PITTSBURGH—In his inaugural letter to residents of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Sen. Dave McCormick, R-Pa., said that after his first year in office, he believed it was important to hold himself accountable to the people he represents in the U.S. Senate for both his accomplishments and his shortcomings. In an interview with the Washington Examiner, McCormick said that accountability has been a constant throughout his life—from his days as a high school wrestler, to his service in the military, to his career in business—requiring him to assess where he succeeded and where he needed to improve honestly. “Being accountable was the standard I held myself to, and I believe it is my obligation to set the same standard of accountability serving in the U.S. Senate,” McCormick said, adding that “the people of our state deserve that.” McCormick won what many viewed as an improbable victory over three-term Democratic incumbent Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., and he was determined to hit the ground running from the moment he was sworn in. Even before taking office, McCormick, joined by his wife, Dina Powell, sat down for an hourslong dinner with soon-to-be Democratic colleague Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., and his wife, Gisele, at a Brazilian restaurant in Pittsburgh, a meeting that was later shared on social media. Within two weeks of being sworn in, he had opened seven offices across the state with a focus on serving constituents everywhere. “Constituent services are so important to the people of Pennsylvania. That is one of our most important jobs,” McCormick told me at the time. By year’s end, McCormick said his office had closed more than 4,400 constituent cases, saving Pennsylvanians an estimated $15.7 million. In his letter, he added that he has sought to bring the outsider perspective he developed as a West Point graduate, military officer and CEO to his work in the Senate. “That kind of accountability does not exist in Washington, where elected officials almost never admit mistakes or acknowledge when they have fallen short,” McCormick’s letter reads. “To that end, I am pleased to deliver this annual report to the people of Pennsylvania—a letter to the constituents evaluating the progress we’ve made compared to my promises, the challenges we still face, and what I see as the path ahead.” McCormick earned praise in Pennsylvania and nationwide for hosting the state’s first Energy Summit at Carnegie Mellon University in July, which brought together leading figures from academia, the energy sector and business development. The event was attended by President Donald Trump, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and several Cabinet members, and it culminated in commitments of billions of dollars in investment for data centers. He also played a role in Trump’s historic decision regarding the Nippon-U.S. Steel deal and worked closely with Fetterman on several issues over the past year. McCormick said, despite the historically busy year in the Senate, in which they have been in session for 197 days, he was still able to make 185 different stops across the Commonwealth. McCormick said his accomplishments included casting votes for the “Working Families Tax Cut Act,” which he said secured major new tax cuts, expanded child care tax credits, eliminated taxes on tips and overtime, established $1,000 Trump accounts, and cosponsored a new school choice tax credit. McCormick noted in his statement that the first bill he introduced was cosponsored with Fetterman and focused on coordinating fentanyl enforcement. “Bipartisanship is hard to come by in Washington,” he wrote, “but there is no reason we cannot build consensus around sound ideas to stop fentanyl. I am devoting significant effort to this problem.” McCormick said he was not afraid to be blunt when he disagreed with his colleagues, such as parts of the “DOGE” effort to cut spending, excise waste, and unwind bureaucracy. “I did not always agree with how the administration went about it and said so publicly. I criticized the disruptions to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other research funding and lobbied, alongside colleagues, to release it,” he said. “And, when the tariffs uniquely harmed Pennsylvanians, such as the levies on cocoa, I worked with the Administration to roll them back. I also publicly challenged and encouraged Governor Shapiro, with whom I have built a productive working relationship, to opt into the new school choice tax credit to create equality of opportunity for all families in the Commonwealth.” 2026 COPYRIGHT CREATORS.COM We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Dave McCormick Pens Inaugural Letter to Pennsylvania Voters appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Many popular movies make a constructive point: If you work hard enough and push through tough times, you can achieve your dreams. In “The Pursuit of Happyness,” a struggling father tells his son, “Don’t let anyone tell you, you can’t do something.” The movie is a true story about a man who overcomes homelessness and gets his dream job. In “Rocky Balboa,” Rocky says, “It’s not about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.” These are good messages. They fit my libertarian philosophy. We libertarians believe people try harder and do best when individuals are free to pursue their own dreams. In my new video, I interview libertarian Timothy Sandefur, author of the new book, “You Don’t Own Me.” He says, “The title comes from the famous song by Leslie Gore, saying, I’m in charge of my own desires, dreams. I’m responsible for my own self.” “That’s kind of obvious.” I point out. “It should be,” he replies. “Unfortunately, a lot of people ignore this and say, you’re responsible for other people, or other people must be responsible for you.” He gives examples from Hollywood. “The original ‘Wizard of Oz’ movie is this optimistic, joyful film about somebody who always had the strength within her to accomplish her dreams.” But the recent “Wizard of Oz,” “Wicked,” focuses on the Wicked Witch, who is a victim because she’s green. Her dream isn’t to do anything; it’s for others to accept her. “Very different from a film in which the character wants to accomplish something,” says Sandefur. She rejects the wizard’s offer of a seat by his side, instead asking him to help society. Sandefur says the message is, “We should not pursue our own dreams. Instead, curtail our own behavior for the benefit of society.” Likewise, in the latest “Wonder Woman” sequel, the villain grants individuals’ wishes, but that threatens the world. So Wonder Woman tells everyone to give up their wishes. That saves the day. As Sandefur puts it: “We should not want things, not desire or dream things, and that will save the world.” The flop “Strange World” is a kid’s movie about a society that relies on a power source called Pando. Leftist scriptwriters, selling climate hysteria, have the hero say: “If we want to survive, Pando has to go.” The good guys happily destroy their main source of energy. Sandefur mocks the stupidity, “Living without today’s energy technology doesn’t just mean doing without warm coffee. It means doing without ambulances when you have a heart attack, doing without an airplane to carry people’s organ transplants. Doing without today’s energy technology would be a colossal disaster for the human race. Yet the movie kind of ridicules that concern.” When woke movies fail, Hollywood often blames the audience. After remaking “Charlie’s Angels,” director Elizabeth Banks said, if this movie doesn’t make money, it’s because “men don’t go see women do action movies.” But that’s just dumb. Didn’t Banks notice that men helped make the original “Charlie’s Angels” TV series a hit? Did she not notice “Kill Bill,” “Aliens,” “Tomb Raider,” “Resident Evil”—lots of successful action movies feature female leads. “The reality,” says Sandefur, “is that people are not interested in another lame remake that satisfies all the politically correct tests.” “Films that are individualistic,” he adds, “tend to be very successful.” But “Hollywood wants to propagandize to us about the evils of individualism.” To Sandefur, the best message is: “My life is mine. I don’t exist to make other people happy.” “Sounds selfish,” I say. “It is, but it’s also true that I might want to spend my life helping other people that I love, my wife and my kids. When it comes down to it, my life belongs to me.” COPYRIGHT 2026 CREATORS.COM We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Hollywood vs Individualism appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Society has spent decades telling boys that masculinity is toxic, and now there’s a shortage of skilled tradesmen. The connection should be obvious.   Through his on-again, off-again tariff dance, President Donald Trump has made one thing clear: He wants more things built in America. He’s bragged about already securing more investment dollar commitments than former President Joe Biden did during his entire term. And he wants more.   Trump has long championed the rural communities devastated by factory shutdowns. It’s one reason that he has enjoyed such strong support in Middle America. In his speech at the Republican National Convention last year, now-Vice President J.D. Vance detailed the importance of remembering that America is both a “nation” and “our homeland.”  The hardworking people I grew up with “love this country, not only because it’s a good idea, but because in their bones they know that this is their home,” he said. He continued, “This is the source of America’s greatness.”  This is why Trump and Vance are so determined to rejuvenate American industry. But there’s a major obstacle to accomplishing this—a shortage of skilled workers.   “For every five tradespeople that retire, two enter the workforce,” Mike Rowe, host of “Dirty Jobs,” wrote in 2024. “That’s a 5:2 ratio, and the math is simply not sustainable.”  It’s not for lack of opportunity. For instance, the Navy Industrial Submarine Base needs to hire 100,000 skilled tradesmen within the next decade. But the companies working there are struggling to find enough qualified employees.  One reason is that society has relentlessly pushed students toward college. Former President Ronald Reagan once said, “If you want more of something, subsidize it.” And the government has, dumping trillions of dollars into higher education over the decades.   Sure enough. College enrollment more than doubled from 1972 to 2022, growing from 9.2 million to 18.6 million. In 1972, around a quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds were enrolled in college. In 2022, it was 39%.  This hasn’t just limited the potential pool of future welders and plumbers. It’s sent the message that those careers are second-rate. That they’re only for people who aren’t smart enough for college.   It’s a terrible and false message. It may not earn you a high SAT score, but understanding how wiring, pipes and parts work in the real world is a much-needed type of intelligence. Men working with their hands literally built the country.   There’s a more fundamental issue here, too. The skilled trades continue to be dominated by men. This isn’t the result of a patriarchal society but innate differences between men and women. Men are stronger than women. They’re more mechanically minded. They’re more interested in working with their hands. They’re more willing to do dangerous and dirty jobs, like building the Hoover Dam.   This doesn’t make men superior to women. It makes men and women different. Women have their own set of strengths, including better language and social skills. Modern feminists rarely praise pregnancy, but growing a baby inside of you is the closest thing human beings have to a superpower.   But society doesn’t nurture the unique strengths of boys. Most schools want little boys to act like little girls. Doctors prescribe Ritalin to boys who can’t sit still. Male students see their success in areas like mathematics and engineering dismissed as the result of systemic sexism, not their achievements. Compounding this problem is the growing number of boys living in homes without their fathers.   Little wonder so many men—and potential skilled tradesmen—have disengaged. The labor force participation rate for men 25-54 hit 98% in 1954. In November, it was under 90%.   Masculinity isn’t toxic. It’s what built this country. And rebuilding American industry requires celebrating masculinity, not attacking it.   COPYRIGHT 2026 CREATORS.COM  We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post America Needs More Masculinity  appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Is the United States about to invade Greenland? If you listen to EU politicians and much of the U.S. legacy media, and actually take them seriously, then you might answer “yes.” President Donald Trump is going to unleash Delta Force to spirit away the prime minister before we nuke Nuuk (the capital of Greenland) and send in the Army to mop up survivors. If you’ve followed this issue from the beginning and have tried to accurately understand how the president operates, then you should conclude that this brouhaha is all about negotiating. You also may think that the U.S. is just pursuing a long-term policy more vigorously, and that our allies in Europe really need to chill. The issue of Greenland suddenly popped back up in the news recently, and I kid you not, because White House adviser Stephen Miller’s wife posted this on X. SOON pic.twitter.com/XU6VmZxph3— Katie Miller (@KatieMiller) January 3, 2026 This sent the European elite straight to their oft-used fainting couches, which they had to stay firmly emplaced on when Trump himself weighed in and said he still aims to acquire Greenland. This has been his goal since 2019 and has been, off and on, a U.S. strategic aim since the 19th century. When White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked if Trump meant to use the military to acquire Greenland, she said that “utilizing the U.S. military is always an option.” Was Katie Miller being a bit of a troll? Yes. Is Trump putting Denmark’s collective feet to the fire with his aggressive insistence? Yes. Here’s Austria’s Gunther Fehlinger-Jahn, the chairman of a committee to bring his country into NATO, saying that European countries should seize U.S. bases on the continent if the U.S. takes Greenland. NEW: If the U.S. annexes Greenland, we must confiscate all American bases in Europe, says Austria's NATO enlargement committee chairman Fehlinger."If you take Greenland, you have to leave". pic.twitter.com/FYzd3hATpY— Election Wizard (@ElectionWiz) January 7, 2026 Keep in mind, the U.S. has been practically begging NATO allies to spend more on their defense, so this is hardly a credible threat. It’s also strange to witness European belligerence on these issues when European countries continue to demand increased American involvement in Ukraine. For those less hysterical than the very serious Western elites who go into a tizzy any time President Donald Trump says something outside their bland, corporate, and respectfully conventional framework, it’s worth taking a step back and considering what’s really happening. Trump is basically using his well-worn tactics as a negotiator to secure a long-term goal of the U.S. He has made it plain from the beginning that he intends to buy Greenland from Denmark. Secretary of State Marco Rubio reportedly communicated as much, assuring lawmakers that the administration’s intent was not to invade the sparsely populated, North American island owned by a NATO ally. I’d hazard to guess Trump’s reason for potentially using the military is because he virtually always says as much. It is an option, one that he would almost certainly never take. What he wants is to create maximum urgency on the part of a negotiating partner to get a deal done. And that’s what he’s done in the Greenland case. We are closer to acquiring the territory than any time since World War II despite Danish and European protests. And that’s a good thing. I’ve written about why Greenland is important for the interests of the American people as far as security, economics, and even to a certain extent national pride. Bringing the island territory fully into the American orbit is not just a pointless media stunt. It has real implications for U.S. strategy vis-à-vis major competitors like Russia and China, countries that have a keen desire to have access to and control of the Arctic. China has already made overtures to Greenland to control and mine its rare earths mineral deposits.  Is the current security arrangement enough to keep China out and America in? Maybe. But consider this, on top of the current tension it’s clear that there is a significant independence movement within Greenland. It’s very possible that the tiny population may go independent, enter the “market” so to speak, and seek out an arrangement with a rival of the United States. The issue can be seen in this joint statement issued by Denmark and a coalition of European countries. BREAKING: Joint statement by European countries on Greenland pic.twitter.com/9ODVJzIRAo— The Spectator Index (@spectatorindex) January 6, 2026 Denmark committed years ago to accepting any decision the people of Greenland make about their independence. If Greenland, with a population of around 56,000 people, decides to go independent they can do so theoretically without the Danes stopping it. And as of now, independence is quite popular. But Greenland is also highly dependent on Danish subsidies for its economy and welfare state. What’s to prevent Greenland from going independent and then selling itself to the highest bidder? At the moment, not much. And given how much pressure Trump is globally putting on U.S. rivals it makes sense that he’s essentially playing hardball to ensure that Greenland remains and becomes an even more integral part of U.S. national security. Trump was quite serious about the return of the Monroe Doctrine, or the “Donroe Doctrine” as he calls it. Nothing personal to the Danes, who have been good allies, or other European nations who’ve been, well, uneven allies. This is just how Trump does business, don’t take it personally. The post Europe Needs to Calm Down About Greenland appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Now that the nation’s attention has turned to Minnesota and its massive welfare fraud – fraud so large (referred to as “industrial-scale” by the assistant U.S. attorney, possibly as much as $9 billion) that Democratic Gov. Tim Walz felt compelled to end his bid for reelection—we should take the opportunity to investigate the possibility of a different kind of fraud, the fraud made possible by Walz’s signature on the so-called “Driver’s Licenses for All” law, which enabled illegal immigrants in Minnesota to receive driver’s licenses from the state. Let’s be clear about what this policy represents. It’s not compassion. It is not common sense. It is not public safety. It is an open invitation to chaos, fraud, and the further erosion of confidence in our civic institutions. A driver’s license is not just permission to operate a motor vehicle. In modern America, it is one of the most powerful identity documents a person can possess. It opens doors—literally and figuratively. It allows easier access to banking services, rental agreements, government buildings, employment verification processes, and, yes, in many cases, even voter registration systems. When a state hands out official credentials to individuals who are in the country illegally, it is effectively laundering unlawful status into something that looks legitimate. Walz and his allies insisted this policy would make roads safe. That claim collapses under even minimal scrutiny. Driving safely depends on focus and awareness, obedience to the rules, and vehicle readiness for the road, not on redefining who is eligible for official identification. Public safety does not require the state to reward illegal behavior with government-issued credentials. On the contrary, it requires the consistent enforcement of the law. Vehicle crash data from Minnesota strongly support the contention that granting illegal immigrants driver’s licenses, despite Walz’s assertion, does not increase public safety. In 2022, there were 444 traffic fatalities in Minnesota. In 2023, that number fell to  402. But in 2024—the first full year the new “Driver’s Licenses for All” policy was in effect—the number of traffic fatalities jumped almost 20%, to 475. But the most troubling consequence of this driver’s license policy is not traffic safety. It is the risk it introduces to the integrity of elections and public programs. Minnesota, like many states, increasingly relies on identity-based systems for voter registration. While supporters of this bill protest that non-citizens are already denied the ability to vote legally, that is not the point. The issue is vulnerability. When you dramatically expand access to state-issued IDs for people whose presence in the country cannot be legally verified, you dramatically expand the opportunity for misuse, error, and fraud. Confidence in elections depends on safeguards. It depends on citizens believing that only eligible voters are participating and that the system is not being manipulated. Policies like handing out driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants undermine that confidence—not because every recipient will act in bad faith, but because the system is being made more porous by design. This is not hypothetical. State IDs are routinely used to register to vote. They are used to access absentee ballot processes. Expanding eligibility without corresponding enforcement and verification measures creates risk. Responsible governance requires minimizing risk, not dismissing it – and certainly not enlarging it. Beyond elections, the policy opens the door to broader identity fraud. A state driver’s license can be used to obtain credit, enter secure buildings, and access public benefits. Once issued, it becomes exceedingly difficult to revoke. When the state blurs the line between lawful residents and those who entered illegally, it creates downstream consequences for taxpayers and communities who are already stretched thin. This is a pattern we see again and again from progressive leaders: redefine the law to accommodate illegal behavior, then scold anyone who raises concerns as heartless or extreme. But there is nothing heartless about expecting the law to mean what it says, and there is nothing extreme about insisting that citizenship and legal presence still matter. Americans are a generous people. We welcome legal immigrants who follow the rules, work hard, and contribute to our communities. What we cannot accept is a government that, rather than enforcing the law, finds ways to accommodate those who break it. Walz’s decision to sign that bill sent exactly the wrong message. It told illegal immigrants that the state government would step in to shield them from the consequences of federal law. It told citizens that their concerns about election integrity and public safety were secondary to ideological virtue-signaling. And it told taxpayers that they would be expected to absorb the costs—financial and civic—of policies they never asked for. The Tea Party movement was born from a simple conviction: government must be accountable to the people, and the rule of law must apply equally to everyone. Minnesota’s driver’s license policy violates both principles. If we want a country that works, we must stop pretending that laws are optional and borders are meaningless. Walz may call his driver’s license policy progress. The rest of us know better.Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation The post Minnesota’s Dangerous Surrender of the Rule of Law appeared first on The Daily Signal.