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'Secret Service adhered to those requirements'

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—Sen. Ted Cruz condemned the U.S. Food and Drug Administration following news that an FDA team leader urged the approval of so-called puberty blockers for “transgender” minors, even while she acknowledged that these drugs are associated with an increased risk of suicide, depression, and seizures. “These emails are beyond troubling,” Cruz, a Republican from Texas, told The Daily Signal in a written statement Monday. “The Biden-Harris administration has consistently put its radical gender ideology over the safety of children, and these emails strongly suggest that the FDA not only participated in those campaigns but actively knew that advancing them was endangering children.” “Gender ideology” refers to the idea that a person’s internal sense of “gender” overrides his or her biological sex such that it is considered healthy to undergo experimental interventions. Cruz referenced one email that emerged as part of an email chain. In a Jan. 25, 2022, email, Shannon Sullivan, clinical team leader at the FDA’s Division of General Endocrinology, noted that the agency’s Division of Metabolism and Endocrinology Products performed a “safety review of the GnRH agonist class in pediatric patients in 2016/2017.” GnRH stands for “Gonadatropin-releasing hormone,” and GnRH agonists prevent the natural release of testosterone and estrogen that initiate puberty. The conservative nonprofit America First Legal obtained the email in the discovery process of a lawsuit and made it available Thursday to The Daily Signal. “Our review focused on suicidal ideation/depression, seizures, and bone health,” Sullivan wrote in the email. Although most of the minors in the study suffered from central precocious puberty (in which puberty starts too early), she said, “a handful were transgender kids using the drugs off-label.” “We found no effect on bone (after factoring in catch-up growth), including no increase in fracture risk,” she noted. “We did find increased risk of depression and suicidality, as well as increased seizure risk and we issued [safety-related labeling changes].” Yet Sullivan went on to recommend approving GnRH agonists for minors. The FDA’s Division of Urology, Obstetrics, and Gynecology, she wrote, “has done a patient listening session with trans kids and separately with trans adults, which I participated in, and there is definitely a need for these drugs to be approved for gender transition, as they are typically not covered by insurance and are expensive out of pocket.” Sullivan also said that “no company has come in” to provide “GnRH agonists in the transgender population” yet, but “it was my understanding” that the FDA division “would take these applications if and when they do come in.” Screenshot of FDA official Shannon Sullivan’s email endorsing “puberty blockers” for minors despite a suicide risk. “It is shocking and unacceptable that the FDA would admit that puberty blockers cause suicidal ideation and depression, yet in the same breath recommend their approval for transgender ‘medical’ procedures for children,” Ian Prior, senior adviser at America First Legal, previously told The Daily Signal. “The advocates of these brutal practices on children claim that they are necessary to prevent suicide and depression, but in reality, the treatments themselves cause the very thing they claim they are trying to prevent,” Pryor added. “This barbarism has no place in a civilized society and it’s time for the federal government to follow the lead of Europe in banning these experiments on children.” America First Legal sued the Food and Drug Administration for illegally concealing records related to the off-label use of “puberty blockers” and cross-sex hormones on children. The organization also filed a Freedom of Information Act request for all FDA records regarding off-label use of “puberty blockers” and other drugs on children to provide “gender-affirming care,” a euphemistic term for experimental interventions to make young men appear female and vice versa. “Puberty blockers” and cross-sex hormones may cause sterilization and other serious side effects including depression, blood clots, high blood pressure, and weight gain. Internal documents from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, which presents itself as the premier source on “gender-affirming care,” reveal that medical doctors who support experimental “treatments” for children have acknowledged that side effects include liver cancer in teens and reduced sexual function. They have also expressed concern about the lack of informed consent for procedures with lifelong impacts. Some doctors prescribe Lupron, a drug also used to chemically castrate sex offenders, to make young boys appear female. The Food and Drug Administration has approved GnRH agonists for central precocious puberty but not for gender dysphoria. The FDA didn’t turn over requested documents in the timely manner required by law, so America First Legal sued. Sullivan’s email is among the documents the nonprofit obtained. Sullivan originally sent the email as FDA staff discussed how to respond to a media request from Reuters reporter Chad Terhune. Terhune had asked about “puberty blocking drugs,” noting that such drugs have been “approved for central precocious puberty but [are] also used off-label for transgender children.” The FDA did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment by publication time. The post ‘BEYOND TROUBLING’: Ted Cruz Calls Out FDA for Putting ‘Radical Gender Ideology’ Over the ‘Safety of Children’ appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Monday's Final Word

The media's unelected Democrats cannot tolerate anyone questioning the racial authenticity of Kamala Harris. On This Week, ABC's cantankerous George Stephanopoulos yelled at Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) over Trump questioning her racial shape-shifting. Donalds calmly stated and repeated that this is a phone issue, and that George was the one obsessing over race.  But it's far too common for journalists to question the blackness of black conservatives and Republicans, and suggest they're just pandering to the white man. ABC's The View did this in June, as Joy Behar suggested Donalds was stupid, and Sunny Hostin bizarrely implied black Republicans were mythical figures, like "unicorns." But when Trump said in Atlanta that Harris was a "low-IQ individual," CNN morning host Kasie Hunt said this was "definitely race-related." These people have a field full of cows when you pronounce her name Ka–MAH-la. But you can compare Trump to Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, and Mao, homicidal tyrants all, is fair game.  The contrast in "accountability" between Republicans and Democrats was on display on Sunday and Monday. After yelling at Byron Donalds on Sunday, Stephanopoulos sounded remarkably soft on Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), celebrating her new book. He began "You wrote a book called The Art of Power. How is power an art?" Then there’s this: STEPHANOPOULOS: Your book is also in many ways a plea for political civility and decency. You open of course with the attack on your husband from a couple of years ago. The harrowing events of January 6th. It does seem like we've gone off the rails in many ways.  These people are so preposterous. Pelosi was consistently celebrated. On CBS Sunday Morning, she bizarrely suggested President Biden belonged on Mount Rushmore. CBS's Lesley Stahl expressed a little skepticism, but then launched into puffing Pelosi's excellence: “If there were a Mount Rushmore for Speakers of the House, Nancy Pelosi would certainly be up there, commemorating her 20 years as a commanding leader in Congress.” Enjoy the podcast below, even as the media can be more disturbing than enjoyable.   

Protests and upheaval have roiled Venezuela following a contested election on July 28. Incumbent leader Nicolas Maduro claims victory by a margin of 51% to 44%, while his opponent leader, Edmundo Gonzalez, says his coalition garnered 66% of the vote. It’s worth noting that Gonzalez was 25 points up in polls through most of July. The United States has officially recognized Gonzalez as the victor, joining a chorus of international criticism of the election’s lack of transparency. Reports detail at least 15 protesters killed so far by Venezuelan authorities, including a teenager who stopped to watch the protests on the way back from a party. There have been at least 39 injuries reported, and over 1,000 protesters have been arrested. The internet has led to significant democratization in many ways simultaneously, as it has allowed the rise of technocracy and autocratic governments to clamp down even farther on popular discontent they dislike. Prior to the election, Maduro emphasized there would be a “bloodbath” if he didn’t win this time around. He has the wherewithal to make good on his threat, given that he’s in charge of the nation’s army, cops, courts, and most of its lethal paramilitary gangs. Even leftist-led Brazil and Colombia have expressed concerns over the situation and the transparency of Venezuela's July 28 election, urging Maduro to reveal the vote tallies that prove his claims publicly. It’s worth keeping in mind that the U.S. Department of State is still offering up to $15 million for information or help in arresting Maduro for allegedly drug trafficking and engaging in narco-terrorism. He’s also under investigation at the ICC for violently cracking down on protests in 2014 and 2017. In the past ten years, almost 8 million Venezuelans have left the country due to the economic and political crisis, which has been worsened by devastating sanctions from the U.S. and its allies. Maduro doesn’t have many options and certainly doesn’t appear to believe he’d receive much leniency if he negotiates with the West, steps down, or redoes an election to placate his critics. So he’s all in. One key to Maduro’s power is control and leverage over information that reaches citizens, as well as their ability to spread viral messages and activism in a timely fashion. An analysis by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists reportedly “uncovered a flood of GenAI dupes, disinformation campaigns, and blocks on more than 100 websites” before the election. Despotic regimes from North Korea and Iran to Cuba and Syria are well known for limiting and censoring internet access to quell unrest, mitigate the citizenry’s ability to access information and mobilize resistance. This year, countries including Kenya and Comoros have also resorted to shutting down and limiting large areas of the internet to quell unrest. Various independent outlets have been suspended in Venezuela since the election, including El Estímulo and Analítica, and that number has now climbed to 11, with Maduro authorities shutting down numerous outlets that were focused on exposing government-fueled disinformation and “fake news.” “They wish to dismantle the sources of news that still spark communities in this country,” says Tinedo Guía, leader of Venezuela's National Journalists' Association. A blueprint for totalitarian control Venezuela's government adopts a four-pronged approach to achieve its aims of quashing widespread anti-government unity or mobilization. Seizing power over what is shown and broadcast to Venezuelans by closing down independent media chains. “For example, in April 2019, multiple media outlets were shut down after opposition leader Juan Guaidó used Twitter to announce an opposition plan to encourage the military to leave Maduro,” note Moises Rendon and Arianna Kohan. “The internet was restored 20 minutes before a live-streamed speech given by Maduro in which he denounced the opposition.” Limiting the ability and ease of citizens to use data, VPNs, and alternate browsers like TOR (the Onion Router). Using the state-held internet and phone provider CANTV to spy on and track what citizens communicate about. Government agency Conatel also operates under the guise of technical compliance to yank licenses from those who displease Maduro. Meanwhile, Chinese telecom company ZTE helps track citizens’ trends, habits, and behavior through a “fatherland card” that is required to access any state-subsidized services and social programs including emergency food assistance. Weaponizing the court system and governmental bodies to prosecute and harass those whose activism, journalism, or online activity irks the regime. This includes the 2013 creation of the Center for Strategic Security and Protection (Centro Estratégico de Seguridad y Protección) to track and stop those who may be spreading information or communicating in ways that allegedly harm political stability. Then there’s just plain intimidation and chasing down those who cause a headache for the regime. NGO Public Space (Espacio Público) reports 1,317 incidents of attacks on journalists, including arrests and murders, since 2002 in Venezuela. Many are embroiled in court cases and under charges that remain unresolved. In the past two decades under Maduro and former leader Hugo Chavez, Public Space lists 400 media companies that have bitten the dust, from TV channels and websites to radio stations and newspapers. Most ordinary Venezuelans are focused on having enough to eat for the day and getting the fuel necessary for their daily work and needs. Twitter and other social networks help spread information and the locations of medicine and other services. But for those who can’t afford internet access or aren’t in an area where they can use VPNs, text messaging on basic flip phones is used to stay in touch about what’s happening. However, the Maduro regime easily taps this, and smartphone ownership has been declining by around 7% per year due to costs. Mesh networks that let people talk offline are also used, although they are illegal and still trackable by the regime. In addition to state-run internet service providers, the Maduro regime has increasingly leaned on private ISPs to report user activity, including Spain’s Movistar, the nation’s only international ISP. “What I can’t understand is how a company with corporate governance and an ethics code that operates under the European Union principles of free expression is doing what it’s doing in Venezuela,” says César Batiz, editor of the Venezuelan independent news website El Pitazo. Surveillance politics Jesus Vargas/Getty Images Even apart from government control, censorship, and tracking and prosecution of user activity, Venezuela’s physical internet infrastructure has been on a dramatic downward slide for over a decade now, with lagging bandwidth, inefficient DNS servers, and sluggish performance due to lack of submarine cables connecting them to the rest of the world. The country’s millions of poor and various criminal gangs also routinely steal cables and antennae that are needed to keep the internet running smoothly. Only about 40% of those polled in Venezuela’s seven biggest cities report having any internet access. At the same time as it throttles the internet for citizens, Venezuela’s government has become more skilled at utilizing the internet that does exist to its advantage. This information control has echoes with the past. The internet and social media played a crucial role in the 2010 Arab Spring, rousing protesters against their governments, and numerous other democratic movements, uprisings, coups, and color revolutions from Nigeria to Ukraine. However, the groundswell of momentum and viral effect facilitated by social media and the internet was also quickly turned into a tool of increased state control. As Marwa Fatafta notes: “Dictators and despots — old and new — quickly learned how to weaponize the same online spaces and tools against their own citizens in order to quash any form of political dissent or mobilization, both online and offline.” While the internet can be democratizing, it can also be a sand trap, full of mirror sites, tracking, and disinformation. As Venezuela has adapted to a patchy internet infrastructure, it’s also adapted to the reality of ground-level organizing and learning not to rely on digital messaging as the primary conduit of resistance. The end result is a country in crisis but without much digital unification on the ground for anti-government citizens. The energy is in the streets more than the tweets. Political momentum is hard-won rather than easily disseminated widely or via top-down messaging. In addition to difficulty rallying a broad-based anti-government movement, digital weakness extends to trouble interesting foreigners in the country’s crisis. Tales of breakups and heartbreak ahead of the election are one approach used to try to rouse more engagement around the world in seeing the human side of the crisis. The internet is both a malleable record-keeping environment and a receptacle of the collective instincts of the citizenry. It can be shaped and guided in many ways, from the bottom up and the top down. It has led to significant democratization in many ways simultaneously, as it has allowed the rise of technocracy and autocratic governments to clamp down even farther on popular discontent they dislike. Venezuela’s difficulty in shaking off Maduro and communications breakdown may seem distant and far more dramatic than anything going on in America, but if anything, it serves as a warning for how slippery the slope becomes when only one version of the political truth is permitted to be broadcasted and believed.

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