Jay Bhattacharya, a Stanford University physician and economist, has reportedly emerged as the leading candidate to be the head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Bhattacharya is known for criticizing the government’s COVID-19 response, specifically the decisions of former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci. “This signals a potential shift toward ‘focused protection’ policies over sweeping mandates. With an annual $48B budget, new NIH leadership could redefine U.S. health policy,” Mario Nawfal noted. TRUMP LEANS TOWARDS JAY BHATTACHARYA FOR N.I.H. Stanford professor Jay Bhattacharya, known for his criticism of COVID lockdowns and co-authoring the Great Barrington Declaration, is reportedly Trump’s top choice for N.I.H. (National Institute of Health) director. This… pic.twitter.com/PcNuELVMti — Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) November 24, 2024 Per Reuters: The Stanford-trained physician and economist met with Robert F. Kennedy Jr, Trump’s pick to lead HHS this week and impressed him with his ideas to overhaul NIH, the report said. Trump’s transition team did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Bhattacharya has called for shifting the agency’s focus toward funding more innovative research and reducing the influence of some of its longest-serving career officials, the report added. Trump picked Kennedy earlier this month to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, the United States’ top health agency which oversees NIH and other health agencies. This would be amazing. Jay Bhattacharya would be a phenomenal Director of NIH.@RobertKennedyJr pic.twitter.com/NtQNS9PG86 — John Durant (@johndurant) November 17, 2024 DEVELOPING: @DrJBhattacharya Emerges as Top Contender for NIH Chief—The Stanford professor of Health Policy was a leading critic of government-imposed lockdowns and restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.https://t.co/dn19lZZMc7 pic.twitter.com/lLDMTwlpk5 — Jan Jekielek (@JanJekielek) November 18, 2024 “The public did not know that there were prominent scientists that disagreed with the lockdown policies. They wanted to create an illusion of consensus,” Bhattacharya said. WATCH: Dr. Jay Bhattacharya: “The public did not know that there were prominent scientists that disagreed with the lockdown policies. They wanted to create an illusion of consensus!” pic.twitter.com/S8LjeMYu4N — Jan ? Jensen (@_Jan_Jensen) November 19, 2024 “Francis Collins, when I wrote the Great Barrington Declaration, which argued against lockdowns and in favor of focused protection for vulnerable older people in October 2020. You know we’re out with Martin Kulldorff and Sunetra Gupta at Harvard and Oxford, the head of the NIH, Francis Collins, wrote an email to Tony Fauci four days after we wrote the declaration calling for a devastating takedown of the premise of the declaration,” he explained. WATCH: During the Covid era, the government used the excuse of suppressing "misinformation" to suppress criticism of its misinformation. Dr Jay Bhattacharya @DrJBhattacharya, was demonized, suppressed, and shadow-banned [as revealed by the #twitterfiles].@gbdeclaration pic.twitter.com/wchJ07zNxj — Asher Press (@AsherPress) November 18, 2024 From the Washington Examiner: Bhattacharya has been a strong critic of the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, directing specific attention at Dr. Anthony Fauci, a former NIH official and head of the pandemic response before retiring at the end of 2022. Fauci has faced intense questioning from Republicans over the years, including most recently in the House this past summer. Bhattacharya also co-authored the Great Barrington Declaration, a document that called for scaling down lockdown policies in favor of herd immunity for those less vulnerable to COVID-19, while still protecting those who are. According to his Stanford University page, he is a professor of both health policy and economics at Stanford, while also serving as a senior fellow for the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and director of the Center on the Demography and Economics of Health and Aging.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) released a statement announcing that three suspects have been arrested in connection to the death of Rabbi Zvi Kogan who had been missing for several days. 

Incoming First Lady Melania Trump has announced her longtime aide Hayley Harrison will be her chief of staff.

On Friday, a German government official said that Germany would inform the future U.S. administration of the damage that a “spiral of tariff hikes” would cause. This comes ahead of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s participation in the Group of 20 leaders’ summit. “We will enter into very intensive discussions with our American partners to formulate ourselves […] The post Germany Is Very Afraid of US Tariffs appeared first on www.independentsentinel.com.

CNN Republican commentator Scott Jennings argued this weekend that President-elect Donald Trump is building an “ideologically diverse” Cabinet that reflects his 2024 election victory. During a panel on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Jennings noted how Trump picked Russ Vought to return as director of the Office of Management and Budget and Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR) to be the next labor secretary, among many others. “I think Trump is not getting enough credit here for building an ideologically diverse Cabinet,” Jennings said. “When you’ve got everybody from Russ Vought, who’s very conservative, all the way over to the pick for labor secretary — is a supporter of the PRO Act, and somehow Randi Weingarten is happy about it.” .@ScottJenningsKY: "I think Trump is not getting enough credit here for building an ideologically diverse Cabinet… and that's kind of how he won. His coalition was kind of ideologically diverse — that elected him." pic.twitter.com/lgxe57gy8x — Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) November 24, 2024 Jennings was referring to the “Protecting the Right to Organize Act,” a bill written to amend labor laws that passed the House, but did not get through the Senate, and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). “I mean, what he has done is — which makes me squeamish, to be candid,” Jennings said of Trump. “And so what he has done, though, is put together an ideologically diverse group of people to sit in a room and help run the government. And that’s kind of how he won. His coalition was kind of ideologically diverse that elected him.” CHECK OUT THE DAILY WIRE HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE In the 2024 election victory that included winning all the swing states over Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump made gains among working-class voters, minority groups, and young people. And Republicans maintained control of the House and retook the Senate for the coming term. Over the past several weeks, Trump has picked a number of former Democrats who became disaffected with their old party to serve in top roles in his second administration. They include Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has been tapped to serve as Health and Human Services administrator, and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) to serve as Director of National Intelligence. He’s also picked Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) for Secretary of State, now-former Fox News host and Army National Guard veteran Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense, and former Florida Republican Attorney General Pam Bondi for Attorney General after Matt Gaetz dropped out, among others.

Social media star Montana Tucker told Ben Shapiro how she went from singing, dancing, and acting to being one of the fiercest pro-Israel voices following Hamas’ October 7 attack. “That was a really big risk for my platforms because people were not following me to see me cry and to see me talk about something so serious,” Tucker told Shapiro on the Sunday Special. “They were following me to see me dance on the streets and sing.” Tucker, who has more than 14 million followers across all platforms, said she lost hundreds of thousands of followers and received death threats after she became outspoken. “But I also gained a whole new following of people who truly share my morals, values, and mission,” she said. She noted that many of her original followers, who might not have been exposed to her perspective on the war in Israel, stayed with her. “I now have a diverse audience — people of all races, religions, and walks of life — who are not only being educated about this, but are also beginning to truly understand what’s happening.” Tucker expressed disappointment in how TikTok — her largest platform — became increasingly hateful after October 7, a stark contrast to the welcoming space she once knew. “It used to be a place that I felt was so loving and accepting of everyone. Like it didn’t matter what you looked like, where you’re from, anyone had the opportunity to go viral,” Tucker said. “I feel like now, it’s turned into like such a hateful place.” Tucker, 31, said her career shift was deeply personal and followed in the path of her two of her Holocaust survivor grandparents who spoke about Jewish suffering around the world. “I just knew that I had to now take over their legacy and their goal and their mission,” Tucker said. “When October 7th happened specifically, something came over me that it was like, okay, this is now my time.” CHECK OUT THE DAILY WIRE HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE Tucker made headlines in February when she wore a dress to the Grammy’s with a large yellow ribbon and the words “Bring Them Home,” referring to the hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. Tucker, who is from Boca Raton, Florida, said her last time being in Israel before October 7 was for a birthright trip 11 years ago. But after Hamas’ attack, she said she’s been back several times to create different projects. One of her most notable projects was a viral video featuring survivors of the Nova massacre and Lilach Friedman’s Dance Ensemble, filmed at the site of the Nova festival. The tribute, titled “We CAN Dance Again,” honored the 364 festival goers who were killed. Tucker also released her “How To: Never Forget” docuseries in January where she traveled to Poland to learn more about the history of the Holocaust. In December, Tucker will release her latest documentary about the child survivors of Hamas’ attack, titled “The Children of October 7th.” Tucker told Shapiro about one of the chilling interviews she had with a child while filming. “I interviewed a kid who Hamas kill both of his parents right in front of him, and then he had to hide under his mother’s dead body for a few hours so that Hamas would think that he was dead as well,” she said. “Can you imagine living under your mother’s dead body just to survive?” “The lifetime of trauma that these kids are going to have to deal with, they’re never going to be the same ever,” she added. You can watch the full interview on DailyWire+. 

Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) slammed Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s (D-IL) attack on former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) over the weekend, calling her smear “outright dangerous.” Mullin made the remark during a Sunday interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” while responding to Duckworth’s attacks on Gabbard — whom President-elect Donald Trump has tapped to be his Director of National Intelligence — just moments prior on the same show. Duckworth claimed that Gabbard, who is now a Republican, was “compromised” and potentially someone who “will not have America’s best interests at heart.” When asked to respond to Duckworth’s attacks, Mullin said he thought they were “ridiculous and outright dangerous words.” “You have got to keep in mind that Tulsi Gabbard is still a lieutenant colonel in the United States Army,” he said. “She commands a Reserve unit here in Oklahoma and Missouri. If she was compromised, if she wasn’t able to pass a background check, if she wasn’t able to do her job, she still wouldn’t be in the Army.” “And so Tammy is absolutely dead wrong on this, and she should retract those words,” he continued. “That’s the most dangerous thing she could say, is that a United States lieutenant colonel in the United States Army is compromised and is an asset of Russia.” He said Duckworth’s attack could be motivated by her being upset that Gabbard left the party. CHECK OUT THE DAILY WIRE HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE ?NEW: Splitscreen of Sen. Tammy Duckworth slandering Tulsi Gabbard as “compromised” — and Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s immediate response BLASTING Duckworth: “Tammy is absolutely dead wrong on this, and she should retract those words. She’s upset that Tulsi Gabbard left the Democrat… pic.twitter.com/ceDUcabQbD — Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) November 24, 2024

President-elect Donald Trump‘s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) could set its sights on government-funded media programs like National Public Radio (NPR), Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said on Sunday. Greene, who has been tasked with heading a new House Oversight subcommittee to work with DOGE leaders Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, mentioned the network while discussing how she believes wasteful spending is happening all over the U.S. government during a “Sunday Morning Futures” interview with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. “We will be looking at everything from government-funded media programs like NPR that spread nothing but Democrat propaganda,” Greene said, adding: “We will be going into grant programs that fund things like sex apps in Malaysia, toilets in Africa, all kinds of programs that don’t help the American people.” .@RepMTG says one of the things DOGE will look at is “government-funded media programs like NPR that spread nothing but Democrat propaganda.” pic.twitter.com/2ni9GkQypS — The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) November 24, 2024 She continued: “I want to talk to the people at the Pentagon and ask them why they can’t find billions of dollars every single year and why they fail their audit, but not just that, Maria. I’d like to talk to the governors of sanctuary states and the mayors of sanctuary cities and have them come before our committee and explain why they deserve federal dollars if they’re going to harbor illegal criminal aliens in their states and their cities.” In his first term, Trump proposed reining in funding for public media, but Congress did not take him up on the cuts. Earlier this year, while back on the campaign trail, Trump demanded that funding be cut from NPR after one of its editors accused the network of espousing left-wing bias. That editor, Uri Berliner, resigned a short time later. CHECK OUT THE DAILY WIRE HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE “NO MORE FUNDING FOR NPR, A TOTAL SCAM! EDITOR SAID THEY HAVE NO REPUBLICANS, AND IS ONLY USED TO ‘DAMAGE TRUMP.’ THEY ARE A LIBERAL DISINFORMATION MACHINE. NOT ONE DOLLAR!!!” Trump said in a post to Truth Social. When NPR ditched Twitter (now X) last year after being slapped with labels linking it to the U.S. government, the network insisted it “receives less than 1 percent of its $300 million annual budget from the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.” Still, on its website, NPR says federal funding is “essential” and that ending it “would result in fewer programs, less journalism — especially local journalism — and eventually the loss of public radio stations, particularly in rural and economically distressed communities.” In her Fox interview, Greene went on to say: “We’re going to look in every single aspect. And we don’t care about people’s feelings. We’re going to be searching for the facts, and we’re going to be verifying if this is worth spending the American people’s hard-earned tax dollars on.”