“Emilia Pérez” star Karla Sofía Gascón became the first trans-identifying person in history to be nominated for an Academy Award as the committee announced the nominees on Thursday morning.  Gascón, 52, is a biological man who will be up for the Oscar for Best Actress alongside Cynthia Erivo (“Wicked”), Mikey Madison (“Anora”), Demi Moore (“The Substance”), and Fernanda Torres (“I’m Still Here”). Previously, Gascón jointly won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress alongside the movie’s other co-stars, becoming the first trans-identifying star to win the prize. The “Emilia Pérez” headliner also got a Best Actress nomination at the Golden Globes but lost out to Demi Moore for her role in “The Substance.” Despite controversy surrounding the film, “Emilia Pérez” received the most nominations at this year’s Oscars with 13.  “Emilia Pérez” is also nominated for Best Picture, Best Director (Jacques Audiard), Best Supporting Actress (Zoe Saldaña), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Cinematography, Best Sound, Best Original Song (“El Mal” and “Mi Camino”), Best Film Editing, and Best International Feature. Gascón previously spoke about being proud to be in the movie. “You have an action movie that’s not an action movie, a drama that’s not a drama, a comedy that’s not a comedy,” Gascón told Tudum in November. “It is such a great gift, and I’m so proud to be part of it.” CELEBRATE #47 WITH 47% OFF DAILYWIRE+ MEMBERSHIPS + A FREE $20 GIFT The narrative follows a Mexican drug cartel leader who fakes his own death to undergo gender transition surgery and live a new life. Chaos ensues when “Emilia Pérez” insists on reuniting with his family while disguised as a distant female relative following gender reassignment surgery.  Reactions on social media to Gascón being nominated for Best Actress were mostly negative. “The patriarchy continues to win,” one person replied to the nomination announcement on X. “Another year of dismal ratings and awards to movies no one cares about,” another agreed. “Liberal Hollywood has learned nothing from the recent election,” a third commenter chimed in. “They keep trying to cancel women even though America soundly rejected Democrats in the presidential election for doing exactly that…the entertainment industry has lost its mind.”

The Biden State Department celebrated its leftwing DEI agenda just days before President Donald Trump scrapped the whole enterprise. Earlier this month, the State Department released a report titled “U.S. Department of State DEIA Accomplishments 2021-2024 – Building A Workforce That Reflects America.” The report cataloged some of the radical measures the agency took to embed the far-left ideology into America’s foreign policy. The report, which has since been removed from the State Department website, lists specific actions the State Department took in service of the DEI agenda, ranging from DEI events at embassies and consulates to formal policies dedicated to pushing the ideology. “We made our recruiting fairer and more transparent. We incorporated commitment to diversity and inclusion as an important metric for Foreign and Civil Service evaluations,” former Secretary of State Anthony Blinken says at the outset of the report. “When the people making decisions on behalf of the American public don’t reflect the full diversity of our nation, we all lose, and that impacts our national security.” CELEBRATE #47 WITH 47% OFF DAILYWIRE+ MEMBERSHIPS + A FREE $20 GIFT At the consulate in Sao Paulo, Brazil, for example, officials “commemorated Black Consciousness Month with an event in which employees learned about inclusion of Afro-Brazilian culture through Capoeira music and LGBTQI+ culture through Vogue dance.” The embassy in Panama City, meanwhile, “hosted inclusive language training on how the Spanish language discusses women and gender,” also discussing Panamanians with disabilities, LGBTQI+ Panamanians, Afro-Panamanians,” and “indigenous communities — specifically Wounaan Panamanians, and HIV-positive Panamanians and the stigmas they face.” The embassy in Cambodia’s capital of Phnom Penh created a “DEIA Library for all ages, featuring over 150 books in English and Khmer on DEIA and the traditions and cultures of both the United States and Cambodia.” The events at the consulates and embassies were not just one-off DEI celebrations, but were instead part of the State Department’s broader approach under former President Joe Biden and Blinken. The agency also created a data dashboard with the demographic characteristics of civil service and foreign service officials, instituted a biennial “DEIA climate study,” and hosted “Start Out Right,” the first DEIA summit intended to “train 250 first-time Department managers from across the world on inclusive leadership.” The Biden administration launched a whole-of-government approach to embed the DEI agenda throughout the entire federal government and its bureaucracy, establishing DEI offices, policies, and new roles for those tasked with advancing the ideology. The Trump administration has already rolled back these measures and is actively rooting out potential efforts by bureaucrats within the executive branch to rename and conceal the DEI agenda. The Daily Wire documented the rise of DEI at the Biden State Department, which appointed activists to high-paying positions and tasked them with spreading leftwing dogmas on race and gender across the world. Those two officials — special envoys tasked with advancing far-left dogma on race and gender — both appear to have vacated their positions at the State Department. Trump also signed an executive order intended to purge DEI from the State Department and all executive agencies. In response to the order, the Office of Personnel Management issued a memo directing agency heads to “send a notification to all employees of DEIA offices that they are being placed on paid administrative leave effective immediately as the agency takes steps to close/end all DEIA initiatives, offices, and programs.” The federal Office of Personnel Management also provided agency heads with a template email to send to bureaucrats, which explains that the DEI actions of the previous administration “divided Americans by race, wasted taxpayer dollars, and resulted in shameful discrimination.”

On Thursday, the GOP-led Senate confirmed the nomination of John Ratcliffe to become CIA director in President Donald Trump‘s second term. The final tally was 74-25, with many Democrats joining with Republicans in voting for Ratcliffe, who is the second Trump Cabinet nominee to be confirmed after Secretary of State Marco Rubio was approved unanimously earlier this week. A simple majority was needed for confirmation. Ratcliffe is a former House Republican from Texas who served as director of national intelligence at the end of the first Trump administration. During his confirmation hearing last week, Ratcliffe testified that he demonstrated his “record in terms of speaking truth to power and defending the intelligence community and its good work” when he stood firm against efforts to discredit the Hunter Biden laptop story. “In 2020, when a chairman of an intelligence committee misrepresented that a laptop owned by then-candidate [Joe] Biden’s son was somehow a Russian intelligence operation and 51 former intelligence officials used the imprimatur of IC authority to go along with that, I stood in the breach. I stood alone and told the American people the truth about that,” he said. CIA Director Nominee @JohnRatcliffe: “In 2020, when a chairman of an intelligence committee misrepresented that a laptop owned by then candidate Biden’s son was somehow a Russian intelligence operation… I stood in the breach. I stood alone and told the American people the truth… pic.twitter.com/5d75IK13BG — Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) January 15, 2025 The Senate Intelligence Committee advanced Ratcliffe’s nomination by a 14-3 vote with bipartisan support. However, earlier this week, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) objected to a so-called time agreement that would have allowed a final confirmation vote to have taken place on Tuesday. CELEBRATE #47 WITH 47% OFF DAILYWIRE+ MEMBERSHIPS + A FREE $20 GIFT Murphy said he wanted a “full” debate that lasted a couple of more days while insisting that some members had “serious concerns” that the CIA pick would not be able to “distance himself from the political interests of President Trump.” Intelligence Chairman Tom Cotton (R-AR) rejected Murphy’s claim about Democrats needing more time and surmised that “what this is really about is trying to drag out all of these nominations to play procedural games, as we’re about to, with Pete Hegseth’s nomination to try to deny President Trump his Cabinet in a prompt and timely fashion.” My message to obstructionist Democrats: Don’t make plans this weekend. We’re going to get President Trump’s nominees confirmed the easy collegial way, or apparently the hard way. pic.twitter.com/DJrA09bTqk — Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) January 21, 2025   The Senate could hold a confirmation vote on Hegseth, who is the nominee to become defense secretary, as early as Friday after GOP leadership took procedural steps to set it up in the face of Democrat resistance to speed up consideration of Trump’s Cabinet picks. South Carolina Governor Kristi Noem, who is Trump’s nominee to become Secretary of Homeland Security, may be next with a final vote over the weekend.   Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) warned Democrats against slowing down efforts to confirm Trump’s nominees, saying on X: “As I’ve repeatedly said, Senate Republicans are ready to work as long as needed to confirm President Trump’s nominees. Nights. Weekends. Recesses.”

President Donald Trump’s executive order purging DEI from government has made its way to the Department of the Interior, one of the wokest agencies in the federal government. Shortly after taking office, Trump signed an executive order “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEl Programs and Preferencing and Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions.” In response, the Office of Personnel Management began implementing the order with a memo instructing agency heads to begin the purge of DEI offices and officials. An internal Interior Department email obtained by The Daily Wire indicates that the agency, previously home to elaborate DEI exercises, has begun to purge the agenda in compliance with the President’s order. “Dear Interior Employees, we are taking steps to close all agency Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEIA) offices and end all DEIA-related contracts in accordance with President Trump’s executive orders,” the email from Acting Secretary of the Interior Walter Cruickshank says before going on to say that the DEI agenda “divided Americans by race, wasted taxpayer dollars and resulted in shameful discrimination.” Obtained by The Daily Wire “We are aware of efforts by some in government to disguise these programs by using coded or imprecise language” it goes on to say before asking employees to promptly report any attempts to conceal ongoing DEI efforts. The email also states that “Interior is withdrawing all final or pending documents, directives, orders, materials and equity plans issued by the agency” and that “all DEIA-related training must be canceled.” Prior to Trump’s return to the White House, the Interior Department was one of the wokest agencies in the federal government, an investigative series from The Daily Wire found. The department celebrated “Transgender Day of Visibility” by showing a documentary about queer inclusion in the field of marine biology. Woke Biden bureaucrats are celebrating ‘Transgender Day of Visibility’ by screening a film about a “queer conservationist” and a hosting panel of LGBT employees. The film complains that science is full of straight men and asks if a “queer woman” can join the field. WATCH ? pic.twitter.com/m2hGw2m3K4 — Spencer Lindquist ?? (@SpencerLndqst) April 2, 2024 “Transgender Day of Visibility is an internationally recognized event that is celebrated annually on March 31st to help raise awareness and increase understanding of the challenges, importance and struggles of our transgender, non-binary and gender non-conforming communities,” an email obtained by The Daily Wire said. “The Department will mark this important occasion by showing a short documentary called ‘Diving for Rays: A Queer Conservationist’s Story.” One internal document at the agency instructed employees to avoid gendered terms like “husband,” “son,” and “daughter,” and even instructed them to use the “they/them” pronouns for individuals rather than assume someone’s gender. “When referring to individuals whose identified pronouns are not known or when the gender of a generic or hypothetical person is irrelevant within the context, use their name or a singular ‘they’ to avoid making assumptions about an individual’s gender,” the 104 page document reads. It also directed employees to replace “opposite sex” with “different sex,” replace “father/mother” with “parent, caregiver, care provider,” and replace “Aunt/Uncle” with “Parent’s sibling.” Daily Wire host Matt Walsh also revealed that Interior Department bureaucrats recited a DEI poem at the agency’s “ally awards” ceremony. “I’m diversity, embrace me and we’ll journey far. I’m diversity, include me and we’ll reach the shining star,” the poem stated. I’ve just obtained footage of a “diversity poem reading” from a recent DEI “Ally Awards” show at the Department of Interior. However bad you assume this will be, I assure you that it’s much worse. pic.twitter.com/NKwNmayAXx — Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) April 9, 2024 “Don’t exclude me due to a lack of knowledge. Welcome me like the recruit fresh out of college,” read one line of the poem. “Let me take a seat at the table, even though I may be differently able.”

No suspect information has been shared at this time

'A bureaucracy of money suck'

'I am unable to support Mr. Hegseth'

'The sermon given is not reflective of the faith community'

'Her legacy has grown to become transgenerational and transnational'

How do you cheer up a lonely fish? Trick question, fish don’t get lonely. Or do they? It’s difficult to know for sure, but one aquarium in Japan seems to think, in fact, they just might. The Kaikyokan Aquarium in Shimonoseki, southern Japan closed on December 1st, 2024 for renovations. Within a few weeks, their […] The post Japanese Aquarium Cheers up Lonely Sunfish with Cardboard Cutouts of People appeared first on Good News Network.