Cross-Examination

• Arizona just helped Donald Trump: Given that the 2020 election was decided not by seven million votes, as Joe Biden claims it was, but by roughly 43,000 votes across three states — Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin — it’s reasonable to assume that those states will help decide the 2024 election. And yesterday, a couple of Arizona State Senate Republicans helped their Democrat counterparts overturn the Grand Canyon State’s near-total ban on abortions, and in doing so, likely helped Donald Trump’s chances of reclaiming the state’s 11 crucial electoral votes. As The Wall Street Journal reports: “Two Republicans joined with Democrats in the Arizona Senate to roll back the state’s nearly total ban on abortions, as some in the GOP look to reverse a significant political liability for the party ahead of the November elections. The move Wednesday comes a week after the Arizona state House also voted to repeal the ban. Three Republicans joined with all Democrats in that vote.” If political positions, however desirable in certain cases, are considered “extreme,” it tends to galvanize political opposition. And nowhere is this truism in greater evidence right now than on the issue of abortion. The Democrats have increasingly become a single-issue party, and this moderating move in Arizona effectively blunts the issue. Here, the American people should remember that the difference between the parties on abortion is that the Republicans are willing to find a middle ground. The Democrats, on the other hand, have a party platform committed to abortion on demand no matter what. Thus, when it comes to abortion, the Democrats are the real extremists.

• Illegals are invading our nation by plane: One of the hallmarks of the modern Democrat Party is its willingness to ignore both the will of the people and the judgment of the courts in order to enact its radical agenda. Remember Barack Obama’s pen-and-phone strategy for subverting the will and the constitutional authority of the legislative branch? Joe Biden’s handlers are nothing if not students of subversive behavior, and this is plain to see in the way the Open Borders Administration is collecting illegals who are ineligible for asylum and distributing them all across the country under the laughable terms of what they call their “migrant parole program.” As Fox News’s intrepid Bill Melugin — one of the only network journos covering Biden’s intentional 10 million-and-counting border invasion — grimly reports: “During an eight-month period from January through August 2023, roughly 200,000 migrants flew into the U.S. via the program. Of those, 80% of them, (161,562) arrived in the state of Florida in four cities: Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, Orlando and Tampa Bay, according to DHS data obtained via a subpoena by the House Homeland Security Committee and provided to Fox News. The policy was first announced for Venezuelans in October 2022, which allowed a limited number to fly or travel directly into the U.S. as long as they had not entered illegally, had a sponsor in the U.S. already, and passed certain biometric and biographical vetting. The program does not itself facilitate flights, and migrants are responsible for their own travel.” Melugin adds, “By the end of February 2024, more than 400,000 nationals have arrived under the parole program, according to Customs and Border Protection data.” Imagine that. Illegals don’t even have to make the perilous trek to our southern border anymore. They can simply bypass our immigration laws and invade our country by plane.

• Biden insults Japan: In an apparent effort to defend his disastrous open border and record numbers of migrants illegally entering the U.S., Joe Biden blamed the recent economic struggles of China, Russia, and Japan on racism. At a campaign fundraiser, in a nod to the start of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, Biden boasted that the U.S. economy was so robust “because we welcome immigrants.” He continued: “Think about it. Why is China stalling so bad economically? Why is Japan having trouble? Why is Russia?” He then answered: “Because they’re xenophobic. They don’t want immigrants.” Earth to Biden: This is not 1941. Why lump Japan, one of America’s most important allies in Asia, with two of our biggest geopolitical foes? Furthermore, why insult them by basically accusing them of being raging racists? The fact of the matter is that Japan’s main problem is that its population is contracting due to years of sustained low birth rates. While adopting a more liberal immigration policy may help solve some of the problems, it also comes with obvious cultural impacts and concerns for the Japanese. Furthermore, unlike Russia and China, which are two of the largest nations based upon sheer land area and natural resources, Japan is an island nation with much less land area and fewer resources. And despite these limitations, Japan still boasts the fourth-largest economy in the world. Meanwhile, Americans are struggling under a lackluster economy thanks to Biden’s bad economic policy decisions.

• States sue Biden over gun regulations: Twenty-six Republican-led states have filed three separate lawsuits against the Biden administration over the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ newly released regulation of the buying and selling of private firearms. The ATF changed the definition of a gun dealer to anyone who sells a firearm for a profit to anyone, irrespective of the number of firearms sold. In its lawsuit, Kansas notes: “Until now, those who repetitively purchased and sold firearms as a regular course of business had to become a licensee. This rule would put innocent firearm sales between law-abiding friends and family members within reach of federal regulation.” The court filing adds, “Such innocent sales between friends and family would constitute a felony if the seller did not in fact obtain a federal firearms license and perform a background check." Similarly, Florida states: "The challenged rule, in fact, goes far beyond the plain text of the [Bipartisan Safer Communities Act]. It purports to force thousands of law-abiding gun owners to register as federal firearms dealers and navigate a federal bureaucracy as a precondition to engaging in constitutionally protected activity.” NRA-ILA Executive Director Randy Kozuch praised the states for raising the lawsuits, observing: “Undeterred by having three of its most recent Rules restricting gun rights invalidated by federal courts, the ATF’s new Rule restricts Americans’ rights to sell even a single firearm. The ATF has exceeded its authority once again, and we expect that this new Rule will be invalidated as well.”

• BlackRock underwrites ChiCom nukes: No one ever accused Wall Street’s leading globalist money-grubbers of putting American interests first, but it’d be nice if they didn’t put our nation’s interests last. Sadly, that’s precisely the case with BlackRock, whose $10 trillion in assets under management make it the world’s largest asset manager. BlackRock “is investing millions of dollars in an estimated 30 Chinese military-linked companies sanctioned by the U.S. government, according to a think tank report prepared for Congress,” The Washington Times reports. “Additionally, BlackRock, which manages retirement assets for millions of Americans, has invested in companies working on China’s large-scale nuclear weapons buildup, said the Coalition for a Prosperous America.” BlackRock, of course, denies any wrongdoing, claiming that it “does not do business with companies in China producing nuclear arms.” But as the report inconveniently concludes: “The reality is that BlackRock holds stock in Chinese companies pursuing an aggressive buildup of nuclear warheads meant to hold United States territory at risk. China’s nuclear expansion has been called a ‘breakout’ and the largest buildup of nuclear weapons since the Cold War.” Nothing to see here, folks. Just BlackRock and its rotten CEO, Larry Fink, working to help Communist China supplant the U.S. as the world’s first among nations.

• The United Methodist Church is self-destructing: Jesus warned that if Christians lose their “saltiness,” they have effectively become useless and good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet. Sadly, that indictment applies to today’s United Methodist Church (UMC). Over the last several decades, as the UMC has steadily embraced worldly values over and against biblical values, the protestant denomination that once boasted a membership of 11 million in the U.S. alone has dwindled to fewer than 5.5 million U.S. members today. And things will only get worse for the UMC after delegates at its General Conference on Wednesday voted to lift its ban on LGBT-identifying individuals serving in the clergy. The church had previously prohibited ordaining “self-avowed practicing homosexuals” to serve as ministers. Revealing just how far from biblical faithfulness the UMC has strayed, the delegate vote for lifting the LGBT clergy ban was 692-51. One of the few Methodists opposed to lifting the ban, Rob Renfroe, predicted, “As the church becomes more and more liberal, and if a social agenda becomes its driving force, that’s not going to grow the church.” The UMC has lost its saltiness and, therefore, has become largely irrelevant. This should serve as a warning to other Christian denominations that are tempted to think that embracing the world’s values will somehow make them more relevant. The opposite is the case.

• RFK Jr. proposes a “No Spoiler Pledge”: It’s no secret that Joe Biden’s team is really frustrated with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.‘s run for the presidency. They have labeled him as nothing but a spoiler candidate who is in cahoots with Donald Trump. While there is no evidence to prove such claims, Team Biden has remained adamant that RFK Jr. has absolutely no chance of winning and, therefore, his continued presence in the race serves as a threat to Biden and thus constitutes a “threat to democracy.” With Kennedy now officially on the ballot in three states, the latest being California, and well on his way to making the ballot in a dozen others, he has doggedly refused to back down. Furthermore, in a clear effort to blunt Team Biden’s labeling of him as merely a spoiler candidate, Kennedy on Wednesday offered a challenge to Biden. Calling it the “No Spoiler Pledge,” Kennedy made an offer to Biden: Come mid-October, a 30,000-plus poll with each of the two candidates against Trump, and between them whoever fared worse in a head-to-head matchup against Trump would drop out of the race. Kennedy argued: “We only have one chance to beat Donald Trump, and we need a nominee who can get the job done. And that would be me.” Of course, Biden would never agree to this pledge, but it is a savvy move by Kennedy to refute the “spoiler” label. As one Kennedy supporter stated: “I’m always talking to people on Instagram, and they say 'he’s a spoiler,’ and they say ‘a vote for Kennedy is a vote for Trump. I’m excited. I’m going to definitely use this.”

• Patriotic chant unites opponents in Alabama: In our increasingly polarized nation, common political ground has become as scarce as an intelligible utterance from Joe Biden. Indeed, we see the battle between the decent and law-abiding Right and the filthy and lawless Left playing out on college campuses across the country. But didn’t Joe Biden promise to unite us? Didn’t he give us his word that he’d “marshal the ingenuity of goodwill of this nation to turn division into unity and bring us together”? (You could look it up.) And yet, hope of a rapprochement springs eternal, as an incident at the University of Alabama illustrates. As Townhall’s Matt Vespa reports: “On an issue where no common ground could be found, the pro-Hamas and pro-Israel camps had found one. The one thing they agreed on is that Joe Biden sucks. The editor-in-chief of the Crimson Herald, Maven Navarro, caught both camps chanting 'F*ck Joe Biden.’” Ah, nothing beats the sweet strains of a patriotic melody. But, as Vespa reports, “The best part is that each side waited for the other to complete their excoriation of the president.” Lo and behold! Joe Biden has unified the country. Against him.

Headlines

• Republicans dismissive of Greene’s plan to oust House speaker (Washington Post)

• Democrat Tim Kennedy wins New York special election for House seat (Washington Post)

• GOP senator launches push to shut down noncitizen voting in DC elections (Fox News)

• Biden’s education secretary defends biological males in girls’ bathrooms (Washington Times)

• Police and pro-Palestinian demonstrators clash in tense scene at UCLA encampment (AP) | UCLA encampment requests vegan, gluten-free food; “no bananas,” “no nuts” (Breitbart)

• Nearly half of anti-Israel protesters arrested at Columbia, City College weren’t students (NY Post)

• Student group stands against UNC-Chapel Hill pro-Hamas mob to protect U.S. flag in powerful moment (RedState) | More than $389K raised for UNC frat brothers who protected American flag from anti-Israel mob (NY Post)

• Florida’s six-week abortion ban takes effect (NBC News)

• Another Boeing whistleblower dies, succumbs to “sudden illness” (PM)

• Macron vows to send troops to Ukraine if Putin’s forces break through front lines and Zelensky asks for reinforcements (Daily Mail)

• Humor: AOC announces she was killed during NYPD raid at Columbia and is dead again (Babylon Bee)

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