Enrollment Figures Change Dramatically at MIT After Affirmative Action Ban (And That's Good)

During Night One of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, veteran reporter Judy Woodruff falsely reported on a Donald Trump phone call to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that never happened, a call that would have made Trump appear to influence Israel’s war policy in order to help himself win election. Discussing how lame-duck President Joe Biden could still help VP Kamala Harris succeed him in office, Woodruff made the hasty, unsourced claim that showed Trump as unscrupulous during the 11 p.m. (ET) hour Monday night. Judy Woodruff: I would venture to say, without hearing this directly from anybody, that one thing that the Harris campaign would love is if President Biden would bring home a cease-fire in the Middle East right now between Gaza and Israel. We know that Secretary of State Blinken is over there right now working Netanyahu. The reporting is that former President Trump is on the phone with the prime minister of Israel urging him not to cut a deal right now because that, it’s believed that would help the Harris campaign. So, I don’t know where that -- who knows whether that will come about or not, but I have to think that the Harris campaign would like for President Biden to do what presidents do, which is work on that one. The accusation is reminiscent of the “October Surprise” election conspiracy theory -- the unsubstantiated rumor that Ronald Reagan’s 1980 presidential campaign, led by William Casey, delayed the release of the 52 American hostages in Iran in order to win election over Democrat Jimmy Carter. But “the reporting” Woodruff cited turned out false, and Woodruff herself seemed to have misinterpreted it anyway. The next day, after Netanyahu’s office denied the call had occurred, Woodruff took to X to “clarify,” explaining she had mistakenly forwarded initial faulty reporting that had been corrected afterward. Yet strangely, not even Axios's original bad report backed up what Woodruff said about Trump urging Netanyahu not to cut a deal with Hamas. If anything, the report suggested Trump was pushing him to take it: "One source said Trump's call was intended to encourage Netanyahu to take the deal, but stressed he didn't know if this is indeed what the former president told Netanyahu." Where did Woodruff get the opposite idea, then? Here's Woodruff's apologetic X post: I want to clarify my remarks on the PBS News special on Monday night about the ongoing cease fire talks in the Middle East. As I said, this was not based on my original reporting; I was referring to reports I had read, in Axios and Reuters, about former President Trump having spoken to the Israeli Prime Minister. In the live TV moment, I repeated the story because I hadn't seen later reporting that both sides denied it. This was a mistake and I apologize for it. After first reporting on the alleged Trump-Netanyahu call last week, Axios updated its story with an Editor’s Note, August 15.  This story has been updated to reflect that Netanyahu's office denied a phone call took place on Wednesday between the Israeli prime minister and former President Trump. Woodruff cited the discredited account during PBS’s live DNC coverage five days later, on Monday night, August 20.    

As Democrats gather in Chicago for their convention, they will deliver soaring speeches, engage in over-the-top rhetoric, and prompt media pundits to peddle hot takes and outlandish predictions. Amidst the endless war of words, the most important story may be the one no one is discussing: State election laws have changed — for the better. None of these reforms matter if there are no criminal consequences for bad actors who violate election laws. Lawmakers across the country answered the call of voters to protect their ballots. Legislators from Tallahassee, Atlanta, and Des Moines to Jefferson City and Columbus took action to protect democracy at the ballot box. In committee rooms, at legislative hearings, in offices and chambers, they crafted strong election integrity bills. And despite an overwhelming media campaign of threats and dishonest coverage, they put Americans first. Since 2020, 30 state legislatures have passed 225 bills that secure ballots, increase process accountability, and provide transparency to the American people. It’s worth looking at what exactly they’ve accomplished. First, state lawmakers decided it was common sense to stop billionaires from selectively handing out cash to election officials whose job it is to run elections impartially. In the past four years, 28 states have banned one of the worst abuses of the 2020 election — the private funding of public election administration. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg “donated” more than $400 million to election offices across the country. Labeled as COVID relief grants and funneled through a nonprofit organization, this money, known as “Zuckerbucks,” allowed a private organization to not only fund public election operations but also fund them on a highly partisan basis. Take Georgia, for example, where election offices were awarded $45 million in Zuckerbucks during the 2020 cycle. The money was spent predominantly on get-out-the-vote efforts in strategic districts. As a result, 75% of the counties that received grants shifted significantly leftward. Georgia lawmakers were the first to ban this tactic — and they came back again in 2023 to close a loophole when a government official in DeKalb County took another $2 million in violation of the ban. In Wisconsin and Louisiana, where Democratic governors twice vetoed anti-Zuckerbucks bills, state lawmakers strategically passed legislation that put bans on the ballot. Voters in both states overwhelmingly approved the laws, which did not require the governors’ signatures and are now in effect. Second, state legislators recognized the common sense in securing the absentee voting process — determining that it should not be easier to get an absentee ballot through the mail than it is to receive one in person on Election Day. Since 2020, eight state legislatures have passed bills to require identification, such as a driver’s license number, on absentee ballots. Absentee voting is inherently more vulnerable than traditional in-person Election Day voting, and identification helps to secure these ballots cast by mail. Lawmakers in states like Ohio, Georgia, Missouri, and South Carolina all faced aggressive scrutiny from the media for passing voter identification legislation. Yet bill sponsors, committee chairmen, and leadership didn’t back down. Ultimately, the voter identification bills that have been challenged have withstood court scrutiny and will be in place to secure absentee votes in November. Third, state lawmakers passed common-sense reforms to protect vulnerable voters — like the elderly — from ballot harvesting tactics. In 2020, partisan special-interest groups routinely gathered absentee ballots from voters with no delivery safeguards. Voters had no way of knowing whether their ballots were tampered with or even delivered at all. Lawmakers correctly decided that political operatives, with a stake in election outcomes, should not be handling ballots. Ten states have recently enacted reforms to stop ballot harvesting practices by narrowly defining who may return an absentee ballot on the voter’s behalf. Florida, Iowa, Ohio, and Texas passed laws that allow specific people, such as a family or household member or designated caretaker, to return a ballot for somebody else. Of course, none of these reforms matter if there are no criminal consequences for bad actors who violate election laws. State lawmakers in four states enacted reforms to investigate and prosecute nefarious behavior and hold election violators accountable. In Florida, legislators established a dedicated Office of Election Crimes and Security. This investigative office has trained law enforcement officials with election expertise to review complaints, oversee a public fraud hotline, and conduct investigations. Since the office was created, officials have received more than 2,000 complaints and initiated over 1,000 independent investigations. These changes represent just a few of the accomplishments that state lawmakers fought hard to achieve. While much more work remains on election integrity, these efforts will lead to safer, more secure elections — exactly what voters demanded. State lawmakers put Americans first. And it’s their work — not the words of national political parties — that might just determine the outcome in November.

Here are two simple truths. First, the Biden-Harris administration has allowed more dangerous people, including known terrorists, to cross our border and be released into the country than ever before. Second, as vice president, Kamala Harris was appointed as the point person over the border. With the president essentially incapacitated, she is in charge.Donald Trump and Republicans must relentlessly connect these two points without distractions. Harris recently promised to get tough on the border. Since she’s currently in charge, Republicans should call her bluff.Now is the time to get back in session and have Trump give a speech on the Capitol steps, backing an effort to end the catch-and-release of criminal aliens.Republicans must get back in session — precisely as Democrats bask in the glowing coverage of their convention — and force the national discussion to focus on the invasion of terrorists, murderers, rapists, drug traffickers, and dangerous gangs such as Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua.In just the past few days, the House Judiciary Committee published a report revealing that the Biden-Harris administration released 99 known illegal aliens who are on the terrorist watch list. Most bad actors who cross the border don’t have a known profile, so catching and releasing 99 individuals on a terror watch list is nothing short of astounding. How many voters are even aware of this?Where are they now?The actual number of terrorists caught and released is likely much higher. The report shows that among the tens of thousands of Border Patrol encounters with illegal aliens from dangerous countries, there were 2,134 Afghan nationals; 33,347 Chinese nationals; 541 Iranian nationals; 520 Syrian nationals; 3,104 Uzbek nationals; 1,260 illegal aliens from Russia; 752 from Kyrgyzstan; 734 from Pakistan; 704 from Somalia; 433 from Kazakhstan; 123 from Yemen; and 62 from Lebanon.We need not speculate where special interest aliens are because even those caught attempting to attack America have been let out on bail.Hasan Yousef Hamdan, one of the two Jordanians arrested on May 3 for trying to crash into the barrier at Marine Corps Base Quantico, was reportedly on the terrorist watch list but was still released on just $15,000 bail. Hamdan was caught at the California-Mexico border just three weeks prior and was released under the Biden-Harris policies.Additionally, the House Judiciary Committee report identified four individuals on the terrorist watch list who received asylum. Many terrorists from the Middle East, engaged in sectarian civil wars, are now coming to claim asylum from rival terror groups.Others, like the thousands from Uzbekistan, are being repressed by their home governments precisely because they are so radical. The United States has become a dumping ground for terrorists too extreme even for Muslim governments. This is why three of the eight Tajik nationals with suspected ties to ISIS, who arrived through the Biden amnesty app, were released. Tajikistan is another country where the government “persecutes” radical Islam.Asif Merchant, a Pakistani national charged with being an Iranian spy tasked with assassinating Trump, was also on the terror watch list. Shockingly, officials granted him “significant public benefit parole” when he flew into a Houston airport on April 13. If he was allowed into the country, imagine how many less obvious terrorists have entered by the thousands. Bizarrely, Trump himself has not focused much on this case.Republicans will never find a more consequential issue that is easier to sell to the public.Aside from terrorists, we have numerous sex offenders being let in. Papa Diop, a Senegalese national released by the administration last year, stands accused of raping a woman on a park bench in the Bronx. David Davon-Bonilla, a Nicaraguan who was living off the taxpayers at a La Quinta Hotel on Third Avenue in Brooklyn, was charged with brutally raping a woman in a relatively busy area of New York City after having been released by the Biden-Harris administration in December 2022.How many more rapists are being housed in these shelters at a staggering cost of $5 billion so they can roam free and harm Americans?Cory Alvarez, the Haitian illegal alien flown into the country on the illegal Biden-Harris parole program, was released on just $500 bail after being charged with rape of a disabled 15-year-old girl in Massachusetts. So far in August, the Boston ICE office has arrested a number of vile criminal aliens, including a Brazilian man facing attempted murder charges in his home country, a Mexican previously deported for rape, a Guatemalan charged with child molestation in Rhode Island, an Ecuadorian facing rape and kidnapping charges, a Dominican fentanyl trafficker, and a Colombian gang leader wanted for murder.Not only do the cartels control both sides of our border on the ground, but they also control the air.Air Force General Gregory Guillot, commander of U.S. Northern Command, recently testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee that more than 1,000 drones, mainly operated by the Sinaloa cartel, cross our airspace every month and that these incursions are a “growing” threat to national security. Look no farther than Israel’s northern border with Hezbollah to envision the problem with enemies being able to launch drones with impunity.Force Kamala’s handAccording to a House Judiciary Committee report, an astounding 420,000 “unaccompanied minors” have been released during the Biden-Harris administration to “sponsors” who are often in the country illegally themselves. More than 140,000 are unaccounted for.Many of these youths, lacking a sense of connection and purpose, often join gangs like 18th Street, MS-13, and Tren de Aragua. According to the NYPD, droves of illegal alien teens are now engaging in “wolfpack” robberies and carjackings throughout New York City.If we don’t address this issue now, we will face security threats from this invasion for years to come — not just at the border but in every community. Republicans will never find a more consequential issue that is easier to sell to the public. Now is the time to get back in session and have Trump give a speech on the Capitol steps, backing an effort to end the catch-and-release of criminal aliens.Kamala Harris claims she wants to secure the border. If Republicans send a bill to the Senate that funds the government without allowing catch-and-release of criminals, terrorists, child molesters, gangsters, and fentanyl traffickers, will she use her power as de facto president to oppose it?Republicans complain that the corporate media focuses on trivial matters. What if Republicans coming back into session would pledge, “No border? No budget!”Every Republican and conservative has resoundingly dubbed this election as “the most important election of our lifetime — this time for real.” Well, if that is the case, then we cannot afford to lose it. It’s time to start making big plays to ensure we win.

A transit bus driver in New Jersey was arrested for brutally beating a passenger who allegedly spat in his face. The severe beating was caught on several videos by other passengers who recorded it on their cellphones.'If someone spit on me, I'm automatically hitting them.' Newark Public Safety Director Fritz Fragé said that the fight erupted on the bus near Court Street and Broad Street on Friday at about 1 p.m. Videos showed the driver, later identified as Toron Walker, telling other passengers to stand back before he punches a man repeatedly and even gets him into a chokehold. When police were alerted to the altercation and responded to the scene, Walker was still struggling with the man. Fragé said that Walker was taken into custody and charged with aggravated assault. The passenger was also arrested and charged with aggravated assault. Police are reviewing the videos of the incident in their investigation. WABC-TV spoke to some transit bus drivers about the arrest of the bus driver, and some said they were opposed to it. "It's a bus driver trying to help out the community, and you did wrong to a bus driver that's trying to help us out. He's doing his job and he wants to feel safe," said bus rider Zoey Clarke."If someone spit on me, I'm automatically hitting them," said Newark resident Donna Defeo. A statement from the New Jersey Transit confirmed that the driver was assaulted prior to the beating. We don't condone any form of assault aboard any of our vehicles or within our facilities. We can confirm that our driver was assaulted prior to the altercation. We want to take this opportunity to remind everyone that assaulting a transit employee is a serious offense and can result in a fine, jail time and/or a ban from riding the transit system.Here's a news video from WABC with much of the cellphone footage that captured the brutal beating. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

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Former President Bill Clinton, whose Democratic Party today hardly resembles the one he led to consecutive terms in the White House in the 1990s, was to be the among the biggest names gracing the stage Wednesday night at the Democratic National Convention.