The Patriot Post® · Tuesday Executive News Summary
Ghislaine Maxwell invokes the Fifth: Jeffrey Epstein co-conspirator and convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell invoked her Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination during her deposition before the House yesterday. Maxwell appeared before the House Oversight Committee following months of negotiations, so her refusal to testify is unfortunate, said Committee Chairman James Comer. Maxwell’s attorney made clear that she wants to leverage her potential testimony to secure clemency from the White House. She claims she can clear the names of both President Donald Trump and former President Bill Clinton. Trump has not been credibly named in connection with any of Epstein and Maxwell’s criminal activities.
House passes housing bill: On Monday, the House overwhelmingly passed the Housing for the 21st Century Act, bipartisan legislation that aims to make housing more affordable for Americans. As House Financial Committee Chairman French Hill explained, “This bill represents that consensus of both Democrat and Republican members in the House who want at the federal level to take some steps that we believe will lower the marginal cost of constructing housing, making [Department of Housing and Urban Development] programs more efficient, more effective, more accountable to taxpayers.” The bill would loosen some federal housing regulations and land-use rules to ease constraints on home construction. The question is whether the Senate will take up the House version after previously passing its own Road to Housing Act.
California swipes entire bonus from Super Bowl champs: NFL teams may want to decide if they make a run at the Super Bowl if the championship game is scheduled to be played in California. That’s because the Golden State’s tax code fleeces the players from their hard-earned cash. Thanks to the state’s highest income taxes in the nation, many of the Super Bowl-winning Seattle Seahawks players, as well as the runner-up New England Patriots, are seeing their bonus payments sucked up by California taxes. For example, winning quarterback Sam Darnold, along with all his teammates, received a $188,000 bonus for the victory; however, under California’s tax laws, Darnold owes the state an estimated $202,102 in taxes for the 10 days he worked in the state. To put this in perspective, two years ago, the Super Bowl was played in Las Vegas, Nevada, where there is no state income tax, and the players got to keep their full bonuses.
Big Brother’s Ring? Does having a camera on your property that anyone in your neighborhood can activate and access sound like a good idea? That seems to be what the Amazon Ring doorbell camera Super Bowl ad was selling. Pitched as a way to find lost dogs, the ad proudly proclaims, “One post of a dog’s photo to the Ring app starts outdoor cameras looking for a match.” The ad goes on to explain that AI then matches that photo to images of dogs in the area. Viewers were somewhat disturbed by the idea that AI might be using their personal cameras to surveil their neighborhood. Finding lost dogs is a harmless and beneficial use of this technology, but many fear it could easily be used to track individuals’ private actions.
California’s ICE mask ban blocked by court: Federal Judge Christina Snyder blocked California from enforcing its recently enacted law that bars ICE officers from wearing masks. Snyder ruled that the state illegally targeted federal officers with its anti-masking law, writing, “Because such discrimination violates the Supremacy Clause, the Court is constrained to enjoin the facial covering prohibition.” Attorney General Pam Bondi heralded the decision as a “key court victory,” noting, “These federal agents are harassed, doxxed, obstructed, and attacked on a regular basis just for doing their jobs. We have no tolerance for it.” Snyder, however, did uphold the state requirement that federal officers wear visible identifying information.
Biden’s parole program legally quashed: The Trump administration has garnered a legal settlement to end Joe Biden’s mass illegal alien parole program, which could prevent future presidents from reviving it. Biden’s parole program was designed as a legal loophole to allow migrants into the U.S. without securing a legal visa. Former immigration judge Andrew Arthur observed, “This consent decree will prevent a future administration from abusing DHS’s limited parole authority in the way that the Biden administration did.” According to The Washington Times, “It also binds the national government not to attempt any repeats for 15 years.” Florida AG’s press secretary Jae Williams welcomed the development, stating, “We thank the Trump administration for working with our office to obtain this result, which ensures that the next Democratic administration cannot abuse the parole system to allow another invasion of illegal aliens into our country.”
Meta, YouTube sued for addicting children: In what is likely to be the first of many addiction lawsuits brought against social media companies, plaintiff attorney Mark Lanier argued that the case was “easy as ABC,” which stands for “addicting the brains of children” but may also be a reference to YouTube’s parent company, Alphabet. Lanier argued that the companies knew that children experienced “adverse events” from their platforms and were vulnerable to addiction, and that parental supervision did little to help. One plaintiff identified as KGM is an alleged victim of social media addiction, having started using YouTube at age six and Instagram at age nine, and uploading 284 videos to YouTube before reaching middle school. Meta’s representation argued that KGM’s mental health issues stem from interpersonal relationships, not social media. Conservatives might wonder how parents might better act in their children’s best interests.
Jimmy Lai gets 20 years: After spending the last five years in solitary confinement, Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Jimmy Lai has been sentenced without a jury to 20 years in prison. The 78-year-old founder of the Apple Daily newspaper, who has long fought for freedom for Hong Kong, was convicted of “conspiracy to collude with a foreign country to endanger national security and conspiracy to publish seditious publications,” reports National Review. Lai, a British citizen, represented himself during the 156-day trial and pleaded not guilty to violating Chinese national security laws. Six of his former employees at the Apple Daily were sentenced to 10 years in jail. Chairman John Moolenaar of the Select Committee on China called this another “stain on the human rights record of the Chinese Communist Party” and said he plans to “lead efforts to sanction those responsible for the repression of Lai and his colleagues.”
Olympic medals are falling apart: One thing Olympians probably don’t expect as they celebrate winning a medal is for the medal itself to break. Unfortunately, at least four Olympians have suffered minor breakages of their medals so far. The affected medals include two golds, one silver, and one bronze. “I was jumping in excitement, and it broke,” said Team USA gold medalist Breezy Johnson. The 2026 Winter Olympics Organizing Committee says it is aware of “an issue affecting a small number of medals” and is investigating. Since the Olympic Games have just gotten started and significantly fewer than 100 medals have been awarded so far, the fact that all three metals — gold, silver, and bronze — have already been affected indicates that this issue is more widespread than the committee may want to admit.
Headlines
FBI: Epstein didn’t run a sex-trafficking ring for the powerful (Hot Air)
Trump DOJ seeks to dismiss Steve Bannon’s J6 conviction and indictment (Just the News)
ObamaCare sign-ups drop, but the extent won’t be clear for months (CBS News)
Japan’s right-wing party wins supermajority in mass rejection of migration and liberalism (Not the Bee)
The Executive News Summary is compiled daily by Jordan Candler, Thomas Gallatin, Sterling Henry, and Sophie Starkova. For the archive, click here.