Cross-Examination

• Wealthy leftists are behind the smear campaign against conservative justices: Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have recently come under attack for supposed ethics violations. The claims are essentially vacuous complaints dressed up with loaded language designed to give the impression these conservative justices have been flouting the rules. So, who is behind these obviously targeted attacks? The answer is the nonprofit news outfit ProPublica. The Leftmedia organization has received almost $40 million since 2010 from the leftist Sandler Foundation, effectively making it little other than a propaganda organization. As Judicial Crisis Network President Carrie Severino observes, “ProPublica isn’t a news organization; it’s a front group for liberal billionaires wanting to ensure that the court rubber stamps their political agenda.” A spokesman for Senator Ted Cruz agreed with that assessment, contending: “The corrupt corporate media has been working with these liberal activists for decades, so of course Soros-type donors would be behind this. The fact is, Justices Thomas and Alito have complied totally with the Supreme Court’s ethics rules.”

• A dishonest honesty professor: Francesca Gino, a professor at Harvard Business School who produced a report studying honesty back in 2012, has made headlines for fabricating some of her study results. Gino’s study claimed to show that people who signed an honesty pledge prior to filling out a form were less likely to give dishonest answers than those who signed an honestly pledge after completing the form. The trouble is that researchers in 2015 conducting the same experiments were not able to duplicate the results. Then, in 2021, another group of researchers looking at Gino’s original data observed that it had been altered. Since the discovery, three other papers that Gino coauthored show evidence of falsified data. Harvard placed Gino on administrative leave after the scandal broke.

• Bud Light sales continue to drop: Nothing that Anheuser-Busch has tried has been able to stop the sales bleed from its formerly number one selling beer in America. No amount of Clydesdales or American heartland virtue-signaling commercials have been able to reverse Bud Light’s apparently now permanently tarnished image. Last week, Bud Light hit the lowest sales numbers since the controversy started, dropping over 28% from the same week a year ago. All of this is thanks to Anheuser-Busch’s refusal to offer a true apology to its former customer base. Instead, the beer company has only leaned further into the woke ideology that triggered this whole episode in the first place, as Bud Light was one of the main sponsors of Toronto’s pride parade in which naked men strutted on the street in front of children. Bud Light-in-the-Loafers appears to be how an increasing number of Americans view this beer now.

• Four Mexican smugglers arrested in connection with the migrant trailer death atrocity: The episode that served to epitomize the disastrous results of Joe Biden’s de facto open-border policy was the death of 53 migrants who had been smuggled into the U.S. in the back of a locked tractor trailer that was found outside San Antonio, Texas, one year ago. On Monday, four Mexican nationals were arrested in connection with the smuggling ring that transported the migrants. These arrests add to four other suspects who were arrested last year after they were found hiding near the abandoned trailer. Tragedies like this could have been avoided; instead, both Americans and migrants suffer from Biden’s border malfeasance.

• Over $200 billion in COVID relief stolen by fraudsters: According to a recently released report from the inspector general of the Small Business Administration, over $200 billion in COVID relief funding from two federal government programs was stolen by “fraudulent actors.” The report found that $136 billion was stolen from the Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program and $46 billion was stolen from the Paycheck Protection Program. Both programs were allegedly intended to help small businesses stay afloat under government-imposed lockdowns. Of note, the stolen money amounts to 17% of all the money distributed by these programs. Furthermore, this latest report marks a significant increase from the previous estimate of stolen funds that was reported as $106 billion. Bob Westbrooks, the former executive director of the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee, blasted the federal government’s gross mismanagement: “The government can walk and chew gum at the same time. They should have put basic fraud controls in place to verify people’s identity and to make sure targeted relief was getting into the right hands.”

• Moms for Liberty receive threats due to SPLC targeting: Thanks to the leftist, hate-promoting Southern Poverty Law Center targeting the parental rights group Moms for Liberty with its infamous “hate map,” cofounder Tina Descovich noted that she has had to hire extra security for the group’s annual summit scheduled for later this week in Philadelphia. “The Southern Poverty Law Center has put a target on the back of every mom that wants to stand up and speak out on behalf of her child and we take that very seriously so we have invested in extra security,” Descovich explained. “We have received numerous threats. We receive threats all the time and forward them to appropriate law enforcement.” The venue Moms for Liberty contracted for the summit, Museum of the American Revolution, has come under a pressure campaign from leftists seeking to get the event canceled. Democrat State Representative Nikil Saval sent a letter to the museum calling for cancellation, stating, “Moms for Liberty, put plainly, is a hate group.” Thus far, the museum has stood firm by its contract.

Headlines

• Supreme Court rejects “independent state legislature” theory, finds state courts can rule on federal elections (National Review)

• New York Times confirms IRS whistleblower claim about Hunter Biden probe, buries in 21st paragraph of report (Fox News)

• White House claims Biden inviting Hunter to state dinners is “no different” than any previous president (Daily Wire)

• FBI Director Christopher Wray will testify before House Judiciary Committee (Daily Caller)

• Embracing “Bidenomics” term, president seeks credit for economy (Roll Call)

• Foreigners overstaying their visas hits “record number” under Joe Biden (Breitbart)

• New York City is housing more illegal migrants than homeless people (Daily Caller)

• China created COVID-19 as a “bioweapon,” Wuhan researcher claims (Jerusalem Post)

• Republicans urge Blinken to end science and technology cooperation with China (National Review)

• White House blames technical glitch for removal of Jean-Pierre’s hostile exchange with reporter (Fox News)

• Maryland school district bans parents from board meeting on policy restricting parental rights (Free Beacon)

• Disney has lost nearly $900 million at box office due to its recent woke flops (Not the Bee)

• Jail guard misconduct led to pedophile Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide, scathing DOJ report finds (NY Post)

• Policy: Russia’s uprising is a serious threat to China as well (AEI)

• Humor: NYC mandates all pizza must be cooked under a bathroom hand dryer (Babylon Bee)

• Related humor: Trump indicted in New York for eating pizza cooked in wood-burning oven (Babylon Bee)

For more editors’ choice headlines, click here.