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Fox News’s Harris Faulkner suggested that the Department of Justice’s efforts to put a key witness in the Hunter Biden investigation in prison might result in his untimely demise on Monday.

A panel on Outnumbered was discussing Devon Archer, Biden’s former friend and business associate, when Faulkner floated the theory.

Archer was scheduled to — and did — testify before the House Oversight Committee in a closed-door meeting on Monday, but a letter sent by the DOJ to a judge asking him to set a date for Archer to begin a prison sentence for a fraud case caused some to speculate that it was attempting to silence him ahead of his potentially damaging testimony about the first family.

The New York Post has reported that Archer will say Hunter Biden called his father during business meetings at the request of foreign business partners. “The DOJ is trying to arrest Devon Archer ahead of his bombshell testimony Monday about Joe Biden’s involvement in his son Hunter’s Ukraine business when he was VP,” the Post’s Miranda Devine wrote on social media.

Both Archer’s attorney and the DOJ have denied that charge, with the former issuing a statement professing to be “aware of speculation that the Department of Justice’s weekend request to have Mr. Archer report to prison is an attempt by the Biden administration to intimidate him in advance of his meeting with the House Oversight Committee.”

‘To be clear, Mr. Archer does not agree with that speculation,” he explained.

But that didn’t stop Faulkner from wondering aloud if the motivation behind the letter was more sinister still.

“What deal did lawmakers have to get him to come in this fourth time, to keep that promise? And also: What deal did they have to make to keep him out of prison on Saturday?” asked Faulkner, seemingly under the impression that the actions of Congress had kept Archer from immediately reporting to prison.

“I’m really curious, cause you know, and I want to be delicate here: People die in prison. I mean, you put somebody in there who can take down really, really powerful people — stuff can happen.”

Watch above via Fox News.

The View‘s Sunny Hostin predicted Monday that the newest defendant in the Trump classified documents case will flip against his Mar-a-Lago boss and “sing like a canary” to prosecutors.

“What you have to understand is, this guy, Carlos De Oliveira, who was the property manager, went to the keeper of the records basically of the tapes and said, ‘The Boss’ wants us to erase it… That guy said, ‘No.’ So, now Carlos is a defendant, and he is going to sing like a canary. Because once you’re faced with an indictment, a federal indictment, even if it’s one charge, that’s up to 10 to 20 years in prison, and he ain’t going to spend 10 to 20 years in prison for Donald Trump,” Hostin began, adding:

Donald Trump may not testify, and Mr. [Walt] Nauta, who was the guy who was, like, ‘Uh, I’m not doing that.’ Maybe he’s not going to become a defendant, but this guy is going to do this and say, ‘he told me to erase everything, and I didn’t erase it. ‘I didn’t have anything to do with it,’ and I love — I used to love as a prosecutor — those weak canaries. Those weak canaries, they sing real, real well.

De Oliveira made his first appearance in Miami federal court on Monday where he heard the charges against him and surrendered his passport. He also signed an agreement to pay $100,000 if he doesn’t appear in court at his Aug. 10 arraignment.

Trump was charged in June with 37 counts related to violations of the Espionage Act, willfully retaining classified documents, and refusing to turn them over to the federal government. Last week, prosecutor Jack Smith tacked on three new charges of obstruction, alleging Trump asked De Oliveira to delete surveillance video showing Nauta moving boxes containing the classified documents.

Both Donald Trump and Walt Nauta have pleaded not guilty.

Watch the clip above via ABC News.

Trader Joe’s did not have a good week: They made headlines for recalling two types of cookies for potentially containing rocks, then insects were found in some of their broccoli cheddar soups, and then Trader Joe’s put out an announcement on Friday warning their customers not to eat their falafels because they might …

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A large photo displaying Vivek Ramaswamy‘s face was defaced with antisemtic drawings and Nazi refences at the conservative Turning Point Action Conference earlier this month, according to an video segment released on Sunday by CNN.

Elle Reeve covered the conservative conference earlier this month in Florida where she interviewed attendees about their thoughts on Ramaswamy’s candidacy. The CNN journalist noted that the conference displayed large photos of every candidate for attendees to write down their thoughts with post-it notes.

However, some comments for Ramaswamy sign featured antisemitic drawings of the Star of David and “1488” Nazi refences.

“We have a little bit of the dark side here,” Reeve tells the audience as the camera pans to the defaced sign. “We have a Star of David crossed out that says, ‘soon.” Now that’s a 4chan joke saying there will be another Holocaust. We also have 1488. That is also a Nazi joke. So I got two Nazi jokes here.”

When CNN pointed out the Nazi references, a Turning Point spokesman removed them from the sign. Reeve asked Ramaswamy for his thoughts on the incident later on in a sit down interview.

“I can’t speak to that particular instance. I’ll tell you my experience in this country. Have I experienced racism? Yes, I have. But I reject the myth that hardship is the same thing as victimhood,” the up and coming GOP presidential candidate told Reeve.

Ramaswamy is currently polling in third place on average in the Republican presidential primary, according to a national average assembled by Real Clear Politics.

Watch the full segment above via CNN.

(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Former Attorney General Bill Barr could not decide whether he would vote for his former boss Donald Trump or President Joe Biden in the general election.

Barr told NBC News for a poll that he opposes Trump for the GOP nomination, but when asked who he would vote for in the general if the candidates were the same as 2020, he responded, “I’ll jump off that bridge when I get to it.”

The Trump appointed former head of the Department of Justice has criticized Trump amid his legal troubles and condemned the Republican frontrunner for his actions following the 2020 presidential race.

“I have made clear that I strongly oppose Trump for the nomination and will not endorse Trump,” Barr told NBC News. When asked how he would vote if Trump faced Biden in the general election, Barr said, “I’ll jump off that bridge when I get to it.”

Following Trump’s federal indictment for charges related to his handling of classified material after leaving the White House, Barr called Trump a “consummate narcissist” and said his behavior was “reckless.”

Barr’s response was apart of a poll asking former Trump cabinet members whether they would support him in the election. Only four said they would back Trump, while most did not respond.

Per NBC News:

NBC News reached out to 44 of the dozens of people who served in Trump’s Cabinet over his term in office. Most declined to comment or ignored the requests. A total of four have said publicly they support his run for re-election. Several have been coy about where they stand, stopping short of endorsing Trump with the GOP primary race underway. Then there are those who outright oppose his bid for the GOP nomination or are adamant that they don’t want him back in power.

–

Author and MSNBC columnist Ruth Ben-Ghiat told host Jonathan Capehart on Sunday that there’s “a war, actually, on Blacks” in America being waged by Donald Trump, Gov. Ron DeSantis, and the rest of the GOP, who are “criminalizing Black people” so that White kids don’t feel “guilty” and instead can “feel like, you know, victims.”

Ben-Ghiat and Nevada Democrat and Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus Rep. Steven Horsford joined Capehart for The Sunday Show on MSNBC. Horsford said that there is a “ban on blackness,” and Ben-Ghiat agreed and expanded on the phrase after Capehart claimed that “information, books, and libraries” are being attacked.

He asked the author how that plays into the “authoritarian playbook you talk so often about.”

Ben-Ghiat called Republicans “authoritarian’ and replied that “there’s a war on blackness at the ballot box, disenfranchising Blacks. There’s a war actually on Blacks at their places of employment, through the suppression of diversity and inclusion initiatives. And there’s the war on blackness and education.”

Both guests characterized opposition to “wokeness” from candidates like DeSantis as racism or signs of aspiring to dictatorship, and Ben-Ghiat claimed that Republicans are “erasing” and “rewriting history in ways that satisfy, you know, White people.”

Capehart talked about Trump’s often repeated claim that his supporters are the “real” targets and he’s just “in the way,” and said, “This is standard for him on the campaign trail and standard for dictators, no?”

The author agreed and looped DeSantis in again, saying:

If we relate this to to the questions of race and education, you know, it’s it’s making, creating an educational and emotional environment so Whites feel that they’re under attack all the time. And criminalizing Black people and non-Whites in general, and non-Christian Whites, is part of this game to keep people in a state of tension.

And, you know, the Prager curriculum that Ron DeSantis is adopting, which is not accredited, by the way, it’s a it’s a propaganda outfit. And all of these GOP, you know, education measures, they want, they say, they all have the same language, that they want to remove emotional distress like sources, things that make people feel, White people feel guilty. And and so they can feel like, you know, victims.

“This is an incredible conversation,” said Capehart.

Watch the clips above, via MSNBC.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) warned that the House GOP is putting their “majority at risk” by pursuing efforts to impeach President Joe Biden.

The Republican lawmaker joined Shannon Bream on Fox News Sunday to discuss the latest efforts by GOP House members to impeach Biden over his family’s foreign business dealings. Lawmakers such as Marjorie Taylor Greene have called pushed for investigations and proceedings against the president since the day he took office.

Mace warned her fellow Republicans doing so could have consequences for the party by putting moderate members at risk of losing reelection, especially in districts where Biden won in 2020.

“So what about this issue of impeachment? Is the party divided,” Bream asked Mace.

“I do believe we are. At this point, an inquiry is different from an impeachment vote and is another tool in the toolbox. But I will tell you, every time we walk the plank, we are putting moderate members, members that won Biden districts, we are putting those seats at risk for 2024,” Mace responded. “We are putting the majority at risk.”

“And it’s not just impeachment that does add other issues like abortion, etc. also put those members on the plank,” She added. “We ought to follow the facts and we have to be better than Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi really politicized the impeachment process. We do not want to do that here. We have to show overwhelming, undeniable evidence in order to move this thing forward. And if we can’t, then we should not.”

Watch the full segment above via Fox News.

GOP presidential hopeful Chris Christie briefly turned his attention away from bashing Republican frontrunner Donald Trump to slam President Joe Biden over inflation.

During an interview on CNN with CNN anchor Kasie Hunt, the former New Jersey governor labeled Biden as the “Jimmy Carter of the 2020s’ for record inflation that he claims was created by the president’s “ridiculous spending.”

Christie is currently polling near the bottom of the Republican field for president. He is one of the few GOP candidates to openly attack Trump every week in media interviews and campaign speeches.

“These days, inflation is creeping down to 3%. GDP is strong. Consumer sentiment is on the way up. We have wages going up faster than prices. Do you think President Biden deserves any credit for that,” Hunt asked Christie in a Sunday interview.

“What he deserves credit for is the fact that everything is 17% more expensive today than it was when he took the oath of office on January 20th of 2021,” Christie responded. “Interest rates are at our highest level in 25 years, making it much more expensive for people to buy a home, to buy a car, to be able to invest in their business and grow it to create jobs.”

He added, “This guy is the Jimmy Carter of the 2020s and his inflation, that he created Don’t take my word for it. Democratic economist, former Treasury secretary under Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, has said that Joe Biden created this inflation through his ridiculous spending. I dealt with this in New Jersey, Casey, after coming after Jon Corzine. We had an $11 billion deficit on a $29 billion budget. We balanced the budget by cutting 836 individual programs and did not raise taxes.”

Watch the full clip above via CNN.

Former President Donald Trump demanded that Congress pause all U.S. military support to Ukraine until federal agencies cough up every piece of information they have on President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.

In his Saturday night rally from Erie, Pennsylvania, Trump went on a tangent where he pushed several of the corruption allegations surrounding the Biden family’s foreign business dealings.

“The Biden’s got millions of dollars from Ukraine. Now, Ukraine gets billions and billions of dollars from the American taxpayer,” Trump whined. “Joe Biden is compromised. He’s dragging us into a global conflict on behalf of the very same country, Ukraine, that apparently paid his family all of these millions of dollars.”

This led to Trump’s proposal for Ukrainian aid to be put on hold to force the Biden administration’s full compliance with the investigations being led by Congressional Republicans. This folded into the part of his speech where Trump threatened to endorse the primary opponents of Republicans that won’t carry out his will.

In light of this information, the U.S. Congress should refuse to authorize a single additional shipment of our depleted weapons stockpiles…to Ukraine until the FBI, DOJ, and IRS hand over every scrap of evidence they have on the Biden crime family’s corrupt business dealings.

For months, Republicans have been pushing allegations that Biden corruptly took foreign money as vice president as part of an influence-peddling scheme. Trump and his allies have also run with the long-time claim that Biden demanded Viktor Shokin to be fired because the former Ukrainian prosecutor general was investigating Burisma while Hunter Biden was on the company’s board.

This claim ignores the context that Biden was representing the official positions of the U.S. government and anti-corruption advocates when he called for Shokin’s removal because the latter was ineffectual at dealing with corruption. The Burisma investigation was also was not being actively pursued at the time, so Shokin’s replacement should have put more scrutiny on Hunter Biden’s activities.

Trump’s proposal of withholding Ukranian aid contains echoes of the quid pro quo he demanded that led to his first impeachment trial.

In 2019, Trump threatened to withhold military aid to Ukraine unless President Volodymyr Zelensky investigated the Biden family when Joe Biden was his 2020 rival. Trump has repeatedly claimed he had a “perfect call” with Zelensky, though it was reported by two whistleblowers, which eventually led to impeachment.

Watch above via Newsmax.

Ahead of his rally speech on Saturday, ex-president Donald Trump spent some time on his Truth Social app sharing videos, talking about Richard Nixon, and trashing other Republicans before exploding in a Caps Lock fury over what he calls “A COORDINATED ATTACK” against him.

Trump will be speaking at his campaign rally in Erie, Pennsylvania on Saturday night, but the event, like most of his rallies, is an all-day affair for his fans during which wild interviews and wild speeches take place before the main event.

Trump, too, spends the day ahead of his speech getting fired up, and pumping up the themes he talks about at every rally, such as relentlessly claiming the 2020 election was stolen from him and calling investigations and prosecutions of him conspiracies and witch hunts.

In his Saturday Truth Social posts, Trump trashed “little known, failed former Congressman” Will Hurd over wildly booed comments the 2024 GOP candidate made at a Lincoln Dinner in Iowa that was also headlined by Trump, as well as Gov. Ron DeSantis, who got a standing ovation, and former VP Mike Pence, who called for late-term abortion and transgender military bans.

Trump also shared videos from the lines outside the rally in Erie, pimped a story about disgraced former president Richard Nixon praising him, attacked fellow Republican Asa Hutchinson with the nickname “Aida” in a “Russia, Russia, Russia” post, and then eventually went into ALL CAPS HYPE MODE ahead of his rally appearance.

“WHY DIDN’T THE CORRUPT MARXIST PROSECUTORS BRING THESE RADICAL & UNJUSTIFIED CHARGES AGAINST ME 2.5 YEARS AGO, LONG BEFORE MY PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN HAD BEGUN. NOW DERANGED JACK SMITH WILL PROBABLY BRING ANOTHER CASE, ALONG WITH THE RACIST D.A. IN CRIME RIDDEN ATLANTA, WHO HAS BEEN WAITING FOR THE PERFECT TIME DURING MY CAMPAIGN TO FILE. THIS IS ELECTION INTERFERENCE & PROSECUTORIAL MISCONDUCT! THEY ARE ALL, IN A COORDINATED ATTACK, TRYING TO STEAL ANOTHER ELECTION, BUT WE WON’T LET THEM!!!” he wrote.

Trump is set to speak at 6pm at the Erie rally, and among his usual topics will likely drop mentions of the speeches in Iowa on Friday in order to bash the other members of his party.

Former Georgia Lt. Governor Geoff Duncan compared nominating Donald Trump for the presidency to “a lot like peeing your pants” because “it feels good for a couple of seconds” until you wake up and realize “what you just did.”

Despite legal troubles and the possibility of facing four criminal indictments in four different jurisdictions, Trump currently leads the Republican presidential field, according to multiple polls.

Moderate Republicans in the GOP have begun floating names such as Glenn Youngkin and Tim Scott as possible replacements to Trump who could reach a wider range of voters.

Duncan, a CNN political analyst, told network anchor Victor Blackwell on Saturday that he hopes a “once in a generational leader” is currently running in the GOP field but that Republican contenders need to criticize the former president more often.

“They should all be unanimous in rebuking anything Donald Trump has to do and say he’s hijacked our Republican Party,” Duncan claimed.

“Nominating Donald Trump for the Republican Party is a lot like peeing in your pants,” he added. “It’s going to feel good for a couple of seconds. But then you wake up and you realize the realities of what you just did.”

Watch the full clip above via CNN.

The Lincoln Project‘s Tara Setmayer wrecked Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis to MSNBC’s Jen Psaki for having a “not good week” that included “whitesplaining slavery to Black Republicans.”

At least three prominent Black Republicans have joined Vice President Kamala Harris — who has been  torched the new curriculum in speeches — in criticizing DeSantis and the the newly-approved Florida curriculum on Black history — which includes teaching that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

Former congressman and Republican candidate for president Will Hurd told CNN “Slavery was not a jobs program!” and ripped DeSantis for defending it, while Sen. Tim Scott and Rep. Byron Donalds also criticized the standard, while making relatively mild criticisms of DeSantis.

On Friday night’s edition of MSNBC’s All In with Chris Hayes, Setmayer delivered a blistering summation of the governor’s week that stressed his “white-splaining” of slavery to three Black Republicans:

TARA SETMAYER: So Ron DeSantis, I’ve never seen someone trip over their arrogance so much at a time when they’re supposed to be resetting their campaign. Can we just recap the week? You did a great job of explaining the idea that he’s whitesplaining to Black Republicans, the slavery issue.

He also had to, we forgot that he also had to cut staff, including a Nazi sympathizer who was on his staff. That’s not a great look when you’re trying to do a campaign reset. And he’s hemorrhaging donors. The Miami Herald put out a report this week that discussed how he’s also hemorrhaging white, college-educated Republicans. They don’t want to vote for him. So he’s going in the wrong direction. And it’s been an absolute disarray for him. Ron DeSantis And I don’t see how he comes back from it, but, you know, good luck with that. When you’re that arrogant and aloof, it’s not a winning combination, particularly when you have to be a retail politician in places like Iowa.

Setmayer circled back later to add “Any time a candidate is crabby and trying to whitesplain to Black lawmakers the benefits thereof of slavery in any form, it’s not a good week for you.”

Watch above via MSNBC’s All In with Chris Hayes.

As Republicans remain divided over how to address the issue of abortion at a national level, former Vice President Mike Pence made his position clear on Friday by calling for a 15-week federal abortion ban in Iowa.

Republican contenders vying for their party’s presidential nomination all came to Iowa to attend the 2023 Lincoln Dinner and speak directly to conservative voters and leaders in the state.

Pence has struggled to make a name for himself in the crowded Republican field as he dodges attacks from supporters of former President Donald Trump and the moderate wing of the GOP.

“We can end Biden’s radical abortion agenda by doing just what you all did recently here in Iowa, and that is promoting pro-life laws at states across the country,” Pence told the audience on Friday.

“And I believe the time has come for a minimum national standard of a 15 week ban at the federal level. And finally, we can restore confidence,” he added.

A national abortion ban remains widely unpopular across the country. Recently, pro-life initiatives have been rejected by voters in conservative states, such as Kentucky, and the issue has helped increase Democratic turnout in the 2022 midterm election.

For years, Pence has remained popular within the conservative evangelical political sphere for his pro-life and religious position on abortion.

Watch the full clip above via CSPAN.

MSNBC’s Allie Raffa filed a live report on President Joe Biden publicly recognizing Navy Roberts — Hunter Biden’s child outside of marriage — as his 7th grandchild, and wondering how it will “play out” politically.

After waiting for contentious disputes between his son and Lunden Roberts to be settled, President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden issued a statement publicly acknowledging Navy Roberts in an exclusive for People Magazine:

“Our son Hunter and Navy’s mother, Lunden, are working together to foster a relationship that is in the best interests of their daughter, preserving her privacy as much as possible going forward,” President Biden said in a statement provided exclusively to PEOPLE.

…

“This is not a political issue, it’s a family matter,” President Biden’s statement continues. “Jill and I only want what is best for all of our grandchildren, including Navy.”

But on Saturday’s edition of MSNBC’s Alex Witt Reports, host Alex Witt tossed live to Delaware for Raffa’s report, which included background from a “source familiar” and an extremely personal attack from a Republican rival:

ALEX WITT: A first for President Biden, the president and first lady now publicly acknowledging their seventh grandchild, grandchild, rather, four-year-old Navy, a little girl who Hunter Biden fathered with an Arkansas woman several years ago. NBC’s Allie Raffa is in Rehoboth Beach with more on what the Bidens are saying, Allie.

ALLIE RAFFA: Alex, the president has never shared his reasoning for not publicly acknowledging this little girl. But a source familiar with the family’s situation tells NBC News he’s avoided doing so until now to give his son and the girl’s mother the time and space to navigate this.

The Biden family is officially a little bit larger. The president and first lady acknowledging for the first time that they have a seventh grandchild, a four-year-old girl named Navi, who their son Hunter fathered out of wedlock during the peak of his battle with drug addiction. Navy’s mother, Lunden Roberts, a former exotic dancer, are settling a year-long paternity and child support dispute with Hunter in the Arkansas courts last month. The first couple releasing a statement Friday saying, quote, “Our son, Hunter and Navy’s mother, Lunden, are working together to foster a relationship that is in the best interests of their daughter.”.

Adding, “This is not a political issue. It’s a family matter.”.

In April, President Biden told a group of children at the White House.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: I have six grandchildren and I’m crazy about them.

ALLIE RAFFA: The president and first lady proudly displaying monogrammed stockings of family members in the White House each Christmas since taking office, including Hunter’s four other children, but not his fifth. The White House up until now avoiding the topic.

REPORTER: Does the president acknowledge this little girl as his granddaughter?

KARINE JEAN-PIERRE: I don’t have anything to share from here.

ALLIE RAFFA: Republican presidential candidates seizing on the silence as opportunities to attack the president.

RON DESANTIS: Why don’t you spend some time with your granddaughter in Arkansas or at least recognize her existence before you start worrying about our kids?

ALLIE RAFFA: The president, who’s always made his family a very public part of his life, now asking to preserve this little girl’s privacy. So at this point, it’s still unclear whether the family dynamics change at all, as well as more broadly how this plays out on the 2024 campaign trail. Alex.

REPORTER: We shall see.

Watch above via MSNBC’s Alex Witt Reports.

NBC News reporter Gabe Gutierrez stunned  Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis by bluntly reminding him just how far behind ex-President Donald Trump he is.

DeSantis is focusing his efforts on Iowa, where he gave a speech Friday night at the 2023 Lincoln Dinner hosted by the Republican Party of Iowa in Des Moines, where many other candidates including ex-President Donald Trump were on the bill.

A recent Fox Business Network poll of the state had some rather discouraging results for the Florida governor:

In Iowa:

Trump … 46%
DeSantis … 16%
TIM SCOTT …11%
VIVEK RAMASWAMY … 6%
NIKKI HALEY … 5%

On Friday night’s edition of NBC Nightly News, the program’s package on Gutierrez and his report on the DeSantis effort in Iowa included a brutal exchange in which Gutierrez interrupts DeSantis with some hard reality, and DeSantis pauses for a moment before giving the classic rebuttal “Says you!”:

GOV. RON DESANTIS: If we make it about the vision for the future, we’re going to win. Obviously, with me as the nominee, you know, we’re going to focus on Biden’s failures and our vision for the future. That’s what the election will be about. If Donald Trump is the nominee, it’s going to be about all those other issues.

GABE GUTIERREZ: With all due respect, Governor, you’re down by 30 points, though.

GOV. RON DESANTIS: (PAUSE) Well, no, I mean, that… Says you! I mean, I can tell you, we’ve been in Iowa. I’m the one showing up at all these places. We’re signing up people day after day here in Iowa.

That jarring record-scratch sound effect you heard there was actually in your head.

The 2024 Republican primary picture for DeSantis isn’t much better nationally, as Trump leads the entire GOP field by between 20 and 39 points — although DeSantis is the runner-up in pretty much all of the polls.

Watch above via NBC Nightly News.

Stocking up on staples is a great way to stretch a budget and minimize waste, so a good chest freezer is a boon to the budget-minded home cook. Sadly, common misconceptions about their energy usage and footprint size discourage the folks who would benefit the most from a chest freezer—apartment-dwellers with decrepit,…

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Refrigerators can start smelling pretty funky after a few years of use. If you want to rid your fridge and freezer of lingering odors once and for all, you need a deep cleaning regimen to get the job done.

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A witness referred to as “Trump Employee 4” in the classified documents indictment against former President Donald Trump has been identified as Mar-a-Lago’s IT Director, CNN reported.

“We’re just learning the identity of that IT Director. Two people close to the investigation tell CNN his name is Yucil Taveras.” said anchor Jim Sciutto on Friday’s CNN News Central. “He is identified as Trump Employee Number Four.”

Earlier, Sciuto reported, “Prosecutors say Trump, along with two employees Walt Naruta and Mar-a-Lago property manager Carlos De Oliveira, tried to ‘alter, mutilate and conceal evidence’ after trying to delete security camera footage. Why? De Oliveira has been added to the case as a defendant now. Prosecutors argue he told the IT Director that, quote, ‘The Boss’ wanted that server deleted.”

Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig explained in an earlier block on CNN News Central how prosecutors will use the testimony of “Trump Employee 4.”

“However, if we look at some of the allegations about the tampering with the surveillance video. The way they’re going to have to prove that is with testimony from this “Trump Employee Four” about what he was told by De Oliveira about what Donald Trump said — that’s admissible, but it’s a couple layers of hearsay, the admissible kind of hearsay. And so, not everything is locked in, but the indictment overall strikes me as quite strong, but it is not perfect,” Honig said.

Megyn Kelly grilled 2024 GOP hopeful Ron DeSantis over his continued war with various corporations and pointedly asked the Florida governor if he was “using government to punish citizens for political wrong think.”

The exchange took place on the Friday edition of SiriusXM’s The Megyn Kelly Show where Kelly asked DeSantis if his treatment of Disney, which spoke out against a Florida bill on teaching gender ideology in school, and Bud Light for their partnership with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney, was “viewpoint discrimination.”

“You, in my view, are pretty quick to use the power of the state against certain corporations you don’t like,” Kelly began. “Aren’t you doing the very thing to these companies that conservatives are mad at left-wing leaders for doing?”

“No, not at all. So taking Anheuser-Busch, I mean, we’re not punishing them. They departed from business practices by indulging in social activism,” DeSantis said.

The Florida governor explained that the pension fund in Florida holds stock in Anheuser-Busch and as a result of their stock falling, it has affected citizens who rely on the pension.

“Didn’t you support the boycott against them?” Kelly pressed, noting DeSantis himself may have hurt Anheuser-Busch’s stock price.

“No, I did, but that’s just as a personal thing. But I mean, we didn’t have like the state government necessarily putting power about it,” DeSantis said reiterating that they “departed from their fiduciary duty.”

“I’m not in favor of the Bud Light thing at all, but how can you say they departed from their fiduciary duty, they sent a beer can to this very controversial person, which upset the consumers and the consumers had their say. But how is that a departure from — and how does the state get involved in that?” Kelly asked.

DeSantis questioned if the partnership with Mulvaney would help shareholders or company values.

“But how is that for you to weigh in on?” Kelly pressed.

“I have people in Florida that were injured by the company’s decline as a result of that,” DeSantis insisted.

The conversation pivoted to Disney.

“They started going down the road of sexualizing children. We just could not be joined at the hip with a company that was doing that,” DeSantis said, elaborating that as a result Disney should lose long-held agreements made with the state.

“So you are suggesting you would’ve done this irrespective of them criticizing and fighting your parents in education act?” Kelly asked.

“Obviously, they’re supporting sexualizing kids in Florida schools. I mean, they were putting their corporate weight behind ensuring that that could happen. So of course that was a factor,” DeSantis said, making a very harsh allegation against Disney.

“That’s an admission that they were punished by you in part by the state for their political viewpoint,” Kelly said. DeSantis denied that it was a punishment. Disney is suing Florida in federal court for allegedly violating its right to free speech.

Kelly then asked how his tactics were “not viewpoint discrimination.”

“Why can’t Disney oppose your law?” Kelly pushed. “Why can’t they promote this agenda in their viewpoint without being punished by the state,” she asked referring to their opposition of the Florida bill.

“They’re not being punished. We’re just simply removing special benefits that they have had,” DeSantis said.

The full conversation regarding DeSantis’s corporate wars lasted over eight minutes and can be listened to in full here.

Listen above via SiriusXM’s The Megyn Kelly Show.

Ford Motor Company is recalling 870,701 Ford F-150s in the U.S. because there is a risk the truck might have its electric parking brake activated unexpectedly due to a potential wiring issue.

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During a discussion on “corruption in the Biden administration” with GOP Chair Elise Stefanik (R-NY), Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo called for the impeachment of Joe Biden and a whopping four of his Cabinet officials.

In addition to the president, Bartiromo name-checked the Department of Homeland Security Secretary, the Attorney General, the Treasury Secretary, and the Energy Secretary.

“I can understand the issues that you’re looking at given the corruption on one hand, and the ineptitude of policy on the other hand,” Bartiromo told Stefanik. “You know, who do you impeach first? Do you impeach Joe Biden for corruption, uh, taking all of this money, or do you impeach Alejandro Mayorkas for ineptitude and dereliction of duty at the border? Or, do you impeach Merrick Garland for interfering in an investigation and lying under oath? I mean, you’ve got lots of choices here, and I didn’t even mention Janet Yellin, telling us inflation was ‘transitory.’ And the energy secretary [Jennifer] Granholm not really knowing how much energy and oil we need.”

“Well, certainly, you know, we’re doing multiple investigations on Homeland, you know, it is clear that Secretary Mayorkas has been derelict of his duty. But it’s not just Secretary Mayorkas, Maria. It’s Joe Biden’s administration.”

Stefanik said Biden’s border policies “have failed and I think we need to hold them all accountable.”

“When it comes to Attorney General Merrick Garland, it was my questions that revealed that the Department of Justice solicited the letter it used to go after parents as terrorists, based upon my questions that we were able to unveil that…So, yes, we will make sure that we’re holding them accountable and, you know, certainly there’s a lot of officials to hold accountable. We’re going to leave no stone unturned.”

Watch the clip above via Fox Business Network.

Bonfires are a summer and early fall tradition. You might think they’re easy to throw together in a few minutes, but they can be tricky—and potentially dangerous. According to the Forest Service, out-of control campfires are the second leading cause of wildfires in the National Forest. And making a bit more effort…

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No-bake desserts get a lot of shade most of the year, but the dead of summer is when they shine brightest. Suddenly the insults stop and the compliments fly. Clear a space in your fridge because we’re jumping in the deep-end of no-bake desserts with this simple yet dazzling Panna Colada Pie.

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Cold wine traveling down your throat and into you belly is a refreshing feeling, whether it be a lightly chilled red or thoroughly chilled white, rosé, or bottle of bubbly. But not many wines come pre-chilled, which is unfortunate, because I am always grabbing a bottle at the last minute, especially during the summer,…

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In the wake of Mediaite’s reporting last week on allegations that Steven Crowder fostered a toxic workplace rife with unorthodox conduct, the Louder with Crowder host called for an emergency staff meeting on Monday at the show’s offices in Texas.

The meeting was held to address concerns around internal leaks — and to warn staffers against speaking out about what goes on inside the company.

Four ex-staffers on the popular right-wing show told Mediaite they then received text messages, which were reviewed by Mediaite, from current staffers telling them they were no longer allowed to communicate or associate with each other.

“The company is clearly in damage control mode,” one former Louder staffer said, “What’s bizarre is that Louder with Crowder employees are a bit like a family. Even after people leave, they still remain friends and hang out together. But after the [Mediaite article] was published I noticed several current employees quit returning my texts and left group chats.“

“One outright told me they could no longer associate with me or else they would be fired,” they said. “I could tell they were scared.”

The former staffer said intimidating behavior like this is nothing new under the leadership of the YouTube star,  but the latest crackdown is the most dramatic manifestation of it yet.

“This kind of thing has happened in the past, just not at this level,” the former staffer said. “After an employee was fired, people on the team were told they could no longer associate with that person.”

“So when someone leaves and we’re told we can’t be around them it feels very cult-like,” they added. “Not only is the company done with them, but we’re being asked to end friendships. It always seemed over the line to dictate who people can and can’t be friends with outside of work.”

Another ex-staffer said they were on the receiving end of a current Crowder employee’s text message breaking off their friendship after the internal staff meeting: “An employee friend of mine texted me saying they can no longer associate with me but that it’s nothing personal. I asked why and they said they couldn’t tell me, but that it’s something with work and they could get in serious trouble.”

The “serious trouble,” according to a third former show employee, is termination. They said they also received a text message from a current staffer that read, “It’s nothing personal but we can’t communicate with any ex-employees right now. This is on threat of firing, and comes from the top. Hopefully it won’t always be this way.”

The third ex-staffer explained to Mediaite that Crowder operates with a bunker mentality, where all disputes between his staff and the outside world are seen as “us vs. them, liberal media vs. us or past employees vs. us.”

“He sees everything as good guy against the bad guy and he is never the bad guy,” they said. “If you’re actually the good guy and in the right, you would want more transparency not less.”

Crowder did not respond to a request for comment.

Rich von Biberstein/AP

World Aquatics’ latest ruling regarding transgender swimmers could potentially knock the wind out of the sails of one the of the largest current right-wing talking points.

On Tuesday, World Aquatics — the governing body for major swimming championships and the Olympics — announced the creation of an “open category” in which trans swimmers will compete. Previously, trans swimmers were outright banned from competing in major events.

“This is a very complex topic,” World Aquatics President Husain Al-Musallam said at a conference in Fukuoka, Japan. “But I am delighted to tell you today that we are now making plans for the first trial of an open category, and we hope to be able to confirm all the details soon.

“Our sport must be open to everybody.”

What makes this ruling especially significant is the fact that it came from the sport that sparked the national discussion.

In 2022, women’s collegiate swimmer Riley Gaines competed in the NCAA Championships against Lia Thomas, a transgender woman. Gaines has been vocal in her disapproval of the experience and advocates for bans on trans athletes in women’s sports. She was even ambushed for speaking on the issue at a university.

As of Wednesday morning, Gaines has not publicly commented on the announcement from World Aquatics.

The issue has since made its way to lawmakers in the nation’s capital. In April, the House approved legislation that would ban trans athletes from participating in girls and women’s teams. Outside of Washington, D.C., at least 20 states have taken matters into their own hands with bans at the school level.

Now, World Aquatics could be laying out the blueprint at the professional level. Similar to what’s been done with bathrooms in some establishments, the creation of an all-gender or open category would allow trans athletes to participate without forcing them to compete with a gender they no longer consider themselves.

Netflix is back on its business (adapting a popular anime to live action). At the tail end of August, the streamer will drop the first season of the apprehensively anticipated flesh-and-blood take on Eiichiro Oda’s long-running manga/anime series One Piece.

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If you’re not careful, cleaning ceiling fans, chandeliers and other hanging light fixtures can leave dust and gunk on everything down below, which is basically the opposite of what you’re trying to accomplish. To avoid that, forget what you think you know about opening umbrellas indoors and try this trick to make sure…

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If you’re overweight, biking might be the ultimate way to get active and get in shape. It’s low impact, so you can get an intense workout without crushing your joints and bones. It’s great for building your leg muscles, strengthening your core, burning calories, and for cardiovascular fitness. But best of all, bombing…

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If you tend to lie awake in bed, anxious about what you’ve forgotten to do today or prepare for tomorrow, it’s likely you’re not taking advantage of Google Assistant’s “Bedtime” routine. Once you’ve set it up, you can simply say “Goodnight” to Google through any device, and Assistant will execute an automated set of…

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Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) snapped at a Capitol Hill reporter on Tuesday after she asked a question regarding how he bridges the divide between moderate and MAGA House members.

“What do say to the moderates in your party who say you continue to side with and appease the right wing on many issues,” an off-camera reporter began.

“Such as what?!” snapped McCarthy.

“I’m talking about an impeachment inquiry of President Biden, on appropriations, on the long list of things,” the reporter replied.

“Well, I don’t know, because you haven’t quoted anybody. You just say something. You say you frame some brand of something,” McCarthy replied before going into a lengthy diatribe accusing President Joe Biden of corruption.

“So right now you have a president who told you and every other American that he’s never talked to his family about business and they never got $1 from China. You now know that’s not true. You have a president while he was vice president that got 16 out of 17 payments from Romania,” McCarthy claimed.

As he wrapped up, he concluded, “Congress has a responsibility for the investigation wing. All I’m saying is, and I’m sure you would probably ask the same question, where’s the truth? You’ve got to get to the bottom of the truth. And the only way Congress can do that is to go to impeachment inquiry. That gives Republicans and Democrats the ability to get all the information.”

McCarthy raised the possibility of opening an impeachment inquiry into President Biden on Monday night while on Fox News.

Watch the full clip on Fox News.

CNN anchor Abby Phillip asked R&B star Monica about the “incredible” moment — caught on video — when she went into the crowd to stop an alleged assault in the middle of her concert.

The singer went viral this weekend when she jumped off the stage into the crowd to stop a woman from being assaulted at the Riverfront Music Festival in Detroit.

On Monday night’s edition of CNN Primetime, Phillip played the stunning clip, then asked the superstar  to take viewers inside that moment:

PHILLIP: That remarkable moment, that altercation was Saturday night and it was caught on tape. It’s now gone viral on social media. And Monica is here with us and she joins me now. Monica, really, I mean I watched it this weekend and I was like, wow. It’s incredible to see you make the decision to do that. What made you jump off that stage? What did you see?

MONICA, GRAMMY AWARD-WINNING ARTIST: Honestly, that was just instincts. And I know that people don’t have the opportunity to know us personally or on a personal level, but the few that do know that everything for me is a matter of the heart. It’s a matter of — I’m a mom, I’m a sister, I am a mother. I’ve said mom. I am — I’m so many things that would allow someone to want to protect me. Simply put, I didn’t want to see her hurt or harmed and her not make it back home after coming just to be a concert-goer for myself and Ashanti who was also on the show.

You know, these concerts have become what almost feels like a dangerous space and place and I just really want that to change. So, that was just my instincts kicked in. I do not feel like I’m some form of superhero in any facet, but I did what I would hope that someone would do if they saw that happening to my aunt or mother. I could tell that she was — she’s definitely my elder. And there was a level of fear there for me, just watching what appeared to be a situation that could have been escalated even further. I was simply trying to de- escalate it.

PHILLIP: When you jumped down there, you confronted the man who you saw allegedly doing this. What did you say to him? No, it was more so, and I know these different views and videos, I’m still getting used to the idea of things going viral because in moments like such, you don’t think about that. I am from an era that is pre-internet, so none of that crossed my mind. What I was attempting to do was to get security who was standing there. I don’t think they were able to hear or understand me asking them to remove them especially once the situation started to transpire.

So, for me, it was all instinct. It was simply just a matter of the heart. I didn’t want to see her hurt. I didn’t want to see her hit again. I didn’t want them fighting. I’m a firm believer that all parties should keep their hands to themselves. Women shouldn’t hit men. Men definitely shouldn’t hit women because at the end of the day, we don’t have, there’s no win for us with them. They’re naturally stronger.

Watch above via CNN Primetime.

If you read about cooking online, you’ve no doubt seen several listicles that tout the many uses of a single, humble chicken. At this point, you know what a chicken can do for you, so another overly-prescriptive, chicken-based meal plan seems unnecessary. My agenda here is very simple: The next time you buy a whole…

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After two and a half seasons, Geralt of Rivia (Henry Cavill) is returning for the second part of The Witcher’s third season. Season 3 of The Witcher had been broken into two parts: Part one included five episodes and aired on June 29, and part two will drop the season’s final three episodes on Thursday, July 27. Three…

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AP Photo/Chris Jackson

It’s not a huge surprise to see West Virginia Governor Jim Justice (R) endorse former President Donald Trump. But boy, can he spin a yarn while delivering that endorsement.

Justice, who is running for U.S. Senate in West Virginia, posted his endorsement for Trump on Twitter on Monday in the form of a somewhat rambling-slash-folksy phone call or voicemail that includes some weird lines like saying if President Joe Biden was his father, he wouldn’t let him keep his job and “allow him to embarrass himself.” (For reference, Justice is 72, Biden is famously 80. And Trump is 77.) Biden, according to Justice, is also “really challenged and sad.”

Other points he makes is how under Biden, “everything we touch turns to doo.”

Here’s the full text:

Surely to goodness, Americans understand, you know, loud and clear the leadership, whether you like him or didn’t like him, that came from President Trump and the successes that happened, you know, when he was our president versus what we have today. I mean, what we have today is just, I mean, you know what it is today. I mean, for God’s sakes, a’ living, and I mean, you know, if President Biden were my father, I would not allow… there was no way that I could allow him to embarrass himself and continue on this job. There’s no way. I mean, President Biden is really challenged and sad and, you know, others are pulling the strings in every way. But anything we touch almost is becoming toxic, whether it be Afghanistan, the border, all the different things, energy on and on and on. Inflation, just one thing right after another, whether it be crime or woke in schools or I mean, it is everything we touch turns to doo. And then there’s people that don’t like President Trump’s personality. Well, they don’t like my personality. But with all that being said, I think that President Trump will be the nominee and I think he’ll be our next president. And I’m very hopeful of that.

You can also listen to the endorsement for yourself, and you should imagine Justice saying all of this to his adorable dog Babydog, who is pictured above:

Black tea is a tasty, uplifting beverage, but it also has other uses around the house. If you’ve got hardwood flooring, you can put together a large batch of black tea to use for cleaning and disguising scratches. It’s one of many floor-cleaning hacks we’ve loved over the years—but it really withstands the test of…

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CNN analyst Ashley Allison pushed back when fellow analyst Scott Jennings attacked Vice President Kamala Harris and claimed the controversy over Florida’s new Black history curriculum teaching the “benefits” of slavery to enslaved people is a “made-up deal.”

The Florida Board of Education voted Wednesday to approve a curriculum on Black history that includes teaching that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit” and requires teaching “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans.”

Vice President Kamala Harris torched the new curriculum in two speeches on consecutive days, and The Tampa Bay Times published numerous examples debunking the claims of the board’s working group, which is headed by the chair of the  National Black Republican Association.

On Sunday morning’s edition of CNN’s State of the Union, anchor Dana Bash played some video of the speech VP Harris gave, and analyst Karen Finney called it a “stellar moment.”

But when Jennings attacked VP Harris for speaking out against a “made-up deal” and cited the Black scholars who developed the curriculum, Allison pushed back:

SCOTT JENNINGS: Well, it’s amazing to me that how little Kamala Harris apparently has to do, that she can read something on Twitter one day and be on an airplane the next to make something literally out of nothing.

This is a completely made-up deal. I looked at the standards. I even looked at an analysis of the standards in every instance where the word slavery or slave was used.

I even read the statement of the African-American scholars that wrote the standards, not Ron DeSantis, but the scholars. Everybody involved in this says this is completely a fabricated issue. And yet look how quickly Kamala Harris jumped on it.

So, the fact that this is her best moment, a fabricated matter, is pretty ridiculous, in my opinion.

BASH: Let’s get Ashley in.

ASHLEY ALLISON: Well, I’m glad she said — went down, and I’m glad she spoke on the issue.

And just because Black people write it don’t mean — that doesn’t mean it’s going to be accurate. Like, we can disagree as Black people as well. I think what the bigger picture is, is that this is happening in Florida. This is happening in a Florida where you have a governor who has an anti-woke bill, who has a don’t say gay bill, who wants to ban DEI problems, who wants to do — wants to ban Rosa Parks. And now you have — children reading Rosa Parks or other academic books that talk about a diversity of issues. I think, at this panel, we can all agree that slaves did not benefit from slavery, even if the citation says, well, they might have gotten something — but they didn’t have a choice, so that’s not a benefit.

Slaves did not have the freedom to choose if — Ron DeSantis said maybe they could have become a blacksmith, not when they didn’t have the choice to become a blacksmith. And so that was what Kamala Harris is saying.

And I hope, in this moment, when we have such a contentious political environment, that we can all agree that slavery was not a good thing and slaves did not benefit, and then we could move on. But the problem is, the governor, who is the second in the polls for the Republican nomination, won’t do that.

Watch above via CNN’s State of the Union.

New York Times correspondent, best-selling author, and CNN analyst Maggie Haberman revealed that the much-derided anti-LGBTQ video attacking ex-President Donald Trump was produced by a Ron DeSantis staffer and “passed off” to a supporter for publication.

“To wrap up ‘Pride Month,’ let’s hear from the politician who did more than any other Republican to celebrate it…” the DeSantis War Room tweeted on June 30, along with a video that would be derided near-universally as bizarre and rabidly homophobic — yet also oddly homoerotic.

The video appeared in the tweet to originate from another account, and merely retweeted and commented on by the official DeSantis campaign account:

To wrap up “Pride Month,” let’s hear from the politician who did more than any other Republican to celebrate it…

https://t.co/FT7LdW4vls

— DeSantis War Room (@DeSantisWarRoom) June 30, 2023

The account owner later deleted the video.

But according to a deep dive on the DeSantis campaign “reboot” published by Haberman and Shane Goldmacher, the retweet was a subterfuge to conceal the fact that the video was produced in-house:

One recent move that drew intense blowback, including from Republicans, was the campaign’s sharing of a bizarre video on Twitter that attacked Mr. Trump as too friendly to L.G.B.T.Q. people and showed Mr. DeSantis with lasers coming out of his eyes. The video drew a range of denunciations, with some calling it homophobic and others homoerotic before it was deleted.

But it turns out to be more of a self-inflicted wound than was previously known: A DeSantis campaign aide had originally produced the video internally, passing it off to an outside supporter to post it first and making it appear as if it was generated independently, according to a person with knowledge of the incident.

The DeSantis campaign declined to comment on specific questions about its spending, the candidate’s travel and the video. The communications director, Andrew Romeo, said in a statement that Mr. DeSantis was “ready to prove the doubters wrong again and our campaign is prepared to execute on his vision for the Great American Comeback.”

The Haberman/Goldmacher article’s headline and subhed — “A ‘Leaner-Meaner’ DeSantis Campaign Faces a Reboot and a Reckoning
The campaign’s missteps and swelling costs have made donors and allies anxious. One person close to the Florida governor said he had experienced a “challenging learning curve.” — don’t paint DeSantis and his presidential bid in a favorable light.