A small Texas police department is being shut down after a state investigation found it failed to meet minimum law enforcement standards, mere months after its officers arrested a local mother over a Facebook post criticizing the town’s troubled drinking water.
The Texas Commission on Law Enforcement notified Trinidad Mayor Dennis Haws on September 9 that the city’s license to operate its own police department was being revoked. Investigators determined that the department “failed to meet minimum standards” and “was unable to provide evidence that the agency provides public benefit to the community.”
The decision comes after the five-officer department became the center of a national controversy in May, when officers arrested Jennifer Combs and jailed her overnight over a Facebook post concerning Trinidad’s water supply.
Combs had written that she had seen reports that people had been hospitalized after drinking the city’s water. Police charged her with felony false alarm or report, arguing that the post had created “fear, panic, or unnecessary emergency response within a community.” The charge was later dropped after a Henderson County grand jury declined to indict her.
On April 21, the city issued a notice advising residents to boil their water to “avoid harmful bacteria,” according to reporting on the dispute. A separate investigation by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality subsequently found problems with Trinidad’s water supply, which city officials have said they intend to address.
The department’s handling of the controversy soon generated additional scrutiny. The day after Combs’ arrest, police arrested Winston Noles after he stood outside City Hall holding a sign criticizing the police. Noles was charged with misdemeanor disorderly conduct. That charge was also later dropped.
Police Chief Charles Gregory, who defended Combs’ arrest and called the case against her “cut and dry,” resigned in June, according to the <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/09/16/us-news/texas-police-department-that-arrested-mom-over-dirty-water-facebook-post-ordered-to-disband-by-state/">New York Post</a>. He had previously told the Trinidad City Council that he had “nothing to hide” regarding the arrests.
After Gregory’s resignation, the judge who approved the search warrant in Combs’ case questioned the “accuracy, completeness, and reliability” of the information Trinidad officers presented to him.
The Henderson County District Attorney’s Office then <a href="https://www.fox4news.com/news/henderson-county-wont-take-trinidad-police-cases-after-controversial-arrests">announced</a> in August that it would no longer accept cases from the Trinidad Police Department following the controversy and state investigations.
The Texas Commission on Law Enforcement’s investigation ultimately found problems extending well beyond the arrests. The department lacked 18 required policies, including policies governing professional conduct, use of force, vehicle pursuits, and even active-shooter situations. The state also found that the department could not demonstrate that it provided a public benefit to the community.
Trinidad Mayor Dennis Haws said he was not surprised by the state’s decision. “There’s been a lot of neglect through the years,” Haws told <a href="https://www.fox4news.com/news/not-shock-trinidad-mayor-reacts-shuttering-citys-police-department">Fox 4</a>. “We are moving in a positive direction. We’ve got to get past all of this.”
The department’s law-enforcement responsibilities will be transferred to the Henderson County Sheriff’s Office while Trinidad considers a permanent arrangement.
For Combs, however, the state’s decision closes a remarkable chapter that began with a Facebook post about the town’s drinking water. “For months, citizens who questioned this department were dismissed, attacked and in my case arrested,” Combs wrote after the state ordered the department shut down. “We were never the problem. We were exposing it.”

Trindad_09.JPG

Police Department Shut Down After Mom Arrested For Facebook Post About Dirty Water

arrest

first amendment

free speech

police

texas

J.K. Rowling&#8217;s agent fired back at Lilly Wachowski after &#8220;The Matrix&#8221; co-creator accused the &#8220;Harry Potter&#8221; author of causing &#8220;trans genocide&#8221; and compared her to the Nazis.  
Wachowski, who identifies as transgender, made the accusations during an interview with <a href="https://variety.com/2026/film/features/lilly-wachowski-jk-rowling-harry-potter-trans-the-matrix-1236858104/">Variety</a> that touched on Hollywood&#8217;s reluctance to finance “cool and queer trans stories” and the forthcoming HBO adaptation of Rowling&#8217;s books.
When Variety described Rowling and Tesla CEO Elon Musk as having inflicted &#8220;an enormous amount of cultural damage on the trans community,&#8221; Wachowski replied, &#8220;These people are Nazis. They&#8217;re literal Nazis.&#8221;
“As much as another country can, I think they need to be fighting back against hate speech and shutting those platforms down,” Wachowski added.
When pressed on the new “Harry Potter” television series, Wachowski accused Rowling of using proceeds from the franchise to support legislation targeting transgender people.
“She is funding trans genocide,&#8221; Wachowski said. &#8220;J.K. Rowling funds trans genocide, full stop. So, if you support ‘Harry Potter,’ you’re supporting trans genocide.&#8221;
&#8220;The money that goes into you enjoying these products, a portion of that money goes to J.K. Rowling and that money goes into her funding anti-trans legislation all over the world,” Wachowski continued.
Wachowski compared boycotting &#8220;Harry Potter&#8221; to refusing to purchase a Tesla because of objections to Musk or reducing gasoline consumption because of concerns about climate change.
&#8220;It’s simple math,&#8221; Wachowski said. &#8220;So, your enjoyment of these shows, and continued support of these shows, is supporting my eradication.”
Rowling&#8217;s agent, Neil Blair, <a href="https://ew.com/j-k-rowling-responds-lilly-wachowski-funding-trans-genocide-exclusive-12116263">rejected</a> the allegations. 
“Freedom of speech is a principle we should all cherish,&#8221; Blair said. &#8220;What matters is that J.K. Rowling’s views, as with anyone else’s, are represented accurately, fairly and respectfully and that individual opinion does not detract from those views.”
Blair said the J.K. Rowling Women&#8217;s Fund supports women pursuing legal action in the United Kingdom to preserve sex-based protections under the Equality Act 2010.
“People are free to disagree with her views but seriously defamatory allegations of this nature, even outrageously invoking the Nazis and the genocide that they committed, should never be presented as fact when they are clearly fabricated and not based on any evidence,” the statement concluded.

JK Rowling

J.K. Rowling’s Agent Fires Back At ‘Matrix’ Director Accusing Her Of ‘Funding Trans Genocide’

entertainment

harry potter

jk rowling

lilly wachowski

transgender

Twenty-five years after September 11, Americans will again remember the smoke over Lower Manhattan, the collapsing towers, and the passengers who fought back aboard Flight 93. We will honor the dead and repeat the vow: Never forget.
But remembrance is not the same as understanding. We have remembered 9/11 as a terrorist atrocity, but we have failed to confront the ideological challenge it represented — one we remain reluctant to name, understand, and resist.
The men who carried out the attacks were not an invading army. They were the violent edge of a movement that sees liberal democracy not as an order to join on equal terms, but as one to be displaced. Their instrument was terror, but their purpose was much larger.
That distinction matters. Jihadist violence is its loudest expression: spectacular, coercive and impossible to ignore. But political Islam also works through da’wa, or religious “invitation”: the quieter effort to persuade, organize, and advance an Islamist program within open societies.
This is not a claim about Muslims as a people, nor does it deny the diversity of belief and practice among Muslims. It concerns the political theology of Islamism: the effort to make a particular interpretation of Islamic law sovereign over civil authority, equal citizenship and democratic self-government. Its most violent adherents use terror; others seek influence through law, education, social pressure, and institutional accommodation. The methods differ, but the common political claim is that religious doctrine should outrank equal citizenship and democratic self-government.
A liberal democracy can accommodate religious faith. But it cannot survive if any faith, secular creed or political movement claims exemption from the principles that protect everyone else: equal rights under law, freedom of conscience, free speech, reciprocal tolerance, and the right to dissent.
For a quarter-century, Western leaders and institutions have often treated any discussion of Islamist doctrine as an accusation against Muslims. The result is paralyzing confusion. Criticize a political theology that rejects equality between believer and unbeliever, man and woman, or dissenter and authority, and the critic is readily charged with bigotry. Yet refusing to distinguish a people from an ideology is a moral and intellectual failure. It leaves Muslims, reformers, women, religious minorities, secularists, and ex-Muslims without allies.
Among the doctrine’s bravest opponents are Muslims who have risked their lives to challenge its claims of religious and political supremacy. Their existence should end the claim that opposition to Islamist political doctrine is inherently anti-Muslim. They understand, from experience, what many Western elites prefer not to see: Ideas can be dangerous when they demand immunity from criticism and enforce themselves through intimidation.
Muslims deserve the full protection of religious liberty in the West. But religious liberty is not a license for political supremacy, unequal citizenship, or a violence-backed veto over dissent. No religious movement may claim a veto over speech, scholarship, art, apostasy, conversion or political debate. Salman Rushdie’s attack and the murder of Charlie Hebdo’s staff show why a violence-backed claim of religious offense becomes a veto only when a free society accepts it as one.
That principle has weakened where it most needs defenders. A critic can be branded beyond the pale. A university can hesitate before inviting a speaker. A publisher can choose silence. A threat of violence can become an informal censorship regime. None looks like surrender in isolation. Together, they teach free societies to pre-censor themselves.
The underlying problem is not merely fear. It is also a loss of confidence in the civilization that produced the freedoms at stake. Roger Scruton called this oikophobia: a reflexive contempt for one’s own inheritance. A culture that sees itself chiefly as history’s oppressor may hear warnings about illiberal ideas only as prejudice. It can mistake moral clarity for intolerance and unilateral concession for sophistication. In universities, newsrooms and advocacy organizations, an instinct to scrutinize Western failures too often becomes an inability to scrutinize the claims of those who would dismantle Western liberties.
A supremacist ideology that cannot tolerate criticism or scrutiny is not strong; it is insecure enough to enforce its claims through intimidation and, at times, murder. That is the danger worth naming on this anniversary: not simply another September 11, but a free society that loses the confidence to defend the liberties on which its freedom depends.
The alternative to both collective suspicion and silence is principled clarity: distinguishing Muslims from an illiberal political doctrine, while affirming the rights that doctrine seeks to subordinate. Muslims are often among Islamism’s first victims, and some of its bravest opponents are those within the faith who have risked their lives to challenge it. Equal citizenship, freedom of conscience, free speech, and the right to dissent must remain the standard for all.
Defending that standard requires courage — the courage to name an ideology of submission without maligning a people, to protect the liberties that make honest disagreement possible, and to stand with all who refuse coercion. A free society survives not by looking away from hard truths, but by learning their lessons — so that “never forget” becomes “never again.”
***
Richard Landes is a historian, founder of Infidel Awareness Month (InfidelAwareness.com), and author of “Can ‘The Whole World’ Be Wrong? Lethal Journalism, Antisemitism, and Global Jihad.”

Mosque sunset sky

Beyond ‘Never Forget’: The Ideological Enemy We Refuse To Name

islamism

opinion

religious freedom

september 11 attacks

A former Miss North Carolina beauty queen is suing the Miss USA Pageant for defamation after she was stripped of her title over old social media posts.
Brittany Boltinhouse said the organization targeted her unfairly because she is a Trump-supporting conservative Christian. 
The lawsuit does not claim that Miss USA doesn’t have the right to take away her crown. Instead, Boltinhouse is accusing the organization of “maliciously coordinating to publish a false public narrative portraying Brittany Boltinhouse as a racist, homophobe, transphobe, and intolerable bigot to be shunned from public life.&#8221;
The beauty pageant contestant is suing for loss of income, reputational harm, and emotional distress. 
“Brittany Boltinhouse was not merely stripped of a title. She was publicly branded with a scarlet letter, accused of some of the most despicable accusations that can be lodged against another person in modern society,” Boltinhouse’s attorney Patrick M. Mincey <a href="https://people.com/dethroned-miss-north-carolina-usa-sues-pageant-for-defamation-12061990">said</a> in a statement obtained by People.
Another attorney for Boltinhouse added, “While defendants enjoy a certain level of discretion to crown and remove titleholders, they cannot remove a titleholder for political reasons and then defame that titleholder to the public to hide their true motivations.”
The beauty pageant contestant’s title was stripped after old social posts from 2017 and 2019 resurfaced. The posts included racial slurs, which Boltinhouse has since apologized for. Her attorneys describe the posts as “the self-evident, colloquial use of the popular slang term.”
The lawsuit also states that other social posts &#8220;revealed she was a staunch supporter of President Trump, the assassinated conservative activist Charlie Kirk, and an open skeptic of President Biden’s &#8216;Transgender Day of Visibility.&#8217;”
&#8220;Defendants hid from the public the real reason they dethroned Brittany: she is a conservative Christian,&#8221; the lawsuit states.
The Miss USA organization announced that Boltinhouse was being stripped of her Miss North Carolina USA 2026 title in an Instagram statement shared on August 5.
Thom Brodeur, chairman and CEO of Miss USA and Miss Teen USA, said in a <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DbrYgANGQyw/?img_index=1">statement</a> the decision was made due to “conduct over an extended period of time.&#8221; Brodeur did not specify the conduct, but did state that the organization “does not tolerate racism, homophobia, transphobia nor language that strips any person of their dignity.”
&#8220;I believe I was stripped of my title because of my political stance and my belief system as a conservative Christian woman,” Boltinhouse said in an August 7 <a href="https://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusive-video-brittany-boltinhouse-miss-north-carolina-usa-sits-down-with-cj/">interview</a> with the Carolina Journal.

Miss North Carolina

Dethroned Beauty Queen Says She Was Targeted As Conservative Christian

Dethroned Beauty Queen Sues Miss USA, Claims She Was Targeted As Conservative Christian

brittany boltinhouse

conservative christian

defamation

miss usa

Torrey Pines High School is facing a <a href="https://timesofsandiego.com/education/2026/08/21/torrey-pines-high-students-sue-discipline-pro-trump/">lawsuit</a> alleging that teachers and administrators retaliated against two students who expressed pro-Trump views during a February protest — landing one of them in a psychiatric hospital on a mandatory hold.
Two students at Torrey Pines High School — identified in the suit only as A.F. and M.F. — attended a February 6 rally on the San Diego, California, campus meant to protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), but showed up instead to voice support for President Donald Trump&#8217;s administration, <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/08/23/us-news/san-diego-high-school-attacked-students-over-pro-trump-lgbt-poster-suit/">according</a> to the New York Post. M.F. carried a printout of the letters &#8220;LGBT&#8221; — each letter paired with an image: the Statue of Liberty for &#8220;L,&#8221; a rifle for &#8220;G,&#8221; a glass of beer for &#8220;B,&#8221; and a photo of Trump for &#8220;T.&#8221;
M.F. reportedly returned to class after the rally still carrying the flyer — prompting his teacher to become upset and immediately leave the classroom. Three days later, according to the suit, Assistant Principal Angela Guerrero called M.F. and another student into her office and informed them they would serve two days of detention because the flyers had &#8220;frightened&#8221; other students on campus.
That same week, M.F. was called into the vice principal&#8217;s office alone to face more serious accusations: that he&#8217;d made &#8220;disturbing searches&#8221; on a school computer, including &#8220;how to load a Glock,&#8221; &#8220;how to load a magazine,&#8221; and &#8220;how to dispose of a body.&#8221;
M.F. denied making the searches and said other students routinely use classmates&#8217; unprotected school computer logins. Guerrero apparently believed him and sent him back to class. The next day, however, five to six police officers arrived at the school and interrogated M.F. themselves.
&#8220;School officials refused to allow M.F.’s parents to see him, instead requiring them to speak with a crisis social worker. The crisis social worker stated that [M.F.’s teacher] requested the police because the searches made Defendant [Theresa] Barnes feel ‘scared’ and ‘unsafe,'&#8221; the suit claims.
M.F. was then taken into custody, and police delivered him to a mental health facility on a 5150 psychiatric hold.
While he was being held overnight, law enforcement executed a search of his home and his bedroom — but they found nothing to support the accusations against him.
&#8220;M.F. did not research how to load a ‘glock,’ did not confess to murder, was not watching homicide videos, and did not target the LGBT community. The claims were completely false, as school officials were fully aware,&#8221; the suit states.
The harassment, according to M.F., did not end there. Although police found nothing and he was allowed to return to school, administrators referred to him as an &#8220;LGBT bully,&#8221; barred him from playing varsity baseball, forced him into counseling sessions, and pushed him toward testing for &#8220;Special Education placement and ongoing mental health monitoring.&#8221;
The same school landed in hot water over a different protest when students were allowed to carry signs comparing ICE to the KKK — but one student was suspended over flyers that read, &#8220;We love I.C.E. — real Americans.&#8221; That suspension was later reversed by the district following pressure from the free speech group FIRE.

U.S. Economy Caught In Trump Tug-Of-War Over Reopening Schools

Student Committed To Psych Ward Over Pro-Trump Flyer, Lawsuit Says

School Got Teen Student Placed In Psych Ward Over Pro-Trump Flyer

lawsuit

politics

school discipline

torrey pines high school

A politician convicted of hate speech for sharing her Christian views on marriage said she was “blocked” from entering the United Kingdom to advocate for free speech. 
Finnish parliamentarian Päivi Räsänen said Tuesday that officials in the U.K. prevented her from traveling into Northern Ireland, where she was slated to speak at a conference on religious liberty. Räsänen said she was initially authorized to enter the country in June, but that approval was yanked in July. 
“It is shocking that the U.K. has blocked me, a democratically elected politician in an allied European state, from entering the country,” Räsänen said. “I was convicted of ‘hate speech’ in Finland for peacefully expressing my Christian views.”
Räsänen called on U.K. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood to reverse course and allow her to enter the country. She currently plans to address the conference remotely on Wednesday and Friday. 
The denial of entry comes just a few months after Finland&#8217;s top court <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-politician-shared-traditional-christian-values-now-she-stands-convicted-of-hate-speech">found</a> Räsänen guilty of “hate speech” for sharing her Christian views on marriage in a 2004 church pamphlet. The court found her guilty of “making and keeping available to the public a text that insults a group.” The “text” she was charged over was a pamphlet explaining the Bible’s position on marriage and sexual ethics, published by Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola, who was convicted alongside her.
The Trump administration, which slammed Räsänen’s conviction, said the latest development showed the dangers of restricting free speech. 
“Paivi was prosecuted for quoting the Bible. A downstream effect of countries criminalizing speech is that systems designed to flag and filter ‘criminals’ trigger rippling second-order punishments [can] lead to debanking, visa denials, and more,” Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers said Tuesday. 
Throughout her legal battles, Räsänen has been represented by Alliance Defending Freedom International, which called for the U.K. to immediately approve her application. 
“This is not an isolated incident,” said ADF International lawyer Lorcan Price. “The UK has in the last year blocked a number of mainstream conservative individuals, politicians, and now even a member of the Finnish Parliament and a Lutheran bishop, from entering the country. This trend is yet another example of the severe and escalating censorship crisis in Great Britain.”
The U.K. itself has a troubled track record on free speech. In May, a pastor <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/pastor-convicted-for-preaching-on-john-316-outside-hospital">was fined</a> for preaching on John 3:16 inside a so-called “Safe Access Zone” outside a Northern Ireland hospital that performs abortions.

MixCollage-19-Aug-2026-11-05-AM-2826

Politician Punished For Christian Beliefs Targeted Again

finland

hate speech

paivi rasanen

united kingdom

world

The WNBA’s double standard on free speech is officially out of bounds.
Women&#8217;s sports advocate Riley Gaines pulled no punches on Monday night, telling Fox News that league handlers tried to silence her support for Indiana Fever star Sophie Cunningham. Appearing on &#8220;Hannity,&#8221; Gaines said that arena officials asked her to put down a benign, completely non-political sign praising Cunningham while Left-wing propaganda was prominently displayed on the arena&#8217;s Jumbotron.
&#8220;The league often says they have a problem with people like Sophie bringing politics into sports. The league doesn&#8217;t have a problem with politics in sports. They have a problem with conservative politics in sports,&#8221; Gaines told host Sean Hannity.
Gaines recounted sitting in the Target Center during a Minnesota Lynx home game holding a small poster that simply read, “Sophie, thank you — a girl mom.” Despite strictly adhering to arena rules, an official approached Gaines and requested that she put the sign away.
Yet, as Gaines pointed out, Minnesota coach Cheryl Reeve strolled the sidelines wearing a &#8220;Trans Kids Belong&#8221; shirt while others wore pro-trans shirts featuring an image of a knife even as the arena&#8217;s Jumbotron repeatedly highlighted fans draped in Pride and trans flags. &#8220;If Protect Women&#8217;s Sports is deemed political like they say, then so is Trans Kids Belong,&#8221; Gaines slammed.
After Gaines pushed back, she said she was ultimately allowed to keep the sign displayed, and the arena staffer returned and apologized.
The WNBA finds itself engulfed in an explosive culture war sparked by Cunningham, who has spoken out against allowing men to compete in women’s athletics. Cunningham ignited the firestorm by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/wnba-star-breaks-with-league-on-explosive-issue">telling</a> ESPN she wants to &#8220;protect young girls in a locker room,&#8221; later <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sophie-cunningham-triples-down-on-haters-with-ice-cold-instagram-post">doubling down</a> on Instagram with a blunt message to her critics: &#8220;I said what I said.&#8221;
While Cunningham’s common-sense stance has earned her praise from high-profile figures, including Gaines and White House Press Secretary <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/karoline-leavitt-rips-leftist-backlash-to-sophie-cunninghams-trans-sports-comments">Karoline Leavitt</a>, it has drawn intense hostility from leftist fans and league insiders. Gaines noted that Cunningham was relentlessly booed by the Minnesota crowd every time she stepped onto the hardwood.
Meanwhile, WNBA leaders continue to hide behind corporate double-talk. Asked point-blank about men in female sports, Fever head coach Stephanie White<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sophie-cunninghams-coach-asked-where-she-stands-on-men-in-womens-sports?author=Hank+Berrien&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=4&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Sophie+Cunningham%E2%80%99s+Coach+Asked+Where+She+Stands+On+Men+In+Women%E2%80%99s+Sports"> offered</a> a classic corporate dodge, claiming she wasn&#8217;t &#8220;educated enough from a scientific standpoint.&#8221;
The hostility has even boiled over into the stands. During a recent Fever road trip to Seattle, Storm co-owner Celeste Keaton was suspended from attending her team&#8217;s next five home games after <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/wnba-co-owner-accused-of-cursing-out-teen-girls-over-xx-xy-shirts?author=Hank+Berrien&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=8&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=WNBA+Co-Owner+Accused+Of+Cursing+Out+Teen+Girls+Over+XX-XY+Shirts">launching</a> an expletive-laden tirade against two 16-year-old female fans wearing gear in support of Cunningham&#8217;s position.
Despite the intimidation tactics, Gaines insists that Cunningham remains unshakable and uncancelable.

Riley Gaines

Riley Gaines Goes Off On WNBA, Says Staffer Tried To Take Away Sophie Cunningham Sign

riley gaines

sophie cunningham

transgender in sports

wnba

A tense Oxford Union debate on whether the West is right to be suspicious of Islam erupted into high-stakes confrontation when an Oxford student told far-Right activist Tommy Robinson that he was lucky the university provided security to prevent leftist protesters outside from attacking him.
Addressing Robinson, whose legal name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, the student highlighted the large demonstration gathering outside the union building. She warned him that without the security provided by the union&#8217;s leadership, he would be &#8220;quite literally cooked.&#8221;
&#8220;Stephen, there is a crowd outside rioting against you tonight,&#8221; she said, “and without the protection and generosity of the Muslim-Palestinian president and a mostly South Asian executive committee, you’d be quite literally cooked.”
Robinson had blamed leftist protesters for the unrest, arguing that it was his opponents, rather than his supporters, who were creating chaos and clashing with law enforcement outside the venue.
To justify suspicion of the religion, Robinson <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aqzr_C9UZMw">pointed</a> to severe legal and social measures enforced across Muslim-majority nations. He highlighted that 24 countries where Islam is the state religion criminalize homosexuality, with eight prescribing the death penalty. Responding to an audience member who questioned where Islamic texts sanction such executions, Robinson insisted the argument belonged not with him, but with countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia that enforce these laws, as well as extremist groups like ISIS and Hamas.
Robinson further cited capital and corporal punishments across the Islamic world, pointing to canonical legal codes that mandate lashing and stoning for adultery. He cited a seminar by a prominent U.K. imam, saying, &#8220;In 2023, the head imam of the Green Lane Mosque, the head imam — you can watch this video — actually gives a seminar to his congregation on how we keep the modesty of the woman before we smash rocks at her head. You see, she has to be buried up to a certain level to preserve her modesty.&#8221;
Expanding his critique to religious minorities and civil rights, Robinson claimed that centuries of persecution following early Islamic precedents had virtually eliminated Jewish and Christian populations across the Middle East. He also targeted the issue of child marriage, pointing out that seven of the 10 nations with the highest rates of child marriage are Muslim-majority states due to the absence of a defined minimum marriage age in their laws.
Closing his address, Robinson framed his position as a defense of classical liberal values, saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, if you care about gay rights, if you care about women&#8217;s rights, if you care about children&#8217;s rights, If you care about human rights, or if you care about free speech, I urge you to support this motion.”

Far Right Groups Encourage Protest Over Death Of Henry Nowak

Leftist Student Warns Tommy Robinson He’d Be ‘Cooked’ Without Security At Oxford Union Debate

islam

oxford union

tommy robinson

Shiloh Hendrix 2

The Shiloh Hendrix Trial Was Even More Corrupt Than We Thought

minnesota

NAACP

Rochester

Shiloh Hendrix

The Shiloh Hendrix Verdict Is A Horrifying Sign For America. Here’s Why.

Implicit Bias

Somalis

tim walz

A Minnesota jury found a woman guilty of disorderly conduct after she repeatedly used the racial slur &#8220;n*gger&#8221; during a confrontation at a playground. 
Thirty-seven-year-old Shiloh Marie Hendrix was captured on video as a bystander confronted her for allegedly directing the racial slur at an autistic child. Although the alleged remark itself was not captured on video, the bystander urged Hendrix to repeat it while recording the encounter.
Rochester City Attorney Michael Spindler-Krage charged Hendrix with two counts of disorderly conduct, one for her alleged behavior toward the child and the other for her confrontation with the bystander. A jury acquitted Hendrix on the first count but convicted her on the second, finding her guilty of disorderly conduct for directing the racial slur at Omar rather than the child. 
She was sentenced to one year of supervised probation, fined $1,000, and ordered to complete 200 hours of community service. She faces a 90-day jail sentence only if she violates the terms of her probation.
The man who recorded the confrontation, Sharmake Beyle Omar, was previously charged in a sexual assault case involving a 16-year-old girl. Prosecutors later <a href="https://www.kimt.com/news/charges-dropped-against-rochester-men-accused-of-sexually-abusing-a-teen-victim/article_461bf354-a3ff-11ed-bedb-d329b9d4dcb6.html">dismissed</a> those charges &#8220;in the interest of justice.&#8221; 
According to the criminal <a href="https://fromthegman.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Hendrix-Complaint.pdf">complaint</a>, the confrontation began after an eight-year-old autistic boy took an applesauce pouch from Hendrix’s diaper bag. Both Hendrix and the boy’s father chased the child as he climbed onto playground equipment in an attempt to get away. Hendrix allegedly shouted at him and repeatedly used the racial slur. 
While recording on his phone, Omar asked Hendrix why she called the child the racial slur, noting that the boy was autistic. Hendrix replied that she used the word because “he acts like one” and said he had taken her son’s belongings. When Omar continued confronting her, Hendrix responded, “I don’t give a sh*t and f*ck off.” 
Hendrix’s attorney blasted the verdict.
“I think it’s pathetic,” defense attorney Brian Karalus <a href="https://x.com/Tomhennessey69/status/2080543001323978782">said</a>. “I think it’s sad. I think it’s sick … this is a fraud upon the community.” 
Karalus argued the government was “prosecuting a young lady for language,” and this trial was the result of cancel culture. He added that Hendrix’s choice of words was inappropriate but that there is a difference between inappropriate and illegal. 
Prosecutor Nicholas Shabel argued jurors should consider both Hendrix’s conduct and her language.  
Shabel argued that Hendrix&#8217;s “screaming at the child, her demeanor, her language all speak to this. All of those are appropriate for your consideration,” said Shabel.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) set up a GoFundMe for the child, raising more than $340,000. 
The incident drew backlash from conservatives. 
The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh <a href="https://x.com/MattWalshBlog/status/2080623002824200284">said</a>, “The Shiloh Hendrix case isn&#8217;t even a close call or a grey area. She was charged and convicted of a crime for saying a word. If that&#8217;s not a violation of the First Amendment, nothing is. This is one of the most straightforward free speech issues we&#8217;ve seen in a long time.”

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Free speech in Europe, and Britain in particular, has been a concern for the second Trump administration. At the 2025 Munich Security Conference, Vice President J.D. Vance gave European leaders both barrels over the issue. Since then, U.S. government figures such as Sarah Rogers have ceaselessly drawn attention to the ever-increasing infringements on free speech in the U.K.
In recent years, Britain has seen high-profile stories such as the jailing of mother-of-two Lucy Connolly for a swiftly deleted tweet about asylum seekers in the midst of the Southport riots in 2024, the arrest of comedian Graham Linehan over tweets about transgenderism, and police officers dismissed from their jobs over gallows humor in private WhatsApp groups. Much more could be said about “non-crime hate incidents” resulting in police visits, a proposed special ban on “anti-Muslim hostility,” and the Labour government’s clear desire to reduce digital freedoms through different forms of regulation, and even the outright banning of Elon Musk’s X.
To American readers who take pride in the First Amendment, this might sound unthinkable. It can seem as if Britain is a victim of its un-American political system. Unlike the United States, Britain has no single written constitution. Rather, it combines unwritten conventions and statutes passed by its elected Parliament. Free speech warriors in both the U.S. and the U.K. increasingly suggest that, to protect their liberties, they should adopt a written constitution or Bill of Rights to safeguard things such as freedom of speech.
However, Britain’s Parliament has never worked this way, nor should it start. The driving force of British politics has always been parliamentary sovereignty; that is, an elected Parliament can create and remove whatever laws it likes if it has a majority and the political will.
Crucially, this means that no Parliament can bind its successor. If a new government is elected with a mandate to overturn the laws of the last one, it can always do so. This is not the case in written constitutional systems, such as the United States, which are subject to a constitution that is incredibly difficult or even impossible to change. It is this reality that has left President Trump, even with a conservative majority in the Supreme Court, unable to make good on his central campaign pledge to end birthright citizenship. In a true British system, he could have passed that law on day one.
Britain’s free speech crisis is downstream of bad laws created by Parliament. This began with the Race Relations Act 1965, which, in the wake of tensions arising from post-World War II immigration, outlawed the expression of certain political beliefs. This was worsened by the Public Order Act 1986, which criminalized speech that was “likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress.” Later, already confused communications offenses designed for the era of snail mail and telephone operators collided disastrously with public-facing social media, just as “hate speech” offenses began to appear on the books under Tony Blair. It is these laws and others that helped to shape Britain’s own strain of cancel culture.
But the British answer to bad speech laws is not a new written constitution that takes the question out of our Parliament’s (and therefore voters’) hands. Instead, it is to repeal the bad laws and, if necessary, replace them with good ones.
This is the approach outlined in <a href="https://x.com/Prosperity_Inst/status/2075135466974618075">Reversing Britain’s Free Speech Recession</a>, the latest report from the Prosperity Institute. Barrister Jon Holbrook, himself a vindicated survivor of cancel culture, has identified the laws that most need to be repealed or amended to restore a boom in the British free speech economy, with new legislation drafted and ready for implementation for a free speech government.
In the revived Britain imagined in this paper, laws criminalizing speech that merely causes “harassment, alarm or distress” will be repealed; communications speech will be criminal only if it is intentionally menacing and targeted; all so-called “hate speech” laws will be repealed. Interference with free speech in the civil sphere will no longer be a matter for contested anti-discrimination law, but a simple matter of tort law. Spurious allegations will be deterred by a new costs regime that protects those wrongly accused. A cultural shift will be needed, certainly. But we must start with the law.
English liberty gave the Western world its tradition of free speech. Yet lately, as Shakespeare wrote in Richard II, “That England, that was wont to conquer others, Hath made a shameful conquest of itself.” But it possesses all that it needs to liberate itself once again.
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Rhys Laverty is Editorial and Research Director of the Prosperity Institute.

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