WASHINGTON—The government shutdown is not slowing down President Donald Trump’s Justice Department. Over the course of the last week, Attorney General Pam Bondi’s team successfully pressured Facebook to remove a page targeting Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, brought Antifa-related terrorism charges in the Texas attack on ICE officers, seized $15 billion in Bitcoin from a massive “pig butchering” scam, and, perhaps most significantly, secured an indictment charging former National Security Advisor John Bolton with crimes related to the mishandling of classified information, including eight counts of transmission of national defense information and 10 counts of unlawful retention of NDI. “From restoring one tier of justice, to making key arrests, to ongoing successful surges in Washington, D.C., and Memphis, Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Department of Justice are advancing President Trump’s agenda and Making America Safe Again,” Justice Department spokesman Gates McGavick told The Daily Wire. In another significant move, the Justice Department also arrested a 33-year-old man, Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub Al-Muhtadi, a Gazan living in Louisiana, for alleged involvement in the Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. “After hiding out in the United States, this monster has been found and charged with participating in the atrocities of October 7 — the single deadliest day for Jewish people since the Holocaust,” Bondi said in a statement first obtained by The Daily Wire. “While nothing can fully heal the scars left by Hamas’s brutal attack, this Department’s Joint Task Force October 7 is dedicated to finding and prosecuting those responsible for that horrific day, including the murder of dozens of American citizens,” she shared. “We will continue to stand by Jewish Americans and Jewish people around the world against anti-Semitism and terrorism in all its forms.” Hamas kidnaps an Israeli woman on October 7,  2023. (Photo by -/AFP via Getty Images) Al-Muhtadi learned about the “unfolding” attack on October 7, 2023, and “sprang into action,” arming himself, recruiting other marauders, and entering Israel, Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg shared on Friday. Eisenberg said there is “evidence placing him near one of the worst-hit Israeli communities.” “Subsequently,” Eisenberg said, “Al-Muhtadi fraudulently obtained a visa to enter the United States where he hoped to remain undetected. This arrest is but the first public step in bringing to justice those responsible for harming Americans on that day.” The Justice Department wants this arrest to serve as a reminder that those who commit acts of terrorism cannot escape justice by hiding in American communities. In a press release, the DOJ says that Al-Muhtadi is an operative for the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s (DFLP) military wing, known as the National Resistance Brigades or the Martyr Umar al-Qasim Forces, a “Gaza-based paramilitary group that participated in the Hamas-led terrorist attack against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.” Hamas militants of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades move towards the Erez crossing between Israel and the northern Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023. (Photo by Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto via Getty Images) Al-Muhtadi crossed into Israel with the intention of helping Hamas in their terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, the DOJ said, and his phone “utilized” a cell tower near the Kibbutz Kfar Aza in Israel, where Hamas massacred dozens of Israelis and four American citizens. “In addition, Al-Muhtadi allegedly provided false information in his U.S. visa application relating to his involvement with a paramilitary organization, connection to Hamas, participation in a terrorist attack, and military training,” the DOJ says in a release. “Al-Muhtadi swore to the accuracy of numerous materially false statements in his visa application with respect to at least his affiliation with DFLP, the NRB, and Hamas, his training, and his involvement in the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks.” He entered the United States on September 12, 2024, the Justice Department said.

The journalism conference that pulled a Daily Wire reporter and another conservative journalist off a panel on faith and reporting replaced the canceled speakers with an anti-Israel panelist. MediaFest has come under fire for scrapping Daily Wire White House Correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan and The Daily Signal’s Virginia Allen from its “Faith Central” panel without cause. The group replaced Olohan and Allen with Erum Ikramullah, a Senior Research Project Manager at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, the Washington Free Beacon’s Chuck Ross reported Friday. Ikramullah petitioned the Howard County Council and County Executive Calvin Ball in Maryland to back a council member’s resolution for an “immediate ceasefire in Gaza” in January 2024. “I also urge the inclusion of a demand in CR22-2024 for the immediate release of the thousands of Palestinians unjustly detained by Apartheid Israel, reaffirming our commitment to human rights and international law,” Ikramullah wrote. “Lastly, I call upon the council to advocate for the immediate cessation of all political, diplomatic, and military support for Israel. Our community should not be complicit in the perpetuation of these conflicts,” the email added. In her role at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, Ikramullah has worked to advance the anti-Israel boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement. Her colleagues include Dalia Mogahed, a scholar who called Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel an act of legal “resistance.” Ikramullah was featured in a September 2024 Newsweek article titled “How Kamala Harris Could Win Back Muslim Voters.” “Any candidate wishing to win over Muslim voters would do well to distance themselves from Biden’s Gaza policy in favor of one that secures a permanent ceasefire and reduces military aid to Israel,” Erum Ikramullah, senior research project manager at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, told the publication at the time. Olohan and Allen were reportedly told they were no longer allowed to participate in the event following a complaint from Oregon State University faculty member Steven Sandberg about their reporting on LGBTQ issues. “LGBTQ students are feeling targeted by our administration, by the government, and by society. So I was disappointed to see them bring in people who espoused anti-LGBT views,” Sandberg said, according to the Columbia Journalism Review. The Daily Wire editors criticized the decision to remove the journalists from the event.

The Pentagon has come out against a new Netflix series aimed at promoting LGBT themes. “Boots,” based on a memoir titled “The Pink Marine,” is about a gay “bullied teen” who “impulsively” joins the U.S. Marine Corps and “finds new purpose — and unexpected brotherhood — with his motley team of fellow recruits.” Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson released a statement on the series, saying a person’s sexuality is not relevant in this administration’s effort to strengthen our military. “Under President Trump and Secretary [Pete] Hegseth, the U.S. military is getting back to restoring the warrior ethos. Our standards across the board are elite, uniform, and sex neutral because the weight of a rucksack or a human being doesn’t care if you’re a man, a woman, gay, or straight,” a statement given to Entertainment Weekly said. Kingsley confirmed that officials “will not compromise our standards to satisfy an ideological agenda, unlike Netflix whose leadership consistently produces and feeds woke garbage to their audience and children.” Hegseth made waves during a September speech to his top military leaders after sharing new directives for the War Department, including the news that every military branch will ensure that requirements for combat positions return to “the highest male standard.” Join us now during our exclusive Deal of the Decade. Get everything for $7 a month. Not as fans. As fighters. Go to DailyWire.com/Subscribe to join now. “This job is life or death,” he said at the time, as The Daily Wire previously reported. “Standards must be met … it’s common sense and core to who we are and what we do.” Hegseth also noted that the military would no longer focus on ideology-driven initiatives left over from the Biden years, noting that their department is “done with that s***” and there will be no more “identity months, DEI offices, [and] dudes in dresses.” “Boots,” which stars Miles Heizer and Vera Farmiga, premiered October 9 and has been ranking in Netflix’s top 10 viewed charts ever since. The series is critical of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” military policy from the 90s that required recruits to keep their sexual identity secret.

Courtesy of Hunter Biden, all of America recently received a crash course in effective ways to launder millions of dollars. As it turns out, it’s nowhere near as complicated as the movies make it seem. In reality, even when you’re the son of the president of the United States, you can collect dirty money in plain sight. One way to do it is to get a do-nothing job, which you’re not remotely qualified for, and then collect paychecks without ever showing up to work. Another tactic is to start a bunch of fake companies and accept massive investments from foreign governments (saving some of the money for your father, of course). Alternatively, if you’re feeling especially bold, you could get into finger-painting and sell your great works of art for millions of dollars to anonymous buyers. Or, if you’re Hunter Biden, you could do … all of the above. All this is to say, if Hunter Biden could get away with flagrant corruption like this, then there’s a very good reason to be skeptical of other prominent Democrats who are making a suspiciously large amount of money from bizarre, unusual sources. That’s why, even though he’s a billionaire and presumably doesn’t need any extra cash, it’s worth taking a close look at this story about the finances of the anti-American and pro-crime governor of Illinois, JB Pritzker, who’s being touted as a potential presidential candidate. This is from the New York Post. Billionaire Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) and his wife pocketed $10.7 million worth of taxable income last year, including $1.4 million he won from playing blackjack in Las Vegas, according to tax filings released by his campaign. … Pritzker will be donating the money to charity, his campaign added. … An heir to the Hyatt Hotels Corp family fortune, Pritzker has a net worth of about $3.9 billion, according to the latest estimate from Forbes. … In the prior two years, the Pritzkers reported much less taxable income, including $3.2 million in 2023, $2.3 million in 2022. Right away, there are some unanswered questions here. First of all, why did he only donate the money after this story came out? If he doesn’t need the cash, why not get rid of it immediately? He’s a high-profile governor. He clearly recognizes the optics issue here, which is why he’s donating the money. But why did he wait until people asked about it? It’s true that JB Pritzker is a billionaire, and that for someone with that kind of money, $1.4 million isn’t a whole lot. But at the same time, $1.4 million is more than 10% of Pritzker’s total annual income from 2024. And it’s roughly half of his annual income from 2022 and 2023. He’s making around $10 million a year in taxable income, most of which is capital gains from investments that he sold. The overwhelming majority of Pritzker’s wealth, in other words, is tied up in the hotels and various trusts. So a million dollars is certainly money that he could use, at least in the short term, unless he wants to liquidate some assets. And for all we know, he wasn’t keeping this money for himself. Maybe he was sending it to someone else, or holding it for someone. We have no idea. So without a doubt, we need more information about how exactly JB Pritzker acquired this money. And yet, in a press conference the other day, when he was asked about this report, the governor didn’t provide very many details. Watch: JB Pritzker says he won $1.4 million playing BlackJack on just one trip to Las Vegas last year: “I went on vacation with my wife, with some friends, I was incredibly lucky.” pic.twitter.com/gqAft8Xii6 — Greg Price (@greg_price11) October 16, 2025 Credit: @greg_price11/X.com Even if you don’t know anything about casinos or blackjack — and I don’t — you can tell, immediately, that something is “off” with this answer. He doesn’t provide any specifics at all. He just says he got “lucky” in Vegas, laughs a bit, and immediately pivots to talking about a completely unrelated topic, which is some charity poker organization he has in Illinois. He doesn’t mention the specific casino or anything about the hands he supposedly played. He actually doesn’t even say it was blackjack, although his staff has made that claim. He seems extremely eager to change the subject and move on. Imagine if you were in Pritzker’s position here. Let’s say you’re a big fan of playing blackjack. You’re a public official. And you manage to make $1.4 million at a high-rollers’ table on a vacation with some friends in Vegas — an extremely unlikely outcome, by any measure. And now a reporter is asking about your big win. Assuming you have nothing to hide, why not talk about how you did it? Why not throw in a single, verifiable, human detail about your time in the casino — like what your friends thought, or what friends you were with, or what casino you were in, or how many hands you played, or whether you had any particularly amazing plays — anything at all? Even if you’re bashful, and you don’t like bragging about your wins, you must have some understanding how bizarre the whole situation looks. If only to reassure everyone that this wasn’t bribe money, you’d probably say something, anything, about what happened. But JB Pritzker wasn’t forthcoming at all. And for that reason alone, there needs to be an immediate federal investigation. Someone needs to pull the tapes from the casinos, for one thing. Presumably, if he actually made all of this money in one night, there’s footage of him at a blackjack table somewhere. I looked online to see what some blackjack players thought about this whole situation. Here’s one take, from someone assuming that Pritzker was playing $100,000 hands of blackjack, which is at the high end, even for high rollers. Ok, $100k hands. That’s still 1,400 hands he’d have to play. And that’s if he’s so good at blackjack he can maintain that 1% edge. which is on par with some of the best blackjack players in the country. So, lets say he’s an average blackjack player making 100k bets per hand. in… — MegaChimp (@ChimpMega) October 16, 2025 Credit: @ChimpMega/X.com Now, admittedly, you can quibble with the numbers. It’s possible that Pritzker was playing with extremely large and unusual amounts of money — like $500,000 hands or something. But if that’s the case, you have to wonder: Why is he doing that, exactly? Why would he go to a casino and risk a significant chunk of his annual taxable income when he doesn’t need the cash? He’s supposedly just hanging out with some friends and family. Did the casino notice Pritzker doing anything unusual, like card counting, which would enable him to win so much money? If so, did they stop it? Does the casino have any connections to Pritzker? At best, given what we know, this seems like degenerate behavior. You don’t win a million dollars in Vegas without being a degenerate gambling addict, at best. At worst, it’s money laundering or a bribe. Regardless, again, there needs to be an investigation. And this investigation should not end with JB Pritzker. We’ve spent so much time talking about political violence by Democrats — and rightfully so — that we often overlook the obvious, pervasive corruption in the party. For example, you probably missed this story from last April, when Kamala Harris was vice president: Vice President Kamala Harris’ stepdaughter opened her textile exhibition Thursday at a cannabis store on the Lower East Side — where she peddled knit portraits for several thousand dollars. Ella Emhoff — whose father is second gentleman Doug Emhoff — debuted her knit pieces, which she said marks her transition out of the fashion world and into her new phase of life as an artist. … Harris’ stepdaughter was also asking for $4,500 for a textile of two heart-shaped Gucci hairclips — a 1,400% markup from the designer accessories after which they were modeled. You can only imagine why someone would pay a 1,400% markup for Ella Emhoff’s textiles. Maybe we’ll get the answer to that question someday. After all, Biden pardoned his own family, but he didn’t pardon Kamala’s. In the meantime, we’re learning about several more Democrat fraud schemes in California, where money — including your federal tax dollars — was stolen from programs that are supposed to develop housing for homeless people. These kinds of schemes are extremely common in states like California. Now, finally, the DOJ is doing something about it.  Here’s California U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli. California has spent billions of taxpayer dollars to combat its homelessness crisis with very little to show for it. Six months ago, I announced the Homelessness Fraud and Corruption Task Force. Today, we begin to hold people accountable by announcing two cases where more than $50 million of homelessness funding was fraudulently obtained. Here’s one of those cases. Watch: BREAKING – Federal investigators have just revealed California Democrats stole millions in federal tax dollars through a $27 million homeless housing scheme involving former state senator Kevin Murray’s nonprofit and a $16 million inflated building sale from indicted L.A.… pic.twitter.com/Cg6saUoxik — Right Angle News Network (@Rightanglenews) October 16, 2025 Credit: @Rightanglenews/X.com As if you needed yet another reason to oppose government-funded housing for the “homeless,” here it is. Really, there are only two outcomes that are possible. Option number one is that the housing gets built, and the homeless proceed to trash the place and use it as a drug den. Option number two is that the housing never gets built, and the developer pockets tens of millions of dollars.  As Fox’s Matt Finn reports, one of the fraud cases might implicate a Democrat politician. Feds just announced that a former California Democratic state senator’s non-profit is linked to an alleged $27 million scheme using homeless housing funds. Former state Senator Kevin Murray is the CEO of ‘Weingart’ — which the Feds say used $27 million in homeless dollars to purchase a building in 2023 from an alleged criminal developer who just bought it months prior for $11 million. … Murray was not charged or named but the Feds say the non-profit he’s a CEO of is part of an active investigation. These housing organizations and housing schemes are probably the single most common vector of fraud in Democratic Party politics. It’s not just happening in California. It’s happening all over the country. For example, the Somali who’s running for mayor of Minneapolis, Omar Fateh, has been implicated in a possible Medicaid-related fraud. This is from the local news station KARE 11, which has done most of the legwork on this investigation, along with the Star Tribune: Sen. Omar Fateh’s wife was the listed owner of a Housing Stabilization company while the senator himself was pushing legislation to fast-track client approvals without divulging his ties to the taxpayer-funded program. … On March 24, 2025, Sen. Omar Fateh introduced Senate File 2741, a bill he said would speed up access for people to be approved for HSS, a Medicaid-funded program to help the elderly and disabled find and maintain housing. … Weeks later, a KARE 11 investigation would expose allegations of widespread fraud in the HSS program, including clients being signed up without their knowledge and Medicaid billed for services never provided. The fraud was so pervasive, in fact, that the entire HSS program has been shut down. The acting United States Attorney for Minnesota estimated that virtually all of the $100 million in annual spending on the program was fraudulent. And there’s reason to believe that Omar Fateh was trying to realize some of those profits. The article notes that, while Omar Fateh was pushing a bill to benefit HSS programs: Senator Fateh’s wife, Kaltum Mohamed, was a founder and owner of Community Development Services LLC, an HSS company with an active website soliciting referrals and clients. …. She was still officially an owner, at least on paper, when her husband introduced the bill impacting the HSS industry. Instead of being forced out of the race for this obvious corruption, of course, Omar Fateh has the full support of his party. He’s currently shooting videos with “baddies for Omar.” Watch: Minneapolis Mayor candidate Omar Fateh launches a “Baddies for Omar” campaign Where Muslim Somalian women will help to get him elected Omar Fateh was exposed for funneling taxpayer money into his wife’s housing NGO yet somehow isn’t arrested. Instead he’s campaigning to run the… pic.twitter.com/hDIr7DEW1F — Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) October 16, 2025 Credit: @WallStreetApes/X.com So Omar Fateh certainly isn’t feeling any pressure to withdraw from the race, as he hangs out with “baddies for Omar.” But in the Democrat Party, as it turns out, even if you’re forced out of your job, you can still collect tons of taxpayer cash you didn’t earn. To that end, last week, an outlet called “LAist” reported on this very strange story, involving the CEO of Los Angeles County, which is the highest-ranking unelected position in the county. L.A. County officials quietly approved a settlement deal that paid $2 million to the county’s CEO almost two months ago, LAist has learned. CEO Fesia Davenport was issued the check in August to compensate her for damages she claimed — including alleged harm to “reputation, embarrassment and emotional distress,” according to records LAist obtained from the county. At the time, it wasn’t clear what the lawsuit was about. All we knew was that the CEO of LA County had just received a $2 million settlement from the city. But there were indications that the settlement related somehow to a recent ballot proposition known as ‘”Measure G,” which was, “a voter-approved measure that reshapes the county’s leadership structure, including transforming the appointed CEO job into an elected one starting with the 2028 election. It was put on the ballot by a majority of Davenport’s bosses on the Board of Supervisors.” So to recap: It looks like the CEO of LA County received $2 million in taxpayer funds because she suffered “emotional distress” when the voters decided to eliminate her position — specifically, by making her position an elected one, instead of an appointed one. And indeed, yesterday, that’s what “LAist” reported: L.A. County’s secretive $2 million payout to its CEO two months ago — first revealed by LAist this week — was to settle her claims that she was harmed by a ballot measure that will change her job to an elected position and by the county’s messaging. … CEO Fesia Davenport had requested the settlement for what she claimed was “reputational harm, embarrassment and physical, emotional and mental distress caused by Measure G. … In letters laying out her claims, Davenport said that while the measure made the case for structural changes, its text impugned her reputation by saying “the lack of strong, elected executive leadership has impacted our ability to address these challenges. In response to these allegations, a majority of LA County supervisors agreed to give her $2 million as a lump sum, which Davenport demanded, “to earn interest on the funds to help mitigate the lifelong impact of Measure G on my retirement allowance.” Credit: County of Los Angeles, California. This is, of course, more fraud. It’s more waste and abuse. They’re paying millions of dollars to politicians who are humiliated that they got fired, essentially. If you vote for Democrats, this is what you’re supporting. No party in American history has been more committed to looting the treasury than these people. This is the same party that spent $140 billion to construct a high-speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles, more than a decade ago, and they still haven’t come close to actually building it. Should we be surprised by any of this? Of course not. A party that’s willing to murder its political opponents and let violent criminals go free isn’t going to hesitate to steal your money. And stealing your money is probably the least damaging thing these people do. But at the same time, every now and then, it’s worth talking about just how rampant their grift really is. It is staggering, by any measure. And before any more Democrats go to the casino — or sell textiles, or funnel money to their wife’s NGO, or sue for emotional distress because they got fired — the Trump administration needs to use the full force of the federal government to shut these people down. In a very literal sense, we simply can’t afford to tolerate this rampant corruption any longer.

President Donald Trump closed out a Friday afternoon roundtable and gaggle with reporters by dropping the F-Bomb in response to a question about his administration’s position on Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro. While hosting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House, Trump was asked about Maduro recently offering the Trump administration a massive stake in Venezuela’s oil and mineral wealth. “He has offered everything, you’re right,” Trump said to the reporter. “You know why? Because he doesn’t want to f*** around with the United States.” .@POTUS on Maduro: “He has offered everything, you’re right. You know why? Because he doesn’t want to fuck around with the United States.” ??? pic.twitter.com/EhG7Eeaq7P — Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) October 17, 2025 Trump then dismissed the media after answering the question. After Trump’s recent actions targeting drug trafficking from Venezuela, the Maduro regime offered to give American companies preferential treatment in existing and future oil and gold projects, The New York Times reported. The Trump administration rejected the offer and ended efforts to reach a diplomatic solution with the Maduro regime. The president has focused on Venezuela in his effort to crack down on illegal drug trafficking. In August, the United States sent three guided-missile destroyers to patrol off the coast of Venezuela as the administration addressed threats from drug cartels. Just weeks later, Trump began ordering military strikes on suspected drug runners in the Caribbean Sea. The U.S. military has taken out at least five boats that were suspected of transporting drugs to the United States. In those strikes, at least 27 suspected drug traffickers have been killed, U.S. officials said. Join us now during our exclusive Deal of the Decade. Get everything for $7 a month. Not as fans. As fighters. Go to DailyWire.com/Subscribe to join now. After the most recent strike, a U.S. official told Fox News that two or three suspected drug runners survived, and a search and rescue helicopter was sent out. Trump has also authorized lethal covert CIA operations in Venezuela. The administration has accused Venezuela of helping migrants cross into the United States illegally. “Many, many countries have done it, but not like Venezuela, they were down and dirty,” Trump said. The United States currently has a $50 million reward for information leading to the arrest or conviction of Maduro. The State Department has accused the dictator of participating “in a corrupt and violent narco-terrorism conspiracy” and coordinating “with narcotics traffickers in Honduras and other countries to facilitate large-scale drug trafficking.” Maduro was declared the winner of the 2024 presidential election, despite evidence showing that Edmundo González defeated the dictator at the polls. Maduro has moved to crack down on any opposition, forcing González into exile in Spain.

I didn’t pay much attention to mayoral politics when I lived in New York City. It was the De Blasio years, and as much as I respect Nicole Malliotakis, I don’t think anyone was naive enough to believe she was going to stand between Hizzoner and a second term. Plus, I lived deep in Crown Heights, so far into Brooklyn that it might as well have been a different city. I lived courtesy of the bodega below my apartment and the 4 train, two things that weren’t likely to change, no matter who was in charge. To the extent that I cared about the 2017 mayoral race, I cared about the things that affected me. I wanted to hear the candidates talk about how they’d stop gang members from killing each other on my block, or put cops on the subways to stop the all-too-frequent domestic assaults I witnessed while commuting. I certainly didn’t want to hear them hurl insults at each other and sound off on geopolitics. All of which is to say, had I been a New York City resident last night, I would have put my head through a wall. The debate — between socialist Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani and former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo — was bound to be a spectacle. New York City politics always are, to some degree. This current campaign has made Mamdani a national figure, something Cuomo has already been for quite some time. Even still — and even for this lapsed New Yorker — last evening’s proceedings had frustratingly little to do with the city. After a few perfunctory questions (What will the headlines be after your first year in office? What qualifies you to lead the city?), the debate quickly shifted to what really matters for municipal politics: What would the candidates say on their first official phone call with Donald Trump? Join us now during our exclusive Deal of the Decade. Get everything for $7 a month. Not as fans. As fighters. Go to DailyWire.com/Subscribe to join now. To be fair, this one was a little relevant. At least since Jerry Ford told Abe Beame to drop dead, there’s always been an expectation that the occupants of Gracie Mansion and the White House would deal with each other. And the Queens boy who currently occupies the Oval Office has inserted himself into the mayoral race, threatening to withhold federal funding from the city if it elects Mamdani. The candidates’ answers were unremarkable. Mamdani said he’d yell about ICE, and Cuomo said he’d yell about COVID. Had the national politics portion of the evening ended there, it would have been fine. But it didn’t. Instead, the candidates were then asked about the war in Gaza. Cuomo accused Mamdani of refusing to denounce Hamas and employing antisemitic dog whistles like “from the river to the sea” and “globalize the intifada.” Mamdani offered his thoughts on the situation, sounding more like an ambassador than an assemblyman. “For [the ceasefire] to be just, we also have to ensure that it addresses the conditions that preceded this,” Mamdani said. “Conditions like occupation, like the siege, and apartheid.” Who is this “we”? What role does the mayor of New York City have in resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? At the end of the debate, the candidates were asked about which parades they would attend if elected mayor. Mamdani, wearing the same smug smile he sported all evening, said that he would have more important things to think about than parades. If he thinks he should focus more on Gaza than on New York City parades, he may not be the right man for the job. A legendary New Yorker had a decidedly different take: “I think a mayor has a responsibility whenever possible to march in parades.” That New Yorker was Curtis Sliwa, the founder of the Guardian Angels and the Republican candidate for mayor. There’s a reason I haven’t mentioned Sliwa until now. Though he was standing smack in the middle of the candidates during the entire debate, he was an afterthought from the very beginning. At one point, the broadcast even cut to a side-by-side of Cuomo and Mamdani, literally eliminating Sliwa from the picture. Considering all the questions were about everything under the sun except New York City itself, Sliwa seemed a little bit like a lunatic during the debate. While Cuomo and Mamdani attacked each other as a nepo baby and a pervert, respectively, Sliwa hopped in to attack them for weakening the NYPD. While they talked about standing up to Trump, he talked about all the time he’s spent standing up for real New Yorkers on the subway and city buses. While they talked about Gaza, he rattled off the names of outer-borough neighborhoods with the maniacal fervor of a man desperate to remind people that this was supposed to be about New York City, for God’s sake. Despite how crazy Sliwa may have seemed, he wasn’t crazy at all. It took the moderators 43 minutes to ask about something that actually affects New Yorkers — the NYPD — before they quickly returned to discussing Trump. When the candidates did talk about city issues, it didn’t matter. Mamdani dodged questions about how he’d pay for free buses and free groceries and all the other free things he’s promised, relying on typical socialist smoke and mirrors to distract from the fact that New York Governor Kathy Hochul has made it clear she won’t raise taxes to pay for his policies. Cuomo and Mamdani’s failings were on full display, but not in a way that mattered. Sure, Cuomo’s a sexual predator who killed a bunch of grandparents, and Mamdani’s a trust fund jihadist who lacks the experience to govern a condo board. But does any of that have any bearing on how they would run the city? You wouldn’t know from watching the debate. That’s because the debate wasn’t for New Yorkers. It was for Washington, and for journalists. It was more for me than for whoever now lives in my old apartment in Brooklyn. It was also for the candidates themselves. For Mamdani, it was an audition for the Democratic powers that be. For Cuomo, it was a chance to remind those same powers that he’s not down for the count just yet. In other words, what should have been a political contest about local issues became one defined by national, even global ones. Instead of courting their would-be constituents, the candidates stoked their ambitions and inflated their egos. If you drive through Montpelier, you can probably hear James Madison rolling in his grave. With the exception of those pinning their hope on Mamdani’s socialist revolution, New Yorkers probably aren’t fazed by this. But the rest of us should be. Unless and until they win seats in Congress, Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo should focus on their city and leave the country to those elected to run it. That’s better for New Yorkers and Americans alike. And it may even give them time to fix the subway.

Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner is under scrutiny for a series of resurfaced social media posts in which he declares himself a “communist” and denigrates cops and white people. CNN’s KFile uncovered the Reddit posts from Platner, who is facing off against Gov. Janet Mills in the Democratic primary, the winner of which will take on Republican Senator Susan Collins. “I got older and became a communist,” Platner, a veteran and oyster farmer, wrote on a Reddit forum dubbed “antiwork” in 2021, according to CNN. He also said he was a “vegetable growing, psychedelics taking social these days” in a United States Marine Corps subreddit that same year, saying that he “still got the guns though, I don’t trust the facsists [sic] these days,” citing his past military experience in the post. “Living in white rural America, I’m afraid to tell you they actually are,” the Democrat said about white Americans. “Bastards. Cops are bastards. All of them, in fact,” Platner said in another post. POLITICO reported that Platner wrote other Reddit posts in 2018 suggesting that “an armed working class is a requirement for economic justice” and said that a “good semi-automatic rifle” would be expected in order to successfully “fight fascism.” In addition, the Washington Post reported multiple posts he made to Reddit in 2013 regarding sexual assault, including in the military. “Rape is a real thing. If you’re so worried about it to buy Kevlar underwear you’d think you might not get blacked out f***ed up around people you aren’t comfortable with,” he wrote. “In today’s current climate, when every whisper of a misplaced hand brings down a feature length film, anyone who actually thinks the military is purposefully covering up rape to save the career of some god damn [captain], is clearly both an idiot and junior enough in rank or life experience to think it matters,” Platner wrote. Bangor Daily News on Friday uncovered more of Platner’s Reddit posts, from 2013, in which he calls black people cheap. “I work as a bartender and it always amazes me how solid this stereotype is,” Platner wrote. “Every now and again a black patron will leave a 15-20% tip, but usually it [is] between 0-5%. There’s got to be a reason behind it, what is it?” The candidate said that the posts circulating do not reflect who he is today. “As I told CNN, I was f***ing around on the internet at a time when I felt lost and very disillusioned with our government who sent me overseas to watch my friends die,” Platner told POLITICO. “I made dumb jokes and picked fights. But of course I’m not a socialist. I’m a small business owner, a Marine Corps veteran, and a retired s***poster.” However, Republicans have raised concerns about the candidate’s past comments. “Graham Platner is a communist who supports violence against Republicans to promote his radical agenda. These posts are not just him messing around on the internet as he is trying to claim, they paint a very dark picture of a candidate not fit for office,” Samantha Cantrell, NRSC Regional Press Secretary, told The Daily Wire in response to the reports on the Democrat. The Daily Wire reached out to the Platner campaign for comment.

A senior Hamas official who spoke to Reuters on Friday said that the terror group could not commit to disarming and defended the public executions in Gaza earlier this week. Reuters sat down with senior Hamas member Mohammed Nazzal in Doha, Qatar, where senior Hamas leaders have long enjoyed safe haven. Nazzal said that the executions that took place on Monday were part of “exceptional measures” taken during war. At least seven men were shot in the back of the head in front of a crowd in Gaza after Hamas accused them of conspiring with Israel. Nazzal said the executed men were “criminals guilty of killing.” Nazzal added that Hamas would like to see a ceasefire last between three and five years, so that Gaza can be rebuilt, Reuters reported. He added that after the rebuilding, Palestinians should be given “horizons and hope” for statehood. Asked about Nazzal’s comments, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office told Reuters, “Hamas is supposed to release all hostages in stage 1. It has not. Hamas knows where the bodies of our hostages are. Hamas are to be disarmed under this agreement. No ifs, no buts. They have not. Hamas need to adhere to the 20-point plan. They are running out of time.” The Hamas official’s comments come hours after President Donald Trump warned, “If Hamas continues to kill people in Gaza, which was not the Deal, we will have no choice but to go in and kill them.” The president later clarified that he did not intend to use U.S. troops to take out the terrorists. “I didn’t say who will go in, but somebody will go in. It’s not going to be us. We won’t have to,” he said. “There are people very close, very nearby that will go in. They’ll do the trick very easily, but under our auspices.” Join us now during our exclusive Deal of the Decade. Get everything for $7 a month. Not as fans. As fighters. Go to DailyWire.com/Subscribe to join now. The first phase of Trump’s deal between Israel and Hamas, which was agreed upon earlier this week, required Hamas to hand over the remaining living and deceased hostages, while Israel would release nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, including hundreds of terrorists. The remaining living hostages have been released, but Hamas has so far failed to locate and hand over the bodies of all 28 deceased hostages that were still being held by the terrorists. It appears that Hamas has no desire to see the next phase of the peace plan come to fruition, which would require the terrorists to lay down their weapons and hand over control of Gaza. Trump said earlier this week that he was confident Hamas would disarm, threatening that if the terror group did not agree to lay down its weapons voluntarily, it would be disarmed by force. “They’re going to disarm because they said they were going to disarm,” Trump said. “And if they don’t disarm, we will disarm them.” “They know I’m not playing games,” the president added.