Audio of a Zoom call with DNC head Ed Martin and his officers leaked to Politico. It has reportedly set off infighting. Martin, sounding a tad whiney in the call, complained about the little commie Vice Chair David Hogg. He told Hogg he’s “ruining” his career. Didn’t Martin notice Hogg is a fraud who posed […] The post The DNC Is a Mess, David Hogg’s a Mess appeared first on www.independentsentinel.com.

Gender ideology’s war on America’s children has turned its guns on a particularly vulnerable group: children in foster care. Despite a court ruling blocking a Biden-era rule that imposed gender ideology as a condition of serving children who identify as LGBTQ, several states now demand that prospective foster parents affirm the “gender identity” of hypothetical children they might foster one day. Vermont has taken this egregious stance even further, telling one Christian family that they presented too much of a risk, that they would raise children sharing their beliefs. Decenda and Frank Cram were “blindsided” when Vermont state officials denied their application to become foster parents because of their “belief system.” State officials added that “if children in their home are raised with the same beliefs it could perpetuate further discrimination of the LGBTQ community.” Two other Christian families – the Wuotis and the Gannts – also failed Vermont’s ideological litmus test and so were denied the chance to foster. Represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, they are pushing back. Their case is currently under review by a three-judge panel of the Second Circuit court of appeals. The Crams shared their experience (link brief) as friends of the court in support of the families. Decenda Cram, like many foster parents, was a foster child herself, entering care when she was only six years old. Her first foster parents were devout Christians and eventually adopted her. “I think ever since then,” she says, “I just thought someday I wanted to give back … I definitely wanted to return the favor in some way.” Frank credits Christian neighbors for helping him turn around his own life. “If it wasn’t for a Christian family back when I was out in Arizona, I probably would’ve been getting in more and more trouble,” he explains. The Crams, both devout Christians, hoped, in Frank’s words, to offer needy children “a home, unconditional love, understanding – the whole nine yards.” In October 2020 the couple applied to be foster parents. Decenda recalls that “we made it clear that we were Christians, and we asked if that was going to pose a problem with foster parenting. And we were reassured by a higher up in the state’s Department of Children and Family Services (DCF): ‘We don’t discriminate against anyone for any reason.’” Gift Dad an All Access Membership. Use code DAD40 at checkout to save 40%! Although they had not completed the licensing process, Decenda and Frank were called to take in a pair of sibling girls, ages nine and fourteen, in December 2020. The girls stayed with the Crams for a month and a half before one of the girls’ relatives assumed custody. We “worked out very well as a team in taking care of them,” says Frank. Decenda agrees, adding that “Frank and I worked beautifully as a parenting team.” Their initial DCF worker and the relative that the girls moved in with when they left us “all commended us for doing such a good job with the girls.” Nicholas Klein. Getty Images. Given their success caring for the two sisters, the Crams thought they would be licensed as foster parents. They were surprised when the licensing process turned hostile. Decenda recalls a different official telling her during a phone interview that “Vermont has recently taken a stance.” This “stance” is that no foster families can be considered unless they are willing to fully embrace the LGBTQ community. Despite the clear desire and ability to provide a safe, loving home for children in need, the Crams were denied a license to foster. According to the denial letter sent to the Crams in June 2021, the Cram’s “fundamental belief” about “God’s plan for all of us,” would “not meet the emotional or developmental needs of children.” “It felt like I’d lost a child,” laments Decenda. Frank says that “It really broke my heart. It’s like, here we are. We’re willing to give our home and our time and effort to help these children.” Vermont’s behavior is inexcusable: its exclusion of prospective foster and adoptive parents based on their sincerely held religious beliefs is blatant religious discrimination and adds to the injury already suffered by children in need. The Crams are hopeful that the Second Circuit will order Vermont to stop its discriminatory policy so they can open up their home to children in need. As Frank says, “all things can work out by God’s grace.” * * * Andrea Picciotti-Bayer is Director of The Conscience Project  The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

The “One Big, Beautiful Bill,” backed by President Donald Trump and awaiting passage in the Senate, would revolutionize how colleges distribute student loans, disincentivizing schools from saddling students with debt for degrees that don’t lead to employment. The move would not just provoke left-wing colleges that have been a thorn in Republicans’ side, but also provide a practical, good-governance change that could save taxpayers billions and prevent people from being saddled with student loan payments they can’t afford. Under the bill, colleges will have “skin in the game,” meaning if they churn out dropouts or graduates with a particular major who can’t afford to pay their student loans, the college will have to eat those costs. That makes it in their interest to discourage people from going into debt for programs in useless or low-quality fields, admitting students who are unlikely to be able to complete a useful program, or charging such high tuition that the increase in earnings isn’t worth it. Colleges will no longer be able to admit an endless stream of people who take $150,000 in student loans for a gender studies degree when half of them default on their loans and stick taxpayers with the bill. Schools will have to reimburse the federal government for missed loan payments based on the percentage in a “program of study,” meaning a major within a particular school, who drop out or don’t see increased earnings based on the degree. Gift Dad an All Access Membership. Use code DAD40 at checkout to save 40%! A “value-added earnings” amount is calculated for graduates of each program based on their median salary four years after completing an undergraduate or doctoral degree, or two years after an associate’s or master’s degree. It looks at how much higher that salary is than 150% of the poverty level for those with undergraduate degrees, or 300% of the poverty level for people with graduate credentials. The number is further adjusted based on the cost-of-living in the metro area of the university, even though graduates may not be working in that region. How much money schools have to repay is based on the relationship between total tuition cost and value-added earnings. Divide the median value-add by median cost of attendance. That’s the percentage of missed principal and interest payments that taxpayers will eat. Colleges must reimburse the government for the rest. Let’s say a class of students spends four years earning degrees in critical race theory, with tuition of $50,000 a year, totaling of $200,000. Four years after that, at 26 years old, they are making a median of $30,000 in their jobs. The poverty level is $15,650, so college graduates should be expected to make more than 150% of that, or $23,475. That means the CRT program has value-added earnings of $6,525. Divide that by the cost of attendance, and you get 3%. When those graduates failed to make loan repayments, the colleges would have to eat 97% of the revenue that would otherwise be lost by taxpayers. Left-wing colleges have also put taxpayers and impoverished young people at risk by lowering admissions standards — often in the name of diversity, equity, and inclusion — to the point where huge portions of those admitted aren’t capable of college-level work and wind up dropping out. Then, they default on their loans since they incur costs but do not earn a degree. The Big Beautiful Bill would force colleges to own the results of their admissions decisions, with a separate reimbursement rate for missed student loan payments by people who dropped out of a given academic program. Colleges would have to reimburse the government for dropouts’ missed loan repayments based on the percentage of community college students who didn’t graduate in six years, and other students who didn’t complete the program within 150% of its expected time. Let’s say a disreputable college is admitting people with abysmal math SAT scores, and using them as cash cows to pay reams of administrators and faculty who claim they’re making math majors out of them. All of the students are impoverished and pay tuition using student loans, and six years later, only half of them actually graduated. The other half defaulted on their student loans, missing a combined million dollars in payments per year. The school would have to reimburse the federal government for half of that amount, or $500,000. The bill’s education provisions are aimed not just at mitigating taxpayers’ losses, but correcting the root cause: colleges should not admit people who are likely to drop out, and they should not encourage people to take on debt to major in things like art history. If they do offer majors that don’t lead to gainful employment, they can protect their bottom line by making sure tuition is low, making it easier to hit the required ratio. The rates are calculated only based on people who take student loans, so if people really want to major in dance, knowing that most of them won’t make money, they can do so if they pay using private sources of funding. Colleges are also empowered to protect themselves the same way banks do when making an investment they know is risky, by limiting the amount of student loans people can use for particular majors. The bill also stops students from taking out huge amounts of student loans. That comes after President Joe Biden waived billions of dollars in loan repayments, even though a court told him he didn’t have the authority. Democrats pushed the initiative by highlighting the sob stories of people who had hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans, and whose lives have been ruined as a result. Republicans say the best policy solution is making sure people never get in that situation to begin with. The bill caps lifetime federal student loans to $200,000, plus $50,000 in federal loans in a parent’s name. That will provide a strong disincentive for colleges to raise tuition, because they would lose out on many prospective customers if they do. It also prevents the president from using executive orders or regulations that “would result in an increase in a subsidy cost.” Typically, when Democrats have tried to make college more affordable by subsidizing more of the cost, colleges simply raise tuition by that amount and pocket the proceeds. “Colleges should have a stake in their students’ success and be responsible for reimbursing taxpayers for a portion of their losses if students don’t see financial value from enrolling in an institution and can’t repay,” Republicans on the House Committee on Education and Workforce said. “Students, families, and the federal government pay tens, sometimes hundreds, of thousands of dollars in tuition while many degrees offer students no additional value but leave graduates with debt. Too many are left worse off than if they never enrolled in the first place.”

'Should be thanking ICE officers'

'This is obviously not operationally necessitated'

'Abundance of caution'

'Without her permission'

'He showed no signs of impairment'