Joe Biden’s then-White House chief of staff told a congressional panel Thursday that he asked the White House physician about a full medical and cognitive exam after Biden’s disastrous June 2024 debate with Donald Trump.  Jeff Zients is the last scheduled witness to take questions from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee for its investigation into Biden’s fitness while he was in office. Zients said that Dr. Kevin O’Connor told him he would take the suggestion under advisement, according to a person familiar with Zients’ closed-door interview with the committee.  Zients was White House chief of staff from February 2023 to the end of Biden’s term in January 2025. He ignored reporters who peppered him with questions as he walked into the interview with the committee. He told the committee that after Biden’s poor debate performance against Trump, he thought it made sense for the president to drop out of the reelection race. The House committee has been investigating Biden’s cognitive state and whether staff improperly used the White House autopen for major presidential actions, such as offering clemency to felons, without authorization from the president.  Zients also said the former president’s son, Hunter Biden, was involved in the pardon discussions and attended meetings on the matter, according to the person familiar with the interview. The then-president pardoned Hunter Biden, who had been convicted on tax and gun crimes. Zients told the committee that when he began as chief of staff, first lady Jill Biden asked that he ensure her husband get more rest and not be overscheduled. He said that for Biden, decisions previously required three meetings and then eventually started requiring a fourth. The 46th president’s difficulty recalling names and dates also got worse, Zients told the panel, according to a person familiar with the transcribed interview.  On Thursday morning, House Oversight Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., was speaking to reporters briefly as Zients walked through the Rayburn House Office Building. Comer stepped away, and the two men shook hands.  The committee has had transcribed interviews with more than a dozen former White House officials in Biden’s inner circle about his mental fitness for office. The interviews were not under oath, but it is illegal to lie to Congress.  Three other officials would not voluntarily sit for interviews and had to be subpoenaed and ultimately invoked their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination. They were O’Connor, the Biden White House physician; Anthony Bernal, former senior adviser to first lady Jill Biden; and Annie Tomasini, former deputy director of Oval Office operations.  Zients said he spoke to all three after the Trump debate.  He said he and Tomasini discussed tailoring Biden’s schedule and limiting walking distances and the number of stairs he needed to climb, according to the person familiar with the interview.  When it came to Biden’s appearances, Zients recalled telling Bernal about the need to consider location settings, the frequency of events, and interactions with attendees. Still, like previous witnesses, Zients blamed Biden’s poor debate performance on having a cold. Nevertheless, he admitted he had seen Biden with a cold before but had never observed him act the way he did at the debate. He recalled that Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, also thought that Biden should drop out of the race.  Zients said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, and Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough all had concerns about Biden getting reelected. The post Biden Chief of Staff Had Suggested Cognitive Exam, Recalls Concerns From Cabinet appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. Something is happening in the United States and, I think, worldwide too. It’s almost as if there were fuel and the death of Charlie Kirk ignited it. It’s not a George Floyd movement at all, or moment. We’ve talked about that. It’s very different. It’s building up frustration. It’s not a top-down DEI mandate. It’s a grassroots kind of collective shrug throughout Western civilization. And I guess it could be characterized as enough is enough. We’re witnessing large-scale demonstrations in Ireland, Great Britain. The government of France has fallen, and French President Emmanuel Macron will have to appoint a new prime minister. There is unrest in the Netherlands. We used to think, during the Cold War, that Eastern Europe was supposedly backward, politically, under the Soviet sway, economically stagnant. But since the Cold War, and especially lately, the Eastern Europeans seem the most sensible of all Westerners. They believe in tradition. They believe in borders. They believe in legal-only immigration. They believe in fossil fuel development. And they have strong militaries because they’ve experienced Soviet aggression and German aggression in the past. And yet, they also are having a reinforcing moment. What is this moment? We’re seeing it in the United States with thousands of people commemorating the death of Charlie Kirk. There’s no tolerance for the usual left-wing, socialist craziness, the abhorrent, violent smears of conservatives who’ve died. And you don’t see major bureaucrats, or generals, or Hollywood figures—increasingly, they’re not coming out and rejoicing because they feel that they’re going to get a big pushback. This is not violent. It’s just a collective shrug. And what is the shrug, basically? It’s saying we’re tolerant of people with alternate lifestyles. But whether we like it or not, the nuclear two-parent family, for 2,500 years, has ensured the survival of Western civilization. It gives us two to three to four children, and we can reproduce the species. We’re tolerant of Islam and Buddhism, Hinduism. We have a multiracial, multicultural population. But whether we like it or not, the foundations of the United States are Judeo-Christian, as they are of Western civilization in general. We have no apologies for that. Sermon on the Mount is a unique document. We also are tired of what I call boutique anti-Americanism. We see Rep. Ilhan Omar suggesting that our elected government is worse than the dictatorship in Somalia; or we see Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez calling President Donald Trump a fascist, as she has in the past; or we see Rep. Rashida Tlaib just demonizing and damning the United States, even though her parents fled the Middle East to come here. And we’re tired of it. It doesn’t mean we’re gonna outlaw free speech or try to use the same tactics as the critics of America do. But what we’re saying is, we’re a unique place. We’re better than the alternative. We don’t have to be perfect to be good. So, you can say all you want, but we’re gonna not just ignore you, we’re gonna do our best to make sure your voices have no influence. And that’s why people are taking to the street in Europe. They’re saying an open border and illegal immigration brings in millions of people from the Middle East. They have no proven desire that they wish to readily assimilate, integrate into a culture and a civilization that they feel is antithetical to that of their home. And that presents a paradox because they voted with their feet to join the West, but they want to bring their culture and values into the West, which, if they were successful, would mean that the West would look like their homelands, of which they have forsaken. Doesn’t make sense. But we see the same thing in the United States. We have an open southern border. We’re criticized by immigrants that come across. And yet, if we were to embrace the values and culture of Latin America and turn the United States into Latin America, then the immigrants would not wish to leave Latin America to find another Latin America. The Left cannot deal with that paradox. But we can on the conservative side. So, we’re saying open borders do not work. We’re saying that if you dismantle natural gas, energy, if you dismantle oil, if you dismantle nuclear power, and you choose to subsidize inefficient and unreliable solar and wind, then you’re going to be a pre-civilizational society. Germany was the juggernaut of Europe, and now it’s a pathetic weakling, economically. Why? Because its energy costs are four times what they used to be. And it’s not a competitive country. So, what I’m getting at is people throughout the West say we’ve sat still where we had open borders. We have let in millions of people that do not like us and do not share our values. We have opted for economic irrationalism that has, in suicidal fashion, harmed our economies and hurt our lifestyles. We have embraced critical legal theory, critical race theory, that suggested the criminal is a victim rather than a victimizer. And we see the effects. And the verdict is in, it doesn’t work. And we see that our governments, our bureaucracy, our culture, at large, doesn’t want to hear this message. And we know they’re influential in the media, in the corporate boardroom, in the university. But they don’t have one thing. They don’t represent 51% of the people. And crowds are now marching in Europe, in the United States. And the message is: What has worked in the past does not have to be perfect, as I said, it’s better than the alternative. And we’re gonna return to it. And we wish you would join us. But if you don’t wanna join us and you want to dismantle Western civilization, or you hate the United States, or you despise your particular European country, then you’re gonna be voted out of office, and you’re gonna have zero political power, as it should be. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Western Civilization Has Reached a Turning Point After Charlie Kirk’s Death appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The crowdfunding platform GoFundMe is reviewing fundraising campaigns to remove any fundraiser that celebrates political violence in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination. While most Americans seem to have reacted to Kirk’s death at Utah Valley University with shock and dismay, some on the Left celebrated it, including Bernadette “Bird” Bowen, a professor who earned a Ph.D. in media and communication in 2022. Bowen reacted to Kirk’s death with this message: “Ding ding the Nazi’s dead, the wicked Nazi. Which old Nazi? The wicked Nazi!” Ding ding the Nazi’s dead, the wicked Nazi. Which old Nazi? The wicked Nazi!https://t.co/0LldJh4Wyq— Bernadette "bird" Bowen, PhD??? (@bbirdbPhD) September 10, 2025 “Charlie Kirk was not your everyday person,” she wrote in another post. “Any false conflation of him with that rhetoric is seriously bulls—. He was a Nazi, with a net worth of $12 million. And now, he’s not. Love that for us.” Bowen created a GoFundMe campaign seeking funds for “rent, food, and monthly bills,” saying that Western Governors University fired her after she criticized the university’s president for expressing sympathy with Kirk. “Hi, general anti-fascist Internet community,” her GoFundMe message opens. “The neo-nazis just got what they wanted.” “Western Governors University VP Casey Clark just fired me for calling out President Scott D. Pulsipher’s Charlie Kirk sympathizing at the start of our All Hands meeting on 9.11.25,” she wrote. Clark does indeed serve as vice president of academic operations for the university’s business school, and Pulsifer is the president. “WGU does not discuss individual personnel matters,” a university spokesperson told The Daily Signal. Bowen’s GoFundMe page features an image with the text, “Tears for Neo-Nazis don’t belong in higher education.” “Thanks to billionaire greed, despite my PhD, research expertise, publications, content, and 4 books, I have nothing saved and lived in perpetual millennial debt poverty, even during this job,” the fired professor wrote. “If I don’t get help from community I will be homeless / starving / dead just like the neo-nazis want.” She described herself as “an autistic, non-binary neuroqueer leftist, COVID-19 realistic, ex-academic, author, and content creator.” Her GoFundMe campaign repeated condemnations of Kirk and his allies, whom she branded “fascist” and “Neo-Nazi.” As of Thursday afternoon, Bowen has raised $2,701 of her $26,000 goal, and 95 people have contributed since she launched it three days ago. Bowen did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment about concerns that her celebration of political violence may violate the platform’s terms of service. GoFundMe’s Response “Our hearts go out to the Kirk family and everyone impacted by this tragedy,” a GoFundMe spokesperson told The Daily Signal in a statement Thursday. “Our team is swiftly reviewing fundraisers related to this horrific shooting to ensure they are verified and that funds are safely delivered to the intended beneficiaries.” “We have zero tolerance for the celebration of political violence,” the company added. “Our Trust & Safety team reviews both the content on a fundraiser page and how the funds will be used when determining whether a fundraiser violates our terms of service.” Those terms “explicitly prohibit fundraisers for the legal defense of a violent crime, and any attempted fundraisers for the suspected shooter will be swiftly removed from the platform and fully refunded.” GoFundMe did not address Bowen’s fundraiser. The post ‘ZERO TOLERANCE’: GoFundMe Is ‘Swiftly Reviewing Fundraisers’ to Remove Any Celebration of Political Violence appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok temporarily banned an independent news outlet after flagging two videos in which lawmakers pay tribute to Charlie Kirk in the wake of his assassination. TikTok flagged two videos from Off The Press, an independent news brand “for Americans who feel the mainstream media ignores the stories they care about most,” as violating “Community Guidelines.” TikTok later told Off The Press that its account—which had nearly 40,000 followers—had been permanently banned. The social media platform restored the account Wednesday, but flagged a third video, leaving Off The Press vulnerable to another ban. “As social media platforms emerge as the dominant source of news for Americans, it is absolutely critical that moderation is conducted fairly and reasonably,” Off The Press Managing Editor Julian Baron told The Daily Signal in a statement Thursday. “What we’ve seen from TikTok is arbitrary takedowns of important news content, specifically videos of lawmakers making remarks on Capitol Hill. That cannot be the norm.” “This sends a chilling message about how much control social media companies have over our public discourse and how easily it can be mismanaged or abused,” he added. Violating TikTok ‘Community Guidelines’ TikTok flagged an Off The Press video featuring Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., urging the House of Representatives to pray in response to news that Kirk, who founded the conservative youth grassroots organization Turning Point USA, had been shot last week. Off The Press posted the video last Wednesday and appealed TikTok’s adverse decision on Friday, and the social media platform rejected the appeal about a half-hour later. Off The Press Screenshot TikTok also flagged a video featuring Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., saying he is sending thoughts to Kirk’s family. The company said the news outlet’s post violated its “Community Guidelines.” Off The Press Screenshot On Saturday, TikTok banned the news outlet’s account. Off The Press Screenshot After The Daily Caller and The Daily Signal reached out to TikTok for comment, the social media company restored the account, but it flagged as “ineligible for recommendation” a video of Melania Trump, the first lady, responding to Kirk’s death. Screenshot TikTok did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment about how these posts may have violated its “Community Guidelines.” The guidelines encourage “Safety and Civility,” stating, “We don’t allow threats, encouragement or glorification of violence, promotion of crime, or instructions on how to commit harmful acts.” The guidelines also forbid “content that promotes hate or attacks people based on protected attributes like race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.” Nothing in the guidelines suggests videos of lawmakers’ responses of sympathy and prayer after a shooting would violate them. Americans ‘Deserve to Know’ “Americans deserve to know exactly what their elected lawmakers are saying—unfiltered and without bias,” Baron told The Daily Signal. “That’s what we strive to provide at Off The Press. Any roadblocks in accomplishing that mission, especially from social media companies, are a threat to the free and fair flow of information.” “The tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk was a moment of national mourning and fear,” Baron added. “At times like this, the public seeks guidance and leadership from their elected officials. There is nothing controversial about connecting Americans with their lawmakers, especially during instances of national tragedy.” Questions About TikTok “TikTok is a weapon of the Chinese Communist Party,” Wes Hodges, acting director of The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Technology and the Human Person, told Politico this week. ByteDance, the social media platform’s parent company, operates out of Beijing, and under Chinese law, all China-based companies must make data available to the Chinese Communist Party. Last year, Congress passed a law banning TikTok if it did not divest from ByteDance within nine months. In January, the Supreme Court upheld the law and affirmed that TikTok must divest from ByteDance or face expulsion from American mobile application stores.   Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has signed multiple executive orders extending the deadline for the U.S. TikTok ban, signing the latest extension on Tuesday.  Once critical of the platform, Trump now claims it is important for his younger supporters. The White House joined the platform last month. TikTok did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment by publication time. The post ‘CHILLING’: TikTok Bans Independent News Outlet Over Lawmaker Speeches About Charlie Kirk appeared first on The Daily Signal.

As Congress faces an end-of-September deadline to fund the federal government and avoid a shutdown, Democrats are making big demands on health care—including undoing Medicaid reforms and extending COVID-era tax credits. Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, D-Mich., joined fellow Democrats at a press conference Thursday in demanding an extension of expiring health care premium tax credits instituted under then-President Joe Biden. “We are standing at a precipice, where almost 20 million people across this country are about to lose a health care tax cut,” said Rivet. “I have authored a letter where we saw 36 Democratic battleground members sign on, calling on leadership and calling on Republicans to join us in reinstating the [Affordable Care Act] tax credit.” Those enhanced tax credits have emerged as a main issue for Democrats, many of whom are seeking to use their shutdown leverage to force Republicans to extend them before they expire at the end of the year. The credits were introduced during Biden’s administration under the American Rescue Plan Act to subsidize the cost of health care premiums as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and then were further extended, and set to expire at the end of 2025 by Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act—which no Republican voted for. The Democrat legislation expanded the reach of the health care tax credit to higher earners, while also boosting the savings it provided. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., while not ruling out an extension, has signaled he’s not a fan of the policy and doesn’t feel a need to address it in the seven-week stopgap funding bill he is pushing to keep the government open. A shutdown could lead to federal employees not being paid and federal government services being cut off. “They don’t expire until the end of the year, and so we have until December to figure that all out,” Johnson told reporters Tuesday. “Republicans have concerns about those policies, if you look at how much they’ve been abused … . People make $600,000 a year and get a government subsidy for their health care.” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images) The Daily Signal asked McDonald Rivet if she thought Democrats should demand an extension be added to the seven-week spending bill, and what she thought of Johnson saying that discussion can wait. “It’s easy to say that the discussion can wait when you’re not worried about paying your premium payments, but people are going to get these bills now,” she told The Daily Signal.  “What’s important is that we stand with the American people, and we fix this right now,” she continued, saying that the extension cannot “get caught in the various morass of what’s happening in Congress—processes, by the way, that most American families don’t know anything about … . We just have to move. The rest of it is just political mumbo-jumbo that we hear out of Congress.” A reporter then asked a colleague, Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., if Democrats would shut down the government over the issue. Democrats have shutdown leverage in the Senate, where Republicans would need at least seven votes from their caucus to bring a spending bill to a vote. “That’s the Republicans’ choice,” Horsford replied. “They control the House, the Senate, and the White House. They have the power, but they also have the choice, and it’s because of the cuts to health care that we are facing this dire situation with a potential Republican shutdown.” But it appears that even if Democrats had their demands on the extension fulfilled by Republicans, that would not guarantee that the government remains open—perhaps a primary reason why Republican leadership is not so eager to attempt a deal on the matter. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev. (Jemal Countess via Getty Images) Horsford, pressed further by reporters on whether resolving that issue would avert a shutdown, laid out a laundry list of additional health care grievances. “On top of the premium tax credits, you’ve got the cuts to Medicaid, you’ve got the cuts to cancer research, you’ve got the cuts to [the National Institutes of Health], you’ve got the defunding of the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention],” he said. “You’ve got the dismantling of community health centers and rural hospitals, like the ones that I represent—two in Nevada—that could close. So, it’s not about one piece.” If Democrats do get a deal on the tax credit, it would be to the chagrin of many fiscal conservatives. “Look, the bottom line is that if the Democrats wanted them to last forever. They should have put that in the bill,” House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., previously told The Daily Signal. “COVID is over. The Democrats’ law is going to expire, and I think it should expire. It’s too expensive to renew.” The post Dems Have Big Health Care Demands in Budget Battle, But Will GOP Accede? appeared first on The Daily Signal.