President Trump quipped about “forgetting” the separation of church and state and declared “we’re bringing religion back to our country” during a National Day of Prayer event on Thursday. “They said separation of church and state, they told me. I said, let’s forget about that for one time. We said, really? Separation? Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I’m not sure,” Trump remarked during the Rose Garden ceremony. “But whether there’s separation or not, you guys are in the White House where you should be, and you’re representing our country,” Trump told faith leaders at the event, adding, “We’re bringing religion back to our country.” President Trump: “We’re bringing back religion in our country. And we’re bringing it back — as I say — bigger and better and stronger than ever before.” pic.twitter.com/TM0Y0rx9gz — CSPAN (@cspan) May 1, 2025 Trump signed an executive order, first reported by The Daily Wire, establishing the Religious Liberty Commission to be composed of church clergy, legal experts, and other Trump allies tasked with identifying “threats to domestic religious liberty,” such as attacks on houses of worship and First Amendment violations, and recommending protective actions. During the Rose Garden ceremony, Trump thanked Paula White, White House senior advisor and leader of the White House Faith Office, for her dedication to religious freedom and emphasized the importance of protecting religious expression in American life. “Prayer is not a religious act, it’s a national necessity,” said Paula White, later adding asking God in a prayer to grant the president “wisdom beyond human understanding and capability, and … divine dreams.” “We call for a spiritual reset in our nation, a return to what is right, a reverence for what is sacred, a real alignment with your divine purpose,” she said. Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, vice chairman of the committee, along with former Housing Secretary Ben Carson, was also present at the event, praising the president: “There’s never been a president who’s invoked the name of Jesus more than you.” Trump’s latest order builds on Trump’s previous executive action in February, establishing a “Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias,” which aimed to address what Trump described as the Biden administration’s “egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians, while ignoring violent, anti-Christian offenses.” Religious liberty concerns have escalated significantly in recent years, with numerous legal challenges arising across the country involving prayer in schools, religious symbols in public spaces, and faith-based organizations’ hiring practices. The Religious Liberty Commission is expected to hold its first formal meeting within the next several weeks, with the commission set to “terminate on July 4, 2026, which marks the 250th anniversary of American Independence, unless extended by the President.”

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, right? Well, apparently not if you hang with Justin Timberlake. The NSYNC vocalist brings together some of his favorite celebrity pals to play golf for charity at the annual 8AM Invitational at the Wynn. This year, Justin invited the Kelce brothers to play. If we’ve learned anything from those boys, they love to have a good time. During the event, Justin Timberlake spent some time on the links with Travis Kelce and lived it up. They weren’t just playing golf, they were dancing like no one was watching. But that certainly wasn’t the case. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Justin Timberlake (@justintimberlake) Travis Kelce Showed Justin Timberlake Some Smooth Moves In a clip posted to Instagram, Justin Timberlake, Travis Kelce, and Andrew Santino head out for what Justin calls a “Real easy vibe today.” The three men start to dance, but it’s apparent very quickly who the headliner of this show is. Justin captioned the video, “We are just @killatrav’s backup dancers now.” And honestly, he’s not kidding. Travis Kelce dominated the dance floor and showed Justin Timberlake exactly how to bring sexy back. No question, fans ate the video up. They couldn’t get enough of Travis and friends. This person was surprised by what they saw on the course. “Didn’t know Travis was such a good dancer. He’s been so overkill and saturated in the media just because he’s Swifty’s boyfriend. This was a nice surprise and fun to watch,” they wrote. A Swiftie keyed in on the unlikely connection between the golfers. They wrote, “Imagine your teenage crush and your actual boyfriend being friends and hanging out, Taylor’s reality is crazy lol.” So many fans loved what they saw. Like this person who was living a dream. “As a lifelong Nsync/JT and Kansas City Chiefs fan, I am ultimate fan girling right now!” We don’t know who Justin Timberlake plans to invite to play in the tournament in 2025, but we have a feeling he’ll send Travis Kelce a text that says, “I Want You Back.” You can find the source of this story’s featured image here. The post Travis Kelce Shows Justin Timberlake How To Bring Sexy Back In Hilarious Golf Video appeared first on InspireMore.

I wish I never wrote the damn movie

'I took my usual sleeping pills and they didn't work'

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. There’s been a lot of media hysteria, some ambiguous and some negative polls. We have talked about that before, that they seem to be not so disinterested as we might imagine. It’s in line with previous prejudicial polls. But here’s the main course of action that we’re all looking at. It’s 100 days and we’re right in the middle of everything. And yet, people are already talking about President Donald Trump as if he’s failed or there’s an obituary. Nothing could be further from the truth. Don’t listen to the libertarian right or the “Never Trump” right or the hard left. What’s happening is we’re watching the most dramatic counterrevolution in our history. This is more fundamentally changing than even the Reagan revolution that rebooted the American economy and won the Cold War. And it’s even more—I don’t know—more fundamentally transformative than the Roosevelt first 100 days when he took the country hard left with the New Deal. And what do I mean by that? Everything is in play and we have no idea how it’s gonna happen—it’s going to turn out or what will happen. But it could be what Donald Trump called “a golden age.” Let’s look at foreign policy very quickly. Iran is not the Iran of 2015-16 when former President Barack Obama did the deal. It’s not even the Iran that we got out of the deal under Trump’s first administration. This is Iran that has no air defenses to speak of. Anytime the United States or Israel wants to penetrate the air shield of Iran, it can. There is no Hezbollah as we knew it. There is no Hamas as we knew it. The Houthis have been completely neutered. We spent a billion dollars but Trump hit them with almost everything we’ve had. The Red Sea is opening up to navigation. And so, my point is that if Donald Trump wants to cut a deal, it will be on terms that get rid of the nuclear program. And if they do not want to get rid of the nuclear program, they have no more surrogates. There’s no Bashar al-Assad in Syria. And these other terrorist appendages that I just said are defunct. So he’ll either get a nuclear deal or he’ll either outsource to Israel or we will take out that nuclear threat that Iran may possess. So there’s going to be, one way or another, a solution to the Iran problem. In Ukraine, we’re beyond give them whatever it takes, whatever it takes. The Joe Biden strategy of—it’s a non-strategy—just feed that Stalingrad carnage house. From liberal to conservative have already outlined the parameters of a ceasefire and peace. A DMC. A commercial corridor. Institutionalized Crimea and Donbas in the possession of Russian President Vladimir Putin, unfortunately, which he took those two territories in 2014. No NATO membership for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but a lot of arms so that he can deter Putin and probably EU membership. If that piece is settled, Donald Trump will soar. Former President Joe Biden allowed that war to break out because he did not arm Ukraine in an offensive way, in the way that Trump had. The Afghanistan pullout lost his deterrence. And then he had a non-strategy. And we had something worse than Stalingrad in World War II. Back home, we are on a renaissance of foreign investment, $4 or $5 trillion. Our tech lords are building huge factories. All that’s gonna kick in very soon. In addition to that, we’re on an energy renaissance. There is no prohibition about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or Keystone. Whatever we want to do, in terms of natural gas, nuclear, clean coal, oil production—it’s gonna happen. And it’s going to lower energy prices. And it’s gonna be very important for Europe. And that’s gonna change our strategic relationship when we start in full mode supplying them with liquid natural gas and maybe even oil. When we look at the universities, there’s gonna be a fundamental change in the universities, whether they like it or not. There may be a tax on their endowment. There may be some conditions on student loans—this $1.6 trillion student loan program that’s in shambles. They’re gonna have to get rid of DEI and trying to avoid the Supreme Court decisions. They’ve taken so many billions of dollars and not told us about it from China. I could go on. But there’s gonna be fundamental reform of the university that’ll be positive. And most importantly, and finally, there’s about five or six entities with whom we run the trade deficit that account in aggregate for about 90% of the $1.2 trillion that we are in deficit. And if Donald Trump gets a deal—and I think there’s a 50-50 chance in the next month he will—with the EU, with Canada, with Mexico, with the ASEAN or the Southeast Asian nations, with Germany, part of the EU, with South Korea—there’s not a lot of them. And once one deal starts to unfold, the others will follow. And because the fundamental economic indicators of job growth, inflation, corporate profits, energy prices are sound, there’ll be a little bit of disruption as we reboot with these trade deals. But they’re going to do two things: They’re gonna bring in a lot of foreign investment of these countries that wanna avoid another trade war, and they’ll find it’s—I don’t know—useful. And there’s efficacy in putting plants in the United States. That’s already happening. And more importantly, we will not be sending out $1.2 trillion. What am I getting at? All of the hysteria I think is prompted or fueled by—I’ll say it—I think it’s fueled by fear. I really think they have no alternative to addressing the debt, the budget deficit, the trade deficit. And there’s only one pathway. And whether you like Donald Trump or not, or you think he’s crude, he is embracing policies that in bygone days both Democrats and Republicans saw was the solution. And the Democrats are terrified that it is not only the viable solution, but it’s gonna work. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Donald Trump Brought a Plan. The Left Brought Hysterics. appeared first on The Daily Signal.

America’s students deserve better than to be treated as pawns in the Chinese Communist Party’s long game to undermine our country. We can all agree that China does not have the best interests of American students in mind. Yet, thanks to lax enforcement and misplaced priorities from the Biden-Harris administration, billions of dollars have flowed anonymously from our adversaries into American colleges and universities. President Donald Trump and Republicans are charting a different course for higher education. We are delivering on our promise to put American students—not foreign interests—first. The Chinese Communist Party has a proven record of stealing intellectual property and infiltrating key American institutions, particularly in fields like defense and medicine. When $2.32 billion from the party finds its way into our universities, it’s not generosity—it’s a threat. As the saying goes, “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” But it’s not just research theft at stake. The U.S. House Committee on Education and Workforce, of which I am a member, has underscored the grave threat of foreign influence on college campuses for years. China seeks to win over the hearts and minds of the next generation, using its financial influence to censor dissent and promote propaganda on American campuses. Whether through secret police stations that mysteriously popped up in New York City or the censorship operations of campus Confucius Institutes, Beijing’s ambitions are clear: to undermine American sovereignty and erode freedom of thought. While public outrage forced many Confucius Institutes to “close,” the rot remains. Congressional investigations have uncovered nearly $40 million in unreported contracts with Chinese Communist Party-tied entities at just two universities. Our schools should be bastions of free inquiry, not beachheads for hostile foreign regimes. Unfortunately, our adversaries are exploiting colleges and unraveling our sacred First Amendment rights—and American schools are complying to keep the cash coming. Under current law—Section 117 of the Higher Education Act—universities are required to disclose large foreign gifts. But former President Joe Biden’s Department of Education refused to hold universities responsible for compliance and allowed billions in secret foreign donations to continue flowing. Biden’s cover-up is especially egregious considering that the first Trump administration vigorously enforced the reporting requirements of Section 117 and discovered that colleges were hiding over $6.5 billion in previously undisclosed foreign funding between 2019 and 2021. Outside experts say billions in previously undisclosed foreign funds to universities even helped fuel antisemitism on college campuses. Even worse, the Biden-Harris administration shuffled enforcement responsibility to an already overburdened office and shut down critical Trump-era investigations. Reports estimate that during this lapse, another billion dollars poured into our schools from undisclosed foreign sources. Thankfully, Trump has reversed course, reopening investigations, including one into hundreds of millions of dollars in secret donations to the University of California, Berkeley. Trump is taking the threat of foreign funding seriously during his first 100 days in office, and I stand firmly with him. We must defend the integrity of our colleges and protect the hearts and minds of our young people. Our students should be learning how to think freely and boldly—not being indoctrinated by the propaganda of hostile foreign powers. This fight is about the future of our country. America’s adversaries see our students as soft targets—we must prove them wrong. Ignoring this serious threat abandons the hearts and minds of our next generation of leaders. By securing our campuses and shutting down foreign influence, we can keep America’s future bright and free. Let’s put students first—not our adversaries. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Safeguarding Students: Stopping China’s Infiltration of US Universities appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Conservative groups who have successfully backed legislation in six states this year to ban foreign funding of ballot initiatives have one message for Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte about his state’s measure.  Veto it.  House Bill 818 passed the Montana Legislature but was watered down through amendment and lacks the same strong protections against foreign funding of ballot measures that passed in other states, conservative critics said. States have enacted bans on both direct and indirect funding of state ballot initiatives. They are designed to prevent a foreign person or entity from bankrolling a ballot measure. Conservative groups have pointed to the foreign money that in some cases indirectly funded state abortion measures. But such funding bans would just as easily prevent a foreign donor from indirectly funding a ballot measure favored by a pro-Second Amendment or pro-school choice group.  Foreign contributions to candidates are already banned, but foreign contributions for ballot initiatives has been a loophole that has been exploited in the past. Montana is significant in the nationwide push to block foreign contributions of ballot measures.  That’s because in 2023, the Federal Election Commission recommended that Congress close the legal loophole allowing foreign money for ballot measures in a case stemming from a Montana ballot measure. The FEC contended that under existing law, it had no power to police foreign donations for ballot initiatives, only donations to candidates. The recommendation came after the FEC, in charge of enforcing federal election law, dismissed a 2021 complaint that Australian mining company Sandfire Resources contributed over $280,000 to defeat a Montana ballot initiative that would have increased the power of state mining regulators to deny mining permits.   As an Australian mining company doing business in Montana, Sandfire opposed the possibility of reducing the availability of mining permits in the state. The dismissal came because the FEC determined it lacked the authority to hear the case.  “Heritage Action has seen a groundswell of conservative grassroots support nationwide to ban foreign funding for state ballot initiatives,” Heritage Action for America Vice President Janae Stracke said in a public statement.  “Six states have enacted laws prohibiting this corrupt practice, and several more states are considering similar legislation,” Stracke continued. “These states have taken decisive action to close all loopholes in their election laws. Unfortunately, HB 818 stops short of actually protecting Montanans’ voices at the ballot box. We urge Gov. Gianforte to veto this ineffective foreign funding legislation.” Gianforte’s spokesperson, Kaitlin Price, did not immediately respond to email and phone inquiries from The Daily Signal on whether the governor would sign or veto the measure.  House Bill 818 would still allow U.S.-based political organizations to collect money from foreign individuals or entities to fund ballot measures, said Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project.  “House Bill 818 was originally intended to protect the integrity of Montana elections by banning foreign influence,” Snead said in a statement.   “Unfortunately, the Montana Legislature passed a version of the bill with amendments that leave it substantially weakened,” Snead continued. “If signed into law, foreign-funded groups like the Sixteen Thirty Fund would remain free to pour millions into state ballot measures, drowning out the will of Montana voters. We urge Gov. Gianforte to veto House Bill 818 so that lawmakers can pass a true ban on foreign funding for ballot measures. The people of Montana deserve no less.” The Sixteen Thirty Fund is a nonprofit advocacy group that was established as part of the Arabella Advisors, a firm that oversees a network of left-leaning advocacy groups.  “While House Bill 818 was once a recognition of the need to address foreign influence in Montana’s politics, the bill was amended and now fails to comprehensively prohibit foreign funding of state ballot issue campaigns,” said Caitlin Sutherland, executive director of Americans for Public Trust, in a statement.  “Foreign-backed organizations like the Sixteen Thirty Fund will still be able to dump money into state ballot measures unimpeded, drowning out the voice and will of Montana voters. We urge Gov. Gianforte to veto HB 818, and hope Montana lawmakers will pass legislation at the earliest opportunity that actually closes this foreign influence loophole.” The post Advocates of Bans on Foreign Money for Ballot Measures Urge Governor to Veto Montana Bill appeared first on The Daily Signal.

TEL AVIV, Israel—After Oct. 7, 2023, and the amid the ongoing the war between Israel and Hamas, the Abraham Accords remain in place and may soon be expanded, according to a Heritage Foundation visiting fellow based in Israel.   “To be honest, President [Joe] Biden was not able to add any additional countries to the Abraham Accords. Now that President [Donald] Trump is back in office, we’re seeing a great amount of interest,” Asher Fredman told The Daily Signal.  Under Trump’s first administration, the U.S. brokered the Abraham Accords, which normalized relations between Israel and four nations, Morocco, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, and Sudan, though the agreement with Sudan has been affected by the Sudanese civil war.   The accords aim to foster peace and healthy trade relations between Israel and counties in the Middle East and North Africa, and is named after Abraham, a significant religious figure for Christians, Jews, and Muslims alike.   The nations that signed onto the Abraham Accords have “benefited both in terms of their relationship with Israel and in terms of their relationship with the United States,” Fredman said, noting that trade between the nations has increased even after the Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.   The UAE-based Technology Innovation Institute, for example, has opened an office for artificial intelligence research in Israel. “Now, imagine if we combine that with the relationship that Israel and the United States have on AI, the United States and the UAE [have], that through cooperation [on AI] could help ensure American and Israel and Emirati technological leadership in this key field,” Fredman said.   Fredman was a part of the Abraham Accords Peace Institute, which was established under the leadership of Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, but which has since been absorbed into The Heritage Foundation. The mission of the institute was, and remains, to track and advance the relationships between the countries who are a part of the accords.   Because there are “great benefits for all the countries involved” in the accords, “additional countries are looking to join,” Fredman said.   “There’s a lot of interest. There’s a lot of talk about Saudi Arabia,” he said, noting, “that of course would be the jewel in the crown, peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia.”   Other nations that have previously been reported to have considered signing onto the agreement include Indonesia, Mauritania, the Maldives, and the Comoros, he said.   While the war between Israel and Hamas has changed the situation in the Middle East, and Iran remains a major threat to Israel, the “logic” of the Abraham Accords is still very attractive to countries in the region, Fredman asserted.   Because of “the economic logic, the security logic, but also the logic that’s built on the shared desire for a future that’s based on cooperation, not conflict, that’s based on mutually beneficial, multilateral initiatives,” he said, there remains “quite a lot of interest in the Abraham Accords.”   Even given the ongoing war between Hamas and Israel, Fredman estimates more countries will join the Abraham Accords in the next two years.   The post With Trump Back in Office, More Countries Are Expected to Join Abraham Accords appeared first on The Daily Signal.

DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—A thrice-failed Democratic political candidate in Texas is considering taking on a Republican Senate seat in the consistently right-leaning state if voters want him to. Former Texas Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke said at a town hall in Denton, Texas, on Saturday that he would be open to launching a new Senate campaign for the 2026 midterm elections. Republican Sen. John Cornyn is running to hold onto his Senate seat against state Attorney General Ken Paxton, a fellow Republican, while no Democrats have entered the race so far. “If it comes to pass that this is what the people of Texas want, that it’s the highest and best use of what I can give to you, then yes, I will,” O’Rourke said when asked about a potential Senate run. “We’ll see what the future holds, but I’m going to do whatever is the greatest good for the greatest number in this state,” O’Rourke later told local news outlet WFAA. He said he is focused on running the liberal PAC Powered By People he founded in 2019. O’Rourke served as a House member from Texas between 2013 and 2019. The former representative ran unsuccessfully for Senate in 2018, dropped out of a presidential race in 2019, and lost a race for Texas governor in 2022, but took to the stage to stoke enthusiasm for the Democratic Party. He lost the 2018 election to Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas by 2.6 percentage points and the 2022 election to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott by 11 points. O’Rourke did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation. The former candidate also spent the town hall criticizing President Donald Trump, specifically accusing him of persecuting transgender people in response to a question from a trans-identifying attendee. “The way that these tinpot dictators, these wannabe tyrants, these authoritarians work is they try to pick the most vulnerable among us, the people that they hope you do not want to be associated with,” O’Rourke said. He then said Trump should respect “the rule of law” and “due process” before deporting alleged gang members to El Salvador prisons. “What you do to the least of us unchecked will happen to the rest of us pretty soon,” O’Rourke said. He brought the transgender attendee up on stage and declared support, saying, “We’re going to stand with one another” as the crowd gave them a standing ovation. Originally published by The Daily Caller News Foundation The post 4th Time the Charm? Texas Democrat Mulls Another Run for Office. appeared first on The Daily Signal.

It wasn't as graphic as the fake bloody, severed head of Trump that Kathy Griffin infamously held up. But in her own way, CNN's Audie Cornish lumped Trump into the same category as history's most famous victim of the guillotine. Cornish kicked off today's CNN This Morning by slyly slipping in an analogy between President Trump and Marie Antoinette--the French queen who was beheaded by the guillotine. Commenting on Trump's statement that, given the new tariffs, "maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls," here's how Cornish rephrased Trump: "Let them buy fewer dolls!" That was an echo of the phrase attributed to Marie Antoinette in reaction to being informed that the peasants had no bread:  "Let them eat cake!"   Continuing her attack on Trump, in the same segment Cornish did hold something up. It was the front page of today's business section of the New York Times, with a graph of the economy in which the part showing a dip was displayed as Trump's autograph [see screencap.] Concluded Cornish: "This is the defining image of the Trump economy so far. It's a red line, and it's down when he shows up." Note: Cornish continued her habit of assembling left-leaning panels. Today's array consisted of resident CNN gravitas grump Stephen Collinson, Jackie Kucinich, the Boston Globe's DC bureau chief and daughter of hyper-liberal former congressman Dennis Kucinich, and Axios political reporter Brittany Gibson, whose previous stops included the far-left American Prospect. Here's the transcript. CNN This Morning 5/1/25 6:00 am EDT AUDIE CORNISH: It's Thursday, May 1st. Here's what's happening right now on CNN This Morning.  PRESIDENT TRUMP: Maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls, you know?  CORNISH: Hey: let them buy fewer dolls. President Trump plays defense and casts blame amid new signs that the economy is feeling the impact of his trade war.  . . .  Trump has been trying to say, oh, no, no, no, this is just a hangover from the Biden years. And in fact, maybe even the next couple of reports might be his fault, too. So here's how he tried to explain that.  TRUMP: This is Biden's economy because we took over on January 20th. And I think you have to get us a little bit of time to get moving. But this is the Biden economy. This is a quarter that we looked at today. And I took, we took, all of us together. We came in on January 20th. So this is Biden. And you could even say the next quarter is sort of Biden.  CORNISH: [Holding up front page of NYT's Business section] OK, so this is not, like, exactly mapped. This is a little them having a little satire here.  But I do think this is the defining image of the Trump economy so far that people know. Which is like, it's a red line and it's down when he shows up.