Republicans are poised to lose their supermajority in the Iowa Senate after a leftist activist defeated a Republican businessman on Tuesday in a special election to fill a vacant seat. 
Democrat Catelyn Drey defeated Republican Christopher Prosch by about 800 votes to win Iowa’s 1st Senate district, <a href="https://wcmelepub.wcicc.com/">according</a> to preliminary election results. Drey, the founder of the leftwing group Moms for Iowa, earned 55% of the vote. 
&#8220;I’m just really incredibly honored that the folks in Senate District 1 believed in this campaign as much as the team did and I am looking forward to representing them well,&#8221; Drey <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/2025/08/26/democrat-catelin-drey-wins-iowa-senate-special-election-defeats-republican-christopher-prosch/85819325007/">told</a> The Des Moines Register. 
Drey’s victory shifts the balance of the state Senate, leaving Republicans one seat short of a supermajority. Republicans still hold 33 of the state’s 50 Senate seats. Two-thirds of the Senate is needed to confirm state appointees, so Democrats could block anyone nominated by GOP Governor Kim Reynolds if they all vote in solidarity. 
The special election was called after Republican Senator Rocky De Witt died from pancreatic cancer earlier this summer. De Witt won the seat back in 2022 with 55% of the vote.  The district is located in Woodbury County, an area that backed President Donald Trump in the 2024 election with 61% of the vote. 
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Drey’s Moms for Iowa group backs action to support abortion and gun control. She was <a href="https://www.plannedparenthoodaction.org/planned-parenthood-advocates-iowa/sd-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">endorsed </a>by Planned Parenthood, which called her a “Reproductive Freedom Champion.” 
Democrats celebrated the victory, claiming that it was an indictment of Trump. 
“Iowans are seeing Republicans for who they are: self-serving liars who will throw their constituents under the bus to rubber-stamp Donald Trump’s disastrous agenda — and they’re ready for change,” Democrat National Committee Chair Ken Martin said. “They are putting Republicans on notice and making it crystal clear: any Republican pushing Trump’s unpopular, extreme agenda has no place governing on behalf of Iowa families.”
Iowa GOP Chair Jeff Kaufmann said the result was a flood of out-of-state money and volunteers activated by the Democrats. 
“National Democrats were so desperate for a win that they activated 30,000 volunteers and a flood of national money to win a state senate special election by a few hundred votes,” he <a href="https://x.com/kaufmannGOP/status/1960526514040266793">posted</a> on X. “If [the DNC] thinks things are suddenly so great again for them in Iowa, they will bring back the caucuses.”

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Republican Supermajority Broken As Leftist Activist Wins In Trump-Leaning Iowa Senate District

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A doctor offered up by the American Medical Association as an expert on transgender health care claimed that kids as young as 3 years old have a “stable” view of gender identity and that puberty blockers are reversible, according to footage <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2268-bombshell-taylor-swift-engaged-plus-other-stuff-happens-but-nobody-cares?elementPosition=3&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">published</a> Wednesday by The Ben Shapiro Show. 
Dr. Jesse Krikorian, a transgender-identifying woman, argued during a conversation with Michigan State Rep. Brad Paquette that kids can identify as transgender from a “very young age” and that puberty blockers don’t have permanent impacts on their development. The conversation was arranged by the American Medical Association President Bobby Mukkamala, who referred Krikorian to Paquette after the lawmaker <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/im-not-an-expert-at-all-damning-video-exposes-medical-org-over-support-for-trans-procedures?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Leaked+Footage+Exposes+Top+Med+Org%E2%80%99s+Support+For+Trans+Procedures+On+Kids%3A+%E2%80%98I%E2%80%99m+Not+An+Expert+At+All%E2%80%99">asked</a> the medical association to point him to an expert on transgender procedures. 
Video footage of Mukkamala’s conversation with Paquette was <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2267-trump-protects-the-american-flag-plus-we-break-a-major-story?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=The+Ben+Shapiro+Show&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">published</a> on Tuesday by Shapiro. In that conversation, Mukkamala said his organization endorsed transgender procedures on kids because that was what the experts told them. When asked for a more detailed explanation on the alleged expert science in support of transgender procedures, Mukkamala connected Paquette with Krikorian. 
Throughout the conversation, Krikorian downplayed the impacts of puberty blockers, claimed young teens are able to make informed decisions about their future fertility, and dismissed studies from England and the Department of Health and Human Services critical of transgender procedures. 
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/im-not-an-expert-at-all-damning-video-exposes-medical-org-over-support-for-trans-procedures?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Leaked+Footage+Exposes+Top+Med+Org’s+Support+For+Trans+Procedures+On+Kids%3A+‘I’m+Not+An+Expert+At+All’">READ PART ONE: Leaked Footage Exposes Top Med Org’s Support For Trans Procedures On Kids: ‘I’m Not An Expert At All’</a>
“Developmentally, kids generally have a pretty sense, a pretty stable sense of gender identity starting around age three,” Krikorian told Paquette, according to footage obtained by Shapiro. “They may not tell us unless we asked, but it’s generally there around that age just developmentally. That’s when that comes in.”
Krikorian is a family medicine doctor who told Paquette that she was currently thinking about moving to Canada because of laws being passed in the United States to ban transgender procedures on kids. She told the Republican lawmaker that she has worked with many transgender identifying kids before, including one 7-year-old boy who identified as a girl, whose biggest concern was the “appearance of a bulge in her ballet leotard.”
While discussing the American Medical Association’s designation of Krikorian as an expert, Shapiro said that with no other medical issue, you could be cited as an expert because of your personal experience.
“But suddenly with ‘gender-affirming care’ the most prominent expert the [American Medical Association] could offer is a trans person who is a family physician. That is not expertise, that is projection,” Shapiro said on his Wednesday show. 
When Paquette questioned the wisdom of placing kids on puberty blockers, Krikorian argued that puberty blockers were just needed to “buy time” for a child to figure out their gender identity.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
6/ Krikorian claims:
&#8211; Parents know if their 5yo is trans.
&#8211; Doctors are transing kids to appease their concerns about how other people perceive them.
&#8211; A 13/14yo is ready for permanent decisions after their pubertal (and brain) development has been blocked for a couple of… <a href="https://t.co/13gtfQC2zg">pic.twitter.com/13gtfQC2zg</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960779391887163798?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 27, 2025</a></blockquote>
“There’s nothing about starting puberty blockers that means that you have to continue them. There’s nothing about starting hormones. That means you have to continue them,” she said. “It’s only if you like the results that you’re getting, if you’re happy, if you’re feeling good, if you’re feeling better about yourself and more able to function in society, that you keep going with them.”
When asked about potential side effects of puberty blockers, Krikorian acknowledged that bone density would be impacted, but argued that kids can “catch up” once they are taken off the blockers. “Every drug has side effects for sure. Puberty blockers are very reversible,” she said. 
Despite Krikorian’s claims, studies have shown that puberty blockers can have irreversible impacts on bone growth and cause sexual dysfunction, voice damage, and infertility.
At a different point, when discussing putting males on estrogen and females on testosterone, Krikorian said that “most of the side effects are things that people are looking for.” 
“You know, they’re looking for beard growth if they’re taking testosterone. They’re looking for a deepening voice if they’re taking testosterone. Or they’re looking for that softer skin, they’re looking for the more feminine distribution of fat if you’re taking estrogen,” she said. 
She later claimed that, because “being transgender is really hard,” she doesn’t “worry too much about these patients” since they are not doing it to have fun, but to address their identity issues. 
When discussing the impacts that transgender treatments can have on fertility, she said that “a lot of people are willing to make this trade off.” She said that 13 and 14-year-olds had some “insight” into the possibility of not being able to have kids if they underwent transgender procedures. 
“In other words, according to Dr. Krikorian, cross-sex hormones don’t sterilize kids, but even if they do, it’s okay because these kids can plan to adopt or buy someone else’s sperm one day,” Shapiro said on his show. “That is of course insanse and dystopian. My kids don’t even know what they want for lunch let alone make a decision about adopting a child of their own in 20 years.” 
She also suggested that males wanting to identify as female should save up their sperm before starting estrogen if they wanted to have kids. 
“If your life plan involves genetic children, go ahead and bank sperm,” she said. “Sperm is not that hard to come by. You can buy it. You can access it. If you’ve got a partner who can carry a pregnancy, you guys can make it happen.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
4/ That doesn’t seem to bother Dr. Krikorian much though, because if a boy suffers one of the extremely likely outcomes — such as permanent sterilization — from pumping estrogen into his body, “sperm is not that hard to come by. You can buy it.” <a href="https://t.co/cQw9o6FDWA">pic.twitter.com/cQw9o6FDWA</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960779387780952205?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 27, 2025</a></blockquote>
Paquette asked Krikorian if she had reviewed the Cass report or the recent Department of Health and Human Services <a href="https://www.hhs.gov/press-room/gender-dysphoria-report-release.html">study</a> that documented the flaws with many of the problems with transgender medicine. 
She said that the Cass Report, a British report that criticized transgender medical procedures for kids, was not good evidence and that the HHS report was “politically motivated” and not “sound science.” Krikorian admitted that she had not read through the entire HHS report, only portions of it. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
12/ In fact, Dr. Krikorian hadn’t even read <a href="https://twitter.com/RobertKennedyJr?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RobertKennedyJr</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/HHSGov?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@HHSGov</a>&#8216;s Report on Gender Dysphoria — the most extensive US report on the topic she is an alleged specialist in, authored by our nation’s top health agency.
Krikorian, the AMA’s choice-expert calls it “politically… <a href="https://t.co/IzlR5v71cq">pic.twitter.com/IzlR5v71cq</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960779407041421645?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 27, 2025</a></blockquote>
Paquette ended the conversation with Krikorian by suggesting that they could possibly have a future call to discuss the HHS report in more depth. 
“At this point the AMA is now indistinguishable from other leftist activist organizations like the Human Rights Campaign or the ACLU. They don’t engage in science,” Shapiro said. “They’re not interested in protecting patients. They are a lobbying arm for quacks and a mouthpiece for leftists who prey on children.”
Paquette supports shielding kids from transgender procedures and introduced a bill in May that would have banned them in Michigan. He joined Shapiro on Wednesday to discuss his conversation with the American Medical Association and Krikorian.
The more he pushed back on transgender ideology, the more Paquette said he was told to “trust the experts.”
“A lot of folks said, ‘well, you’re not a doctor Brad,’ even though I talked to a lot of them. And ‘well the AMA supports this,’ and so I went to the AMA. I started to talk to their experts and came to find that they have no idea what they’re talking about,” Paquette said.
He said he wants to expose the “no understanding, no grounding in evidence-based medicine”
WATCH THE FULL CONVERSATION: 
<iframe loading="lazy" title="The AMA’s Dr. Jesse Krikorian on “Gender Affirming Care”" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vjKIkqdVlEs?start=1&#038;feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

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LEAKED FOOTAGE: Top Med Org’s Trans ‘Expert’ Claims Toddlers Have ‘Stable’ Sense Of Gender Identity

The president of a major medical organization made wild claims about the benefits of transgender procedures on kids during a conversation with a Michigan lawmaker before falling back on so-called “experts,” according to video footage <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2267-trump-protects-the-american-flag-plus-we-break-a-major-story?elementPosition=3&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">published</a> by the Ben Shapiro Show on Tuesday. 
During a video call earlier this year, American Medical Association (AMA) President Bobby Mukkamala defended his organization’s support for transgender procedures on kids by saying they relied on what “experts” had told them. Mukkamala also claimed that puberty blockers were reversible and cited other questionable statistics about transgender regret and suicide rates. 
Mukkamala made the comments during a call with Michigan Rep. Brad Paquette and Dr. Eithan Haim, the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-doctor-blew-the-whistle-on-his-hospitals-transgender-clinic-now-the-feds-are-trying-to-ruin-his-life">doctor who exposed</a> Texas Children’s Hospital for doing transgender procedures on kids.  When pressed on the American Medical Association’s <a href="https://www.ama-assn.org/press-center/ama-press-releases/ama-states-stop-interfering-health-care-transgender-children">advocacy</a> for transgender procedures on kids, Mukkamala said that the association effectively rubberstamps whatever “the experts” tell them. 
“Neither one of us spent an hour working on transgender care, neither one of us,” Mukkamala told Haim in the footage obtained by Shapiro. “So we have no business discussing the science that&#8217;s brought to the American Medical Association from people that spent years in training for this, and years taking care of patients for this.”
The call was arranged by Paquette, a Republican who represents the southwest corner of Michigan, who was looking to discuss the AMA&#8217;s endorsement of transgender procedures on kids. Paquette supports shielding kids from transgender procedures and introduced a bill in May that would have banned them in Michigan.
The American Medical Association is the largest association of medical professionals in the United States and plays a powerful role in medical education, ethics, and advocacy.
&#8220;This footage is pretty catastrophic for the AMA,&#8221; Shapiro said. &#8220;It proves beyond any doubt that their support for trans &#8216;healthcare&#8217; is based on fake science, willful blindness, and a total abandonment of all evidence-based medicine — all of which are supposed to be antithetical to the existence of their organization, a violation of the Hippocratic Oath.&#8221;
WATCH BEN&#8217;S FULL EPISODE ON AMA: 
<iframe loading="lazy" title="LEAKED FOOTAGE: American Medical Association Exposed" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/J2hsAz7h07U?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Throughout the call, Haim pressed Mukkamala to provide evidence that transgender procedures don&#8217;t have damaging long-term impacts on kids. When he brought up the flawed studies frequently cited by WPATH and other proponents of transgender procedures, Mukkamala said that he relied on the interpretations of others and didn’t look at them himself.
“I don&#8217;t look at them. I rely on a specialty society to look at them and then give us their opinion of them. I&#8217;m not an expert at all. And honestly, I don&#8217;t think you are either,” he said. “I&#8217;m not an expert at all. I&#8217;m not an expert at all in the science that you&#8217;re talking to me about. I defer to the experts.”
At one point, Mukkamala clearly mocks Haim for even asking questions about the issue.
&nbsp;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
EXCLUSIVE: Secretly recorded call with American Medical Association President, Dr. Bobby Mukkamala, reveals an alarming abdication of responsibility on &#8220;gender-affirming care&#8221; at the highest level of medicine.
Confronted with &#8216;puberty blocker&#8217; side effects, Dr. Bobby evades: <a href="https://t.co/PCqHqNpjts">pic.twitter.com/PCqHqNpjts</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960403515999690972?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
Commenting on Mukkamala&#8217;s repeated claims that he was not an expert,  Shapiro said that he should at least be aware of the ethical issues surrounding transgender medicine.
&#8220;And sure, he’s not an expert in endocrinology or plastic surgery,&#8221; Shapiro said. &#8220;But as the President of the AMA, he’s meant to be an expert in the AMA’s code of ethics, and at the bare minimum, the Hippocratic Oath.&#8221;
Mukkamala also claimed during the call that puberty blockers were reversible. Studies have shown that puberty blockers can cause permanent damage to fertility and loss of bone density, especially in the hips and spine. 
&nbsp;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
3/ CLAIM: The AMA’s Dr. Bobby asserts that so-called “puberty blockers” are “reversible,” dismissing Dr. Haim’s attempts to correct him—despite Dr. Haim having worked with patients who need puberty blockers for actual endocrine disorders and being well versed in their harms. <a href="https://t.co/nHYvgnBiQr">pic.twitter.com/nHYvgnBiQr</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960403521141887136?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
He also suggested that between 50-70% of transgender individuals commit suicide and that only 2% of those who have medical transgender procedures regret those procedures. Both numbers are suspect, as even the most extreme studies only say that up to 40% of transgender identifying people have attempted suicide. 
&nbsp;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
5/ CLAIM: Dr. Bobby insists there is only a 2% regret rate among those who medically ‘transition,’ and cites his source as the doctors who perform the transing of the kids. An unbiased group if ever there was one… <a href="https://t.co/kLDFzHAByd">pic.twitter.com/kLDFzHAByd</a>
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) <a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1960403528066707955?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
The 2% regret rate comes from a <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33968550/">study</a> that only measured after surgery, not the tens of thousands of kids who have been placed on puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones. It also did not measure regret past two years after the initial surgery. 
After Paquette told Mukkamala that he was upset by what he was hearing about kids being pushed to transition, he said that “the way to not be distraught is to talk to experts.”
Mukkamala also appeared to claim that sex change surgeries were not happening on kids in Michigan. This conflicts with data <a href="https://stoptheharmdatabase.com/state/michigan/">compiled</a> by Do No Harm that shows that there have been at least 186 kids who have undergone a transgender surgery in Michigan. 
The American Medical Association has been a staunch defender of transgender procedures on kids for years. In April 2021, the organization sent a <a href="https://www.ama-assn.org/press-center/ama-press-releases/ama-states-stop-interfering-health-care-transgender-children">letter</a> to governors across the country urging them not to protect kids from transgender procedures. 
“Empirical evidence has demonstrated that trans and non-binary gender identities are normal variations of human identity and expression,” the organization wrote. “It is imperative that transgender minors be given the opportunity to explore their gender identity under the safe and supportive care of a physician.”
Then, in a 2022 speech, then-American Medical Association President Jack Resneck Jr. claimed that opposition to transgender procedures on kids was driven by “misinformation.” 
“Drivers of disinformation say that gender-affirming care clinics are performing genital mutilation surgeries on teens, not involving families in care decisions, or using medical treatments on young children who show up after wondering for one day if they are trans,” he said.
Advocates of radical gender ideology will frequently cite organizations like the American Medical Association for reasons why the procedures should remain legal. Over two dozen states have acted in the last few years to ban transgender surgeries on minors.
WATCH THE FULL CONVERSATION:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="The AMA’s Dr. Bobby Mukkamala on “Gender Affirming Care”" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Mxb1qG-yvzY?start=4&#038;feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

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Leaked Footage Exposes Top Med Org’s Support For Trans Procedures On Kids: ‘I’m Not An Expert At All’

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Tuesday gave California, New Mexico, and Washington 30 days to comply with federal English proficiency rules for truckers or risk losing federal funding.
Duffy criticized the three states for failing to enforce new Trump administration rules requiring English proficiency for truck drivers. He announced the move after the Department of Transportation launched an investigation into a deadly August 12 crash on the Florida Turnpike, in which an illegal immigrant driver allegedly killed three people after making an illegal U-turn.
“We at DOT and Federal Motor Carriers, we are not going to tolerate states that don’t comply with the rules that come from this department,” Duffy said at a press conference. “We are going to give these states 30 days to come into compliance with truck drivers speaking proficiently the English language, or we’re going to look at the federal funding that they receive under the Motor Carriers Safety Assistance Program.”
Harjinder Singh, the accused driver in the Florida crash, was given a commercial driver&#8217;s license by both California and Washington. New Mexico law enforcement also failed to administer an English proficiency test to Singh when he was pulled over in July for speeding, the Transportation Department found.
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California could lose $30 million, Washington $10 million, and New Mexico $7 million if they don’t align with the English proficiency standards. The policy was first announced in May and then implemented at the end of June.
“When we did that, there was a lot of press that complained to us that we were being unfair to people, that we were being mean to people,” Duffy said. “And what we said was, ‘no, this is a safety issue.’ Making sure drivers of very heavy, 80,000-pound rigs can speak the language is truly a critical safety issue.”
Duffy said his department would take additional steps to ensure compliance if the states did not satisfy the requirements.
An investigation from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration found that from June 25 to August 21, California allowed at least 23 drivers with documented violations of English proficiency in other states to remain on the road.
During that same period, Washington allowed four drivers to stay on the road with proficiency violations from other states and two drivers who violated proficiency regulations in Washington.
New Mexico also allowed seven drivers to stay on the road who had documented failures in English proficiency.
The Trump administration has taken other steps to crack down on the number of truck drivers who are unable to understand English. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced last week that he had paused the issuance of work visas for commercial truck drivers. 

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Three States Could Lose Federal Funding For Defying Trump’s Trucking Mandate

President Donald Trump warned Monday that countries imposing digital taxes on American tech companies will face significant tariffs if they don&#8217;t remove them.
Without naming a specific country, Trump said that some nations had given a “complete pass” to China’s tech companies while penalizing American competitors. Some countries, like Canada and India, have already backed away from digital taxes after pressure from the Trump administration. 
“As the President of the United States, I will stand up to Countries that attack our incredible American Tech Companies. Digital Taxes, Digital Services Legislation, and Digital Markets Regulations are all designed to harm, or discriminate against, American Technology,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. 
“This must end, and end NOW! With this TRUTH, I put all Countries with Digital Taxes, Legislation, Rules, or Regulations, on notice that unless these discriminatory actions are removed, I, as President of the United States, will impose substantial additional Tariffs on that Country&#8217;s Exports to the U.S.A., and institute Export restrictions on our Highly Protected Technology and Chips,” he added. “America, and American Technology Companies, are neither the ‘piggy bank’ nor the ‘doormat’ of the World any longer. Show respect to America and our amazing Tech Companies or, consider the consequences!”
<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus/?utm_campaign=summer&amp;utm_content=editorialsummersale&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=editorial" target="_blank" rel="noopener">End of Summer Sale – Get 40% off New DailyWire+ Annual Memberships</a>
In June, Canada <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/canada-caves-digital-tax-on-u-s-tech-scrapped-after-trump-pressure">rescinded</a> its Digital Service Tax as part of ongoing trade negotiations with the United States. The tax would have hit American tech companies like Amazon, Google, Meta, and Apple hard, and could have cost American businesses up to $2.3 billion annually. 
India also <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/india/india-proposes-remove-equalisation-levy-digital-services-government-source-says-2025-03-25/">backed away</a> from a 6% digital advertising tax in April after pressure from American officials. 
Many European countries, like France and Switzerland, have <a href="https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/eu/digital-services-taxes-europe/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">implemented</a> digital taxes, while others, like Belgium and the Netherlands, are considering implementing them. France taxes major tech companies 3% on revenue from digital services and targeted advertising. 
In the trade deal between the European Union and the United States, both entities agreed to address “unjustified digital trade barriers.” 
“In that respect, The European Union confirms that it will not adopt or maintain network usage fees,” the framework said. “The United States and the European Union will not impose customs duties on electronic transmissions.”
It is unclear if the agreement will address digital service taxes.

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Trump To Foreign Governments: Drop Taxes On Big Tech Or Face ‘Consequences’

A dangerous member of the violent drug gang MS-13 was recently arrested thanks to intelligence provided by the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), The Daily Wire can first report. 
The NCTC, which operates under National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard, provided intelligence that helped Border Patrol track down and arrest Jonathan Ezequiel Portillo Beltran in Los Angeles on August 14. Beltran was a member of MS-13, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told The Daily Wire. 
“Our team works to ensure law enforcement officers have operational intelligence they need when encountering suspected terrorists like Beltran. Thanks to this work, the days of terrorists living freely within our borders are over,” NCTC Director Joe Kent said. 
Kent added that the National Counterterrorism Center “stepped up to surge resources and personnel to counter terrorist cartels and gangs” in response to President Donald Trump’s executive actions to designate drug cartels as terrorist organizations. 
“Because of President Trump’s designation and NCTC and Law Enforcement coordination efforts, fentanyl deaths are at an all-time low,” he said. 
Intelligence provided by Kent’s office has also aided in the arrests of suspected cartel members. 
According to ODNI, these arrests included Luis Alberto Davila Salazar, a member of the Los Zetas Cartel arrested on July 11 as he illegally entered the United States; Edgar Omar Botello Rangel, a member of the Gulf Cartel who was arrested on July 21 while attempting to enter the United States; and Edgar Martin Rosales Montoya, a Sinaloa Cartel affiliate who was apprehended on July 24 after illegally crossing into the United States. 
Since Trump <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/designating-cartels-and-other-organizations-as-foreign-terrorist-organizations-and-specially-designated-global-terrorists/">designated</a> drug cartels and transnational organizations such as MS-13 and Tren de Aragua as terrorist organizations, the National Counterterrorism Center has added over 21,00 cartel members to its terrorist database. It has also created over 35,000 identities linked to the 10 cartels that have been designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations, which have led to 6,525 terrorists being denied entry into the United States, ODNI told The Daily Wire. 
“This is a snapshot of our success and I am proud to work with our team here, across the Intelligence Community, and with our law enforcement partners at all levels,” Kent said. “Our work is not done; we are just getting started.” 

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EXCLUSIVE: Trump’s Cartel Crackdown Leads To Arrest Of Dangerous MS-13 Member

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