Democrats are not ready to let go of Elon Musk, one of their leading political targets, now that he is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/i-would-like-to-thank-president-trump-musk-says-farewell-to-doge" target="_blank" rel="noopener">parting ways</a> with the Trump administration.
Musk has drawn their ire for months due to his efforts to help President Donald Trump cut waste, fraud, and abuse from the federal government with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). The billionaire tech entrepreneur is moving on to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/elon-significantly-cut-back-doge-time" target="_blank" rel="noopener">rededicate</a> himself to his companies.
&#8220;Good riddance — but Musk isn’t off the hook for his chaos and corruption,&#8221; Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) said in a post on X. &#8220;We must hold him accountable.&#8221;
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), who is <a href="https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/05/01/congress/crockett-maneuvers-for-oversight-00321736" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reportedly pushing</a> to become the top Democrat on the powerful House Oversight Committee, also put Musk on notice.
&#8220;Elon came to Washington thinking he could run the government like one of his companies — firing people left and right, gutting essential services, and tearing this s*** up from the ground up,&#8221; Crockett <a href="https://x.com/RepJasmine/status/1928090181694890007" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>, &#8220;What he did is the definition of waste, fraud, and abuse. It’s time for a full investigation into the damage he’s caused and for the truth to come to light.&#8221;
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As it stands, Democrats in Congress can investigate Musk and make requests for interviews and documents. However, because they lack a majority in the House and Senate, they do not have the power to subpoena or schedule official hearings. That may change after the 2026 midterm elections if Republicans lose seats.
In a post on X announcing his departure, Musk thanked Trump &#8220;for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending&#8221; and said that the DOGE &#8220;mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.&#8221;
Many GOP lawmakers praised Musk after he confirmed his time as a special government employee was coming to an end. They have also voiced eagerness to codify the so-called &#8220;DOGE cuts,&#8221; a process that is set to begin next week, when the White House is expected to send its first <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-budget-director-confirms-first-targets-for-clawing-back-spending" target="_blank" rel="noopener">rescissions package</a> to the House.
&#8220;Thank you [Elon Musk] for your incredible efforts and sacrifices you made to launch DOGE to save America from our national debt crisis,&#8221; DOGE Subcommittee Chairwoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) <a href="https://x.com/RepMTG/status/1927883321997934805" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> in a post on X. &#8220;This should only be the beginning of cutting waste, fraud, and abuse and delivering government efficiency for the American people.&#8221;

US Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX)

Dems Swear Elon Musk Won’t Escape Investigations After DOGE Stint

Congress

Democrats

Elizabeth Warren

Elon Musk

Jasmine Crockett

Politics

Trump Administration

Podcast host Sam Fragoso (&#8220;Talk Easy&#8221;) cornered Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) during his latest episode, clearly making her uncomfortable as she tried to explain why she&#8217;d defended former President Joe Biden&#8217;s mental acuity up to the very end of his 2024 presidential campaign.
Fragoso&#8217;s website highlights <a href="https://talkeasypod.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">episode 411</a> with Warren — along with a sub-headline that reads, &#8220;Senator Elizabeth Warren on fighting for working families, exposing corruption, and guiding the future of the Democratic party.&#8221;
But during their conversation, it was Warren herself who appeared to be exposed as she attempted to explain away her own previous statements.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
🚨Podcast host Sam Fragoso GRILLS Elizabeth Warren on her past defense of Biden&#39;s mental fitness — she DOUBLES DOWN and gets called out on it🚨
FRAGOSO: &quot;Do you regret saying that President Biden had a mental acuity, he had a sharpness to him? You said that up until July of last… <a href="https://t.co/6YJY3U1sRX">pic.twitter.com/6YJY3U1sRX</a>
&mdash; Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) <a href="https://twitter.com/JasonJournoDC/status/1914384559996555604?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 21, 2025</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;Do you regret saying that President Biden had a mental acuity, he had a sharpness to him?&#8221; Fragoso asked. &#8220;You said that up until July of last year.&#8221;
Warren paused, then said, &#8220;I said what I believed to be true.&#8221;
&#8220;You think he was as sharp as you?&#8221; Fragoso asked, and Warren appeared to freeze.
&#8220;Um,&#8221; Warren stifled a laugh. &#8220;I said I had not seen decline &#8230; And I hadn&#8217;t at that point.&#8221;
&#8220;You did not see any decline from 2024 Joe Biden to 2021 Joe Biden?&#8221; Fragoso pressed again.
&#8220;Not when I said that,&#8221; Warren tried again. &#8220;The thing is, he &#8230; Look, he was sharp. He was on his feet. I saw him. Live event, I had meetings with him a couple of times &#8230;&#8221;
&#8220;Senator, &#8216;on his feet&#8217; is not praise. &#8216;He can speak in sentences&#8217; is not praise,&#8221; Fragoso said pointedly.
&#8220;Fair enough, fair enough,&#8221; Warren finally conceded.
Warren was not alone in her defense of Biden: a majority of Democrats and media personalities — some of whom have since written books detailing Biden&#8217;s obvious cognitive decline despite aiding in covering it up at the time — tried to blame Republicans and right-leaning media and accused them of making Biden look impaired when he really wasn&#8217;t.

Podcast Host Corners Elizabeth Warren On Biden’s Mental State: Watch Her Squirm

Podcast Host Corners Elizabeth Warren On Biden's Mental State: Watch Her Squirm

Joe Biden

Media

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) criticized President Donald Trump on Thursday after he called for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates – seven months after Warren told the Federal Reserve the same.
Warren appeared on CNBC on Thursday and said that Trump was risking a market “crash” after he posted on Truth Social that the Federal Reserve chairman’s “termination cannot come fast enough!” Trump has expressed frustration with the Fed chairman, Jerome Powell, in recent days over the level of the federal funds rate.
Warren said that Trump’s post was a threat to fire Powell. As an independent agency, the Federal Reserve’s chairman can only be removed by the president “for cause,” according to a 1935 Supreme Court ruling. “For cause” is typically interpreted to exclude disagreements over monetary policy.
“Understand this: if Chairman Powell can be fired by the president of the United States, it will crash the markets in the United States,” Warren said. “The infrastructure that keeps this stock market strong – and therefore a big part of our economy strong, and therefore a big part of the world economy strong – is the idea that the big pieces move independent of the politics, that somebody is making his/their/her best decisions economically and independently.”
“If interest rates in the United States are subject to a president who just wants to wave his magic wand, this doesn&#8217;t distinguish us then from any other two bit dictatorship around the world,” she added.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
ELIZABETH WARREN: &quot;IF CHAIRMAN POWELL CAN BE FIRED BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, IT WILL CRASH THE MARKETS IN THE UNITED STATES.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/tuKbsvijW6">pic.twitter.com/tuKbsvijW6</a>
&mdash; The Wolf Of All Streets (@scottmelker) <a href="https://twitter.com/scottmelker/status/1913000373654077727?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 17, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Under the Biden administration, Warren, now the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, repeatedly pushed Powell to cut interest rates despite high levels of inflation. She argued that interest rates needed to come down to make housing more affordable.
In one of those letters sent in September, Warren pushed the Federal Reserve to cut the federal funds rate by “75 basis points.” “If the Fed is too cautious in cutting rates, it would needlessly risk our economy heading towards a recession,” the <a href="https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/warren_hickenlooper_whitehouse_letter_to_fed_re_september_rate_cut.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">letter</a> said.
Trump on Thursday appeared to vent in a Truth Social <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114352766082542122" target="_blank" rel="noopener">post</a> about the federal funds rate, which is set by the Federal Open Market Committee and influences other interest rates. The president suggested that Powell was acting late to cut rates as the European Central Bank prepares to cut its own interest rates.
“The ECB is expected to cut interest rates for the 7th time, and yet, ‘Too Late’ Jerome Powell of the Fed, who is always TOO LATE AND WRONG, yesterday issued a report which was another, and typical, complete ‘mess!’ Trump posted. “Oil prices are down, groceries (even eggs!) are down, and the USA is getting RICH ON TARIFFS.”
“Too Late should have lowered Interest Rates, like the ECB, long ago, but he should certainly lower them now. Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!” Trump wrote.

Liz Warren Blasts Trump For Asking Fed To Lower Rates. Here’s What She Said When Biden Was President

Donald Trump

Federal Reserve

Jerome Powell

Violence against America’s executives keeps escalating. On February 21, a gunman shot up the home of State Accident Insurance Fund Corporation CEO Chip Terhune in <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/category/us/us-regions/west/oregon" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lake Oswego</a>, near Portland. <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/us/insurance-ceos-home-riddled-bullets-gunman-remains-run" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Reported</a> Fox News, “The shots were fired at close range by someone possibly wearing a hoodie or ski mask and carrying a light-colored object.”
His family could have also been injured or even killed. As of now, no suspect has been identified.
The attack occurred as America continues to mourn UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, who was <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/unitedhealth-group-slain-ceo-brian-thompson-good-guys/story?id=116705908" target="_blank" rel="noopener">murdered</a> last December 4 in New York City. “It was a life lived to the fullest,” said the company’s CEO, Andrew Witty. “And a life that helped make a profoundly positive impact on the lives of so many people.” However, some on the Left disagree.
Alleged killer Luigi Mangione, who has pleaded not guilty, made his first <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_7b7xLdISk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">court appearance</a> since his arraignment on February 21. Outside the courthouse, deranged supporters chanted, “We, the people, want Luigi free.”
Immediately after the killing, “Wanted” signs <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/executive-hit-lists-wanted-posters-nypd-warns-threats/story?id=116662519" target="_blank" rel="noopener">appeared</a> in Manhattan featuring other corporate executives. An NYPD bulletin cautioned that “some online users across social media platforms reacted positively to the killing, encouraged future targeting of similar executives, and shared conspiracy theories regarding the shooting.” Such disregard for life and free discussion is what led to the Oregon attack and potentially others.
Unfortunately, some leading public discussions on health care and corporate policies have unconditionally failed to condemn such attacks. While they profess support for nonviolence, they often equivocate.
“Violence is never the answer, but people can be pushed only so far,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) told the Huffington Post in an <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/warren-sanders-brian-thompson-health-care_n_6758bc0fe4b063b52a9a524b" target="_blank" rel="noopener">interview</a>. But what happens if they’re “pushed too far” and start killing? She further exacerbated, “The visceral response from people across this country who feel cheated, ripped off, and threatened by the vile practices of their insurance companies should be a warning to everyone in the health care system.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) described Thompson’s murder as “outrageous” and “unacceptable.” Then the self-proclaimed socialist equivocated, “I think what the outpouring of anger at the health care industry tells us is that millions of people understand that health care is a human right and that you cannot have people in the insurance industry rejecting needed health care for people while they make billions of dollars in profit.” 
 
On March 4, John Stossel posted a YouTube <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IOWBjoo7Ew" target="_blank" rel="noopener">interview</a> with Swedish economist Sven Larson, who now lives in Kansas, discussing Bernie Sanders&#8217; cliché for decades that healthcare is a “right.” Larson commented, “You get the right to free health care, but whether you actually get the healthcare or not is a different story.” He added, “I have friends who have died in the Swedish health care system because they couldn’t get treatment in time.” 
 
Wendell Potter, a former vice president for corporate communications at Cigna Corp., took a similarly appalling stance to that of Warren and Sanders in an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/18/opinion/health-insurance-united-ceo-shooting.html">op-ed</a> for the New York Times. While lamenting Thompson’s “tragic assassination,” Potter used that as a tree on which to hang his position.
He stated he resigned while assisting in the planning of a financial meeting “similar to the one that UnitedHealthcare canceled after Mr. Thompson’s horrific killing.” This revealed an “uncomfortable truth&#8230; that shareholders, not patient outcomes, tend to drive decisions at for-profit health insurance companies.”
If companies lose money, they go bankrupt. If the health insurance industry can’t turn a profit, the only alternative is a rationing system like those in Sweden or Canada, which means a “right” to long wait times even for routine care. Potter is taking his disgruntled former employee attitude too far.
In a rebuttal <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/02/opinion/letters/health-insurance-failures.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">letter</a> to the Times, Michael Keyes, an executive with 20 years in the health care industry, branded Potter’s op-ed “a misleading cheap shot” targeting a sector that “cares for hundreds of millions of Americans while navigating an exceptionally complex system.”
If Warren, Sanders, and Potter disagree with the current U.S. health care policy, fine. This is a democracy. State your case. However, taking advantage of a terrorist act as an excuse to advance a policy agenda is beyond the pale and ought to be unequivocally condemned.
Such outrages must cease, or this country will descend into Venezuelan-style anarchy, taking our economy down with it.
* * *
Haley Kennington (<a href="https://twitter.com/ladykennington?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@LadyKennington</a>) is a conservative commentator who served as the Research Director &amp; Story Editor for “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12734800/?ref_=nm_ov_bio_lk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">2020:The Plot Against the President”</a> and Research/Archive Editor for “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt20256528/?ref_=nm_ov_bio_lk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">What Is a Woman?</a>“
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

TOPSHOT-US-POLITICS-GOVERNMENT-HEALTH-KENNEDY

Democrats Excuse Violence Against Healthcare Executives (Again)

Bernie Sanders

Health Care

Luigi Mangione

Murder

Opinion

UnitedHealthcare

Leftist Massachusetts Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren, in a desperate attempt to protect the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau – an entity she created that, unlike other federal regulatory bodies and enforcement agencies, determines for itself how much money it needs and obtains it directly from the Federal Reserve, as the Heritage Foundation has <a href="https://www.heritage.org/courts/report/money-nothing-thats-not-the-way-you-do-it-the-consumer-financial-protection-bureau">noted</a>, actually <a href="https://grabien.com/file/getmedia?id=2788522&amp;key=8c4de1fc2c5ba3aa88f5040b362a9044&amp;userid=9685">praised</a> President Donald Trump.
In late January, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced the Defund the CFPB Act, which would zero out the transfer payments from the Federal Reserve to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“The CFPB is an unelected, unaccountable bureaucratic agency that has imposed burdensome and harmful regulations on American businesses, banks, and credit unions,” Cruz stated. “It is an unchecked Obama-era executive arm and the Federal Reserve should not be transferring funds to it. Enacting this legislation would save American taxpayers billions of dollars and I call on the Senate to expeditiously take it up and pass it.” 
“Under Joe Biden–appointed Rohit Chopra, businesses and consumers have found themselves harassed, hectored, and micromanaged,” David B. McGarry has <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/author/david-b-mcgarry/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">written</a>. “The New York Times summed up the license taken by the agency well, <a href="https://archive.is/o/SrPsD/https:/www.nytimes.com/2023/10/01/business/rohit-chopra-consumer-financial-protection-bureau-wallstreet.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">writing</a> that ‘Chopra insists that he always follows the rules,’ but ‘his view is that he’s simply more expansive than others in determining what those rules are.’ As Chopra’s tenure shows, ‘more expansive’ quickly expands into lawlessness.”
On May 24, 2018, President Trump signed into law the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Growth,_Regulatory_Relief_and_Consumer_Protection_Act" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act</a>, which exempted numerous banks from the CFPB&#8217;s regulations.
On Wednesday, Warren, speaking of debanking, said her staff “found that just four big banks, Bank of America, JP, Morgan, Wells Fargo and Citibank, accounted for half of all the complaints filed at the CFPB.”
She then praised Trump. saying, “Donald Trump was on to a real problem when he criticized Bank of America for its debanking practices.”
<iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jI_YRTHZwzo?si=e7w2FHjaYdlgA-1a" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
Then she made her pitch for her brainchild, arguing, “We can prevent these abuses. I know that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is a favorite whipping boy of the Republicans on this committee, but the CFPB is the main agency in our government that is actively working to stop unfair debanking. Let me say that again, the CFPB is the one agency that is actively working to stop unfair debanking. Right now, the agency has five different rules, either in place or in progress, that would help prevent debanking by addressing some of the root causes, from overdraft fee practices to religious discrimination, and the CFPB is working to hold banks accountable when they close law-abiding citizens and businesses accounts for no good reason.”
“I sent a letter to President Trump today that walks through the CFPB&#8217;s work. &#8230; I said that the CFPB is the one agency fighting back against debanking, but that may be at risk. Earlier this week, Treasury Secretary and acting CFPB Director Scott Bessent halted all CFPB rule-making enforcement, investigations and litigation against financial institutions that are breaking the law, including the banks that are wrongfully debanking their customers. The freeze Secretary Bessent put on the CFPB means more Americans across this country will be unfairly debanked, and they will lose the one agency that is working to help them.”

LOL: Warren, Desperate To Protect Her Brainchild That’s On Chopping Block, Actually Praises Trump

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

debanking

Ted Cruz

There&#8217;s a civil trial going on right now in the state of California that hasn&#8217;t gotten much attention at all. For the most part, the corporate press doesn&#8217;t want to talk about it, probably because it would upset some of their biggest advertisers. But if you have any interest in learning more about how the alleged &#8220;science&#8221; concerning vaccines actually works in this country, it&#8217;s one of the most important cases that&#8217;s ever been tried.
I&#8217;m talking about a product liability lawsuit that&#8217;s underway against the pharmaceutical giant Merck. The litigation relates to allegations that Merck concealed serious side effects of its &#8220;Gardasil&#8221; vaccine, which promised to protect people from getting HPV — a virus that can lead to cervical cancer in women. Merck of course denies the allegations, and the jury hasn&#8217;t returned a verdict yet.
But even without a verdict, the fact that this case has made it to trial, in and of itself, is worth talking about. Concerns about the Gardasil vaccine have been widespread for nearly two decades, since it was first introduced to the market. Here for example are two news clips from 2008 and 2009, related to the first version of the vaccine. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="001 HPV Vaccine Risks" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NVKr59WovsA?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>
&nbsp;
Put aside for a second whether Gardasil was indeed dangerous, or whether Merck lied in its advertising. Those are questions that I don&#8217;t pretend to be an authority on. That&#8217;s for a jury to decide. The really interesting question is why it took until 2025 for anyone to resolve, definitively, the question of whether this vaccine is actually as safe as advertised. The fact that the judge has allowed this case to go to trial means the allegations, at a minimum, probably aren&#8217;t frivolous. So how was this vaccine — which has been taken by countless people — allowed to escape this kind of serious scrutiny for so long? 
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mws-ep-1526-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Matt Walsh Show</a></h3>
That fact alone — the existence of an information blackout on such an important vaccine — is of course just one of many harrowing, unexplained failures of the public health establishment in this country. If you pull up one of the complaints against Merck, which was filed by the law firm Wisner Baum, you&#8217;ll find a lot of other very disturbing allegations too. One woman, the main plaintiff in the case, alleges she&#8217;s been confined to a wheelchair since the age of 16 because of the vaccine. 
There are also allegations that Merck paid doctors and nonprofits thousands of dollars to promote the vaccine, as well as claims that Merck lied about the vaccine&#8217;s contents. Normally, allegations like this never see the inside of a courthouse, because the pharmaceutical industry enjoys a broad liability shield. This case is a rare exception.
I mention the lawsuit over the Gardasil vaccine because it came up yesterday during the confirmation hearings for Donald Trump&#8217;s nominee to be the next HHS secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.. That&#8217;s because RFK Jr. worked with the law firm that brought the case against Merck, and he stands to benefit financially from the outcome. In other words, RFK Jr. played a role in finding the plaintiffs for this very rare, and very important lawsuit that&#8217;s currently in progress against Big Pharma. Here&#8217;s how Elizabeth Warren questioned Kennedy about it. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="002 Elizabeth Warren" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TFGwrLnEmSk?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>
&nbsp;
What&#8217;s extraordinary about this moment is that Warren has built her entire career around the lie that she&#8217;s a populist — or at least, someone who&#8217;s extremely skeptical of entrenched corporate power, particularly when it&#8217;s held by banks. But in this case, Warren is pretty much indistinguishable from a lawyer for Big Pharma. She&#8217;s berating RFK Jr. because he took Big Pharma to court over the HPV vaccine. And even though he&#8217;s stated that he won&#8217;t pursue any lawsuits while he&#8217;s in government, it&#8217;s not enough for her. She wants him to commit to renouncing lawsuits that he&#8217;s already participated in, or that he might pursue after leaving office. And he wouldn&#8217;t agree to that.
I&#8217;m not going to speculate on Warren&#8217;s motivations. You can point to various campaign contributions she&#8217;s received from the pharmaceutical industry, as many people already have. Actually, on second thought, I am speculating that Elizabeth Warren is a bought and paid for shill for Big Pharma. Not speculating but outright accusing her of it. Still the truth is, this is a much larger problem than Elizabeth Warren. Throughout the hearing, RFK Jr. was repeatedly attacked by Democrats simply for questioning the safety and efficacy of various drugs that are widely prescribed. These are drugs we&#8217;re assured are effective, even though there are very real reasons to doubt that. And in particular, Kennedy was hit over his skepticism of SSRIs, in the most unfair and disingenuous way imaginable. Here&#8217;s Tina Smith of Minnesota, in one of the most egregious moments from this hearing:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="003 Smith spars with RFK" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XrPX7fhzUFQ?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>
&nbsp;
RFK&#8217;s response at the end of that clip is obviously the right one. Remember the 2023 mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine? The shooter killed 18 people at a bowling alley and a bar. We still don&#8217;t know what, if any, drugs he was taking at the time of the incident.
The same is true of the trans-identifying mass shooter here in Tennessee. The Tennessee Star has reported, citing a search warrant, that Vanderbilt had prescribed SSRIs to the shooter. But we don&#8217;t know if the shooter was actively taking those medications, because neither the police nor Vanderbilt will tell us. And therefore, it wouldn&#8217;t show up in any &#8220;studies&#8221; that purport to show how many mass shooters were on SSRIs.
This is the norm, when it comes to these academic papers on SSRIs. And as I&#8217;ve <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YPzTZJubSc" target="_blank" rel="noopener">previously discussed</a>, there&#8217;s another way that these &#8220;studies&#8221; hide the number of mass shooters who are on SSRIs. Basically, they include inner city violence in their tally of mass shootings. So if a bunch of gang members in the South Side of Chicago shoot up a birthday party or something, that gets added to the tally of mass shootings. And because those kinds of shootings happen every day in places like Chicago — for reasons that have nothing to do with SSRIs, like turf disputes and so on — the authors of these studies can make it seem like SSRIs don&#8217;t cause mass shootings. But they&#8217;re really just obfuscating the central question by flooding the data set with unrelated shootings. The core question — which is whether SSRIs cause otherwise law-abiding young students to shoot their classmates — remains unresolved in medical literature.
It’s not surprise and no secret that young angry males who grow up in the hood with no father figures and get involved in gangs and drug dealing by the age of 12 would turn to violence. There’s no mystery there. But there is a mystery as to why a child who has never been violent, who was not raised by a street gang, who is financially stable, would one day casually execute a dozen classmates for no reason that he can even articulate. Why is that happening? And why is it that so often these kids are on psychiatric medication?
<h3><a href="https://www.amiracist.com/?_gl=1*jtghwp*_gcl_au*ODQ1NjYzNTg2LjE3Mjg5MDk3OTE.*_ga*MTc2NzM0NDQ2NS4xNzI4OTA5Nzkx*_ga_CZKR9ZYKJP*MTczMDEyMDgwOS40OS4xLjE3MzAxMjA4MzkuMzAuMC4w" target="_blank" rel="noopener">MATT WALSH&#8217;S &#8216;AM I RACIST?&#8217; NOW STREAMING ON DAILYWIRE+</a></h3>
There are definitely reasons to think SSRIs could play a role in this kind of violence. For one thing, you can look at the warning label on SSRIs, which states that the drugs can actually increase the risk of suicide and violent behavior in some cases. The drugmakers are telling us outright that these drugs can put violent thoughts into your head. They can make you want to lash out violently against yourself or other people. The pharmaceutical companies are telling us that directly. And yet when that thing happens, they will insist that the drug they said can cause it to happen, must not have caused it to happen.
Or you can look at the studies that show that SSRIs can increase the risk of violence in people who aren&#8217;t depressed at all. A few years ago, for example, researchers in Denmark reviewed experiments going back to the 1960s. And they found that, when healthy volunteers — meaning, people with no mental health issues — were given antidepressants, the drugs doubled their risk of &#8220;suicidality and violence.&#8221;
So why did that happen? Why might SSRIs make healthy people more violent?
The honest answer is that we have no idea. Just a few years ago, we learned that there&#8217;s actually no clear link between low serotonin levels and depression. This was the central claim that supposedly justified the mass-adoption of SSRIs in this country, and it&#8217;s completely false. We have no idea what these drugs are actually doing. So maybe we should pump the brakes a bit. That&#8217;s what RFK tried to say yesterday. Here&#8217;s the response he got:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="004 RFK on SSRIs" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2tg3QA_TZeo?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>
&nbsp;
Usually, you expect that in a confirmation hearing, the worst thing that can happen is that the nominee says something disqualifying. But in this case, the senator said something disqualifying. Let me be extremely clear about this: If you need psychiatric drugs in order to function, then you are not fit to serve at the highest levels of government. You&#8217;re not qualified to teach elementary school students or operate heavy machinery, for that matter. You simply cannot claim that you&#8217;re competent to govern if you need to regularly take psychoactive substances. Am I saying that every lawmaker on anti-depressants should be removed from office? Yes, I am absolutely saying that. That should be common sense.
More importantly, RFK is obviously right about SSRIs. When the peer-reviewed journal &#8220;Molecular Psychiatry&#8221; — one of the most prominent journals in the field — admits that depression isn&#8217;t actually caused by a serotonin imbalance, which is what happened in 2022, then it&#8217;s obviously worth taking a close look at a class of antidepressants that&#8217;s entitled, &#8220;Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors.&#8221; If a comprehensive review finds that we were wrong about these drugs for decades, then maybe we need some more information and studies before we prescribe them to millions of people — including children.
But of course, this is a pattern in the healthcare industry. Drugs are approved all the time when they don&#8217;t actually work — at least not in any way that we understand. As RFK Jr. said yesterday, it was a similar story for Alzheimer&#8217;s drugs. Some of these drugs received a lot of funding and fast-track approvals, only to turn out to be completely useless. In one case, the data supporting these drugs was actually faked. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="005 Alzheimers Research" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GLftqaQYl5E?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>
&nbsp;
By this point you can probably tell that this hearing didn&#8217;t go very well for Democrats. Later on, they tried to attack him for pointing out that Lyme Disease has some very conspicuous origins. Apparently we&#8217;re supposed to think — post-COVID — that it&#8217;s an outlandish conspiracy theory to believe that Lyme Disease could possibly have anything to do with government labs injecting ticks with various exotic diseases.
Then there was this moment, where one Democrat tried to make the point that RFK Jr. doesn&#8217;t believe that germs can cause disease. Then he refuted what she was saying, so she just &#8220;read it into the record&#8221; anyway. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="006 Avian" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VnDwo3b7iXk?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>
&nbsp;
These hearings are all like this. They&#8217;re not actually about getting any kind of thoughtful answer from the nominee. It&#8217;s all drive-by soundbites. It doesn&#8217;t even matter what he says.
But even by this low standard, there was one moment in yesterday&#8217;s hearing that managed to stand out. This moment comes to us from Bernie Sanders. Sanders began by asking RFK Jr. whether healthcare is a human right, and he said no, because no one — especially gluttons or habitual smokers — is entitled to anyone else&#8217;s labor. And then Sanders resorted to berating RFK Jr. for his support of anti-vaccine apparel — specifically, anti-vaccine onesies. Behold one of the greatest moments in modern congressional history:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="007 Bernie Onesies" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dAqC7pt9OGA?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>
&nbsp;
This is the level of seriousness that Democrats are applying to these confirmation hearings. They barely even mentioned gender ideology, or how RFK Jr. plans to end the castration of children in this country. They weren&#8217;t remotely interested in his call for more transparent and accurate data in modern medicine. Instead, one by one, Democrats ran interference for Big Pharma. They talked about anti-vax &#8220;onesies&#8221; and demanded that RFK stop bullying Merck.
Democrats like to pretend that they stand against “corporate greed&#8221; and so on. But you simply cannot pretend to be an avenger for the working class standing against corrupt billionaires if you will also defend the pharmaceutical industry to your dying breath. There is no greater example of corporate greed than what we have seen from Big Pharma.
This is an industry that we know for an absolute fact has pushed literal poison on people, by the millions, and done it all for no reason other than pure profit. This is the industry that supplies actual castration drugs to 13-year-olds. An industry that got millions of Americans hooked on anti-depressants on false pretenses, based on a belief in a chemical imbalance that doesn’t exist. There are dozens of other examples just like this. And they are all things that Democrats don&#8217;t want us to talk about — and have in fact attempted to forcibly prevent us from talking about.
So whatever reservations conservatives have about RFK Jr., it&#8217;s very clear that he needs to be confirmed. We have a real opportunity to install someone who is skeptical of the junk science we&#8217;ve been relentlessly fed for decades, on everything from SSRIs to Alzheimer’s to gender ideology. And after yesterday&#8217;s debacle of a confirmation hearing, it&#8217;s clear we need to take this opportunity now, while we still have it.

Senate Finance Committee Holds Confirmation Hearing For Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Democrats Shill For Big Pharma In RFK Jr. Confirmation Hearing

Big Pharma

Department of Health and Human Services

Matt Walsh

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

On Wednesday during the hearings for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human Services, the Democrats made fools of themselves, with Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) taking the lead.
What helped RFK Jr. in this hearing was that whatever mistakes he made were quickly covered up by Democrats who were out of their freaking minds. They are out of their minds. They&#8217;re crazy.
It’s not our fault, on the Right, that leftists decided to tout Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) as your champions of diversity, inclusion, and economic issues.
That’s your fault. You decided to make these people your leading lights. We didn&#8217;t. You “chose the form of your destructor” — and it turns out it was a bunch of geriatric socialists with no relationship with the real world.
The funniest moment, by far, came when Bernie Sanders started questioning RFK Jr. about a onesie for a baby that read “Unvaxxed. Unafraid.”
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Bernie Sanders Asks RFK Jr. About Baby Clothing: ‘Are You Supportive Of These Onesies?!’" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NBaMZkZolvQ?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>
&nbsp;
Sanders foamed, “They are selling what’s called onesies. These are little things, clothing for babies.” His eyes became like saucers as he yelled, “Are you supportive of this?”
RFK Jr. replied, “I’ve had nothing to do with leadership —”
“Are you supportive of these onesies?” Sanders yelled again.
“I’m supportive of vaccines,” RFK Jr. said simply.
“Are you supportive of these, this clothing which is militantly anti-vaccine?” Sanders screamed.
Kennedy, trying to suppress a laugh, said, “I am supportive of vaccines. I want good science; I want to protect —”
“But you will not tell the organization you founded not to continue selling that product. Thank you, Mr. Chairman,” Sanders concluded.
Bernie’s new 2028 slogan: “Will you denounce the onesies?”
Do you think you&#8217;re going to get RFK Jr. on, “Will you denounce the onesies?”
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2128-member-exclusive">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
That was not the end of Bernie&#8217;s insanity. He then asked RFK Jr. if healthcare is a right and RFK Jr. gave the correct answer, which was “not the way you mean it.”
“Is health care a human right?” Sanders asked.
RFK Jr. asked if Sanders meant a right in the way that free speech is a human right. Sanders said, “Yes,” whereupon RFK Jr. said, “I would say it&#8217;s different. &#8230; Free speech doesn&#8217;t cost anything. But in health care, if you smoke cigarettes for 20 years and you get cancer, you are now taking from the pool. So are you guaranteed the same right?”
That is the correct answer. When someone asks, &#8220;Is X a right,” you have to ask, “What do you mean by that?”
There are many different types of “rights.” What Bernie means is, “Do you think it&#8217;s a good thing that everybody should have?” And the answer to that is, “Sure, but that doesn&#8217;t mean it&#8217;s a right.”
If you&#8217;re demanding a service from somebody, it&#8217;s no longer a right. I don’t have a right to food. I have a right to have the capacity to obtain food in a free system. I don&#8217;t have a right to food because that means that somebody else would have to provide me with that food.
I do have a right to free speech because I do have the capacity to demand from you that you don’t impede my ability to speak freely.
It wasn’t just Bernie. Elizabeth Warren — who is a sort of a knockoff Temu Bernie —  was yelling at RFK Jr. and basically mimicking the “lady screaming at cat” meme.
If this is who Democrats want to be, please, more of this.
You’re turning Republicans into the cool kids.
Keep on going.

Bernie Goes Nuts: Denounce The Onesies!

Ben Shapiro

Health and Human Services

U.S. Senate

Just days into the second Trump administration, Republicans in Washington are facing an unexpected and poorly understood headwind to unleashing our economic potential, courtesy of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the leadership of Biden bureaucrats.
Under the <a href="https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/cfpb-finalizes-personal-financial-data-rights-rule-to-boost-competition-protect-privacy-and-give-families-more-choice-in-financial-services/">CFPB’s Biden-era 1033 Rule</a>, also known as the “Banking Data Exposure Rule,” American banks will soon be compelled to increase the flow of sensitive financial data to banks and businesses worldwide, with insufficient safeguards and proper oversight. The implications are enormous, and the risks cannot be overstated. 
Progressive proponents like Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) might be cheering this misguided rule under the guise of empowering the consumer. But because the rule is so poorly constructed, it will only benefit a minority of well-informed consumers while creating new and potentially life-changing hazards for many Americans and businesses.
The Banking Data Exposure Rule opens a digital Pandora’s Box. By mandating that banks facilitate unprecedented access to consumers&#8217; financial data, the CFPB is creating a hunting ground for malicious cybercriminals and foreign state actors to exploit. This rule places anyone with a checking or savings account — be it an individual, a business, a municipal government, or even a hospital system — at risk of falling victim to sophisticated schemes designed to gain unauthorized access to funds and sensitive data.
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The rule’s design offers bad actors a roadmap for exploitation, making the CFPB a de facto enabler of potential financial harm. Under the 1033 Rule, banks are essentially powerless to ensure their customers are not being duped by bad actors masquerading as legitimate third parties — a key point seemingly missed by the Biden administration and supporters.
Consider the broader implications of a foreign adversary using this framework to infiltrate a utility company’s financial records, hold a hospital’s payroll system hostage, or drain the retirement savings of an unsuspecting senior citizen. The CFPB’s poorly conceived rule could trigger cascading consequences across critical sectors of the U.S. economy, suppressing the nation’s optimism for an economic revival under the Trump administration and Republican-led Congress.
Proponents claim the ends will justify the means by enhancing competitive innovation and streamlining financial services. However, the 1033 Rule presumes that these benefits outweigh the risks to data security and privacy.
The CFPB’s actions undermine the reasonable demands Congress has made of banks to protect sensitive financial data and secure access to accounts. The rule establishes a false dichotomy between safeguarding consumer information and the promise of open banking, stripping consumers of their agency in making this decision. In reality, we can and should demand both security and innovation from our financial institutions.
Worse still, the Banking Data Exposure Rule is an ideologically-driven mandate. CFPB officials are misusing the Dodd-Frank Act to orchestrate a shift to an “open banking” framework that was largely theoretical when the bill was signed into law nearly 15 years ago. Open banking should only proceed with clear congressional authorization — not unelected, newly-unemployed, bureaucrats — following deliberation on the risks and merits of such a fundamental shift in the financial system.
The CFPB’s overreach in this instance sets a dangerous precedent for unchecked regulatory intervention in other critical sectors of the economy. Congress has a responsibility to rein in the CFPB before the 1033 Rule takes effect. Lawmakers should recognize that while open banking policies are worthy of debate, there is no urgency to enact radical changes nor necessity to do so without considerable public debate. It is a mandate ripe for rollback.
Financial innovation should not come at the expense of data security and consumer trust. Instead, we should pursue reforms that achieve both priorities without exposing Americans to unnecessary risks. By cancelling the 1033 Rule, Congress can send a clear message: safeguarding the financial security of the American people is not up for compromise.
The time to act is now. This is a fight for the integrity of our financial system and the protection of American consumers. Congress must ensure that innovation in banking is built on a foundation of trust, security, and proper oversight — not reckless experimentation.
Doug Wheeler is the Director of the George Gibbs Center for Economic Prosperity at The James Madison Institute (JMI), a free market public policy research organization based in Florida.

Fed Meets As Speculation Builds On Possible Rate Cut

This Biden-Era Banking Rule Is A Pandora’s Box Of Financial Risk

Banking

Biden Administration

Trump’s Defense Department nominee, Pete Hegseth, appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee this week, where female Democrat senators tried to force him to declare that women are fit for combat duty by becoming hysterical and shaking their little fists at him, a man who could crush their skulls between the fingers of a single hand.
Women Democrat Senators like Kirsten Gillibrand, Mazie Hirono and Tim Kaine tried to hammer Hegseth with the mightiest power females have — the power to bully men into lying about women’s capabilities in the hopes it will buy them a few minutes of peace. But the senators’ attacks were dampened by the fact that they were leftists. Because they’re women; they lack the capacity for reason. 
The onslaught by the female Democrats was reminiscent of the playground scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s horror film “The Birds” in which legions of crows and seagulls and other shrill, cawing, vacant-eyed creatures, slowly gather on the telephone lines in what at first seems an innocent natural phenomenon but eventually reveals itself as the prelude to an uncanny assault on humanity itself, with the birds making up for what they lack in logical thought with the sharpness of their talons and a relentlessness that could drive a man almost to madness amidst the cacophony of wild screeching cries from their high-pitched, rage-infused voices — except instead of birds, it was Democrat women, which in some ways was even worse because they didn’t even have the mercy to peck out Hegseth’s eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at them while they tried to rip him to pieces because he refused to lie about women in combat.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1214-trump-s-war-for-reality" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Andrew Klavan Show</a></h3>
Kirstin Gillibrand, for instance, demanded that Hegseth answer two questions. One, do you think women can play an essential role in combat? And two, do you think this dress makes me look fat? Hegseth tried to split the difference by saying the dress was very appealing but women would disappear in combat like a faint pencil smudge under the force of an industrial-strength eraser. But Senator Gillibrand would not be satisfied until Hegseth showed himself willing to shower her with flattering deceit so she could continue to live in a dream world of feminine strength and competence rather than in reality, where she just feels so insecure and down on herself all the time.
Mazie Hirono demanded that Hegseth promise he would give up alcohol, women, nights out on the town with his friends and any hobbies that would distract him from her needs and desires. Hegseth, however, refused, saying he’d only met Hirono ten minutes ago and wasn’t yet willing to make that big a commitment.
And Tim Kaine asked Hegseth if it was true that he had had an affair with a woman and, if so, what was that like and were women’s bodies really as soft as they looked and why did they give him such a funny tingly feeling in his no-no places.
The obsession with feminizing combat units while the Chinese marshal their forces for war is part of a new Democrat strategy forming in the wake of Donald Trump’s victory over What’s-her-name in the presidential election. Whereas the old Democrats hoped to overthrow the immutable nature of reality with lunatic academic theories forced on the nation by censorious social structures meant to silence dissent, the new, reformed Democrat party has taken stock of its weaknesses and failed policies and now hopes to overthrow the immutable nature of reality with lunatic academic theories forced on the nation by censorious social structures meant to silence dissent.
So for instance, in California, Democrats made sure the fire department was stocked with women and that water policy was based on environmentalism. Then when Los Angeles burned to the ground while fat lesbian firefighters all named Kristin for some reason ran in helpless hysteria from one empty fire hydrant to another, Democrats sought to stifle criticism by having the mainstream news media write such headlines as “Homophobes Make Politics Out of Fire Victims’ Suffering.”
This same strategy should work really well when the Chinese invade New York and are met by combat units indistinguishable from the Rockettes. The New York Times headline could read something like, “Hong tsow chee qua su lai chu.”
Godspeed, Pete. Deus Vult.
* * *
This excerpt is taken from the opening satirical monologue of “<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-andrew-klavan-show" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Andrew Klavan Show</a>.”
Andrew Klavan is the host of “The Andrew Klavan Show” at The Daily Wire. He is the bestselling author of the Cameron Winter Mystery series. The fourth installment, “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1613165536?ref_=dbs_m_mng_rwt_calw_thcv_3&amp;storeType=ebooks" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A WOMAN UNDERGROUND</a>,” is now available. Follow him on X: @andrewklavan
The views expressed in this satirical article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Confirmation Hearing Held For Secretary Of Defense Nominee Pete Hegseth

Hegseth Faces Onslaught Of Hysterical Female Senators

Andrew Klavan

Humor

Kirsten Gillibrand

Pete Hegseth

Satire

President-elect Donald Trump&#8217;s nominee to be the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, sparred with Sen. Elizabeth (D-MA) on Thursday during his confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Finance Committee.
The exchange happened when Warren asked him to follow up on a question Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) had asked him about taxing billionaires.
&#8220;It was Senator Warnock who asked you about, is there any billionaire rich enough who you wouldn&#8217;t support a tax cut for going forward,&#8221; Warren said.
&#8220;I think it&#8217;s unwise to single out any&#8211;,&#8221; Bessent began to respond before Warren cut him off.
&#8220;Rich people?&#8221; she snapped back.
&#8220;Any individual,&#8221; he responded.
&#8220;Oh okay,&#8221; Warren replied. &#8220;Is there a group of billionaires, you can just pick a dollar figure and there can be more than one above that?&#8221;
&#8220;I could give you a glib answer, but I won&#8217;t,&#8221; Bessent responded. &#8220;But you know again, that&#8217;s not where the money is. At one point when President Obama was debating Mitt Romney, the moderator said, &#8216;But sir, that would make collections go down.&#8217; And he said, &#8216;Yeah, but it&#8217;s about fairness.'&#8221;
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&#8220;And I have to tell you some Warren, I&#8217;m about collection,&#8221; he continued.
Warren seemed to miss the entire point that he was making as she proceeded to give the same answer as Obama, saying: &#8220;I understand, but I like to think that fairness is about billionaires actually paying their fair share too.&#8221;
WATCH:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Trump Nominee Scott Besnett Shuts Down Elizabeth Warren Over Billionaire Tax Codes" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/7bqThwweGMM?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>

2024 Democratic National Convention: Day 4

Trump Nominee Scott Bessent Shuts Down Elizabeth Warren Over Billionaire Tax Codes

Scott Bessent

The Democrat women of the Senate&#8217;s Armed Services Committee were all clearly working from the same playbook during Tuesday morning&#8217;s hearing for decorated Army veteran <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/pete-hegseth" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pete Hegseth</a>, President-elect Donald Trump&#8217;s choice to lead the Pentagon.
While there were a few substantive questions directed at Hegseth, who acquitted himself calmly and rationally throughout, the majority of the time allotted to the Democratic women was devoted to dishonest and repeated attempts to conflate comments Hegseth has made about women serving in direct combat roles with an outright opposition to all women in military service.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) pointed out the fact that women currently make up 18% of the United States military — and Hegseth agreed with her that they were a vital part of the mission.
Shaheen then referred to Hegseth&#8217;s comments from a podcast last year, when he said, &#8220;I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles. It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.&#8221;
Hegseth has also said on more than one occasion that he absolutely respected and valued the women with whom he&#8217;d served, and that his concern was solely related to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/im-not-a-general-pete-hegseth-tomahawks-sen-warrens-attempted-smear-with-just-4-words" target="_blank" rel="noopener">direct combat roles</a> and the fact that in order to ensure more women met the qualifications to serve in such roles, standards were often lowered.
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Still, Shaheen pressed on as though he&#8217;d said there was no place for women in the military at all — and then suggested that he was only agreeing with her that women played a valuable role because he thought it might help his chances at getting confirmed.
&#8220;What I&#8217;m confused about Mr. Hegseth is, which is it?” Shaheen asked. “Why should women in our military, if you were the secretary of Defense, believe that they would have a fair shot at an equal opportunity to rise through the ranks if, on the one hand you say that women are not competent, they make our military less effective, and on the other hand, you say, ‘Oh no, now that I&#8217;ve been nominated to be the secretary of Defense, I&#8217;ve changed my view.’&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen presses Pete Hegseth on conflicting statements regarding his stance on women in the military.
Hegseth: &quot;It&#39;s not about the capabilities of men and women, it&#39;s about standards.&quot;
Shaheen: &quot;I appreciate your 11th hour conversion.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/SURuMFpSHY">https://t.co/SURuMFpSHY</a> <a href="https://t.co/NB8dBjMMko">pic.twitter.com/NB8dBjMMko</a>
&mdash; ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) <a href="https://twitter.com/ABCPolitics/status/1879196923309047874?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) ripped a page from the same playbook, claiming, &#8220;For 12 years, you were quite open about your views, and your views were consistently the same: women are inferior soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, and guardians. Then on November 9, 2024, just 32 days after your last public comments saying that women absolutely should not be in combat, you declare that ‘some of our greatest warriors are women.'&#8221;
&#8220;I very much appreciate you bringing up my comments from 2013, because for me, this issue has always been about standards,&#8221; Hegseth replied — and every time he attempted to clarify his position further, Warren interrupted, talking over him and substituting her own assessment for his.
Warren also ultimately suggested that Hegseth had only just changed his views upon receiving a nomination to serve in Trump&#8217;s cabinet: &#8220;I have heard of deathbed conversions but this is the first I’ve heard of a nomination conversion.&#8221;
WATCH:
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren questions Pete Hegseth about women in combat roles, telling him &quot;I&#39;ve heard of deathbed conversions, but this is the first time I&#39;ve heard of a nomination conversion.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/auFB1Jif2U">pic.twitter.com/auFB1Jif2U</a>
&mdash; The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) <a href="https://twitter.com/TPostMillennial/status/1879218845224669366?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) raised her voice, repeatedly scolding Hegseth based solely on the false equivalence between his actual position and the one she and her Democratic colleagues had fabricated for him.
&#8220;In all of these other circumstances, you denigrated active duty service members. We have hundreds – HUNDREDS of women who are currently in the infantry. &#8230; You degrade them. You say, we need moms but not in the military, especially in combat units,&#8221; she complained, adding, &#8220;You&#8217;re basically saying women, after they have children, can&#8217;t ever serve in the military in a combat role. It&#8217;s — it&#8217;s — it&#8217;s a — it&#8217;s a silly thing to say. It&#8217;s a silly thing to say, beneath the position that you are aspiring to. To denigrate LGBTQ service members is a mistake.&#8221;
&#8220;Please explain these types of statements because they’re brutal and they’re mean and they disrespect men and women who are willing to die for this country,&#8221; she demanded.
WATCH:
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Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand yells at Hegseth for statements about not wanting to have women serve in combat roles: &quot;We have hundreds – HUNDREDS of women who are currently in the infantry&#8230;You degrade them. You say, we need moms but not in the military, especially in combat units. <a href="https://t.co/LhNKrD4FoV">pic.twitter.com/LhNKrD4FoV</a>
&mdash; Julio Rosas (@Julio_Rosas11) <a href="https://twitter.com/Julio_Rosas11/status/1879198683616719115?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Senator Mazie Hirono (D-HI), in addition to accusing Hegseth of being willing to shoot protesters and lead a military takeover of Greenland, cited Hegseth&#8217;s &#8220;inflammatory statements&#8221; and demanded to know, &#8220;If confirmed, will you commit to defend, not denigrate our troops?&#8221;
Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), who lost her legs in war, held up her copy of The Soldier&#8217;s Creed as a visual aid and suggested that somehow Hegseth was not up to the same standard she claimed for herself.
WATCH:
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Nauseating meltdowns, down to the prepared remarks and sighs that come off like stage cues from Illinois Democrat Senator Tammy Duckworth, arguing he&#39;s somehow not emblematic of the Soldier&#39;s Creed (unlike her b/c of her own service and war injuries)
Disgusting. <a href="https://t.co/IGJGLyUw5V">pic.twitter.com/IGJGLyUw5V</a>
&mdash; Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) <a href="https://twitter.com/CurtisHouck/status/1879228021392990224?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Hegseth clarified his position on several occasions during the hearing, but it did nothing to dissuade the Democrats from talking over him — perhaps in the hopes that no one would hear him pointing out how disingenuous they were — and pushing their own agenda in place of his words.
WATCH:
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Incoming Secretary of Defense <a href="https://twitter.com/PeteHegseth?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@PeteHegseth</a>: I&#39;m incredibly grateful for the two women who&#39;ve served our military in uniform&#8230; When I&#39;m talking about that issue, it&#39;s not about the capabilities of men and women, it&#39;s about standards — standards that we have seen eroded. <a href="https://t.co/Q4VPYsVFfv">pic.twitter.com/Q4VPYsVFfv</a>
&mdash; Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) <a href="https://twitter.com/TrumpWarRoom/status/1879194242444341431?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Senate Impeachment Trial Of President Trump Continues

Talking Points, Assemble! Democrat Women Launch Dishonest But Coordinated Attack In Hegseth Hearing

Department of Defense

General

Mazie Hirono

Military

Women

Defense Secretary nominee Pete Hegseth put a quick stop to Senator Elizabeth Warren&#8217;s (D-MA) line of questioning during Tuesday morning&#8217;s Senate Armed Forces Committee hearing, prompting laughter from around the room.
Warren — who spent the majority of her time falsely conflating Hegseth&#8217;s comments criticizing the placement of women in direct combat roles with opposition to women serving in the military in any capacity — attempted to corner the decorated Army veteran with a hypothetical question about what he might do, assuming he is confirmed, after eventually leaving the Defense Department.
WATCH:
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WARREN: &quot;You are quite sure every General who serves should not go directly into the defense industry for 10 years but you&#39;re not willing to make that same pledge?&quot;
HEGSETH: &quot;I&#39;m not a General, Senator.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/lGJQGhUWdS">pic.twitter.com/lGJQGhUWdS</a>
&mdash; Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) <a href="https://twitter.com/TrumpWarRoom/status/1879218380164792563?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Noting that Hegseth has previously supported the notion that retired generals should wait ten years before seeking employment in the defense industry, Warren pressed him on whether he would impose a similar waiting period on himself once he left the Defense Department.
&#8220;But the question I have for you on this is will you put your money where your mouth is and agree that when you leave this job you will not work for the defense industry for 10 years?&#8221; Warren asked him.
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&#8220;Senator, it&#8217;s not even a question I&#8217;ve thought about,&#8221; Hegseth replied, but indicated that he would review the applicable law before making any such decision.
&#8220;You can think about it right now,&#8221; Warren suggested.
&#8220;I would consult with the president about what the policy should be,&#8221; Hegseth replied.
&#8220;In other words, you are quite sure that every general who serves should not go directly into the defense industry for 10 years, but you&#8217;re not willing to make that same pledge?&#8221; Warren challenged him a second time.
&#8220;I&#8217;m not a general, Senator,&#8221; Hegseth shot back, prompting laughter around the room.
Warren appeared flustered as she paused, collected herself, and continued: &#8220;You&#8217;ll be the one, let us just be clear, in charge of the generals.&#8221;

‘I’m Not A General’: Pete Hegseth Tomahawks Sen. Warren’s Attempted Smear With Just 4 Words

'I'm Not A General': Pete Hegseth Tomahawks Sen. Warren's Attempted Smear With Just Four Words

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