THE DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—A Minnesota activist group encouraging protests against immigration enforcement will host a training to teach attendees to let guilty criminals walk. Defend the 612 will instruct viewers of the Feb. 23 virtual “Jury Nullification Training” on how to use false jury verdicts to fight “unjust laws and political persecution,” according to an event description on its website first reported by Alpha News. The Trump administration has charged hundreds of people with impeding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations around the country, including at Minneapolis protests during ICE’s enforcement surge in the Twin Cities that is now winding down after weeks of immigration arrests. Defend the 612 did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. NEW: Anti-ICE group Defend the 612 is hosting an upcoming "Jury Nullification Training" for activists. https://t.co/fzzkha3ITQ pic.twitter.com/5sRvOWInVZ— Hudson Crozier ?? (@Hudson_Crozier) February 16, 2026 “We will learn about jury nullification—or the people’s pardon—how it’s been used, ways it can stem authoritarian overreach, and how we can use it today,” Defend the 612’s event description says. The event will explore “how to legally use conscience in the courtroom to defend communities from unjust laws.” Jury nullification decisions cannot be overturned due to the Constitution’s Double Jeopardy clause, according to US Legal Forms. However, lawyers or judges could decide to keep potential jurors out of a trial during the jury selection process if they show signs of bias. Defend the 612, named after its Minneapolis area code, is sponsored by the tax-exempt group Cooperation Cannon River, the DCNF previously reported. Defend the 612’s supporters have encouraged risky confrontations with law enforcement and obstructing ICE operations at protests, City Journal reported Feb. 2. Clashes between activists and law enforcement led to two U.S. citizens dying in federal agent-involved shootings in January, sparking further calls for protests. A conservative watchdog group asked the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in January to investigate CCR for sponsoring Defend the 612, accusing CCR of “illegal activity” over protesters’ tactics in Minnesota. Defend the 612 has also announced trainings on how to monitor ICE activity in the area and “protect” potential arrestees. “Due to security and safety concerns, we do not record these trainings,” the group said in a Jan. 26 Bluesky post. Originally published by The Daily Caller News Foundation. The post Lefty Radicals Concoct Strategy to Let Anti-ICE Agitators Get Off Scot-Free appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The American people’s confidence in mass media appears to be continuing its spiral downward, according to the results of a new Pew Research Center survey. The poll found that 57% of the public has little or no confidence “in journalists to act in the best interests of the public.” Some conservatives are pointing to dwindling public trust and legacy media layoffs as the last gasp of a dying empire, but analysts say, “Not so fast.” The Pew poll results, released Wednesday, revealed that just 6% of Americans have “a great deal of confidence” that journalists have the public’s best interest in mind, with 37% having “a fair amount of confidence” (the total of 43% who say they have confidence in journalism is down from 47% in last year’s Pew survey). Meanwhile, 40% said they had “not too much confidence” and 17% had “no confidence at all” in journalistic integrity. Notably, Democrats and Democrat-leaning Independents (61%) were over twice as likely to say they had confidence in journalists than Republicans and GOP leaners (25%). The Pew results are the latest in a steady stream of polls that indicate a growing distrust of the mainstream media. An October 2025 Gallup poll found that only 28% of Americans say they trust legacy outlets a “great deal” or a “fair amount” to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly, which was down from 31% the previous year. When Gallup began polling on the question of Americans’ trust in mass media in 1972, around 70% of respondents said that they had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust. The number steadily declined over the next 50 years, dropping 42 percentage points. The public’s plunging confidence in journalist integrity of mass media and a shifting digital media landscape have sharply impacted the readership of legacy outlets. Over the last decade, Pew found that those who say they follow the news closely has dropped from 51% to 36%. In addition, online traffic to the nation’s top 100 newspapers has dropped by 45% over the last four years. The evaporating readership led The Washington Post, the nation’s third-largest newspaper, to lay off over 300 journalists last week, amounting to about 30% of its workforce. Other legacy media behemoths like NBC News have also made significant cuts to their staff in recent months. Do these ominous signs point to the impending downfall of the mainstream media? Conservative digital outlets, which have exploded in number, readership, and influence over the last two decades, have been predicting the demise of legacy media for years, citing heavy left-wing bias, the mass layoffs, and the loss of public trust via the spreading of outright lies through the Brett Kavanaugh hearing, Russiagate, COVID, the George Floyd/BLM riots, the Joe Biden senility coverup, and more. While all of this may be true, it is likely a bit premature to pronounce the death of legacy media. As veteran journalist and columnist Becket Adams pointed out in a recent National Review article, major outlets like The New York Times, the Post, and NBC, ABC, and CBS “still have institutional heft, power, and at least some perceived credibility, even if it’s not now what it once was.” Adams points to the recent fraud scandal involving Minnesota’s Somali community as an example of the power that heavyweights like The New York Times still have. Despite the fact that conservative outlets had been reporting on the scandal since at least 2018, and despite the fact that City Journal released a major report on the story in November, it wasn’t until the Times released its report on the story 10 days later that the scandal was “legitimized” in the eyes of the public and gained nationwide attention. What’s more, as Adams observes, even conservatives continue to use legacy outlets to legitimize big stories. When the scandal broke over texts Virginia Attorney General-elect Jay Jones (D) sent in which he fantasized about killing a Republican lawmaker and wishing that his children would die, a GOP ad on the subject began with, “The Washington Post confirms …” And despite the incredible rise and growing influence of conservative alternative media, few argue that they can compete with the reach, resources, and cultural influence of decades-old institutional behemoths like The New York Times (which employs 2,700 journalists) or the Associated Press (which has correspondents in 100 countries), or Reuters (which employs 2,500 global journalists). For international news in particular, it is chiefly legacy outlets that have reporters on the ground that alternative media rely on for facts. Still, as Washington Stand Editor-in-Chief Jared Bridges told TWS, the downsizing of mainstream media is a significant development. “I think what we’re seeing now is more along the lines of the legacy media taking a GLP-1 drug for weight loss. They’re trimming down quickly, but they’ll still be around, albeit in a leaner fashion. They’re necessarily a market entity, funded by ad sales and subscriptions, and we can’t ignore that they’re at the end of a significant market flex in a downward direction.” “As for the alternative media that have emerged or are still emerging, I don’t see us as a replacement,” Bridges continued. “We simply don’t have the infrastructure that’s taken decades and sometimes centuries to build. Hopefully, there will, in the long run, be some that can grow to that level, but for now, alternative media should be just that: a corrective alternative.” Originally published by The Washington Stand. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Plummeting Public Trust, Mass Layoffs: Is Legacy Media Becoming Irrelevant? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

President’s Day is an opportunity to reflect on more than just the role of the leader of our nation. Yes, this person should be an individual of strong character, strength, courage and fidelity to what is best for Americans. However, America also has a long-standing history of that office being carried out by a person of faith. The American project was built on the belief that God is real and that He created us with a dignity that no ruler ought to violate. The summer of 1783 saw much confusion and fear about the future of the country. The War of Independence had been won, but the states were still scrambling to decipher how they would interact with each other and with Congress. Before Gen. George Washington resigned from his command, he wrote a letter to all the governors (it was intended for the entire American community as well). This letter is known as the Circular Letter to the States. Washington begins, “I think it is a duty incumbent on me, to make this my last official communication, to congratulate you on the glorious events which Heaven has been pleased to produce in our favor.” Here, and in other correspondences and speeches, Washington clearly holds that God had a hand in supplying the American project with the strength to be victorious. It was in the hands of Divine Providence that they defeated Great Britain because God favors those who are oppressed. It is that divine help that he concludes his letter with as well: “I now make it my earnest prayer, that God would have you and the State over which you preside, in his holy protection that he would incline the hearts of the Citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination & obedience to Government, to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another, for their fellow Citizens of the United States at large and particularly for their brethren who have served in the field.” It is only through the lens of faith that any country can hope to frame the need to care for one’s fellow citizens. The only reason to obey government rule and love our neighbor is because they are all made in God’s image and likeness. If God is not a part of the national discussion on moral action, then we can convince ourselves that it is those in power who decide what is right and wrong. On April 30, 1789, Washington delivered his inaugural address and became the first president of the United States. His words remind us that our country was founded by and fought for by noble, courageous, and faithful men who were grounded in God’s providential care. “It would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official Act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the Universe … and whose providential aids can supply every human defect.” Washington knew that even as the American experiment was launched into existence, they were only able to arrive at this moment because of God’s hand. Without reference to the need for God and the importance of faith for our country, we risk becoming lost concerning who the human person is and what it means to live as a nation. Washington was our first president but also the first in a long line of leaders of our country who spoke vocally about faith, prayer and the need for God. John Quincy Adams, the sixth president, spoke of his daily commitment to prayer: “My custom is to read four or five chapters of the Bible every morning immediately after rising. It seems to me the most suitable manner of beginning the day. It is an invaluable and inexhaustible mine of knowledge and virtue.” In his remarks to the Baltimore Presbyterian Synod, Oct. 24, 1863, Abraham Lincoln said: “Nevertheless, amid the greatest difficulties of my administration, when I could not see any other resort, I would place my whole reliance on God, knowing that all would go well, and that He would decide for the right.” Ulysses S. Grant had a deep reverence for the Bible and once said: “Hold fast to the Bible as the sheet-anchor of your liberties; write its precepts in your hearts, and practice them in your lives.” In his remarks on the National Day of Prayer in 1982, President Ronald Reagan said: “Prayer has sustained our people in crisis, strengthened us in times of challenge, and guided us through our daily lives since the first settlers came to this continent.” All these men, among many others and countless other quotes, reference the fact that God is real and they shine a light on the truth about the American project. We have succeeded and will continue to thrive only insofar as we keep God at the center of what it means to be human, so that we can govern in a way that respects the objective moral order. For our rights as human beings come from God, not the state. Any president or leader of office would do well to reflect on their own faith. It will be the best recipe for the good of the people they lead. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post The Faith of Our Presidents appeared first on The Daily Signal.

It is an unlikely union. America’s Cincinnatus—George Washington—and America’s Michelangelo—the Italian painter Constantino Brumidi—never met. Washington was born in 1732, a third-generation Virginian. Brumidi was born in Rome in 1805 and emigrated to the United States in 1849, becoming a naturalized citizen soon after. Yet both left indelible marks on the American republic. Washington shaped the nation like no other military or political leader before or since, earning the title “America’s Indispensable Man.” Brumidi, who honed his craft painting frescoes and murals in Rome, would leave his imprint throughout the most important building in the country—the U.S. Capitol—earning his own distinction as the Capitol’s indispensable artist. America’s Indispensable Man—and the Capitol’s “Those beautiful hallways on the Senate side of the Capitol? Brumidi,” the U.S. Capitol Historical Society wrote. “The historic committee rooms and fancy reception rooms? Brumidi. The decorative band wrapping around the Rotunda with the scenes from American history? That would be Brumidi, too.” Brumidi’s crowning achievement—among many throughout the Capitol painted over a 25-year period—is the mural known as “The Apotheosis of Washington.” Painted in just 11 months after the completion of the new Capitol dome in 1864, the massive fresco is suspended 180 feet above the Rotunda floor and spans 4,664 square feet. How did an Italian immigrant earn such a commission? And why was George Washington chosen as the central figure of Brumidi’s masterpiece? To answer the first question, it helps to answer the second—and to reflect on Washington’s singular role in the founding of our nation. “Washington is the mightiest name of earth,” Abraham Lincoln declared in 1842. “To add brightness to the sun, or glory to the name of Washington, is alike impossible. Let none attempt it. In solemn awe pronounce the name, and in its naked, deathless splendor, leave it shining on.” The Man Who Walked Away From Power Those were not words of hyperbole, but of earned reverence. Washington led an upstart Continental Army to victory over the mighty British Empire—and then did something almost unimaginable: He resigned his commission. When the American artist Benjamin West informed King George III that Washington was walking away from power, the monarch famously replied, “If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.” Washington returned to Mount Vernon, choosing civilian life over a crown. Duty soon called again. In 1787, Washington was summoned to Philadelphia to preside over the Constitutional Convention. He was later unanimously elected as the nation’s first president. Among his many achievements, he signed the Northwest Ordinance of 1789 into law, barring slavery in new U.S. territories. After two terms, he again relinquished power and returned home. An Artist Finds His Calling But who was Brumidi—and how did he become the Capitol’s most important painter? “As a boy in Italy, he studied at a famous arts academy and learned how to fresco, painting on wet plaster so colors could become a permanent part of the wall,” the Capitol Historical Society notes. In Rome, Brumidi painted palaces, chapels, and the Pope’s residence at the Vatican. Forced to flee political upheaval during the Italian Revolution in 1852, Brumidi came to America. Living in New York, he traveled widely to paint private homes and churches, including a cathedral in Mexico City. On one return trip, he stopped in Washington, D.C., to visit the Capitol—a detour that changed his life. Painting a Nation The timing could not have been better. The Capitol had recently expanded to accommodate larger House and Senate chambers, leaving behind vast, empty walls. Brumidi was determined to fill them. He demonstrated his talent with a small painting in a Capitol meeting room, passed the audition, and soon became a permanent fixture—painting there for the next quarter century. So constant was his presence that few could remember a day when Brumidi was not at work in the Capitol. The scaffolding required for “The Apotheosis of Washington” became nearly as famous as the artist himself. According to the Capitol Historical Society, “Brumidi would lie down on the platform, working flat on his back as he painted on the curved surface seventeen stories above the Rotunda’s floor.” It was dangerous work, and people often gathered to watch him get pulled each day to the scaffolding’s peak. One fall nearly killed him, saved only by the quick action of a watchful security guard who was able to save him. Injured, Brumidi continued painting for another year before his death in 1880. 180 Feet in the Air The most memorable creation of Brumaldi’s career is his effort to honor our nation’s founding father. “In the central group of the fresco, Brumidi depicted George Washington rising to the heavens in glory, flanked by female figures representing Liberty and Victory/Fame,” notes Architect of the Capitol on its website. “A rainbow arches at his feet, and thirteen maidens symbolizing the original states flank the three central figures. The figures in the painting, up to 15 feet tall, were painted to be intelligible from close up as well as from 180 feet below.” What was the significance of this God-like rendition of Washington? “The fresco is less a deification of Washington than a creative recording of his achievements,” wrote Nayeli Riano. “Like any historical painting, it’s telling us a story about how we understand our nation and its identity.” Should art like Brumidi’s show such admiration for its subject? “We might easily mistake such a work as blind reverence,” Riano noted. “Indeed, this is not the case. Brumidi’s fresco demonstrates, instead, the purpose of art: to lift our spirits and grant us something—an ideal—worth striving for.” One of our great historians, the late David McCullough, agreed. “This isn’t ancestor worship, this is reality, this is the truth,” McCullough said not long before his death. “To be indifferent to people like Washington is a form of ingratitude. We ought to be down on our knees thanking God we’re a part of this country, and we ought to know about the people who made it possible.” Two Lives, One Dome That belief animated Brumidi. He honored Washington—and the nation that adopted him—not with speeches or essays, but with paint and paint brush. Washington died at Mount Vernon on Dec. 14, 1799, mourned around the world. Brumidi died nearly 80 years later in Washington, D.C., largely forgotten, with one final work left unfinished: the Capitol’s “Frieze of American History.” Thus ended the intertwined story of America’s Cincinnatus and America’s Michelangelo—forever connected in a fresco adorning the dome of the U.S. Capitol. One the American people have admired for centuries—and will be admiring for centuries to come. Originally published in Newsweek. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post A Presidents Day Story for the Ages: George Washington and the Italian Painter Who Honored Him appeared first on The Daily Signal.

On Presidents Day, officially known as Washington’s Birthday, Americans celebrate the life of George Washington. Here are some facts about George Washington that you might not know. The Only Unanimously Elected President To this day, Washington is the only president to receive all the votes from the Electoral College—and he did it twice. Washington won the electoral votes of all ten states that participated in the first election in the winter of 1788 and 1789, with North Carolina, New York, and Rhode Island not taking part for various reasons. In 1792, Washington would carry the electoral votes of all 15 states. Washington set a two-term precedent which was codified by the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution in 1951. Real Estate Magnate? Like America’s current president, Washington has a background in real estate. He was a major landowner, owning over 50,000 acres of land at the time of his death. His various properties stretched across the areas that are now Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Kentucky. Before becoming President of the United States, Washington was also the head of the Patowmack Company, which attempted to connect trade between the Ohio River Valley and the Atlantic seaboard via a network of canals. Led An Army as President A president personally leading troops toward a potential military engagement is unheard of in modern times. In 1794, as president, Washington personally organized a militia and lead it toward western Pennsylvania to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion, a violent uprising against a federal tax on whiskey. The militia did not engage in battle upon arriving in western Pennsylvania, but Washington did play a hands-on role in putting together a military response to the rebellion. His Only Trip Abroad Although his half-brothers received an education in England, Washington never travelled abroad except for one visit to Barbados. The 19-year-old Washington joined his half-brother Lawrence, who had tuberculosis, in a trip to Barbados in September of 1751 in an attempt to help Lawrence’s health. The post Facts About George Washington You Might Not Know appeared first on The Daily Signal.