Are you a “girl boss” or a “trad wife”? Maybe somewhere in between? Seems like society is pressuring women to pick a side instead of learning to “Lead Like Jael.” Emma Waters, a policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Technology and the Human Person, joins “Problematic Women” us to discuss “seven timeless principles for today’s women of faith,” principles she details in her new book, “Lead Like Jael.” For decades, the feminist movement has lied to women, selling “boss babe” corporate work as the “American dream” instead of being in the home and fostering the next generation. On the flip side, many women are told they can’t be anything more than a stay-at-home mom. It’s important to follow the calling God has put on our hearts, use discernment, be guided by courage and convictions, and equip ourselves to make an impact in our homes and the world, Waters contends. On today’s episode, we also discuss the importance of advocating for women’s health and the progress being made in conservative spaces on Capitol Hill. It’s not taboo to talk about the fact that birth control has been prescribed to millions of women in America as a pill Band-Aid, one-size-fits-all, and now we are in an infertility crisis. Women deserve root-cause care, and we are talking about it on the show. Enjoy the conversation and pick up your copy of “Lead Like Jael” wherever books are sold. The post Girl Boss vs. Trad Wife: Forced to Choose? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has staked out an anti-Donald Trump resistance position on nearly every issue, but backs changing his state’s tax law for children’s accounts bearing the president’s name.  “Minnesota does not adopt federal tax law changes automatically. The state legislature must pass a tax conformity bill in order to adopt federal tax law changes. Until that happens, these accounts would be taxable,” Shane Delaney, assistant commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Revenue, told The Daily Signal.  Delaney said Walz released a supplemental budget proposal on Tuesday that “conforms with the federal Trump accounts.” At least seven states will impose income taxes on the Trump Account earnings, the Washington Post reported. These include battleground states such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania; deep blue states such as California, Hawaii, and Massachusetts; and states that went solidly for Donald Trump in past elections, such as Kentucky and South Carolina.  “California hates the fact that kids might get a leg up to be independent when they reach adulthood. That bothers them greatly,” John Kartch, director of communications with Americans for Tax Reform, told The Daily Signal. “Blue state governments want to extract the maximum amount of taxes from people’s wallets.” South Carolina lawmakers are considering a provision that makes these accounts tax-deferred, a spokesman for the South Carolina Department of Revenue told The Daily Signal. More than half of the states and the District of Columbia either automatically adopt federal tax code exemptions or don’t have state income taxes. So, there’s no danger for those residents to pay state taxes on the accounts. In most cases, the states will tap the revenue by doing nothing. Several states–such as South Carolina and Minnesota–are considering legislative fixes to exempt the Trump Accounts from income taxes. By contrast, California’s three-member Franchise Tax Board–made up of two elected officials and one appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom–refused to make Trump Accounts tax-deferred accounts, as the state already does for individual retirement accounts, 401(k) plans, and pensions. “California is the major culprit in this,” Kartch said. “Now, California chose to make these taxable. That’s what sets this apart from other states that are taxing the accounts.” The child-focused investments were created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in 2025 and allow parents to open a Trump Account for any child under the age of 18. Every American child born from 2025 through 2028 is eligible to receive a one-time $1,000 contribution from the U.S. Treasury Department invested in an index fund. When the child reaches age 18, the account converts into a traditional IRA. Nonprofits, individuals, and employers can contribute to the accounts.  Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, isn’t pushing for changes to the law, nor is the state legislature, said Brandi DeAngelo, deputy communications director for the  Pennsylvania Department of Revenue. “Under current Pennsylvania law, investment earnings from these accounts are subject to the personal income tax, as the commonwealth does not automatically conform to federal tax law,” DeAngelo told The Daily Signal.  “Any change to the tax treatment of these accounts would require action by the Pennsylvania General Assembly, and at this time, the Department of Revenue is not aware of any specific proposals to make these accounts tax-deferred,” DeAngelo continued.  Another battleground state, Wisconsin, will be milking the accounts for revenue.  “Earnings will be taxable for Wisconsin residents,” Jennifer Bacon, communications director for the Wisconsin Department of Revenue, told The Daily Signal. “… The legislative session has concluded, and no legislation was passed that would change how the accounts are taxed.”  “Trump Accounts are a historic initiative to level the playing field for a generation of working-class children to be able to achieve financial independence and build wealth with a tax-free seed investment from the federal government,” White House spokesman Kush Desai told The Daily Signal. “Democrats intentionally sabotaging this policy achievement out of either Trump Derangement Syndrome or incompetence isn’t just a boneheaded failure, it’s an egregious betrayal of America’s children.” After Congress passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, several states moved to change the rules on tax conformity with the federal Internal Revenue Code on several fronts beyond the Trump accounts, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. “Rolling conformity” is when states automatically adopt federal changes. Another is “static conformity,” when the state adheres to the federal code after a specific date. “Selective conformity” is when a state picks and chooses what provisions of the federal code to conform with. Some states have “decoupled” from provisions of the 2025 federal tax law, according to the NCSL.  Nathalie Dailida, spokeswoman for the Massachusetts Department of Revenue, said the administration in the state “has not proposed changes with respect to the provisions.” She noted that “Massachusetts does not conform” to Trump Accounts’ provisions. Maine Gov. Jane Mills’ “supplemental budget proposal would conform to the federal tax treatment of Trump Accounts,” said Sharon Huntley, director of communications for the Maine Department of Administrative and Financial Services. In Vermont, a blue state with Republican Gov. Phil Scott, the legislature is considering overall conformity to the new federal law, said Rebecca Sameroff, deputy commissioner for the Vermont Department of Taxes. The post Some States Are Taxing Trump Accounts—What Families Need to Know appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Thanks to the Human Rights Campaign, even conservatives may be helping fund child-mutilating hormones and surgery, mother-and-father loss, and the destruction of embryonic life—not through elections or legislation, but through burrito bowls, chocolate bars, and bronzer. That is the scandal exposed by a new report from Them Before Us, Harming Rights of Children: How the HRC’s Corporate Equality Index Violates Children’s Rights. For years, Americans have treated the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index (CEI) as a harmless benchmark for workplace fairness. It is not. It is a corporate pressure system that rewards companies for adopting child-harming policies and punishes those that resist. A perfect score is not an empty symbol. It has a price, and children pay it. At least 70 of the CEI’s 100 points reward practices that directly implicate children’s bodies, identities, or family bonds. Companies earn points for “transgender-inclusive” health coverage; for “family formation benefits” that subsidize IVF, surrogacy, and sperm or egg donation; and for “corporate social responsibility” initiatives that fund organizations like the Trevor Project and Point of Pride, both of which promote the medicalization of minors. Child harm is built into the scorecard. Start with the 10 points for family formation benefits. That means corporate-funded surrogacy, donor conception, and IVF. These arrangements impose losses on children from the beginning. Only 2.3% of IVF embryos survive to live birth. Donor-conceived people report deep identity wounds: 85% say learning the truth about their conception changed who they thought they were, and 48% say seeing friends with their biological parents makes them feel sad. Unlike adoption—which seeks to mend maternal wounds—surrogacy inflicts them intentionally by separating a newborn from the only voice, scent, and body he has known. Then there are the 25 points for “transgender-inclusive” health benefits. The CEI does not specify an age floor, meaning companies may cover puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries for dependents, including minors. These interventions carry risks of infertility, cancer, and irreversible physical harm. The 2024 Cass Review found that 30% of transitions ceased within four years and that detransition cases are “no longer negligible.” Yet under the CEI, this is worth a quarter of a perfect score. The index goes further. Under corporate social responsibility, companies earn 15 points for philanthropy and legislative support. That includes funding organizations like the Trevor Project, which received $29 million from corporate partners in 2023, and Point of Pride, which funds chest binders and transition surgeries. The briefing cites an undercover investigation in which the Trevor Project encouraged a caller posing as a teenage girl to leave her home and move in with an adult male who supported her “transition.” The CEI also imposes a 25-point penalty for any company with a “public anti-LGBTQ+ blemish.” In practice, companies that support child protective legislation such as parental rights protections or restrictions on the medicalization of minors risk punishment. The Corporate Equality Index is not a barometer of adult civil rights. It is an indicator that a company has violated children’s natural rights. A perfect CEI score means Starbucks, Amazon, and Microsoft are complicit in child harm. Same with Hershey’s, Procter & Gamble, Kroger, Chipotle, UPS, Truist, Bath & Body Works, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Wendy’s. All household names built on family trust that now fund policies that fracture families and medicalize children. Consumers should be angry. Every time you buy a KitKat, order a Chicken al Pastor burrito bowl, or trust one of these companies with your paycheck or mortgage, you help fund policies that disregard human life at its earliest stages, separate children from their mothers and fathers, and put minors on a path toward sterilization and lifelong medical dependence. Conservatives rightly denounce government policies that harm children. But we have given a pass to corporate America for inflicting those same harms. The good news is that the system is starting to crack. Fortune 500 participation in the CEI collapsed 65% between 2025 and 2026, dropping from 377 companies to 131. Twenty companies representing more than five million employees formally withdrew. Tractor Supply led the way. Walmart and John Deere followed. But leaving the scorecard is not the same as protecting children. That is why public pressure matters now more than ever. If we want to protect children and retake the family, it cannot be only a court or culture fight. It must include confronting corporate America’s role in normalizing and funding child harm. We must pressure companies to stop chasing points and start protecting children. And we must refuse to reward brands that threaten children’s right to life, their right to a mother and father, and their right to intact, unmedicalized bodies. Children are greater than points. That is the standard. It is time to make corporate America live by it. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post How the Human Rights Campaign Makes You Complicit in Child Victimization appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Supreme Court’s conservative justices on Monday seemed particularly skeptical of arguments by the state of Mississippi that mail-in ballots arriving after Election Day should still be counted. Mississippi counts ballots that arrive up to five days after Election Day. At least 17 states and the District of Columbia count ballots that arrive late, with at least two allowing them to arrive up to two weeks after Election Day. The case before the high court is Watson v. Republican National Committee. Mississippi’s Secretary of State Michael Watson is a Republican who oversees state elections.  Justice Amy Coney Barrett pressed Mississippi Solicitor General Scott Stewart about the security of mail-in ballots and what prevents someone from designating their neighbor to deliver a ballot.  “That submission to mail to a common carrier is different in kind than, say, submitting it to a relative or a neighbor,” Stewart answered.  “What’s the difference?” Barrett asked, “They’re not government officials.” Stewart followed, “They are impartial third parties that have a duty to deliver what they’re owed without altering it.” But Barrett noted the state law and the state’s brief did not clearly state that line of argument.  “Your definition didn’t say final, as submitted to an impartial third party, or final, as submitted to a common carrier,” Barrett asked. Justice Neil Gorsuch used the corporation Federal Express as an example of a private delivery service, since Mississippi law didn’t require the U.S. Postal Service to deliver ballots. “FedEx isn’t an election official,” Gorsuch said.  Stewart said, “The recipient is certainly the person you are sending the mail to.” Gorsuch replied, “You submit it to FedEx and they deliver it to an election official. You say it has to be submitted to an election official in your brief. Then you say a common carrier is OK. Those two things don’t add up.” The liberal justices argued against the preemption of state election regulations by courts. States have regulated mail ballots since the Civil War, noted Justice Sonia Sotomayor. “People should decide this issue, not the courts, but Congress, or states and Congress,” Sotomayor said.  Stewart agreed, “That is the history of voting and election law in the country.” Stewart said that in 2020, Mississippi adopted the policy of counting late-arriving ballots during the COVID-19 pandemic.  “There has not been a showing of actual fraud from after-election counting,” Stewart said.  President Donald Trump’s 2025 executive order on election integrity included a provision that would deny federal election funding grants to states that continue counting ballots arriving after Election Day. The counting of late-arriving ballots by states does not break along party lines.  Illinois and Utah count ballots arriving up to 14 days after Election Day, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, as long as the ballots are postmarked by Election Day. Alaska and Maryland allow ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted up to 10 days after the election.  California, the District of Columbia, New York, and Oregon count ballots arriving seven days after the election. New Jersey counts ballots arriving up to six days post-election, while West Virginia’s grace period is five days.  Nevada and Ohio count to four days after Election Day, while Kansas, Massachusetts, and Virginia count ballots arriving up to three days after Election Day.  Washington state law says that ballots received after the election with postmarks before Election Day are counted, but no deadline is specified for when they must be received, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in October 2024 in the case from Mississippi that federal law requires mail-in ballots to arrive by Election Day. The ruling didn’t affect the election that year. The three-judge panel’s opinion said, “Federal law does not permit the state of Mississippi to extend the period for voting by one day, five days, or 100 days.” In April 2025, U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. of the Southern District of Mississippi ordered a stay on further litigation in the case until the U.S. Supreme Court decides on the matter.  The post Justices Skeptical of Counting Late-Arriving Ballots appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The White House installed a statue of Italian explorer Christopher Columbus early Sunday, constructed from the remains of a monument that was destroyed in a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest. The new statue is located outside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House. The original statue was located in Columbus Piazza in Baltimore, Maryland, before protesters tore it down and dumped it into the city’s Inner Harbor in 2020. However, the pieces were retrieved from the harbor, and a local artist used them to create a 13-foot, one-ton replica. The statue was commissioned by the Conference of Presidents of Major Italian American Organizations and is part of the White House’s celebration of America’s 250th anniversary.  “Columbus statues have long stood as symbols of pride and cultural identity for more than 18 million Americans of Italian descent,” conference president Basil M. Russo said in a statement. “For over a century, Columbus’s legacy helped Italian immigrants navigate prejudice and hardship, serving as a source of unity and belonging as they built new lives in this country.” The post Battered Christopher Columbus Statue Resurrected by White House appeared first on The Daily Signal.