The Justice Department has pulled all nonessential federal funding from Maine&#8217;s Department of Corrections over a trans-identifying man who is being housed in a women&#8217;s prison, Attorney General Pam Bondi said Tuesday.
Andrew Balcer, 26, a trans-identifying <a href="https://www.mainepublic.org/courts-and-crime/2018-12-04/winthrop-teen-who-killed-parents-dog-to-be-sentenced" target="_blank" rel="noopener">convicted</a> double murderer is currently <a href="https://apps1.web.maine.gov/cgi-bin/online/correctionssearch/detail.pl?mdoc_number1=156589" target="_blank" rel="noopener">housed</a> in a women&#8217;s prison in Maine.
&#8220;We pulled all nonessential funding from the Department of Corrections in Maine because they were allowing a man in a women&#8217;s prison,&#8221; Bondi said Tuesday. &#8220;A giant, 6-foot-1, 245-pound guy, who committed a double murder with a knife, stabbed his parents to death and the family dog, and he identified as a woman, so they were letting him be housed in a female prison.&#8221;
&#8220;No longer,&#8221; she added. &#8220;We will pull your funding. We will protect women in prison.&#8221;
Maine&#8217;s Department of Corrections is slated to lose more than $1 million in federal grants.
In February, Bondi sent a letter to Maine officials warning them to stop allowing trans-identifying males in women&#8217;s sports or face legal action. She sent similar letters to California and Minnesota.
“We will leverage every legal option necessary to ensure state compliance with federal law and President Trump’s executive order protecting women’s sports,” Bondi <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/attorney-general-pamela-bondi-urges-states-comply-federal-law-keeping-men-out-womens-sports" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> at the time.
Bondi&#8217;s letter came just after President Donald Trump had a tense back and forth with Maine Governor Janet Mills, a Democrat, at a White House dinner. Trump warned Mills that her state would lose federal funding if it refused to comply with his executive order protecting women&#8217;s sports.
&#8220;You better do it because you&#8217;re not gonna get any federal funding,&#8221; Trump told Mills. &#8220;Your population doesn&#8217;t want men playing in women&#8217;s sports.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Stunning moment Trump goes back and forth with Maine governor on women&#39;s sports
TRUMP: &quot;You better do it because you&#39;re not gonna get any federal funding &#8230; your population doesn&#39;t want men playing in women&#39;s sports.&quot;<a href="https://t.co/UrqDl65nLx">pic.twitter.com/UrqDl65nLx</a>
&mdash; Mairead Elordi (@JohnsonHildy) <a href="https://twitter.com/JohnsonHildy/status/1893026795491864862?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 21, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Since then, Maine is facing federal action on other fronts over gender ideology as well.
The federal Department of Agriculture froze Maine&#8217;s funds over the state continuing to allow trans-identifying males to play in women&#8217;s sports. Maine&#8217;s attorney general responded by suing the Department of Agriculture over the funding freeze.
Meanwhile, the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services have <a href="https://mainemorningstar.com/briefs/u-s-justice-department-cuts-maine-corrections-grants-allegedly-over-transgender-policy/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> that Maine&#8217;s transgender sports policies violate Title IX.
The Education Department has given Maine until April 11 to submit a solution before the situation is referred to the Justice Department.
Also last week, the Education Department launched a new task force targeting the &#8220;staggering&#8221; number of Title IX complaints the administration is receiving. Investigators and Justice Department attorneys will look into potential violations.
Trans-identifying males in women&#8217;s prisons have become increasingly common. One trans-identifying male prisoner in New Jersey who was convicted of manslaughter was only <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/nj-trans-prisoner-impregnated-2-inmates-transferred-mens-facility-rcna38947" target="_blank" rel="noopener">transferred</a> out of a women&#8217;s prison after he impregnated two female inmates.

Janet Mills and Donald Trump

Trump Yanks Funding From Maine’s Corrections Department For Putting Man In Women’s Prison

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A French court has now banned Marine Le Pen, who is highly likely to win the next election in France, from seeking public office for five years. The court convicted her of misusing European Union funds.
&#8220;The court ruled that Le Pen and other members of her party illegally used 4.4 million euros, equivalent to $4.8 million, in EU funding that was earmarked for assistants helping lawmakers in the European Parliament with their work,&#8221; The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/frances-marine-le-pen-found-guilty-of-embezzlement-b8c42dac" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>. &#8220;Monday’s sentence bars Le Pen from seeking public office for the next five years, thrusting her far-right party into limbo. Le Pen also received a four-year prison sentence. Half of that term was suspended, judges said, adding that she could serve the remaining two years by using an electronic bracelet or other alternatives to jail time. The ruling takes Le Pen out of contention for the 2027 race, unless she can win a swift appeal. Le Pen had been expected to enter that contest as a front-runner as President Emmanuel Macron will be term limited and other prominent contenders have yet to emerge.&#8221;
This is crazy — but this is part and parcel of the broader attempt by Left-wing judiciary activists across the globe to stop “populist politicians” from being able to run.
We saw it with President Trump, where the DOJ went after him for supposed crimes, the same crimes for which they let Joe Biden off the hook. We saw it in New York, where a New York attorney general filed a civil fraud lawsuit in an attempt to stop then-candidate Trump.
We have seen it in Brazil, where the entire judicial apparatus has been brought down on the head of Jair Bolsonaro, the former president of Brazil, in favor of Lula da Silva, who was then freed by that same exact judiciary.
We&#8217;ve seen it in Romania, where Cǎlin Georgescu won the election in 2024 and then the judiciary decided the election had been rigged by the Russians and annulled it. 
We have seen it in Israel, where the attorney general of Israel has been targeting Benjamin Netanyahu on specious charges for literally years, and the judiciary keep saying that Netanyahu can&#8217;t perform the basic functions of an executive, such as fire his attorney general or fire anyone in the executive branch.
And now we are seeing it in France.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2169-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
It is absolutely amazing to watch these unelected officials going out of their way to thwart the will of the people in supposed democracies. It&#8217;s really insane.
You want to talk about undermining democracy itself? This undermines democracy because the reaction to this is, “Okay, what if we just overthrow the judicial institutions?”
Why do I feel like this is a put-up job? Because it takes effect immediately. The point is to get her out of the elections. Thus they&#8217;re suspending her jail sentence but they are not suspending her ban from running.
Le Pen had denied the charges, “testifying in court that it was appropriate for the assistants to perform other party-related work because they were political aides, not direct employees of the European Parliament,” the Journal noted.
In other words, if the European Parliament didn’t want them focused solely on party-related tasks, perhaps it should have hired them directly, rather than paying the party to handle some of its work. That sounds like a strong defense.
Is the idea here that Marine Le Pen desperately needed a couple of million euros in order to pay off her political party? I feel like she probably could have raised it. Her party&#8217;s pretty big in France.
This is just the latest NATO member to reject a populist candidate by some sort of judicial intervention.
If you want to talk about undermining the argument that democracy must flourish in Europe, this would be a great way to do it.

FRANCE-POLITICS-JUSTICE-TRIAL-RN

Marine Le Pen Banned From Running

Ben Shapiro

Conservatives

Corruption

Europe

European Union

France

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What if everything you were told about the trial of Derek Chauvin was a lie?
Like everyone else in America, I first saw the tape of Derek Chauvin and George Floyd on May 25, 2020, what appeared at the time to be nine minutes of a police officer&#8217;s knee on Floyd&#8217;s neck.
Given the tape alone, I drew the same conclusions as most Americans. I tweeted that the police officer&#8217;s behavior was abhorrent. I called for his prosecution. I said that nobody is defending the actions we all witness.
So, it&#8217;s not as though I was initially a believer in Chauvin&#8217;s innocence. But over time, new evidence emerged. A lot of new evidence. And I realized I had done something absolutely wrong. I had rushed to judgment as new information was released: the full body camera footage, the complete autopsy findings, the Minneapolis Police Department training materials.
My viewpoint changed, and it changed dramatically. But for most Americans, their only opinion on the case was formed in the hours after the original tape broke. They didn&#8217;t know about the new evidence, or they didn&#8217;t care. The legacy media were deeply complicit in this. They didn&#8217;t cover the details of the autopsy, the details of the complete body camera footage, and the defense presentation at trial.
They let that original impression sit in the minds of the American people for years, and they did that for a reason. They had a predetermined narrative of the race-based guilt of Chauvin and, according to the Left, of white people everywhere.
Taking stock of these larger forces at play helps to make sense of the bias that continues to this day. The George Floyd narrative was set.
A racist white police officer murdered a black man in cold blood? Case closed. Evidence to the contrary? Irrelevant. MPD training protocols dismissed? Toxicology report ignored? Medical examiner&#8217;s findings about contributing factors? Conspiracy theories.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2160" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: Episode 1 of &#8220;The Case for Derek Chauvin&#8221; on The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
Consider, for example, ESPN&#8217;s Stephen A. Smith, who last week dismissed my call to revisit the Chauvin trial by declaring on his show that he “doesn&#8217;t care about the autopsy,” effectively admitting he doesn&#8217;t care about the facts or the truth.
This cavalier dismissal of medical evidence perfectly encapsulates how much of America approaches this case.
“See, you&#8217;re trying to go down the lane I wasn&#8217;t trying to go down,” Smith declared. “I&#8217;m not going to let you take me there, which is why I turned down your invitation to appear on your show. We&#8217;re not getting into all of the science and what the doctor said and an autopsy report, even though I just read it to you to some degree. We don&#8217;t have to go there.”
A proper analysis of any case requires examining all the available evidence, not just the parts that confirm preexisting narratives based on the first available information. The media, the politicians, and the prosecutors had no interest in presenting the complete picture. Judging by their reaction to the announcement of this series, they still don&#8217;t.
You&#8217;re not going to hear it from CNN. You&#8217;re not going to hear it from MSNBC. You certainly won&#8217;t hear it from politicians who built their careers on the back of this case. But you&#8217;ll hear it here, because unlike those who rendered judgment and moved on, I believe truth emerges when we&#8217;re willing to revise our positions in light of new information.
On March 4, 2025, I launched a petition called <a href="http://pardonderek.com">pardonderek.com</a>, calling on President Trump to exercise his constitutional authority to pardon former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin from his federal convictions in the death of George Floyd.
This isn&#8217;t just about one man, though the unjust conviction of one man should be enough. This is also about restoring the rule of law after a disgraceful period of politically motivated race and identity obsessed weaponization of the justice system.
Since returning to office, President Trump has been taking historic action to dismantle the radical ideological framework infecting our institutions. In just six weeks, he has signed nearly 100 executive orders and taken over 400 executive actions, declaring that America will be woke no longer. He&#8217;s systematically dismantling DEI programs across the federal government. He&#8217;s targeting what he calls the tyranny of diversity and forced so-called inclusion in our institutions. He has banned men from women&#8217;s sports, returning education to a merit-based system, and declared there are only two genders in America.
But all of this will remain incomplete if we don&#8217;t address the original sin that kickstarted the entire woke revolution, the match that lit the powder keg of woke insanity and then spread through every American institution like wildfire.
President Trump&#8217;s war on wokeness cannot be considered complete unless he addresses the fundamental injustice that started it all. Pardoning Chauvin is about making a definitive statement that the rule of law matters more than mob justice — that America is finally ready to correct the catastrophic error that sent our country spiraling into years of racial division and leftist cultural supremacy.
Of course, I understand that this is politically radioactive. I get it. I understand the entire American Left will completely melt down if President Trump were to do this. I get that the media will lose their collective minds.
But frankly, I don&#8217;t care, because justice should matter more than political expediency.

Derek Chauvin

Recognizing Justice In The Derek Chauvin Case

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Salvadoran Government Receives 238 Alleged Members Of Criminal Organizations ‘Tren De Aragua’ and ‘MS13’

Trump Just Played His Trump Card Against This Insane And Unlawful Judge

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Several counties in New York have moved to defy Governor Kathy Hochul&#8217;s order that bans the some 2,000 correctional officers she recently fired from ever working for the state again.
Hochul fired the officers for continuing to strike over the dangerous conditions inside understaffed prisons across the state. The following day, in a widely criticized move, she signed an executive order banning them from future work in New York, including even county governments.
Officials in Chemung County, Oneida County, and Rensselaer County have all indicated that they will outright defy the order or move to challenge it legally to regain control of their hiring processes.
Chemung County has issued a lawsuit this past week over the action, arguing that the order is unlawful. “We are taking this action to protect our ability to staff our jail with experienced personnel and to stand against unconstitutional overreach,” Sheriff William Schrom <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/chemung-county-sues-governor-hochul-192150636.html?utm_source=chatgpt.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>.
In Oneida County, the Board of Legislators approved a resolution allowing them to sue New York state over Hochul&#8217;s order. County Executive Anthony Picente said the resolution was approved because lawmakers believe Hochul overstepped, Spectrum News <a href="https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nys/central-ny/news/2025/03/12/county-accuses-hochul-of-overstepping-in-co-executive-order?utm_source=chatgpt.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.
“Executive order no. 47.3 is an abuse of the governor&#8217;s authority and discretion, and unlawfully intrudes upon the county’s powers of home rule,” Picente said.
Steve McLaughlin, who serves as county executive for Rensselaer County, said he would outright defy the order, <a href="https://x.com/SteveMcNY/status/1899510158708838650" target="_blank" rel="noopener">calling</a> it “reprehensible and vicious.”
“Just when you think Hochul can’t get worse, she finds a way,” he posted to X, captioning the executive order signed by Hochul. “Preventing Corrections Officers from seeking employment with counties is reprehensible and vicious but that’s exactly who Kathy Hochul is.”
“Like I do with everything else regarding her idiotic statements and actions, I will ignore this as well,” he said. “I will hire as many as I can here in #RensselaerCounty and I dare you to sue me and the individual CO’s as they seek gainful employment Hochul.”
Hochul&#8217;s decision to fire these officers in the first place has raised alarm, considering the understaffing and low recruitment already plaguing New York prisons across the state. Even before the strike started last month, there were about 2,000 vacant positions inside the prison system.
Hochul has National Guard members &#8212; without proper training &#8212; helping to man the prisons, with no end-date in sight. The governor activated thousands of members on the second day of the strike, and their inclusion has been controversial from the start. In some cases, they’ve been sleeping on gym floors and members have leaked photos of their rough conditions.
Moreover, State Sen. Daniel Stec (R) said that these guardsmen were “activated on state orders,” which makes them ineligible for care from Veterans Affairs if they were to get injured.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/vindictive-tyrant-hochul-bars-corrections-officers-she-fired-from-ever-working-for-new-york-again" target="_blank" rel="noopener">‘Vindictive Tyrant’: Hochul Bars Corrections Officers She Fired From Ever Working For New York Again</a>

New York State Governor Kathy Hochul

NY Counties Defying Dem Governor After She Fired Corrections Officers

General

Kathy Hochul

Lawsuit

New York

Every time a radical, out-of-control federal judge issues an outrageous opinion, you would think things couldn’t get any worse. But then someone like Richard Young comes along.
Young, a Clinton-appointed federal district court judge in Indiana, just ordered the state’s Department of Corrections to provide sex reassignment surgery to a man who wants to masquerade as a woman—a man who is in prison for murdering a baby.
That, shockingly, is what Young did in his <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trans-inmate-prison-killing-baby-must-get-gender-surgery-earliest-opportunity-judge.print">order</a> in Autumn Cordellione v. Indiana. Lest you be fooled by the name “Autumn” or the fact that Young refers to “Autumn” as “Ms.” and “her” throughout his disgraceful opinion, this criminal’s real name is Jonathan Richardson. He is in prison for strangling his 11-month-old stepdaughter to death in 2001.
Richardson, who the judge refers to in his order as the “individual” or the “incarcerated transgender person,” is being represented by the ACLU in this lawsuit, in which Richardson demands that he be provided with “gender-affirming surgery.” Really, how can anyone justify making contributions to the ACLU when it engages in this type of despicable litigation?
Indiana has already provided this male child killer with “panties, makeup, and form-fitting clothing” while in prison—a place that, if justice is served for this vicious crime, Richardson will never, ever leave. But as Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trans-inmate-prison-killing-baby-must-get-gender-surgery-earliest-opportunity-judge.print">says</a>, “Convicted murderers don’t get to demand that taxpayers foot the bill for expensive and controversial sex-change operations. It defies all common sense.”
Au contraire, according to Young. He says that Indiana’s failure to provide Richardson with the surgery necessary to cut off his penis and give him fake breasts violates the Eighth Amendment.
If this wasn’t a real order from a real federal judge, you’d think it was something written for The Babylon Bee or Mad magazine.
The Eighth Amendment prohibits the infliction of “cruel and unusual punishments.” As the Heritage Guide to the Constitution <a href="https://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/amendments/8/essays/161/cruel-and-unusual-punishment">explains</a>, the amendment was included in order to prevent the type of “torturous punishments” often inflicted by the British Crown, like “pillorying, disemboweling, decapitation, and drawing and quartering.”
Yet for decades, opponents have tried to use the ban on “cruel and unusual punishments” to outlaw the death penalty altogether. The Supreme Court ended that in 1976 in <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1975/74-6257">Gregg v. Georgia</a>, when it held that the death penalty is not a per se violation of the Eighth Amendment.
The court has further held in a series of cases that under the Eighth Amendment, punishments cannot be disproportionate to the offense. But it also held just last year in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-175_19m2.pdf">City of Grants Pass v. Johnson</a>, a case illustrating the extremes to which those trying to misuse the Eighth Amendment will go, that public bans on camping in public parks are not “cruel and unusual punishment.” That claim was just as absurd as the ACLU’s claim in the Richardson case.
Young relies on his opinion in the guidelines on “gender dysphoria” issued by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, as well as some other so-called experts. WPATH’s <a href="https://can-sg.org/2024/06/28/scandalous-suppression-of-research-on-transgender-health/">work</a> and medical opinions have been severely criticized for bias and lack of scientific rigor. It has also been accused of suppressing research that contradicts its opinions.
Young dismissed the opinion of the treating psychologist at Richardson’s prison that Richardson has personality disorders, not “gender dysphoria,” that display “an established pattern of attention-seeking behavior.”
Richardson is certainly getting that attention with Young’s decision that not providing him with gender surgery is “cruel and unusual punishment.” But we shouldn’t be surprised. Young is the same judge who in 2018 struck down an Indiana law that required healthcare providers to report abortion complications to the state health department in <a href="https://www.aclu-in.org/sites/default/files/sea_340_decisoin.pdf">PPINK v. Indiana</a>.
In other words, when the health and lives of real women were endangered by botched abortions performed by incompetent physicians who committed malpractice, Young prevented state health authorities from being able to do anything about it. Young apparently believes in protecting only fake women, not real ones.
As this case demonstrates, it isn’t only the Trump administration that’s dealing with an arrogant, imperial judiciary that ignores the Constitution and the rule of law and acts far outside of its authority. State governments are also on the receiving end of outlandish and bizarre orders like this one.
The Supreme Court recently declined to intervene – at least for now &#8211; in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/24a831_3135.pdf">Department of State v. AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition</a>, in which the Trump administration is dealing with another rogue judge who has ordered the government to distribute $2 billion of taxpayer money without examining the serious defenses raised by the government. In a dissent from the court’s refusal to hear the case, which was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh, Justice Samuel Alito wrote:
Does a single district-court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the Government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever) $2 billion? The answer to that question should be an emphatic “No,” but a majority of this Court apparently thinks otherwise. I am stunned.
The taxpayers and residents of Indiana should also be stunned by the actions of Judge Richard Young who used his thus-far-unchecked power to force them to pay for a sex change operation for a child murderer, the worst of the worst.
Stunned indeed.
Hans von Spakovsky is a Senior Legal Fellow in the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the Daily Wire.

Tyrants Of The Imperious Judiciary: Federal Judge Orders ‘Gender Reassignment’ For Child Killer

Heritage Foundation

Indiana

Judges

SCOTUS

A lot of people have been asking why I’ve focused on the pardon of Derek Chauvin. After all, he&#8217;s convicted on both federal charges as well as state charges.
There are a few reasons. 
The first and most obvious reason is that there is a likelihood he serves less time if the federal charges are relieved because federal inmates can&#8217;t earn good-time credit that reduces sentences. That happens at a much lower rate at the federal level than it happens at the state level. With Chauvin&#8217;s concurrent sentences, he has roughly a 22.5-year sentence on state charges and 21 years on federal charges.
But under Minnesota state sentencing structure, inmates usually serve about two-thirds of their sentence behind bars and one third under supervised release. So he would serve roughly 15 years of the 22.5-year state sentence in actual confinement under the state charges, thus less time in jail.
But the second reason I have focused on pardoning Chauvin is that when someone believed to be not guilty is languishing in prison, that is the time when the President of the United States ought to either commute his sentence or pardon him. 
Chauvin is the perfect example. It is immoral to allow a person whom you believe is innocent to languish in prison just because that person was made into the face of American racism. With no evidence of such a claim, Chauvin was made the face of American racism before his trial. Every media outlet in the country decided he was guilty. 
The governor of Minnesota decided he was guilty. The mayor of Minneapolis decided he was guilty. The presidential candidates on the Left side of the aisle at that time, including Joe Biden, decided he was guilty. Thus, it was necessary for the jury to convict him in order for an entire narrative structure to be created.
That was wrong.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2154-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
There are many people who object to all of this. One of those people is Steven A. Smith, a loud-mouth on ESPN. When I say loud-mouth, I mean the man does not have a volume that goes below eight on the spinal tap scale. I&#8217;m not sure that there is such a thing as a normal Stephen A. Smith voice, and I say this as a long-time viewer of ESPN. Every time Smith comes on the TV, you have to turn down your volume significantly.
Smith is very angry that I have suggested that Chauvin ought to be pardoned. He <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5EhE8LcwNU">said</a> on his show, “Would you have taken that position if George Floyd was a Jewish person? A white Jewish person? If a black cop had his knee on a white Jewish person for over nine minutes, Ben Shapiro, would you have called for that individual to be pardoned?” 
First, let&#8217;s start with this: I don&#8217;t know why he believes that it would be important, even in his stupid example, for it to be a “white Jewish person” as opposed to just a Jewish person.
His claim is that I am a tribal identitarian; thus, I would be just fine with the wrongful prosecution of a cop if a Jew died under the knee of that cop — even if the cop was not responsible and the fact patterns were exactly the same — and George Floyd’s name had been Harold Bernstein (or something equivalent), and the cop had been named George Floyd, a black man.
That is intensely stupid. It&#8217;s intensely stupid for a variety of reasons. Why don&#8217;t we begin with the first? This would not have been a national news story if that were the case. The reason this entire story was national news is because of the race of the people involved. In fact, when black people were routinely beating up Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn, it was covered up by the New York Times. It was not a national story. 
The reality is that this was made a national story specifically because the media had a preexisting narrative of race in America, and this fulfilled their narrative, even if the facts didn&#8217;t match.
Second, if, in fact, the facts had matched, and this was a Jewish person who had been arrested for counterfeiting (for passing counterfeit bills), had been high on fentanyl with a preexisting heart condition, and then had died under the knee of a cop, would I have said that the cop was innocent?
Yes, because if the cop is innocent, the cop is innocent. That&#8217;s the way this works.
The race or religion of the pseudo-victim is irrelevant to the question of whether this person was in fact murdered or not.
Stephen A. Smith is one of the deepest racial identitarians in our society. He does it all the time. All the time. He does it when he talks about sports — all the time. If you&#8217;re talking about Nikola Jokić, the greatest basketball center of our generation, he&#8217;ll talk about how Jokić should not be included in conversations for MVP specifically because of his race.
The reason Smith makes these kinds of statements is because he is projecting. He is projecting a racial conversation where none exists. I’m a Boston Celtics fan, so the following example with Smith from just a couple of years ago springs to mind.
Danny Ainge was the chief of basketball operations for the Boston Celtics; then, Brad Stevens was elevated to fill his position. Stevens is a really good president of basketball operations. How do we know this? The Celtics won an NBA championship last year, and he&#8217;s been one of the most successful NBA executives in all the NBA over the course of his tenure.
But Smith was firmly convinced the only reason Stevens was elevated was because of his race, <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/ESPN/comments/1dk2a26/from_3_years_ago_how_does_anyone_like_or_respect/">saying</a>, “It&#8217;s moments like this where I get on people&#8217;s nerves, particularly white America and the NBA community specifically, because I point out it&#8217;s beautiful to be a white guy. It&#8217;s just beautiful. You know, you&#8217;re a question mark as a coach in some people&#8217;s eyes, including in Boston. But somehow, someway, you’re moving upstairs.”
It’s worth noting that “it&#8217;s beautiful to be a white guy in America” has not precluded Smith from a five-year $100 million contract for ESPN, a failing network with plummeting ratings.
The reason that Smith is exercised over the George Floyd situation is specifically because of a racial narrative that is not predicated on facts. Now, he&#8217;s projecting that onto me as being some sort of racist for suggesting the racial narrative should not predominate. This is the whole reason that Black Lives Matter was such a mistake and failure, because it was racializing of a question that was not, in fact, racial.
This is just more evidence that what I&#8217;m saying about Chauvin is true, that the reason that Chauvin is in prison right now is because he was the wrong race and George Floyd was the wrong race. Because of that, Chauvin is in prison.
Here&#8217;s the dirty little secret: It never would have been a national news story if the races had been reversed, or if both people had been white or both people had been black.
And that means the officer would have been assessed on the facts of the situation rather than the racial narrative that people like Stephen Smith were propagating.

ESPN First Take At Clark Atlanta University And Morehouse College

Stephen A. Smith Attacks Me

ESPN

George Floyd

Stephen A. Smith

The wife of a correctional officer in <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-leaked-footage-shows-how-violent-ny-prisons-have-become-since-dems-halt-act" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New York</a> was not able to get her chemo treatment for a rare terminal illness last week after Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul terminated the health insurance coverage for thousands of officers and their dependents over the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-corrections-officers-strike-in-ny" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ongoing strike</a>.
Hochul has terminated health care for thousands of officers and sergeants so far, though, notably, the Attica Correctional Facility officer whose wife needs chemo was out on family and medical leave (FMLA) to take care of his family following the diagnosis, News10NBC&#8217;s Jennifer Lewke <a href="https://www.whec.com/top-news/news10nbc-investigates-corrections-officer-with-fmla-has-health-insurance-canceled-amid-strike-leaving-wife-without-chemo-treatment/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.
“I get IV infusion therapy in the home a couple of days a month, I also have to get chemo, I’m also on several different daily medications,” the woman, only going by Rachel, said.
News10NBC noted that other officers who were off on pre-approved leave said their health insurance was terminated, too. The Daily Wire has heard from numerous officers who are on strike and have indicated that they can&#8217;t afford to lose their health care for various reasons, including pregnancy.
Officers have said at the outset of the strike that they want a repeal of the Democrat-backed HALT Act, which took effect in 2022. They also don&#8217;t want to work mandated shifts that are sometimes 72 hours long, which they say increases safety risks.
A source, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution, told <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-leaked-footage-shows-how-violent-ny-prisons-have-become-since-dems-halt-act" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Wire</a> that the strike is “not about the money,” but about how the “liberal agenda has destroyed our justice system.” They said the HALT Act has made it basically impossible for officers to discipline routine problems inside prisons, putting safety at risk for everyone, including inmates.
Hochul, however, has acted increasingly hostile toward officers. Last week, she started firing officers and terminating health insurance coverage for officers and their dependents retroactively, meaning they’re on the hook for covering health care costs since the strike started, which was February 17.
The governor has also threatened to arrest officers, and said she&#8217;s started proceedings to do just that for hundreds already. 
“They created very unsafe circumstances,&#8221; Hochul <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/ny-prison-guard-strike-update-serious-consequences-hochul-warning/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">claimed</a> on Tuesday. &#8220;We warned them day after day after day that you’re gonna lose your healthcare, the health care is gone; that people are gonna be arrested, you could be going to jail. You’ve lost your job, you’ve lost your income, you’ve lost everything.”
The governor has mobilized 7,000 national guard members, with thousands currently working in the prisons. Numerous national guard members have leaked photos to the press of the cramped and squalid conditions they’ve been subjected to.
Additionally, controversy is starting to brew as the number of deaths inside these prisons start to rack up. Since the strike started, at least <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/04/nyregion/ny-prison-strike-guards.html">seven</a> people have died; one death has been deemed a suicide and at least one other is under investigation.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-leaked-footage-shows-how-violent-ny-prisons-have-become-since-dems-halt-act" target="_blank" rel="noopener">EXCLUSIVE: Leaked Footage Reveals How Violent NY Prisons Have Become Since Dems Passed HALT Act</a>

NY Governor Hochul Delivers Remarks At MTA Board Meeting

Woman Can’t Get Chemo After Hochul Cuts Health Insurance For Correctional Officers

strike

There is one person that President Trump should pardon from federal charges forthwith. It would be incredibly controversial, but I think it is absolutely necessary.
That person is Derek Chauvin. President Trump should pardon Chauvin of federal charges. If we are talking about reversing the evils of the last several years in American life, COVID and its handling was obviously a massive evil; it destroyed the economy, set us on a path to fiscal insanity, disrupted children’s education and lives, and led to massive health-related cover-ups. It was horrifying all the way around.
But when it came to Black Lives Matter, the inciting event for the BLM riots that <a href="https://fee.org/articles/george-floyd-riots-caused-record-setting-2-billion-in-damage-new-report-says-here-s-why-the-true-cost-is-even-higher/">caused</a> $2 billion in property damage in the United States and set America&#8217;s race relations on their worst footing in my lifetime was the railroading of Chauvin in the death of George Floyd.
The evidence demonstrates that Chauvin did not, in fact, commit murder of Floyd. Floyd was high on fentanyl and had a significant preexisting heart condition. Floyd began saying he could not breathe while still in the car. Chauvin, for a large segment of the tape footage of the incident, had his knee on Floyd&#8217;s shoulder or back, not on his neck.
The autopsy of Floyd showed that he had no damage to his trachea, and he likely died of excited delirium. Even at trial, there were no accusations that Chauvin had committed a hate crime against or targeted Floyd because of his race.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2150-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
Nonetheless, on the basis of extraordinarily scanty evidence and while there was massive pressure on the jury, the mayor of Minneapolis paid a settlement to the Floyd family. Jurors were being openly threatened and admitted as much. In the end, Chauvin was convicted on federal charges, pleading guilty to federal charges. 
Chauvin should be pardoned on those federal charges. It is worthwhile to remember that there is a man who is rotting in prison because the media decided — in the middle of 2020 — to turn a tragic law enforcement stop that ended with the death of a man (who had a significant problem with drugs and preexisting health problems) into the raison d’être of the entire 2020 election.
It led to vast chaos. It led to the destruction of racial comity in the United States, $2 billion in property damage, and a man rotting in prison who, the evidence demonstrates, certainly was not guilty beyond reasonable doubt in that case.
President Trump should really seriously consider pardoning Chauvin from federal charges.

Minneapolis, Minnesota. People gather at the government center to wait for the verdict in the trial of Derek Chauvin for the killing of George Floyd.

President Trump Should Pardon Derek Chauvin

Donald Trump

Below is my letter to President Trump urging him to pardon Derek Chauvin. You can join the effort by signing the petition at: <a href="https://get.dailywire.com/pardon-derek/?_gl=1*rr7jnp*_gcl_au*OTE0NjE0NDkwLjE3MzcwNTE1NjU.*_ga*NDc2ODcwMzI0LjE3MjM1NTkzNzA.*_ga_CZKR9ZYKJP*MTc0MTExMjYxMy4zMjIuMS4xNzQxMTEyNjE4LjU1LjAuMA.." target="_blank" rel="noopener">pardonderek.com.</a>
* * *
Dear President Trump,
We write to urge you to immediately issue a pardon for Officer Derek Chauvin, who was unjustly convicted and is currently serving a 22-and-a-half year sentence for the murder of George Floyd and associated federal charges.
As you know, this was the inciting event for the BLM riots that caused $2 billion in property damage in cities across the United States and set America’s race relations on their worst footing in recent memory. Yet the evidence demonstrates that Derek Chauvin did not murder George Floyd.
George Floyd was high on fentanyl. He had a significant pre-existing heart condition. He was saying he could not breathe before he was even out of the car. Derek Chauvin, for large segments of the widely circulated video of the encounter, had his knee on George Floyd’s shoulder or back, not on his neck; this was confirmed by the autopsy, which showed no damage to George Floyd’s trachea. There was no accusation at trial that Derek Chauvin targeted George Floyd for his race.
Perhaps most significantly, there was massive overt pressure on the jury to return a guilty verdict regardless of the evidence or any semblance of impartial deliberation. This pressure took the form of threats, coercion, and intimidation. The Mayor of Minneapolis pre-judged the outcome of the trial and immediately issued a large settlement to the Floyd family. Then-President Biden, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, and others pre-judged the outcome of the trial and took to national media to create pressure on the jury to go along with their preferred narrative.
Under these circumstances, there was no opportunity for blind justice to work, and a man is now rotting in prison because of it.
Make no mistake—the Derek Chauvin conviction represents the defining achievement of the Woke movement in American politics. The country cannot turn the page on that dark, divisive, and racist era without righting this terrible wrong.
Thank you for your commitment to ending the weaponization of the American justice system.
Sincerely,
Ben Shapiro

Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin Arrested For George Floyd Death

Pardon Derek Chauvin: My Letter To Donald Trump

Graphic footage obtained by The Daily Wire appears to showcase how violent New York prisons have become for inmates, correctional officers, and other workers since the Democrat-backed HALT Act took effect in 2022.
A source, who wishes to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution, leaked the alleged footage from Green Haven Correctional Facility, wishing to expose how dangerous conditions are as 15,000 correctional officers and sergeants across the state <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-corrections-officers-strike-in-ny">remain on strike</a>.
&#8220;I send this footage to you to help the public understand what it is we face and why we are on strike,&#8221; the source said. &#8220;This is not about money. It’s about how the liberal agenda has destroyed our justice system.&#8221;
As  <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-corrections-officers-strike-in-ny">The Daily Wire</a> previously reported, the strike began on February 17, with officers asking for the HALT Act to be repealed and to have other safety measures put into place, including stopping mandated shifts that officers say can sometimes last days at a time.
The footage, the source said, &#8220;shows staff at Green Haven Correctional Facility being attacked and inmates assaulting, even slashing each other’s faces.&#8221;
The video opens up with an inmate slicing the face of a woman who went to the prison to visit the inmate, according to the anonymous source. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
EXCLUSIVE: *Graphic* footage from Green Haven Correctional Facility exposes the violence Corrections Officers are subjected to in NY prisons while <a href="https://twitter.com/GovKathyHochul?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@GovKathyHochul</a> threatens to arrest them for &quot;illegally&quot; striking. She&#39;s more worried about prisoners’ &quot;rights.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/KKY4HEXBFZ">pic.twitter.com/KKY4HEXBFZ</a>
&mdash; Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) <a href="https://twitter.com/MattWalshBlog/status/1895227321935897017?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 27, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Additionally, footage starting at the 02:09:00 mark appears to show the fatal stabbing of 30-year-old inmate Jarrett Frost, The Daily Wire was told. The <a href="https://patch.com/new-york/midhudsonvalley/police-release-name-inmate-killed-during-fight-green-haven">incident</a> took place in June 2022, months after the HALT Act took effect. 
&#8220;HALT has stripped us of our ability to incentivize good behavior among the inmate population and deter them from attacking us,&#8221; the source added. &#8220;We have been deprived of our authority to control the inmates that we are charged to supervise, are swallowing our pride, and losing our souls in the process.&#8221;
Another segment seems to show a male inmate, who is leaving a shower, being attacked by another inmate. He’s seen violently seizing on the ground, and The Daily Wire is told the victim suffered brain trauma. 
“It’s just the tip of the iceberg,” the source said of the footage. 
The Daily Wire reached out to the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) for comment on Thursday, but has yet to receive a response. 
Democrat <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hochul-presser-spirals-with-arrest-threats-for-striking-officers-catch-every-single-one-of-them">Gov. Kathy Hochul (NY)</a> during a press conference on Tuesday repeatedly denigrated officers for going on strike, saying that she doesn&#8217;t know what officers want from her and blaming them for current safety risks. The governor also confirmed that she’s making legal moves to have striking officers arrested.
“Has anyone been arrested?” a reporter <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0GUYp9sfg">asked</a> the governor, to which Hochul responded, “The proceedings have started. I think we have 380 people on the first list through the attorney general’s office and they’re being served by state police as we speak. This is in violation of law.”
The governor suggested that she had state troopers serve papers with the threat of arrest to striking officers as a scare tactic, but since they didn’t back down, she’d continue down the path to having these officers arrested “in batches.”
During the presser, the governor brought up Marcos Gonzalez Soler, who serves as Deputy Secretary for Public Safety, for more details on the legal proceedings. He suggested all 15,000 would be addressed legally if need be.
“We will go to catch every single one of them until they’ve returned to work,” Gonzalez Soler told the media.
A source told The Daily Wire that Hochul&#8217;s administration has been using &#8220;scare tactics&#8221; to try to get officers back to work.
&#8220;Hochul has been aggressive with her scare tactics, having administrative personnel call staff at home, ordering them to return to work,&#8221; the source said. &#8220;Even those on sick leave, worker&#8217;s compensation leave, pre-approved vacation time, and bereavement leave are receiving these phone calls; being told that if they fail to report that they would be considered AWOL, docked two days pay for each shift missed and lose their health insurance.&#8221;
&#8220;Many of us cannot afford to lose our jobs and health insurance, many of us live paycheck to paycheck,&#8221; they continued. &#8220;But in spite of this fact, we cannot continue to face the long mandated hours in violent, unsafe prisons.&#8221;
&#8220;We are losing our families and missing our children grow,&#8221; they said. &#8220;We spend long hours in a horrific environment that destroys our empathy and then we are expected to act normal and hide the nightmare from our families.&#8221;
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hochul-presser-spirals-with-arrest-threats-for-striking-officers-catch-every-single-one-of-them">Hochul Presser Spirals With Arrest Threats For Striking Officers: ‘Catch Every Single One Of Them’</a>

Green Haven

EXCLUSIVE: Leaked Footage Reveals How Violent NY Prisons Have Become Since Dems Passed HALT Act

EXCLUSIVE: Leaked Footage Shows How Violent NY Prisons Have Become Since Dems' HALT Act

El Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele on Monday night offered to incarcerate the illegal aliens in the U.S. in his country for a &#8220;relatively low&#8221; fee.
Bukele made the offer in a post on X while U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited his country as part of an extended trip throughout Latin America to shore up support for tackling illegal immigration.
&#8220;We have offered the United States of America the opportunity to outsource part of its prison system,&#8221; said Bukele.
&#8220;We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee,&#8221; he continued.
He added, &#8220;The fee would be relatively low for the U.S. but significant for us, making our entire prison system sustainable.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
We have offered the United States of America the opportunity to outsource part of its prison system.
We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee.
The fee would be relatively low for… <a href="https://t.co/HTNwtp35Aq">pic.twitter.com/HTNwtp35Aq</a>
— Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) <a href="https://twitter.com/nayibbukele/status/1886606794614587573?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 4, 2025</a></blockquote>
Rubio&#8217;s office said the meeting was &#8220;tremendously successful&#8221; and resulted in multiple agreements that &#8220;will make both countries stronger, safer, and more prosperous.&#8221;
&#8220;President Bukele agreed to take back all Salvadoran MS-13 gang members who are in the United States unlawfully,&#8221; Rubio wrote. &#8220;He also promised to accept and incarcerate violent illegal immigrants, including members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang, but also criminal illegal migrants from any country. And in an extraordinary gesture never before extended by any country, President Bukele offered to house in his jails dangerous American criminals, including U.S. citizens and legal residents.&#8221;
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce <a href="https://www.state.gov/secretary-rubios-meeting-with-salvadoran-president-nayib-bukele/">said</a> in a statement: &#8220;Secretary Rubio and President Bukele concluded a civil nuclear cooperation MOU, which was signed by the Secretary and Salvadoran Foreign Minister Alexandra Hill Tinoco hours later. Secretary Rubio informed President Bukele that the United States will issue a waiver to unfreeze assistance to support the two countries’ joint work to detect suspicious travelers at El Salvador’s National Passenger Analysis Center (CNAP), resume operations at El Salvador’s Border Security Information Group (CGIF), and support El Salvador’s vetted units working with U.S. law enforcement.&#8221;
Rubio also discussed strategies to counter Chinese Communist Party influence in the hemisphere.

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