Cross-Examination

• Consumer prices still rising: The consumer price index increased by 0.3% from March to April — a slightly slower rate than the anticipated 0.4% rise. CPI has risen to 3.4% over last year, but it’s up roughly 19% since Joe Biden took office. Driving the latest increase is the cost of sheltering (up 5.5% over last year) and energy (up 2.6%). Furthermore, as Gary Bauer notes, “The producer price index, which measures the cost of goods and services being produced, went up much higher than expected.” Given the continued sustained high inflation, the Federal Reserve will not be lowering interest rates anytime soon. And Biden keeps lying about it, saying for a second time that inflation “was at 9% when I came in, and it’s now down around 3%.” It was 1.4% when he came in, and it’s now 3.4%. Other than that, his story was accurate.

• Jim Justice, Larry Hogan win Senate primaries: Two states, two former governors, and two Republican Senate candidates could hardly be more different, but either or both could play a huge role in the GOP’s quest to retake the Senate on November 5. Justice is from West Virginia, which Donald Trump carried by 38 points. He’s a strong supporter of the former president and took more than 60% of the vote in a crowded primary contest yesterday, beating out House Freedom Caucus member Alex Mooney, among others. Justice thus becomes the prohibitive favorite to replace retiring “centrist” Democrat Joe Manchin, which would put the Senate in a 50-50 tie. Hogan, on the other hand, is a Trump-hater from deep-blue Maryland, which Joe Biden won by 33 points. Hogan, too, won easily over a crowded field. He was a very popular governor, and his very public dislike for the former president might make him palatable enough to a majority of voters. Perhaps the most important point here is that, as former governors, both men know what it takes to win a statewide election.

• Biden sends aid to Israel: While Joe Biden paused the shipment of precision bombs to Israel in a politically motivated effort aimed at placating the pro-Palestinian faction of his base, on Tuesday, he effectively reversed course by green-lighting the shipment of $1 billion in arms. The arms to be sent are primarily for ground units, such as ammunition for tanks, tactical vehicles, and mortar rounds. According to the Biden administration, the rationale is an attempt to police how Israel fights its war against Hamas. The White House labeled the bombs as problematic, with National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan asserting, “We have paused a shipment of 2,000-pound bombs because we do not believe they should be dropped in densely populated cities.”

• Hunter’s Chinese EVs: The White House recently announced that Joe Biden is imposing 100% tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and batteries. The high tariffs are intended to fend off Chinese competition with the U.S. auto industry, thanks to his effective EV production mandate in support of his green agenda. Ironically, China can at least partly thank Hunter Biden for its world domination of the EV industry. Back in 2015, Hunter was a board member of the Beijing-based BHR Partners when he worked to broker a $2.3 billion deal for the Chinese company Zhongway to acquire the American aluminum company Aleris. The deal was designed to help Zhongway avoid U.S. tariffs on Chinese aluminum makers. While that deal never came to fruition, BHR successfully bought a cobalt and copper mine from the American company Freeport-McMoRan in 2013. Both are important components in the EV industry. Republicans have responded to Biden’s latest tariff move as political grandstanding, with the RNC calling them a “last-minute election year ploy to gaslight voters into thinking he is tough on China.”

• Black Marine planned anti-white murder: Race hatred runs deep in some twisted individuals, and it isn’t confined to a particular race. This much was crystal clear in the arrest and charging on May 10 of a black man, a 23-year-old Marine from Trenton, New Jersey, with allegedly planning a mass murder of “privileged” white people. According to court records filed last week, federal prosecutors say that in December 2022, the disturbed individual posted online that he wanted “to cause mayhem on the white community.” In one of his rants, he noted that he’d chosen a “gun-free zone” to carry out the massacre. “The reason I specifically want to target White people,” he said, “is because, as a black male, they will NEVER understand my struggles. Same way I will never understand their struggles, but I don’t care to. I want to erase them. All of them really, but in this case as many as I possibly can.” He also bragged that he’d “already acquired 2 of the 4 firearms I plan to use for my attack.” Weirdly, he joined the Marines the following year, attended boot camp at Parris Island, and then headed off to his duty station in Twentynine Palms, California, this year. On behalf of the Corps, we say, Good riddance.

• More pro-lifers sentenced: Two-tiered justice keeps coming at conservatives, especially those who endeavor to protect the most vulnerable among us. As Collin Rugg reports: “Pro-lifer Lauren Handy [was] sentenced to nearly 5 years in prison for ‘blockading’ a Washington abortion clinic in 2020. After she was indicted, police found 5 fetuses in her Washington home. According to prosecutors, Handy instructed co-defendants to chain themselves together with locks and chains. Handy and the other people she was with sang hymns and prayed, accusing the clinic of killing babies even after they were born.” The babies in her home, by the way, had been discarded by the clinic with what Not the Bee called “clear evidence of partial-birth abortion and even post-birth infanticide.” Handy was convicted of conspiracy and for having violated the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. None of the more than one million babies who were aborted last year could be reached for comment.

• GOP ground game ain’t great: Donald Trump might be winning in the polls, but it won’t mean a thing if Democrats are once again able to generate, ahem, 100% voter turnout from all the nursing homes in the urban centers of the swing states, as they did in the Milwaukee area in 2020. Yet, the Republican National Committee “appears to have little to no on-the-ground operations in key battleground states despite former President Donald Trump narrowly leading President Joe Biden,” reports The Federalist. “They expressed optimism, however, that the RNC will step up its efforts and suggested it’s ‘typical’ for the RNC not to have its ground game going until about now.” On the bright side, as The Federalist continues, the RNC recently “announced the launch of a ‘100,000 person strong election integrity program’ comprised of ‘volunteers and attorneys.’” But the RNC was mum when asked how many of those 100,000 had signed up so far. There’s no hurry, of course. Only a republic to save.

• CA leads the nation in job losses: Nearly 500,000 California residents have lost their jobs since the beginning of the year, almost double the losses of Texas, the next highest state for lost jobs. According to the Federal Reserve of Economic Data (FRED), the Golden State’s unemployment rate has steadily risen, peaking in February at 5.3%, where it currently sits. The sector with the most jobs lost since March 2023 is California’s tech industry, which has seen a net loss of 53,600 jobs. Much of the tech sector losses are tied to companies like Tesla and Google. Tesla is laying off workers due to slowing EV demand and growing competition within the EV industry. Furthermore, California’s decision to raise the state minimum wage to $20 an hour for fast food workers has resulted in job losses for thousands of workers. To make matters worse, California has run a budget deficit for the past two years, now reported to be as high as $58 billion. That has Governor Gavin Newsom calling for more than $30 billion in spending cuts.

Headlines

• Jen Psaki retracts lie that Biden didn’t check watch during transfer of servicemen’s bodies killed in Afghanistan (PM)

• Biden’s campaign proposes June and September for debates against Trump (NBC News)

• Ohio purges non-citizens from state voter rolls (Fox News)

• Our border is so secure that the FBI is sending out warnings that ISIS might attack Pride parades in U.S. cities (Not the Bee)

• Harvard to begin reinstating suspended students in deal with anti-Israel encampment organizers (National Review)

• Ship that caused Baltimore bridge collapse had two electrical blackouts day before deadly collision (Daily Wire)

• Justice Department says Boeing violated deal that avoided prosecution after 737 Max crashes (AP)

• California challenged over ban on sale of new diesel trucks (Daily Wire)

• Tennessee will allow death penalty for child rape starting July 1 (The Center Square)

• Just 46% of new immigrants are working, census data show (Washington Times)

• Afghanistan is a “terrorist haven” again despite Biden’s promises (Townhall)

• Group claims 8,200 Nigerian Christians killed in 13 months (PJ Media)

• Humor: White House installs breathalyzer on Kamala Harris’s microphone (Babylon Bee)

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