Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is in the hot seat this week, as he attempts to rally his majority around a Senate-crafted spending package and avert a protracted government shutdown. Since Saturday, the federal government’s discretionary spending authority has expired for key agencies.  Senate Democrats and Republicans crafted a deal on Friday to fund the State Department and financial regulators, as well as agencies overseeing war, education, labor, health, and housing.  However, the House and the president have to approve the package in order to fund the government. The Senate package satisfied Democrat demands for separate consideration of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding by approving a two-week funding extension for the agency, in an attempt to buy time for a congressional debate over immigration law enforcement. Now, Johnson, R-La., has to quickly rally the House behind the Senate’s package to prevent federal agencies from shutting down operations. Normally, the Speaker could rush the package onto the floor under “suspension of the rules,” a process by which bill amendments and debate time are restricted in order to pass a non-controversial bill quickly. This fast-track setup requires two-thirds majority approval, though, and Democrats have so far refused to provide the votes necessary to advance the package despite it passing the Senate by an overwhelming 71-29 margin. “We need a full and complete debate, and what I’ve made clear to House Republicans is that they cannot simply move forward with legislation taking a ‘my way or the highway’ approach,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said Saturday. Without Democrat backing, Johnson now has to send the bill through the House rules committee—a leadership-controlled panel that determines the conditions for debate—before it can come to vote on the House floor. This will likely push the potentially shutdown-ending vote to Tuesday, where Johnson would have to muster a simple majority for passage. However, with such a slim majority, he can only afford to lose two Republican votes if Democrats unite in opposition. The question now is whether House Democrats are willing back funding for the homeland security agency for two weeks amid uproar over recent fatal shootings of protesters in Minnesota by immigration enforcement agents. Seven House Democrats joined Republicans to vote for a DHS funding bill in January, but one of them, Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., later released a statement expressing regret for his vote. Some Republicans may also seek to exert leverage at this critical moment, which could create more headaches for Speaker Johnson. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., for example, has said that if the House rules committee does not attach legislation to the spending package requiring voter ID in federal elections, “these appropriations bills will FAIL.” ? BIG UPDATE: House GOP leadership will no longer move the appropriations under suspension, meaning there will be a rule to which the SAVE (America) Act can be added. If they do not, these appropriations bills will FAIL.Voter ID and the SAVE (America) Act are NOT negotiable.…— Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (@RepLuna) February 2, 2026 Any alteration to the Senate’s bill text could complicate efforts to keep the government open, since both chambers must pass an identical bill. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., wrote in a Monday statement that adding this legislation, the SAVE Act, to the appropriations process would lead to a shutdown. “It is a poison pill that will kill any legislation that it is attached to,” Schumer said. “If House Republicans add the SAVE Act to the bipartisan appropriations package it will lead to another prolonged government shutdown.” The post Speaker Tries to Lead Government Out of Shutdown appeared first on The Daily Signal.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. Lt. Gen. Joshua Rudd, nominated by President Donald Trump to lead both the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command, defended a major foreign surveillance power during his Senate Intelligence Committee confirmation hearing on Thursday. His testimony focused on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a program that permits the government to collect digital communications of foreign targets but also captures information from Americans along the way. Rudd described the authority as a key element of national defense. “It’s indispensable. I know it’s been critical to mission outcomes, protection of our men and women in harm’s way, and I know it’s saved lives in the homeland,” he told senators. He added that if confirmed, he would “do everything I can to provide the best advice as we look to reauthorize or extend this authority.” The law gives intelligence agencies access to communications from US technology firms when monitoring suspected foreign threats. Although it is meant to focus on overseas targets, the system often gathers data from people inside the United States who happen to interact with those targets. American citizens have been surveilled countless times because of this. That overlap has raised serious concerns about warrantless searches and the scale of incidental domestic surveillance. Section 702 is scheduled to expire on April 19. Congress reauthorized the program in 2024 after a last-minute standoff, but no renewal proposal has been introduced this time. Some administration officials, including Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, have criticized the surveillance power, (at least, to an extent) while President Trump himself has accused it of being misused against his 2016 campaign. Lawmakers familiar with current discussions say the president’s decision will ultimately determine whether the program continues. During the hearing, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) asked whether Rudd believed a warrant should be required to search the Section 702 database for information about Americans, except in emergencies. Rudd replied that he would need to study the issue further before giving a complete answer, though he said he has “supreme confidence that the men and women of the NSA are committed to protecting civil liberties.” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) followed by asking why a law dating back to the 1970s still matters to ordinary Americans. Rudd answered, “In my experience, quite simply, it saves lives.” Section 702 continues to illustrate how surveillance tools built for foreign intelligence can affect domestic privacy. The framework relies largely on internal oversight rather than independent judicial review, leaving citizens with limited visibility into how their data is used once it enters government systems. After the hearing, the Senate Armed Services Committee approved Rudd’s nomination in a closed session. The Intelligence Committee is expected to vote next week, setting up a possible full Senate confirmation before February 6, when acting NSA and Cyber Command leader Lt. Gen. William Hartman is scheduled to retire. If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post NSA Nominee Rudd Backs FISA Surveillance in Senate Hearing appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

NY Times vs the Supreme Court

Media Research Center president David Bozell joined the Dr. Phil Podcast on Saturday to challenge the overwhelmingly negative and one‑sided coverage of immigration enforcement by the elitist media, including reporting on ICE operations and broader trends in how stories are framed. "We have the largest archive in America... we just crossed over a million hours in televised archive footage."@DavidBozell breaks down the MRC's vast media archive with @DrPhil. pic.twitter.com/goH0w22MvT — Media Research Center (@theMRC) February 2, 2026 Bozell detailed how outlets have painted ICE operations as uniformly brutal, ignoring the full context of the cases they’re enforcing. In the Renee Good case, citing an MRC NewsBusters study, he noted: “Each network mentioned that the officer was hospitalized for internal bleeding only one time over the course of ten days.” Bozell also highlighted the role of the “Big Four” digital news aggregators: Google News, Apple News, MSN, and Yahoo News in shaping public perception. He explained that even if right-leaning outlets exist to balance the narrative, most casual readers get their news through these platforms, which strongly prioritize left-leaning coverage.  10 days after Renee Good was shot, ABC, CBS, and NBC focused overwhelmingly on criticizing ICE instead of the broader enforcement context.@DavidBozell joins @DrPhil to challenge the elitist media's coverage of the MN protests. pic.twitter.com/iwyfaHafVX — Media Research Center (@theMRC) February 2, 2026 He illustrated this with a striking example: during a Jan. 18 service at Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, a group of anti‑ICE protesters stormed the sanctuary chanting slogans and disrupting worship after alleging that one of the church’s pastors was connected to ICE, and former CNN anchor Don Lemon was present and livestreamed the event as it unfolded, pressing congregants relentlessly and refusing to leave the premises. “Google and MSN completely ignored it,” Bozell noted, later adding, “Apple was the only aggregator that even covered it. They covered it twice with the Washington Post story that blamed Trump for the interaction and a story from the BBC.” Dr. Phil concluded by highlighting the imbalance in reporting and restating the MRC’s mission: “People can say ‘well you’re one-sided or not one-sided.’ The numbers are what they are. This isn't a matter of cherry picking. … You’re reporting it by the numbers and that’s what we want to hear.”

A landmark trial – in which an autistic detransitioner was awarded $2 million – that set a precedent for suing doctors who push and perform life-altering transgender surgery on minors was widely ignored by media. On Friday, 22-year-old Fox Varian was awarded $2 million in damages when a jury found Psychologist Kenneth Einhorn and Surgeon Simon Chin guilty of ignoring standards of care and procedural protections by pressuring Varian to undergo permanent surgery when she was a 16-year-old minor. Varian was awarded $1.6 million for past and future pain and suffering, and another $400,000 for future medical expenses, in the malpractice case, setting a precedent opening the door for a flood of similar lawsuits. Varian’s case did not, however, rule on the legality of performing life-altering transgender surgery on minors, but only on the process that must be followed by doctors in order to perform such surgery. Instead, malpractice cases are based on tort law, not criminal law. With tort law, a form of civil law, the plaintiff must simply show that the defendant caused harm, either through wrongful acts or negligence. While the trial, held in the New York Supreme Court in Westchester County, had sweeping implications, reportedly, only one journalist attended the entire trial and only one other attended it occasionally. Independent Journalist Benjamin Ryan, who covered each day of the trial, appears to be virtually the sole source of news of the groundbreaking proceedings. “My sources suggest that tort law might permanently destroy this field,” Ryan reported on X.com following the decision, before going on to report on Varian’s autism and troubled childhood: “A Legal First That Could Change Gender Medicine At 16, Fox Varian got a mastectomy while undergoing a gender transition. She sued her psychologist and plastic surgeon for leaving her ‘disfigured for life.’” …. “Fox Varian had a turbulent childhood. Her parents split when she was seven, triggering a three-year custody battle that ultimately saw her estranged from her father. She suffered from a constellation of mental health problems, including depression, anxiety, and social phobia. She was diagnosed with autism and bounced around various schools.” Three years after undergoing the double-mastectomy (called “top surgery” by advocates), Varian – now a 21-year-old adult – realized that she was not a male and began the process of detransitioning. The next year, she filed her malpractice lawsuit. Claire Deacon, Varian’s mother, had been adamantly opposed to allowing her daughter, a minor, to have the transgender surgery, but was pressured to do so by the doctors’ warnings that Varian would commit surgery if not allowed to have the procedure. “I was scared out of my wits by the things that Dr. Einhorn was so confident in repeatedly telling me and my daughter,” Deacon testified, explaining that she would never have approved the surgery “Without Dr. Einhorn, repeatedly, emphatically, consistently pushing me.” Einhorn and Chin were negligent in their haste to inflict the transgender surgery on the 16-year-old girl, the jury found, as National Review explains: “The jury found that in many respects the surgeon and psychologist had skipped important steps when evaluating whether she should go forward with the surgery and had not adequately communicated with each other. These missteps were a ‘departure from the standard of care,’ they decided.” Additionally, Varian’s lawyers argued the two health care providers failed to adequately take into account her other mental and psychological conditions, such as autism, depression, and ADHD, before deciding to recommend transgender surgery, according to The National Review. While Varian v. Einhorn is the first detransitioner medical malpractice case to be heard and decided by a jury, there are currently 28 more lawsuits that have been filed. In all, Varian’s victory appears to be just the latest sign that the tide is turning against performing transgender surgery on minors who, axiomatically, are not mature to make irreversible, life-altering decisions. As The Christian Post explains: “More than two dozen states have enacted policies banning the provision of body-mutilating sex-change surgeries and hormone drugs to minors. In recent years, European medical bodies, such as those in the United Kingdom, Sweden, and Norway, have reevaluated their approaches to treating children with gender dysphoria.  “In  2024, the United Kingdom's National Health Service instructed gender clinics to pause first appointments for kids under 18 following the formal review led by Dr. Hilary Cass, the retired former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. Cass's report found there is ‘no good evidence on the long-term outcomes of interventions to manage gender-related distress.’” Ryan reports that, while he has seen them, the court records of the New York trial he covered have since been sealed, leaving him with what “may be the only comprehensive record of the event.” Independent Journalist Benjamin Ryan discusses his exclusive coverage of the case in an interview on Megyn Kelly’s podcast below.

Monday’s front-page New York Times “news analysis,” “Pretti’s Killing Burst a Dam -- A Victim Who Inspired What Others Had Not,” was a story of the triumph of individual decency over government thuggery – in the distorted view of the Times, anyway. The online headline deck called Alex Pretti’s shooting death after a struggle with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers a “National Tipping Point.” This is how the Times wields power -- we'll decide the Tipping Points!  The front-page "news analyzer" is Kurt Streeter, “who writes about identity in America — racial, political, religious, gender and more.” That’s a better fit for Streeter’s liberal activism than his previous “Sports of the Times” perch, from which Streeter shoehorned in his personal politics at every opportunity into stories at every opportunity. As the screenshot quote shows, he loves (liberal) activist athletes.  Both deaths provoked outrage. But Mr. Pretti’s reached further — into conservative circles that had defended the crackdown, and among independents, who had been willing to look away. Why did his death cross political lines that Ms. Good’s, for all the anger it generated, didn’t? It is never possible to say with certainty why one tragedy widens the circle of outrage and another does not. History offers precedents. Suddenly Pretti was being compared to Rosa Parks (and, um, George Floyd). George Floyd was not the first Black man to die at the hands of police in 2020. The searing video of his death, however, and the moment it arrived — during heightened unease around police misconduct — turned his killing into a movement. Rosa Parks was not the first person to refuse to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus; a 15-year-old named Claudette Colvin had been arrested after performing the same act months earlier. But it was Parks, for reasons both strategic and circumstantial, whose case became a catalyst. Tipping points are often visible only in hindsight. This story and its prominent placement demonstrates how valorization of Pretti continues to dominate the media, even after the man’s previous violent attack on ICE emerged. Mr. Drakulich uses a term for the kind of victim the public instinctively sympathizes with: the “ideal victim.” Two attributes make someone fit. “Someone whose life and well-being is broadly valued,” he said, “and someone who people can judge as not bearing any responsibility for their victimization.” ....He was not a so-called criminal immigrant, whom officials say they were targeting, but a white American citizen. He was an intensive care-unit nurse at a V.A. hospital, caring for veterans. A video of him saluting a deceased patient had circulated months earlier. He was a legal gun owner, with a gun permit, and no criminal record. On camera, in the moments before he was killed, he displayed what a former student called his “familiar stillness and signature calm composure.” He did not run.  He came to the aid of a stranger. Masked federal agents killed him nonetheless. Finally, in paragraph 26 out of 32, Streeter briefly noted the complicating video, details which would have been near the top in a fair account. But new footage emerged on Wednesday that may yet complicate the narrative. The video shows Mr. Pretti on Jan. 13, 11 days before he was killed, in a confrontation with federal agents. He spits at them and kicks their vehicle, breaking a taillight. Agents tackle him. A gun appears to be visible in his waistband. He is released without arrest. The story concluded with melodrama. What had happened on that frozen Minneapolis street was reverberating far beyond the city where Mr. Pretti died.

“Yes, Mister Josh, I understand your concern and assure you that I will offer the highest-quality service to resolve your problem.”At least, I think that’s what “Lakshmi” said in her thick Indian accent. But what does it matter? Every company that hires Bangladeshi call centers to “serve” American customers is really only saying one thing — and it isn’t “thank you, come again.”I was hearing a young-middle-age American female voice with the pleasant but not obsequious tone I haven’t heard in customer service since 1999.It’s not Lakshmi’s fault. She’s just doing her job, and she’s just a normal person trying to get paid. But I don’t want to hear her singsong, robotic repetition of an unctuous phone script. I want what I paid for, without excuses and without having to battle an AI phone tree and then strain to understand someone who barely speaks English.But this article is actually about the blessed, wondrous competence of American workers, so let me put the bitterness away and tell you what happened.Susan and Jennifer happened. And thank God, because I was at the end of my tether in a freezing-cold house trying to convince someone on the Indian subcontinent that possible propane leaks in a Vermont winter were serious business.Spoiler: There was no leak, but we’ll get to that.MousetrapLast week I thought there was a dead animal in the house. That smell must have been a mouse corpse that one of the cats snagged but never ate. Surely it was under the bed or under the chest of drawers. That’s where Mina the tabby was racing around at night, yowling, with her claws scrabbling on the wood floors.She’s an excellent mouser, and it’s a good thing, because country houses have critters. This is the beginning of my third year living on a dirt road in the sticks after a lifetime of city living. Those first few years teach citified boys like me a lot of lessons about what nature and the real world are like outside “comfy” urban areas. You better keep your well pump in good order, or you don’t drink or wash. Better have water backup for when the power goes out.After hours of pulling out furniture and crawling around with a flashlight, I couldn’t find the dead varmint. But I did find out that the rotten-egg smell was coming from the valve joint in the copper pipe that feeds propane into my cast-iron heat stove. Propane users, you’re going to laugh, I know. But I assumed quite reasonably that this meant I had a leak. After shutting off the tap on the outdoor tank and closing the valve indoors, I called the nationally known brand-name fuel company that I use.That’s when Lakshmi “entered the chat.” Imagine my irritated surprise when my call to the American company — it has a transfer station and local drivers right across the river; I can see it from my back yard — got routed to Bangladesh.Subcontinental shuffleNo, you cannot reach the local people directly. Yes, I have tried. You must call the national number and get transferred to Bangladesh, which then acts as an intermediary. Only the call center can know the local phone number, apparently. If you do find a local number and call it, and it’s after hours or a weekend, you get a robot lady telling you how sorry she is and how you’ll have to call the 800 number. You guessed it: Back to Bangladesh.The company’s phone script claims to take possible leaks seriously. It claims to be “sending an emergency technician right away.” But you can’t really know this. You just have to trust that Rohan or Lakshmi really did call the people who are located 500 yards from your house, that those people know who you are, and that they really will come to your house.No, you may not have the contact number. No, they will not guarantee you that the driver or tech will call you with an ETA. You just have to “trust” them.One hour goes by. Two. Three. Four. Five. Every hour, I call the company back and work hard to keep my voice pleasant and groveling enough that they’ll deign to continue speaking to me. Give these people one excuse, and they’ll leave you stranded and freezing. And with every call, I have to repeat the same “verification procedures” of reciting my name, address, billing address, phone number, and last four of my SSN just to get these people to be willing to talk to me.“We have dispatched someone,” said Lakshmi/Rohan every time I called. They won’t tell me who. They won’t tell me an ETA. They don’t actually care that I’m starting to freeze my backside off.But Susan cared.RELATED: Pizza Hut Classic: Retro fun ruined by non-English-speaking staff, indifferent customer service Photo by Blaze NewsSweet competenceOn the fifth call to the national number, I thought I must have been dreaming. “Hi there, thanks for calling Nationally Known Fuel Company. I’m Susan. How can I help you today?”“Are you really a live person?” I asked. I thought it was a trick. I was hearing a young-middle-age American female voice with the pleasant but not obsequious tone I haven’t heard in customer service since 1999.“Yes,” Susan laughed.I thanked her for being human and explained the situation. She was immediately riled.“Are you serious? It’s been five hours since you first called us?” she asked, sounding genuinely incredulous. “That is not acceptable. It’s winter there, and I’m from Vermont. Hold on. I’m going to call the local dispatch manager personally.”I almost cried over the competence of it. That interaction used to be common. If you’re 50 or older, this is the customer service you remember for most of your life. But it’s as rare as hen’s teeth today.Voice of AmericaTrue to her word, Susan called the local dispatch manager, Jennifer. In a few minutes, Jennifer was calling me. And then everything got better.“I am so sorry you’ve been waiting so long,” Jennifer said. I could tell she was my age, and from her particular American accent, she sounded just like the gals I went to high school with. Solid, no-nonsense Gen X.It turned out that Jennifer had a much worse day than I did. She had been up all night alone in the dispatch office due to short staff. Between getting a snooze on the cot, she was trying to get propane trucks out to freezing customers who ran out. The main local truck broke down, leaving the rookie delivery guy stranded. She couldn’t find the emergency technician.Jennifer told me all this to explain why everything was FUBAR, but she didn’t tell me in order to excuse the problem. She focused on getting me back up and running, but wanted me to know that if she had her way, none of her customers would have had to go through the hassle.It gets better. Jennifer explained to me that I almost certainly did not have a propane leak. The odor, she explained, happens because fuel companies add an offensive odorant to the propane as a safety measure and a supply alert. When a propane tank runs low, the odorant that settles to the bottom of the tank vaporizes and becomes very apparent around the appliance. Yeah, technically, that means something is “leaking,” but in such tiny amounts that no one is getting poisoned.“When you smell that, it almost always means your tank is about to give out. I regularly stop techs from running out to people, because it’s never a leak; it’s a delivery problem.”Jennifer and I decided I didn’t need a tech (I already knew I was safe, having shut off all valves and airing out the house as precaution), but just a delivery.“I’m looking at your account, and you’re due for a fill tomorrow. It was so cold in December, you probably went through it faster like everyone else. I’m gonna get Dickie out to you this afternoon.”Neighborly helpShe was right. Dickie got here, and my tank was on fumes. He laughed at me good-naturedly because I thought I had a leak, but I told him this was a first-time city-boy-goes-country lesson for me.But it gets even better. Paul, another local, called me later to apologize for the delay and frustration. I told Paul that Jennifer had explained what happened and that I felt just as bad for all of them with the troubles they were having.Paul insisted on giving me a $300 tank of propane for free as an apology. Wow.Here’s the lesson for American companies. I nearly canceled my contract with this nationally known company. If they want to shunt American customers to a call center drone around the world, then they don’t want my business. There are plenty of other companies I can use.But I’m sticking with them for now because of Susan, Jennifer, Dickie, and Paul. All of these people are Americans, and they’re local to me. I probably pass them in the grocery store in Montpelier. They know what winters are like, and they treated me as they would want their families treated in a situation like this.Those four competent, pleasant Americans are the reason I’m going to stay a customer, at least for now. I want them to keep their jobs. My decision to remain a customer is not unconditional. If I have to deal with Lakshmi again in an emergency, I’m done. I can walk into five local, family-owned fuel dealers any day of the week and actually speak to an American who is my neighbor.“Globalization” is a con job by corporations who see themselves as “global corporate citizens” because it pays them more to treat their customers like trash than it does to provide good service. So far, we American customers haven’t found a way to make the market punish them into better behavior. I wish I knew how we could.No cheap prices are worth the aggravation of living in this fantasy world where we pretend a Hindi speaker across the globe is just as capable of keeping my Vermont house warm as someone who lives here. God bless those local Americans.

Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman has yet again bucked his party as tensions rise between ICE and Democrat-backed agitators.Democrats facilitated a partial shutdown late last week after stalling a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security, citing their disapproval of law enforcement operations in Minneapolis. Notably, the DHS funding bill would primarily fund FEMA and other emergency services, with the majority of ICE's funding coming from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed last summer. 'Don't ever, ever doxx people and target their families.'Despite this, Democrats like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have laid out a list of demands they want to see implemented in the DHS funding bill, including a prohibition of face masks on federal agents. Fetterman joined Republicans sounding off on the demands, arguing that their face coverings ensure that unhinged activists can't doxx agents' private information with the intention of endangering them or their families. RELATED: Trump offers hilarious rebuttal to Tim Walz's absurd Civil War analogy Photo by Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images"The agents wearing masks, I think, primarily that's driven by people who are going to doxx those people," Fetterman said. "That's a serious concern, too, absolutely. They could target their families, and they are organizing these people to get their names out there.""Don't ever, ever doxx people and target their families," Fetterman added. Although Democrats have shown they are willing to shut down the government, the Trump administration and his political allies on Capitol Hill have indicated that they aren't going to budge, especially on facial masks and carrying personal identification. RELATED: 'Justice is coming': Border czar Tom Homan vows to stay in Minneapolis 'until the problem is gone' Tom Brenner for the Washington Post via Getty Images "Those two things are conditions that would create further danger," Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said. "I mean, Tom Homan told Leader Schumer himself ... that 'that's one of the demands I'm not going to implement. I have to protect my officers.' And when you have people doxxing them and targeting them, of course we don't want their personal identification out there on the street."Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

If Casey DeSantis passes on the Florida governor’s race, the incumbent will find himself at a crossroads.

Make HIM Famous: YouTube DBAG DECIMATED for Doxxing Hispanic ICE Agents Involved in Alex Pretti Shooting