vulnerable Uyghur Muslim communities in China and Yazidis in Iraq decimated by ISIS that their very modest U.S. funding has been cut off.

“The international religious freedom movement is an issue that is intimately tied to a holistic approach to our national security,” she noted. “We know that societies that breed extremists and social division tend to become problems for us. They tend to export terror and radicalism and there are also a lot of fleeing people who then become refugees and want to come to our country.”

Just hours before Vance was set to speak, however, the Trump administration sent new shockwaves through human rights communities.

RealClearPolitics last week first reported efforts to place more than 50 USAID officials on leave. Since then, Rubio has ordered or signed off on several more efforts to force the agency to cease and desist all of its overseas programs and activity.

The Trump administration Tuesday night announced that nearly all USAID staff will be placed on leave Friday. Earlier in the day, the agency ordered all overseas USAID programs to be shut down and recalled all staff at missions around the world, with certain “case-by-case exceptions” for return-travel extensions for “personal or family hardship, mobility, or safety concerns.”

Forcing decades-long foreign service officers – many of whom bring their families overseas with them – out of their jobs on a few days’ notice, while halting the distribution of food, medicine, and vaccines, risks the trust and relationships with foreign partners. It also jeopardizes programs to advance religious liberty forged during the first Trump term, which were only successful because several officials fought the career officials over several years to make them happen, advocates warn.

Those objecting to DOGE’s harsh tactics argue that the values so many believers hold dear are being brushed aside for expedient budget cutting.

While many of Trump’s strongest “America First” supporters want to slash the foreign assistance budget, Boyajian argues that some may support exceptions for persecuted Christians and other religious minorities overseas if given the chance to understand the impact.

“For me, personally, as a Christian, as believers, it’s so important that we’re advocating for religious freedom. But also, every single human being is precious and made in the image of God,” she added. “In my personal view, it is incumbent on us to also help protect others who are targeted and bring them along.”

Democratic New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker said Sunday on CNN that the Democratic Party’s plan to beat President Donald Trump “is working.”

Democrats have struggled to settle on a message that will win over voters in the upcoming midterms, after Trump won both the Electoral College and the popular vote in November. On “State of the Union,” CNN host Dana Bash asked Booker point-blank why the party “didn’t have a better plan,” after highlighting that the Trump administration’s current strategy to “do as much at once” to “overwhelm the system” had been previously “laid out in Project 2025.”

“Well, again, I think the plan right now is working in four parts. One is a legal strategy to stop him from violating the separation of powers, from violating our civil service laws, civil rights laws and we’re winning. We see 41 cases being taken, 10 of them last week, 12 of them, excuse me, were successful in stopping some of his illegal actions,” Booker said. “The next is a legislative and oversight effort to really try to expose it, not to treat this as Democrat versus Republican, right or left, but really right or wrong and continue to try to use our positions procedurally as well as legislatively to stop what he’s doing.”

“Then finally, perhaps most importantly, because all of us have to have a role, from the media to everyday citizens, which is shining a light on the dark corners of what they’re doing and how it is actually endangering Americans’ lives, is threatening to raise the cost of people’s everyday goods and inflation and more,” Booker added.

In their most recent attempt to push back against Republicans, Democrats have been seen protesting with supporters against the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) Elon Musk and his involvement in the Trump administration.

WATCH:

The heavy criticism of Musk came after he and the president upended the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) after Musk and the DOGE team discovered billions of taxpayer dollars wasted, with some reports revealing that money allocated to international programs had a high risk of ending up in the Taliban’s hands and also aiding an organization linked to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

However, despite Booker’s response, Bash pushed back against the lawmaker and called out how Mother Jones reporter David Corn described their strategy of using social media against Republicans “as bringing a teaspoon to a gunfight.”

“Again, I’ve been blown away by what I’m seeing, by everyday citizens joining together and beginning to shine a much better light on what’s happening,” Booker continued. “Take USAID and the efforts last week to show that what the Trump administration has done is make Americans less safe from diseases like Ebola or treatment-resistant tuberculosis, taking away scientists on the front line of fighting these infectious diseases because we know infectious diseases anywhere are a threat to human safety everywhere.”

“So a lot of the things that Trump is doing, that some of the biggest officials in our state, like, remember, Secretary Mattis, his defense secretary, saying very bluntly, ‘If you cut these kind of programs in the State Department, buy me more bullets, because it’s going to mean that we’re going to use military more.’ By shining a light on these things, by elevating, as we’ve seen online this past week, literally hundreds of millions of shares and likes, exposing what’s going on, this is giving us more strength in actually stopping him from doing what he’s doing,” Booker said.

While Democrats have attempted to determine why they lost in November, some leaders, like Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and newly-elected Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin, have stated that the party’s policies weren’t to blame. Instead, they pointed to voters’ understanding and a messaging issue.

Post election polls show that former Vice President Kamala Harris had not only earned 7 million fewer votes than Biden in the 2020 race, but Trump gained 2.5 million more votes than in 2020 but also eroded Democrats’ hold on certain segments of the electorate.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

(CBS NEWS) — With most describing him as “tough,” “energetic,” “focused” and “effective” – and as doing what he’d promised during his campaign – President Trump has started his term with net positive marks from Americans overall.

Many say he’s doing more than they expected – and of those who say this, most like what they see. Very few think he’s doing less.

His partisans and his voters, in particular, say he’s got the right amount of focus on matters like ending diversity, equity and inclusion programs and deporting those who are in the country illegally.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Reuters on Friday that he hopes to make a deal with President Donald Trump to bring an end to the war with Russia.

During his campaign for office, Trump vowed to bring peace to the world, as multiple foreign wars had been pushed during the Biden-Harris administration. In an interview with Reuters, Zelenskyy said he was open to making a deal with the U.S. regarding Trump’s request for Ukraine to supply the U.S. with rare earths and other minerals in exchange for continued financial aid.

“These deposits are priceless, it is huge amounts of money, huge. That’s why we need to protect it,” Zelenskyy said. “If we are talking about a deal, then let’s do a deal, we are only for it.”

The Russia-Ukraine war has lasted more than two years, with the Biden-Harris administration providing $175 billion in economic and military aid to Ukraine, but the conflict shows no signs of ending. Last year, Ukraine presented a “victory plan,” suggesting the idea of allowing allies to invest in its essential minerals, according to Reuters.

With Russian occupation controlling less than 20% of Ukraine’s mineral resources, including roughly half of its rare earth deposits, Zelenskyy told Reuters that Moscow could potentially strike deals with North Korea and Iran.

“We need to stop Putin and protect what we have — a very rich Dnipro region, central Ukraine,” Zelenskyy told the outlet.

Just days after his election, Trump warned Russian President Vladimir Putin not to escalate the war against Ukraine during a phone call, reportedly reminding him of the U.S.’s large presence in Europe. The call with Putin came after a conversation between Trump, Department of Government Efficiency’s Elon Musk and Zelensky, in which the Ukrainian president reportedly said he left the meeting feeling content.

“We will protect those trillions. We will prevent Russia from mining the minerals which will later be used to produce technologies for the three countries of the axis of evil. The Americans helped the most, and therefore the Americans should earn the most. And in rebuilding Ukraine, they should have this priority. And they will.”

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

President Trump is on a roll.

On Saturday, President Trump stripped the security clearances of at least 8 corrupt ‘antagonists’ who worked for Biden or targeted him for ruin over the last several years:

• Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken
• Former NatSec Advisor Jake Sullivan
• New York Attorney General Letitia James
• Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg
• Biden’s Deputy AG Lisa Monaco
• Corrupt prosecutor Andrew Weissmann
• Deep State lawyer Mark Zaid
• Norm Eisen – the man behind all the lawfare against Trump

President Trump told New York Post reporter Miranda Devine that Alvin Bragg and Letitia James are barred from entering federal buildings.

This means they would not be able to enter the U.S. Attorney’s Office, federal courthouses, the New York FBI Field Office, federal correctional facilities and prisons.

“This is to take away every right they have [revoking security clearances] including they can’t go into [federal] buildings,” Trump told Miranda Devine.

“New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg join the new group of eight Democrat foes Trump plans to punish by revoking any access to classified information and barring their entry to federal facilities,” The New York Post reported.

“The president said they all will be given “exactly the same” punishment as Biden and the Dirty 51 as part of his administration’s vow to hold government officials accountable for actions he regards as election interference or the mishandling of classified information,” the New York Post reported.

Both Letitia James and Alvin Bragg targeted Trump with Soviet-style, politically charged cases.

By barring Bragg and James from entering federal buildings, it could really torpedo their ability to work with the US Attorney’s offices in the SDNY and EDNY.

This article originally appeared on The Gateway Pundit.com.

Mike Huckabee, the incoming U.S. ambassador to Israel, is optimistic about the future of the Mideast, believing “something of biblical proportion” will happen in the region under the leadership of President Donald Trump.

“I’m personally optimistic that we’re going to see something bold,” Huckabee said on “Sunday Morning Futures” with Maria Bartiromo.

“I will use this term, Maria. I think we will see something of biblical proportion happen with his leadership in the Middle East.”

 

His remarks come in the wake of last week’s announcement by Trump that the U.S. will take over the troubled Gaza Strip to help transform it from a “demolition site” to a Riviera-style region.

“President Trump did something bold,” Huckabee said.” He looked into the future and said kind of a what if. We don’t know exactly what might happen in Gaza, but here’s what could have happened in Gaza.

“Gaza could have been Singapore. Instead, Hamas turned it into Haiti and, in fact, maybe worse, far worse than that.

“So let’s hope that people will listen to President Trump. The only time we’ve had real, significant peace in that a region was the four years that Donald Trump was president, and I’m very optimistic that with his leadership, his bold and innovative thinking, he doesn’t think like the other politicians and diplomats have thought. And thank God he doesn’t, because we get results.

Mike Huckabee: ‘I think we will see something of biblical proportion’ happen with Trump’s leadership in the Middle East

‘Gaza could have been Singapore. Instead, Hamas turned it into Haiti and, in fact, maybe worse, far worse than that’ @GovMikeHuckabee @MariaBartiromo… pic.twitter.com/zVyc0OSdhd

— WorldNetDaily (@worldnetdaily) February 9, 2025

“I heard somebody say he’s thinking outside the box. That’s ridiculous. He’s not thinking outside the box, he throws the box away and says let’s start with a blank slate and see where this could go. That’s leadership. And that’s what we have with President Trump.”

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When asked if he believed the U.S. could have an ownership piece of Gaza, the former Republican governor of Arkansas, indicated he did not know.

“The one thing we know is that Hamas not going to be able to exist. That’s just a done deal. It’s sort of like saying Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon, and Hamas cannot continue to exist. They can never have anything to do with the governance of Gaza.

“A lot of people forget Gaza was once inhabited by both Jews and Palestinians until 2005 when Ariel Sharon decided to give it all away. He did. They militarily marched 10,000 Jewish people out of Gaza, turned it into a complete Palestinian state, and the result, we saw October the 7th. So there’s something that has to be rethought.”

Asked when he expected to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate to his ambassadorship, Huckabee responded, “I wish I knew. It’s all up in the hands of the Senate, and as you know, there’s a little bit of tension going on right now in Washington, and I have nothing if to do with that.

“I’m patiently waiting through the process. I do have to be confirmed, that’s the process we all must go through, and I respect that. So I hope it’s soon because I think that our country needs our ambassador in place in this very, very delicate and difficult region. And so I would hope that even Democrats would say the sooner the better.”

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