DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Thousands of American kids are being sent to camps run by a Chinese influence and intelligence agency that promote Chinese Communist Party propaganda and even train some children to act like “Little Overseas Chinese Police,” a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation discovered. The Chinese government advertises the “Root-Seeking Summer Camp In China” as an opportunity for ethnically Chinese children living in the U.S. and other countries to immerse themselves in the Chinese language and culture. However, a Daily Caller News Foundation review of Chinese government announcements and the program’s website discovered the camps are overseen by a Chinese influence and intelligence service. The program not only exposes participants as young as 10 years old to CCP propaganda, but some even operate like boot camps run by officers from the People’s Liberation Army and the Ministry of Public Security, Chinese government social media posts reveal. “The long arm of the CCP’s malign influence extends into the United States and seeks to assert an illegitimate claim on all those of Chinese ancestry—regardless of their nationality,” Rep. John Moolenaar, R-Mich., told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “We need to protect all those on American soil from the CCP’s authoritarian agenda, particularly by educating the American public on the true nature of the Party and its dystopian vision,” said Moolenaar, chairman of the House Select Committee on the CCP. ‘Little Overseas Chinese Police’ The Daily Caller News Foundation found multiple examples of Chinese American children attending “root-seeking” camps run by Chinese security and military personnel. In August 2016, over 50 children from the U.S., Canada, Portugal, and other countries participated in an eight-day camp in and around the city of Suqian in China’s eastern Jiangsu province, according to a social media post from that city’s Foreign Affairs Office. Among other activities, the social media post states that the children trained at the Jiangsu National Defense Education and Training Center in Suzhou, which is a roughly 62-acre military base featuring obstacle courses and field combat training areas, according to a local government website. Photos from the camp show two Chinese soldiers wearing fatigues alongside a group of several dozen participants standing in front of a “Jacob’s Ladder” obstacle course. The following year, campers from the U.S. and the United Kingdom donned matching green shirts and camouflage shorts during two days of military training in Beijing, according to a social media post made by the training center. Photos from the July 2017 camp show the children marching, saluting, doing pushups, and standing at parade rest under the watchful eye of People’s Liberation Army soldiers. Other photos show participants smiling and hugging the soldiers. The Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported that the Chinese military has been conducting “National Defense Education” within Chinese kindergartens for years. Along with learning drill commands, the weeklong boot camps also familiarize kindergarteners with a wide variety of toy weapons, including knives, rifles, grenades, mortars, and shoulder-fired missiles. This summer Chinese kindergarteners are practicing "rifle tactics" and running around playing squad-based skirmish games shooting each other at National Defense Education boot camps that @Dailycaller reported onWatch this video: pic.twitter.com/FkubmCC9O4— Philip Lenczycki ?? (@LenczyckiPhilip) July 10, 2023 The Daily Caller News Foundation discovered another “root-seeking” camp overseen by China’s national police authority, the Ministry of Public Security. In July 2019, over 1,000 overseas Chinese children from the U.S. and other countries took part in a series of camps spread throughout the city of Wenzhou in China’s eastern Zhejiang province, Chinese-language media outlet Sohu reported. Participants in at least one of the camps trained alongside Ministry of Public Security officers at a police station in the city’s Li’Ao subdistrict, according to an announcement from the provincial All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese, which the Department of Justice identifies as an “agency” of a Chinese influence and intelligence service called the United Front Work Department. Camp participants wore matching black T-shirts featuring the English word “POLICE” as well as matching hats bearing a Ministry of Public Security badge, photos show. During the program’s convocation ceremony, Ministry of Public Security and All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese officials inducted the children into a squad of “Little Overseas Chinese Police,” saying they hoped the new cadets would “guide more overseas Chinese youth to join the ranks of the Little Overseas Chinese Police,” All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese’s report states. Afterward, Ministry of Public Security officials showed the children the police station’s “intelligence room” as well as a room dedicated to recruiting and training CCP members, All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese reported. Brandon Weichert, a national security analyst at the National Interest, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the “Little Overseas Chinese Police” camp may aim to threaten participants into operating as informants. “We’re always watching you,” Weichert said, “why don’t you help us keep tabs on mom and dad or grandma and grandpa or brother and sister?” (Image created by the Daily Caller News Foundation with screenshots from Chinese government social media accounts) ‘Get Them While They’re Young’ The Chinese government’s “root-seeking” camp program was jointly launched by the State Council’s Overseas Chinese Affairs Office and its China Overseas Exchange Association in 1999, according to an announcement on the New York Chinese Consulate website. The Overseas Chinese Affairs Office officially became a United Front Work Department bureau in 2018, Chinese government records show. In 2001, the “root-seeking” program welcomed 3,000 participants from over 40 countries and grew to over 6,000 participants from 51 countries by 2010, according to Chinese state-run media. The number of participants nearly doubled by 2018, according to a New York Chinese Consulate announcement from that year. “Every year, over 10,000 overseas Chinese teenagers from around the globe are invited to come to China to visit, inspect, study and communicate, seeking their roots from their ancestors,” the consulate announcement reads. Chinese government social media posts show the camps are held in megacities, like Shanghai, as well as in remote provinces, including Xinjiang, where the U.S. government says the CCP is committing genocide against Uyghur and other ethnic minorities. Salih Hudayar, the East Turkistan Government-In-Exile’s minister for foreign affairs and security, described the CCP’s program as a “calculated attempt to whitewash its brutal policies.” “By inviting overseas Chinese youth to participate in these state-orchestrated tours, Beijing seeks to mask its ongoing Uyghur Genocide, reshaping global perceptions to reinforce a false narrative over our homeland,” Hudayar told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “This program is not a genuine cultural exchange, but a means of manufacturing support for China’s occupation and colonization.” Although the camps’ itineraries vary depending on location, a Daily Caller News Foundation review found they regularly include cultural activities such as practicing calligraphy or kung fu as well as stops at local attractions like the Great Wall of China or Giant Panda Sanctuaries. Yet, regardless of where in China the camps are held, the sightseeing always involves “Red Tourism,” which state-run media outlet China Daily has described as visiting locations “related to the nation’s revolutionary history.” In recent years, participants have “experienced Red culture” by studying revolutionary martyrs, by delivering flowers to Mao Zedong’s statue, or by dressing in military uniforms at the “birthplace of the Red Army,” Chinese government social media posts show. Opening and closing ceremonies overseen by high-level United Front Work Department personnel are another commonality between the camps, with many even featuring special stops in Beijing to attend functions at the Chinese government’s Great Hall of the People. During the program’s 2010 opening ceremony in Beijing, China’s vice president at the time, Xi Jinping, delivered a speech broadly outlining the program’s purpose, Chinese government records show. “Uniting together as one Chinese people is the shared ‘root,'” Xi said at the event, according to a government report, “the wide-ranging and profound Chinese culture is the shared ‘soul,’ and realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is the shared ‘dream’ of Chinese sons and daughters at home and abroad.” Xi urged participants to become “enthusiastic disseminators” of Chinese culture, “active promoters” of cultural exchange, as well as “emissaries” for friendly contact between China and other nations, according to the government report. The “root-seeking” program now closely follows Xi’s theoretical framework, and the Daily Caller News Foundation found multiple government announcements from the summer of 2024 reporting camps had trained participants to become “Chinese culture ambassadors” and to “tell China’s story well”—which is CCP terminology for conducting “external propaganda work,” according to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. “The legitimate rights for overseas Chinese to learn and inherit their own language and culture should be respected and protected,” Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the U.S., told the Daily Caller News Foundation by email. “The Root-Seeking Summer Camp in China provides a platform to help overseas Chinese learn their native language, understand their culture, and go to their ancestral country, China, to seek their roots and to study and exchange in China.” “The Root-Seeking Summer Camp has always been conducted in accordance with international laws and the laws and customs of the country where the overseas Chinese live,” Liu added. “The Root-Seeking Summer Camp not only satisfies the needs of overseas Chinese to learn their own language and culture, but also effectively promotes exchanges and integration between different cultures around the world, and provides convenience for the world to understand China and for China to understand the world.” However, the embassy refused to address questions concerning whether or not the program was connected to the United Front Work Department. National security analyst Weichert told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the program aims to “get them while they’re young.” “What this is all about is forming cadres of sympathizers for the CCP, so that they’ll then come back to the U.S. and they’ll serve the interests of the CCP, whether wittingly or unwittingly,” Weichert said. “No country is going to put resources into a program like that unless there was some kind of ulterior motive.” (Image created by the Daily Caller News Foundation with screenshots from Chinese government social media and Xungen Association of Chinese-Americans Inc. website) ‘Unrestricted Warfare’ The Chinese Embassy and consulates in the U.S. rely on a network of Chinese American organizations to recruit children for the “root-seeking” camps, according to Chinese government and civic association records. The so-called Overseas Chinese Service Centers in the U.S. are among those involved in recruiting for the “root-seeking” program, according to their websites, Chinese state-run media reports, and government announcements. The United Front Work Department oversees a global network of approximately 60 Overseas Chinese Service Centers, which include seven U.S. branches located in California, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Carolina, Texas, Utah, and Missouri, the Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported. One year before campers trained to become “Little Overseas Chinese Police” in Wenzhou, leaders of Overseas Chinese Service Centers from the U.S. and other countries met with Ministry of Public Security officials at the very same Li’Ao subdistrict police station in January 2018, the Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported. During that 2018 meeting, Ministry of Public Security officials showed the Overseas Chinese Service Center leaders how the Wenzhou police station’s “Extraterritorial Video Trial Court” works with “Overseas Chinese Police Contact Points” housed in some Overseas Chinese Service Centers to conduct “cross-border remote justice services,” the Daily Caller News Foundation reported. Overseas Chinese Service Center emissaries also posed with Ministry of Public Security officers outside the Wenzhou police station in the same spot where the “Little Overseas Chinese Police” cadets would later be photographed alongside Ministry of Public Security officers in 2019, Chinese government photos show. However, Overseas Chinese Service Centers are not the only Chinese American organizations recruiting participants for the “root-seeking” camps. A 2018 announcement from the New York Chinese Consulate identifies over a dozen Chinese American organizations recruiting for the program on the East Coast alone. One New York-based group, Xungen Association of Chinese-Americans Inc., claims to have recruited nearly 2,000 children for the program since 2013. In July 2024, All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese appointed that association’s chairwoman as an adviser while she was leading a group of campers through Quanzhou, Fujian. Another large U.S. recruiter is an Ann Arbor, Michigan, nonprofit called the Chinese School Association in the U.S., which describes itself as “the largest grass-root organization for Chinese Americans.” “Every year, the association hosts and organizes China’s ‘Roots-Seeking Tour’ summer camp,” Chinese School Association in the U.S.’ website states. Chinese School Association in the U.S.’ board includes the head of the St. Louis, Missouri, Overseas Chinese Service Center, who in 2018 was among the U.S. service center leaders that met with Ministry of Public Security officials in Wenzhou. In light of its Chinese government ties, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey recently subpoenaed the St. Louis Overseas Chinese Service Center. “The CCP embeds itself in our universities, critical infrastructure, and government through elite capture operations and establishes so-called ‘service centers’ that are linked to the CCP’s intel arm to extend its influence,” Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is waging an all-out war against the United States—not with missiles or bombs, but with a sophisticated and insidious strategy of unrestricted warfare to infiltrate, weaken, and ultimately destroy our nation from within,” said Burlison, a member of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability. Xungen and the Chinese School Association in the U.S. did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation The post Chinese Summer Camps Teach American Kids to Be Like Red Army Soldiers and ‘Little’ Police Officers appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Deranged Homeless Man Goes on Stabbing Spree in Manhattan

'Manufactured Panic': Psaki Pulls Baghdad Bob Routine On Males Competing in Girls' Sports

Of course the corporate media were going to melt down over President-elect Trump’s cabinet picks. But the sheer intensity of their panic over the past week has been enough to surprise even their most cynical critics. It’s difficult to quantify anguish, but it would appear the three cabinet picks who have most deeply upset the beltway journalists are Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL) for Attorney General, Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence, and Fox News host Pete Hegseth to lead the Department of Defense. A case could also be made for RFK, Jr. being tapped as Trump’s HHS secretary, but he didn’t seem to elicit the quite same degree of sheer unadulterated horror.     The reaction to Gaetz was particularly priceless. On CNN’s The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, White House correspondent Paula Reid solemnly remarked: “We’ve seen people today, our fellow reporters, crying, hugging in the hallways.” She later added, “No one is endorsing this.” (If anyone actually has a video of CNN reporters weeping in each other’s arms about Matt Gaetz, please contact @banned_bill on X.) During that same panel discussion, CNN commentator Elie Honig exclaimed: “This is a crazy pick! This is a dangerous pick! I wish there was a gentler way to say it, but there’s no use mincing words.” Other objections to Gaetz’s nomination on CNN and MSNBC ranged from, “insane,” to “simply gobsmacking,” to “literally the worst pick in the world.” The reaction to Tulsi Gabbard being tapped as DNI was perhaps less absurd, though barely. Every talking head who objected to her nomination vaguely accused her of spreading “Russian disinformation” or “Russian propaganda.” Former White House Press Secretary and current MSNBC host Jen Psaki went so far as to pretend that Gabbard might herself be a deep-cover Russian agent: “Russian television, which is a propaganda machine, has joked that she’s a Russian asset. I don’t know that for a fact, but that is something they’ve talked about.” As far as Pete Hegseth was concerned, most of the TV news denizens’ ire stemmed from Hegseth also being a TV news personality. In human psychology, this is commonly known as “jealousy.” There was also a dumber contingent of critics who suggested that some of his tattoos were symbols of “white supremacy”. Sherrilyn Ifill, the cousin of late PBS reporter Gwen Ifill, took things a step further, venturing into the land of potentially outright slander: “This is someone who, you know, is know to be a white supremacist.” The corporate media are certainly making their thoughts on these cabins appointments known. But given their serial dishonesty, rank partisanship, and deeply incestuous relationships with the so-called deep state, it’s hard to see their misgivings as anything but an endorsement of the highest order.

Leave it to Miss Universe to mark the end of universal wokeness. Victoria Kjær Theilvig made history Saturday when she became the first contestant, representing Denmark to win the Miss Universe pageant. She’s also making history as the first blonde-haired, Blue-eyed (actual) woman to win the competition in over 20 years. Unbelievable, miss Universe is a natural born female! ? pic.twitter.com/wyuBUZlQ0C — Figen (@TheFigen_) November 18, 2024 Besides the fact she has no bulge, many viewers believe Theilvig’s crowning marks a symbolic end to the era of DEI. Something tells me it's no coincidence women of her demographic have been passed up consecutively for 2 decades. Wow. An actual European, blonde, blue eyed woman won Miss Universe. That’s legal again? The tides are truly turning. https://t.co/GWTiC6rVfi — Eva Vlaardingerbroek (@EvaVlaar) November 18, 2024 President-elect Donald Trump had owned the pageant up until 2015, when he was blacklisted from show business for announcing his initial White House bid as a Republican candidate. The organization had already begun crowning biological men by then, but used the change in ownership to snub even more biological females from state and national titles.   Miss Universe fell into the ownership of a “trans-woman” who ironically rebranded it as a pageant “run by women, for women.” “From now on, it’s gonna be ran by women. Owned by transwomen” Says the new owner of Miss universe who’s a biological male.pic.twitter.com/lQcWMpC9ok — PBD Podcast (@PBDsPodcast) January 15, 2023 He lifted the age limit, placed 60 year olds and morbidly obese candidates on pedestals, and woke-fied the pageant into bankruptcy. Like every industry that virtue signals a bit too far, the pageant world began to die. Now that Trump won back the White House, fans credit the “effect” of the Presidential election results for Saturday night’s surprise shift. Miss Denmark is the new Miss Universe. Probably the first blonde, blue eyed white girl to win in ages. And she doesn’t have a dong. It’s the Trump Effect. pic.twitter.com/xOGGQKy4DU — Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) November 18, 2024 Social media users praise Theilvig’s victory as part of a new cultural tide that rejects everything our progressive overlords have force-fed us the last few years.  From a fellow pageant girl who has endured my fair share of woke reforms and progressive judges over the years, I send my full congratulations to Victoria on a crown well-earned! This was my onstage interview for Miss New Jersey. I didn’t win. I didn’t even place. But I wouldn’t have changed a single word.#FreeSpeech #AntiPCPageantQueen pic.twitter.com/zvoJ3CAWRa — Justine Brooke Murray (@Justine_Brooke) June 21, 2021

President-elect Donald Trump confirmed on Monday his plan to declare a national emergency and use military assets to implement his sweeping mass deportation plan.Earlier this month, Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton told his X followers, "Reports are the incoming @RealDonaldTrump administration prepared to declare a national emergency and will use military assets to reverse the [President Joe] Biden invasion through a mass deportation program."'Game on.'On Monday, Trump responded to Fitton's post on Truth Social, writing, "TRUE!!!"Trump has repeatedly stated that sealing the border and putting an end to the current administration's migrant invasion is one of his highest priorities. He has pledged to "carry out the largest deportation operation in American history."As part of that mass deportation strategy, Trump plans to complete the border wall and move "massive portions of Federal Law Enforcement to Immigration Enforcement," which includes shifting thousands of troops from their current overseas stations to the southern border. The Republican Party platform on Trump's website reads, "We will deploy the U.S. Navy to impose a full Fentanyl Blockade on the waters of our Region—boarding and inspecting ships to look for fentanyl and fentanyl precursors."Trump also plans to bring back his "Remain in Mexico" policy, end sanctuary jurisdictions, and increase penalties for illegal crossings and overstaying visas.Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragán (D-Calif.) stated Friday that the Congressional Hispanic Caucus is gearing up to challenge Trump's mass deportation plans, claiming that it would "have a negative impact on the U.S. economy."Tom Homan, tapped as Trump's incoming "border czar," responded to Barragán's declaration during a "Fox News Live" Saturday interview."Game on," he replied. "Shame on her. She ought to resign her seat at the House because [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] is enforcing laws that Congress enacted."Homan has vowed to send more ICE officers to sanctuary jurisdictions that refuse to cooperate with federal immigration officials."If they're not gonna help us, then we'll just double the manpower in those cities. They don't want ICE agents in their neighborhoods, but they don't let ICE agents in the jail. They don't understand, if you let us in the jail, that'd be less agents in your neighborhood," Homan told the news outlet."I wish they'd sit down and talk and help with us. But if they don't help, get the hell out of the way, because we're going to do this job with or without you," Homan added.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Actor William Shatner said that he simply could not understand why Americans didn't elect Vice President Kamala Harris even though she checked off the right demographic boxes. Shatner made the comments while speaking with Bill Maher on an episode of Maher's "Club Random Podcast," which was published Sunday. 'That’s not a candidate. ... That’s identity politics. That’s one of the Democrats’ problems.'“I don’t know why the Democrats lost. I don’t understand why the Democrats lost!" a befuddled Shatner said. Maher tried to explain that there were many reasons for the election results but focused on President Joe Biden's insistence on staying as the candidate until it was too late. "That I understand," said Shatner. "But inflation? Prices have come down; the economy is good. I don’t know why they voted against her, against the party.”“Basically," Maher responded, "She was not a great candidate, let’s be honest." “Why isn’t she a great candidate?” Shatner interrupted. “She combined several trends of thought here: black, woman.”"That’s not — that’s not a candidate," Maher replied. "That’s identity politics. That’s one of the Democrats’ problems."Video of the exchange was posted to social media where it garnered millions of views. Maher went on to opine that Democrats could have won the election if they had changed their strategy. "The Democrats could have won this election in a walk, I think," he said. "Not a walk, but I think they could have won it — if Biden got out earlier, [if] they had a true primary season to find the best candidate, not just one whose turn was it — who, by the way, before they anointed her, nobody was sort of on the page that she was very good at being a candidate." Shatner is a Canadian citizen and thereby could not vote in the U.S. election. The podcast in full can be viewed on YouTube. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

The 745-mile underwater internet cable linking NATO allies Finland and Germany was apparently severed in the Baltic Sea Monday morning, sparking concerns about possible sabotage. The cybersecurity and telecoms network company Cinia said in a statement that a "fault" was initially detected in its C-Lion1 submarine cable — the only undersea cable connecting Finland to Central Europe — just after 4 a.m. on Monday, killing the services provided over the line. According to Cinia, it could take anywhere from five to 15 days for cable repairs and to get a clearer sense of what precisely is responsible. Telia Lietuva AB, one of the Baltic states' biggest telecommunication companies, told Bloomberg that the incident took place just hours after an undersea cable linking Lithuania to Sweden's Gotland island, nearly 33 feet away from the Finnish line, was cut. Their allusion to Russian aggression prompted some to speculate that Moscow may have severed the line — possibly in a similar manner to how senior Ukrainian military officers and businessmen allegedly sapped the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in September 2022. Elina Valtonen, the Finnish minister of foreign affairs, and her German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, said in a joint statement, "We are deeply concerned about the severed undersea cable connecting Finland and Germany in the Baltic Sea. The fact that such an incident immediately raises suspicions of intentional damage speaks volumes about the volatility of our times." After noting that an investigation into the incident is underway, the duo stressed that "European security is not only under threat from Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, but also from hybrid warfare by malicious actors. Safeguarding our shared critical infrastructure is vital to our security and the resilience of our societies." Their allusion to Russian aggression prompted some to speculate that Moscow may have severed the line — possibly in a similar manner to how senior Ukrainian military officers and businessmen allegedly sapped the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in September 2022. A line-cutting in the area would have been risky business for the Russians given that just days before the malfunction, NATO allies took part in an anti-submarine warfare exercise in the Baltic Sea and likely had some assets in the area. "The Baltic Sea is a challenging operational environment. The local expertise of our regional Allies facilitates success here and rehearsing command and control ensures the effective use of assets," Royal Danish Navy Commodore Thomas Stig Rasmussen said of the maritime exercises that ran from Nov. 11-14. "Training together in Swedish waters offers Allies an important opportunity to enhance interoperability, which is the key to success in real life operations. Our new Allies in Sweden and Finland have redefined how NATO approaches maritime security in the region." When pressed on whether the Finnish cable showed signs of sabotage, Cinia CEO Ari-Jussi Knaapila indicated there was "no way to assess the reason right now." "We can say that such damage doesn't happen without some kind of external impact," Knaapila told Bloomberg, citing ship anchors and bottom trawling as possible causes. Knaapila ruled out seismic activity and suggested sabotage has not been eliminated as a possibility. Ship anchors have done serious damage to undersea cables in recent years. On Oct. 8, 2023, two telecom cables and a rupture to a Baltic Sea gas pipeline were caused by the Hong Kong-flagged cargo vessel Newnew Polar Bear. After months of investigation and finger-pointing, Beijing finally admitted the error in August. Samuli Bergström, communications chief of the Finnish transport and communications agency, told Deutsche Welle, "The reasons are under investigation. Disturbances occur from time to time and there can be various reasons. For example, they are susceptible to weather and damage caused by shipping. The essential thing is that the problems are identified and corrective measures are taken." Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Spirit Airlines, the budget airline beleaguered by gunfire in Haiti and incidents of violence involving passengers and staff alike, has now filed for bankruptcy.In a letter issued Monday and addressed to "All Spirit Guests," Spirit admitted that it had filed for Chapter 11 in hopes of restructuring its debts. The letter called the move "a proactive step ... to position the company for success" and claimed it should be completed sometime in the first quarter of 2025.The letter also indicated that the Chapter 11 filing had been "prearranged."Spirit's standing as a publicly traded company is likely to change. Spirit told the Business Journals that it expects to be delisted from the New York Stock Exchange sometime soon.According to the New York Post, the financial situation at the airline is quite dire. Spirit has already lost $2.5 billion in the last four years and within the next year will have to make debt payments totaling more than $1 billion.In 2022, Spirit tried to merge with another airline. Frontier first attempted a merger but was soon afterward outbid by JetBlue.The merger with JetBlue never took place either after the Biden-Harris Department of Justice intervened in March, claiming it would cause ticket prices to skyrocket. A federal judge later sided with the DOJ, and the two companies dropped the merger two months later, the Post reported.In an effort to restructure its finances, Spirit bondholders have now offered $350 million in equity investments that will allow the company to "complete a deleveraging transaction to equitize $795 million of funded debt," the Jacksonville Business Journal reported.Bondholders have likewise offered an additional $300 million in debtor-in-possession financing, the outlet added.Spirit did not go into such details in the letter. Instead, it promised that its agreement with bondholders will "reduce [the company's] total debt, provide increased financial flexibility, position Spirit for long-term success and accelerate investments providing Guests with enhanced travel experiences and greater value."The letter did indicate that the customer experience likely won't change much despite the major financial shifts behind the scenes. Customers may still purchase tickets and use credit or loyalty points as normal. Its rewards program and credit-card terms likewise remain in place.Employee wages and benefits will also be unaffected by the Chapter 11 process, according to a website with further information about the case.However, Spirit's corporate standing is likely to change. Spirit told the Jacksonville Business Journal that it expects to be delisted from the New York Stock Exchange sometime soon. Once that happens, its stock shares will "have no value as part of Spirit's restructuring," the outlet reported.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

The medical examiner of Manhattan testified last week she was certain Daniel Penny was the sole cause of Jordan Neely's death after watching video of the incident, even though Neely had drugs in his system.Dr. Cynthia Harris, who performed his autopsy, told jurors she did not wait for the toxicology report to declare his cause and manner of death being asphyxiation, not cardiac arrest, the New York Post reported. Harris said she would stand by that ruling even if Neely had enough drugs in his system "to put down an elephant."'I wasn’t trying to kill the guy. I was just trying to de-escalate the situation.'Harris had originally listed Neely's cause of death as being "inconclusive." She said she changed the cause after watching the video, deciding Neely’s death was caused by “asphyxia” since the video showed Neely being choked and “dying” while Penny’s arm was wrapped around his neck.“After watching it, I had no further questions about how he was dead,” Harris testified, because "there are no alternative reasonable explanations."The toxicology report confirmed Neely had used the synthetic marijuana drug K2 prior to making threats on a NYC subway car in May 2023. Prosecutors have told the jury that while it was understandable for Penny to restrain Neely at first, he went too far by not letting him go after passengers left the car.“I wasn’t trying to kill the guy. I was just trying to de-escalate the situation,” Penny said in a videotaped interrogation that was shown to jurors.The controversy around the incident and Alvin Bragg's office deciding to pursue charges resulted in Eric Gonzalez, who helped Penny restrain Neely, testifying that he lied when he was initially interviewed by the Manhattan District Attorney's Office as a suspect in Neely's death. Gonzalez said he lied out of fear of being "pinned for" Neely's death, telling the DA's office he arrived on the scene earlier than he actually did and claiming that Neely had hit him. Neely was not accused of making physical contact with anyone prior to Penny restraining him.Penny's defense is expected to call its own witnesses this week with the prosecution wrapping up a long list of witnesses.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!