Cross-Examination

• Inflation jumps again: If Joe Biden and Leftmedia talkingheads are really mystified as to why so many Americans aren’t taking their word for it and believing that the economy is awesome, then maybe the latest inflation report will help them understand. Today, the Labor Department reported that consumer prices rose unexpectedly, as inflation rose for the third month in a row, now up to 3.1% annually over this same time last year. The increase was 0.2% higher than the forecasted rate of 2.9%. Increases in the cost of gas, groceries, and housing were the primary drivers for the inflationary increase, which has some economic experts concluding that the Federal Reserve won’t be cutting interest rates anytime soon.

• House GOP demands transcript of Hur’s Biden interview: What did Robert Hur know and when did he know it? That’s what House Republicans are asking in the wake of the special counsel’s devastating report on Joe Biden’s cognitive decline, which was nested within a report about the president’s willful mishandling and sharing of classified materials after his term as Barack Obama’s vice president had concluded. House Republicans leading the impeachment inquiry against the “well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory” demanded yesterday that Attorney General Merrick Garland cough up the interview transcript and any recordings of that interview. The request came in the form of a letter from three leading House Republicans — Oversight Chairman James Comer, Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, and Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith — and it suggests that Biden may have kept sensitive documents related to his influence peddling and foreign business deals. The three men likely have little expectation of success, though, as the White House last week refused to publicly release the transcript due to what it says was “classified material discussed that could not be released.” Of course, the Left’s real story here, as our Nate Jackson noted yesterday, is that Republicans are just being mean, just pouncing on the story and making political hay out of it.

• House will re-vote on Mayorkas impeachment today: House Republicans, clearly not yet ready to take “No” for an answer, will take another impeachment swing at Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas today. Last week, their efforts met with an embarrassing failure, as the final vote was 215-215, with three Republicans refusing to sign on. One of those “No” votes, outgoing Congressman Mike Gallagher, says he’s still a “No.” As he’s made clear, he doesn’t think maladministration or incompetence is grounds for impeachment, and he can’t come to grips with the impeachment of a cabinet secretary for merely implementing the policy of his boss — for merely following orders, as it were. As we’ve noted, we don’t think the two — impeachment of both Mayorkas and Biden — are mutually exclusive. Indeed, we think the exercise of the former lays a logical framework for the latter. So, what’s changed this time around? Why is the GOP doing the same thing again and expecting a different result? One man — Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who missed last week’s vote due to cancer treatment back home in Louisiana — will give House Republicans that decisive extra vote, even assuming a full slate of Democrat “No” votes. Elsewhere in border security politics, left-leaning Axios is reporting on the infighting and dirt-dishing that’s taken place within the Biden administration regarding its willfully disastrous border malfeasance. For example, domestic adviser and former Obama lackey Susan Rice referred to HHS Secretary Javier Becerra as a “b**ch-a**” and privately called him an “idiot,” according to multiple sources. Rice, it seems, doesn’t play well with others, as she’s apparently been at odds with VP Kamala Harris ever since Biden opted for Harris over Rice in his racist “woman of color” veepstakes.

• Will the GOP House scuttle the $95B Schumer-McConnell foreign aid bill? Now that the Mitch McConnell faction of 18 Senate Republicans has voted with Chuck Schumer and his fellow Democrats on a $95 billion aid package for Ukraine, Israel, Gaza, and Taiwan, all eyes turn to House Speaker Mike Johnson and his fellow House Republicans. Because unless the House GOP caucus holds firm, our southern border will remain open, and our children will be on the hook for another massive expenditure that our broke country can ill-afford. As The Hill reports, Johnson has already “fired a warning shot at the Senate’s foreign aid package … criticizing the $95.3 billion supplemental as the upper chamber inches closer to a final vote on the legislation.” Johnson has already slammed the upper chamber’s measure, noting, “The Senate’s foreign aid bill is silent on the most pressing issue facing our country,” and suggested that he won’t bring it to the floor for a vote. “In the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate,” Johnson said, “the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters. America deserves better than the Senate’s status quo.”

• Biden’s desperate TikTok flip-flop: It’s “do as I say, not as I do” for Joe Biden and his reelection campaign. As of Super Bowl Sunday, they’re again up and running on the Chinese spyware platform known as TikTok even though the administration ordered the social media platform banned from all federal government devices due to national security concerns. Wisconsin Congressman Mike Gallagher, who chairs the Select Committee on China, offered a scathing indictment of Biden’s nakedly contradictory decision: “Every single Biden national security official — from the director of national intelligence to the CIA director to the DIA director to the head of Cyber Command — has warned that TikTok is a national security threat. The head of the FBI, Chris Wray, just testified before my committee and said that the parent company that owns TikTok is beholden to the Chinese government and, therefore, is a very significant threat. So here you have Biden’s hand-picked advisers telling him that this is effectively a CCP tool or weapon, and yet he’s ignoring that. Why? To court the votes of anti-Semitic 18-year-olds? To get progressive in a campaign season? It’s not a serious move. It’s not serious leadership. It’s not the move of a serious country. … I urge the president’s Gen-Z TikTok-addled campaign staffers to reverse course in the interest of national security.” Fat chance of that, Congressman. This, of course, is an act of utter desperation by Biden, whose underlings have told him that he’s toast in November without the low-information youth vote. So, what’s the solution? “India banned TikTok,” said Gallagher, “and it wasn’t the apocalypse. … Either a ban, or a forced sale, or a separation makes the most sense.” What doesn’t make sense, though, is an expectation that the American people should swear off this ChiCom spyware if their commander-in-chief won’t do the same.

• RFK Jr. is the party spoiler: Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy — as in Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — has Democrat talkingheads fuming following a throwback ad dropped by his super PAC, American Values 2024, during the Super Bowl. The $7 million 30-second ad features images of RFK Jr. superimposed over a catchy 1960 ad that his uncle, JFK, used in his run to the White House. The ad is a brilliant bit of nostalgia that targets Baby Boomers, alerting many to RFK’s campaign as an independent candidate. The ad has Democrats and members of his own family upset, ostensibly over the ad’s use of images of Kennedy family members without their permission. Of course, the real offense is that RFK Jr. is running as an independent, thanks to the Democrats having fallen off a radical leftist cliff. RFK Jr. offered an apology to his family that was about as sincere as their claimed offense with the ad. While noting that he had nothing to do with creating the ad, RFK Jr. was more than happy to pin it to the top of his X account page. What has Democrats so roiled is the real fear that Kennedy could play spoiler to Joe Biden’s reelection bid.

• Squad member hits Israel for hostage rescue mission: As a record 123 million people tuned into the Super Bowl this past Sunday, Israeli forces launched a hostage rescue mission in Gaza that successfully freed two Israeli-Argentine hostages whom Hamas had abducted during the October 7 attack. Several Hamas militants were killed during the mission, which raised the ire of House Squad member Jamaal Bowman (D-NY). He blasted Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for launching “a wave of attacks and killed innocent civilians in Rafah — a place where many refugees fled for relative safety — despite warnings from Biden.” Bowman failed to mention the two hostages that were freed. Meanwhile, private comments made by Joe Biden complaining about Netanyahu wherein Biden repeatedly called him an “a**hole” were leaked. The leaks were likely an intentional effort to appease the radical anti-Semitic faction of Biden’s base. The message is clear: Biden doesn’t like what Israel is doing in Gaza and is working hard to press Israel into ending the war.

• Good news: Massive rare earth mineral deposits discovered in Wyoming: China has effectively controlled the rare earth mineral trade, as some 95% of all processed rare earth minerals come from China. Furthermore, China currently accounts for 74% of the U.S.‘s supply of rare earth minerals. And with Beijing announcing a ban on rare earth mineral extraction last December, the U.S. supply is significantly negatively impacted. But thanks to a recent discovery of a massive rare earth mineral deposit in Wyoming, the U.S. can potentially avoid being hamstrung by China. Even more significant is the sheer size of the deposit, estimated at 2.34 billion metric tons. That dwarfs China’s deposits, calculated to be roughly 44 million metric tons. These rare earth minerals are needed for making smartphones, hybrid cars, and military tech, among many other items.

• EVs a road hazard: As the popularity of electric vehicles grows, so too does the realization of associated drawbacks. While limited range and charging challenges are the most obvious EV problems, other issues that may be less obvious are also coming to light. One issue is the heavy weight of EVs. Due to their large lithium-ion batteries, an EV weighs up to 50% more than a similar-sized gas-powered counterpart. This significant weight difference has a number of drawbacks. Safety experts are warning that many roadway safety features, such as guardrails, are not designed to handle the weight of EVs. Furthermore, parking garages and other infrastructure features have not been designed for the weight of EVs. Engineers writing for Structure magazine recently observed, “Significantly increasing passenger vehicle weights combined with recently reduced structural design requirements will result in reduced factors of safety and increased maintenance and repair costs for parking structures.” They add, “There are many cases of parking structure failures, and the growing demand for EVs will only increase the probability of failure.” According to a recent study conducted by University of Nebraska professor Cody Stolle on the impact of EVs on the roadways: “Increasing weight means that there’s a lot more force required to redirect that vehicle to the roadway. We found these guardrail systems don’t have great compatibility with these [electric] vehicles yet.”

Headlines

• Police identify Lakewood shooter as 36-year-old female who also went by “Jeffrey,” had gun with “Free Palestine” written on it (Not the Bee)

• Trump takes presidential immunity fight to the Supreme Court (Axios)

• Trump endorses Michael Whatley to replace Ronna McDaniel as RNC chair, with Lara Trump as co-chairwoman (Washington Examiner)

• Marilyn Mosby’s conviction shines light on prosecutorial malfeasance (Washington Times)

• Lawsuit challenging Illinois’s semiautomatic and standard-capacity magazine ban goes to SCOTUS (NRA-ILA)

• House Education Committee expands anti-Semitism probe to Columbia University (National Review)

• Super Bowl LVIII most-watched TV event since moon landing (Just the News)

• Kamala Harris says she is ready to serve as Biden faces age scrutiny (WSJ)

• Humor: Kamala seen practicing her presidential cackle (Babylon Bee)

• Policy: The U.S. strikes in Iraq and Syria don’t go far enough (Daily Signal)

For more editors’ choice headlines, click here.