ABC’s Good Morning America has been the reliable broadcast network morning news show for the left (with MSNBC’s Morning Joe holding that claim on cable), but their toolish, real-life North Korean news lady for the Biden-Harris regime — chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce — took it to another level Wednesday by gushing Vice President Harris was not only “reach voters where they are,” but implicitly comparing her to George Washington. The shameless hack had the led-off story by gushing over Harris as “hoping to reach the small sliver of voters that can still be persuaded with just days to go” and, between “doing targeted interviews, even sitting down with Fox News,” and “holding events with Republicans,” she’s “trying to reach voters where they are.”     Try and read this and decipher if the HarrisHQ X account would have scripted up a segment masquerading as journalism any better (click “expand”): BRUCE: Hoping to solidify support from black men, the Vice President stopping by black-owned businesses in Detroit and sitting down with popular radio host Charlamagne tha God, outlining her plan to boost black homeownership, grow generational wealth, and lower prescription costs, trying to cut through misinformation about her agenda. HARRIS: They are trying to scare people away because they know they otherwise have nothing to run on. Ask Donald Trump what his plan is for black Americans. BRUCE: Speaking to voters who may be swayed by Trump, Harris urging them not to fall for his tough talk. HARRIS: It’s a sign of weakness that you want to please dictators and seek their flattery and favor. It’s a sign of weakness that you would demean America’s military and America’s service members. It’s a sign of weakness that you don’t have the courage to stand up for the Constitution of the United States and the principles upon which it stands. This man is weak and he is unfit. Then came with the elongated Washington comparison, first swooning over Harris “trying to win over conservative voters not happy with the former President” with a Pennsylvania speech featuring “over 200 elected Republicans, including former members of Congress like Adam Kinzinger.” It got even dumber as Bruce hit her final notes: Harris will make a big push for bipartisan unity urging Republicans to put country ahead of party. She will make the case standing at the same site where George Washington famously crossed the Delaware River during the Revolutionary War arguing she is the candidate who will defend the principles and ideals that this country was founded on. Co-host and former Clinton official George Stephanopoulos flipped the script to talk about former President Trump by screeching that he “was in Chicago yesterday at the Economic Club repeating false claims about the January 6 election, refusing to say whether he’s spoken to Vladamir Putin since he left office.” Three-time anti-Trump author Jonathan Karl focused on Russia, January 6, and a biased view of “16 Nobel Prize-winning economists” (pulled together by Harris allies) to blast his views on tariffs (click “expand”): KARL: In that interview before the Economic Club of Chicago, Donald Trump referred to January 6, the day when his supporters attacked the Capitol and tried to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in 2020 as a, “day of love and peace.” Asked whether he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power after this election, Donald Trump pointed to the last one, insisting it was peaceful and bizarrely saying January 6 was a day of love and peace and falsely saying the police invited the rioters into the Capitol building. TRUMP: It was love and peace and some people went to the Capitol and a lot of strange things happened there. A lot of strange things with people being waved into the capitol by police, with people screaming go in that never got into trouble. KARL: The reality? Nearly 500 people have been charged with assaulting police officers on January 6. Nearly half of them pleading guilty or being convicted at trial. The former President also defending his plan to impose new tariffs on products imported into the United States. [TRUMP-BLOOMBERG CLIP] KARL: In Chicago, Trump also refused to comment on Bob Woodward’s reporting that he has had multiple conversations with Russian leader Vladamir Putin since he left the White House. [TRUMP-BLOOMBERG CLIP] KARL: Just days ago, Trump had a different answer, telling me he had not spoken to Putin. [TRUMP-KARL CLIP] KARL: The Kremlin has also denied the two men have spoken but they have not denied Woodward’s reporting that Trump secretly sent the Russian leader Covid testing machines during the early days of the pandemic when most Americans could not get Covid tests. Regarding those tariffs, most Americans — most economists say that tariffs — the cost of tariffs are borne by American consumers. And, recently, George, earlier this year a group of 16 Nobel Prize-winning economists warn that the Trump tariffs would, “reignite inflation.” Stephanopoulos weighed in as well with concern about Trump’s “rhetoric taking an even darker turn” and arguing it’s “absolutely unprecedented in American history.” NBC’s Today didn’t make the Harris to Washington plunge, but they still carried water for her. Co-host Savannah Guthrie fretted in a tease that Trump “double[d] down on his rhetoric against those who disagree with him” and boasted Harris was “trying to shore up the key voting block that she continues to struggle with.” Fellow co-host Hoda Kotb picked up on that first part later in setting the table for the show’s political coverage: “[F]ormer President Trump is doubling down on his controversial comments labeling Democrats, ‘the enemy from within.’ Vice President Harris continuing to condemn his rhetoric.” Chief White House correspondent Peter Alexander cut straight to the Harris talking points: “Vice President Harris is trying to make sure that voters do not ignore former President Trump’s increasingly incendiary language.” He added that Trump “doubled down” in a new interview “on his inflammatory remarks, referring to Democrats as the enemy from within” and hyped his friends on the left as having “seized on that language, warning voters a second Trump term would be dangerous.” On the faux Republican event, Alexander kept it together: “Harris is going to deliver a speech outside of Philadelphia, joined by more than 100 Republicans who support her campaign, Savannah, warning that Trump poses a threat to the Constitution.” To its credit, CBS Mornings was far more muted. Correspondent Nikole Killion framed Economic Club event as a place where Trump “rebutted claims his proposal to implement tariffs on foreign goods would hike consumer prices” and “was also coy about reported conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.” White House and election correspondent Ed O’Keefe covered Harris’s stops, correctly admitting trepidation from some in the black community toward her and that, in her Charlamagne tha God interview, she had “to defend herself against accusations she is doing this outreach now, just because of political timing.” To see the relevant transcripts from October 16, click here (for ABC), here (for CBS), and here (for NBC).

Pro-free speech academics are calling on Congress to halt the “unethical” government-funded censorship experiments causing “harm” to Americans.  Stanford Medical School professor Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and liber-net CEO and former Harvard Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society fellow Andrew Lowenthal wrote an opinion piece for the New York Post reaming misinformation research and government censorship efforts. In their piece, the pair noted that government-funded censorship research often flies under the radar. “Under the guise of combating misinformation, the US government funds universities, ostensibly to analyze social-media trends — but in truth, to help censor the Internet,” they wrote. The pair also called on Congress “to penalize universities” and defund their “misinformation” studies. Bhattacharya and Lowenthal referenced the Twitter Files that detailed how universities collaborate with or receive funding from the U.S. government to target so-called “misinformation” online. The authors called this research “unethical”  and “violating the prime directive of academic research: to do no harm to its subjects.”  Bhattacharya and Lowenthal noted that there are typically high standards for research conducted using human subjects and that “[u]niversity human-subjects boards are, as a rule, sensitive to even the slightest possibility of harm to research subjects.” However, they noted that these standards are often not upheld against those studying the impacts and spread of so-called misinformation. They argued, “University researchers must prove to these human-subjects review committees that their work will not harm subjects or violate subjects’ rights. The boards have the power to prevent investigators from conducting a research project altogether.”  The authors of the op-ed went on to note how these research teams have become censorship proxies funded by the U.S. government. “Agencies like the National Science Foundation provide taxpayer dollars to universities like Stanford and the University of Washington as part of a broader government effort to pressure social-media companies into censoring speech related to elections, public health and other matters.” They later added that in some cases “research teams are embedded within social-media companies, feeding the results into databases that companies use to delete posts or label them as misinformation.”  The Stanford Internet Observatory has been identified as one such proxy with programs like the Election Integrity Partnership and the Virality Project both of which were revealed in The Twitter Files to be working closely with Twitter and the federal government to censor Americans. Similar programs mentioned in the Twitter Files and uncovered by past MRC Free Speech America reporting include the Clemson University Media Forensics Hub and University of Dayton's PREVENTS-OH program and the University of Rhode Island Media Education Lab.  Bhattacharya and Lowenthal went so far as to argue that “misinformation” researchers are “defaming” their subjects and conducting studies on them without their consent. They continued, “For scientists and doctors, such defamation can end careers.” Hence many in the medical and scientific professions either “self-censor or find themselves in the cross-hairs of the censorship industrial complex. The op-ed authors gave the example of, when in 2021 Harvard vaccine expert Martin Kulldorff posted on Twitter (now X), “Thinking that everyone must be vaccinated is as scientifically flawed as thinking that nobody should.”  The Murthy v. Missouri lawsuit and The Twitter Files revealed that, at that time Kulldorff tweeted that,  the Biden administration and its academic censorship researchers were pressuring social media to censor posts critical of COVID-19 vaccines, so as Bhattacharya and Lowenthal noted, Kulldorff found himself suspended.  Bhattacharya and Lowenthal called on Congress to hold the universities acting as censorship proxies to account. “Congress should end federal funding of these unethical projects by agencies like the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation,” the authors demanded. “And universities should live up to their stated ethical principles: Stop authorizing research whose primary purpose is the wide-scale violation of Americans’ free-speech rights,” they added. Conservatives are under attack. Contact your representatives and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on “hate speech” and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.

CBS News has a serious addiction problem. They can’t stop using dishonest techniques to help out their liberal friends while harming conservatives.  Most recently, CBS got in trouble for their deceptive edits of their interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. The so-called “Tiffany network” aired two different answers to the same question on Israel in its 60 Minutes, First they aired a word-salad answer on the October 6 Face the Nation. But when the interview aired on October 7, the answer was entirely different. With Harris CBS News used dishonest edits to make the Democratic presidential candidate look better. However, in the case of conservatives, CBS has a record of employing their video editors to make them look bad.  Speaker of the House Mike Johnson exposed how CBS sliced and diced up his October 13, edition of CBS’s Face the Nation interview. Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis has also been the victim of CBS chopping up videos.  It’s not just selective edits. CBS will target conservatives with investigative pieces based on “fake news” sources (See Rathergate). They will also set them up with ambush interviews (See Connie Chung’s interview with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s mother) or even cut their mic off during a live debate, as they did with VP candidate J.D. Vance.   A look through MRC’s archives shows CBS has a long history of using dishonest techniques to interfere with the election of conservative candidates.    1. RatherGate  In 2004, Dan Rather’s most corrupt act as a journalist occurred when he and producer Mary Mapes attempted an election-year hit job on then-President George W. Bush. Just eight weeks before election day, in a September 8, 2004 report on 60 Minutes, Dan Rather claimed “new” evidence showing Bush received “preferential treatment” during his Vietnam-era service in the Texas Air National Guard. “Newly discovered documents spark new questions,” Rather hyped that night on his CBS Evening News. “CBS News has exclusive information, including documents, that now sheds new light on the President’s service record.” The documents in question were supposedly from Bush’s commanding officer, Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, typed on his office typewriter decades before computers and word processors became common in the workplace. It didn’t take long before observers on the Internet highlighted how the “newly discovered documents” looked more like something whipped up in Microsoft Word using the default Times Roman font than on an early 1970s typewriter. The supposed author of the documents, Col. Killian, was no longer living, but others from the Texas Air National Guard office disputed the documents. Killian’s boss, Major General Bobby Hodges, told the Los Angeles Times that he didn’t believe the documents were real. Killian’s secretary, Marian Carr Knox, told the Dallas Morning News that “those are not real....They’re not what I typed, and I would have typed them for him.” Instead of honestly admitting error, Rather dug in but, by September 20, Rather finally acknowledged that CBS “could no longer vouch for their authenticity.” He revealed that his source had been Bill Burkett, a left-wing Texas activist who, Rather admitted, had been trying “for several years now to discredit President Bush’s military service record.” In the end, Mapes was fired and after the election, Rather announced he would step down in March 2005 after 24 years as anchor of the CBS Evening News.    2. Dan Rather’s Failed Ambush of George HW Bush     On Monday, January 25, 1988, Dan Rather, the anchor of the CBS Evening News at the time, laid a trap and attempted to ambush then-Vice President George H.W. Bush on live TV. Of course, Rather’s goal was to embarrass the leading Republican contender for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination.  The segment was supposed to be a “candidate’s profile.” Instead, Rather screamed at the Vice President over the Iran-Contra scandal, making it the sole topic discussed. Visibly angry, he berated the Vice President: “You’ve made us hypocrites in the face of the world!”  But Bush didn’t just sit back and take the bias. He zinged the journalist by mentioning a truly embarrassing moment for Rather. In 2008, Rich Noyes quoted from The Quest for the Presidency, recounting: “...a notorious incident several months earlier when Rather, on location in Miami, had got sore at having his newscast held up by a tennis match and had walked off his set to call New York to bitch about it. The tennis match had ended in his absence, and CBS, with nothing else to put on the air, had gone to black — an empty screen — for six minutes. It was the ultimate embarrassment for a network…”  So when an unhinged Rather yelled and berated Bush, the Republican retorted: “It’s not fair to judge my whole career by a rehash on Iran. How would you like it if I judged your whole career by those seven minutes when you walked off the set in New York?” Bush lowered the boom: “I have respect for you, but I don’t have respect for what you’re doing tonight!”  Even Rather’s colleagues in the press were appalled. According to the February 1988 issue of the Media Research Center's MediaWatch, 60 Minutes co-host Mike Wallace chided, “The style was wrong. Dan lost his cool.” ABC's Sam Donaldson derided, “Rather went too far.... I don’t think we can get to a situation where we make — on our own authority— accusations.”  The cover of the February 8, 1988 issue of Time labeled it “the ambush that failed.” Then-Time associate editor (and future Obama official) Richard Stengel criticized the CBS anchor, describing the scene as “a powerful TV journalist hectoring the Vice President, who had been lured into the interview expecting that it would focus on his presidential campaign.”    3. Speaker Mike Johnson Exposes CBS for Editing Out Arguments They Didn’t Like On October 14, 2024 House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) lashed out at CBS on X.com for how they sliced and diced his interview on the October 13 edition of Face The Nation. He tweeted about how CBS edited out five “important minutes” out of a 15-minute interview — and he exposed the video edits.  Among the sentences CBS cut were Johnson’s arguments about non-citizens voting, pointing out the “Biden Harris administration sued the governor and the state, the Commonwealth of Virginia, to try to prevent them from cleaning up their voter rolls.” CBS did it again in a follow-up when Johnson said “We passed the SAVE Act. You know, in the house, the SAVE Act says you gotta have proof of citizenship before you register to vote. And Chuck Schumer and the Democrats blocked that in the Senate.”   The CBS transcript shows what they edited out [and the viewer wouldn’t notice during the broadcast because it’s edited where the shot changes to a full-screen shot of Johnson]:  MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the FEMA Director says there’s only $11 billion left from that $20 billion that was allocated. So that's a different accounting than this 2% you say was distributed. SPEAKER JOHNSON: Yeah. So they’ve obligated some funds, but they’ve only distributed 2%, [and when I was there on the ground, and you should go, I mean, bring the cameras and talk to the people there, they'll tell you, don't- don't take politicians words for this or the administration's word, talk to the people there on the ground they had not been provided the resources almost two weeks out from the storm that they desperately needed. And when I was there 13 days, post- you know, post the storm hitting that state, people are still being rescued. They're stuck in the higher elevations in the mountains because the roads are down and all the rest. So they need every- every available resource and all hands on deck.] The rescue and recovery efforts are still going on, and then we address the rest of it. But FEMA was slow to respond. They did not do the job that we all expect and hope that they will do, and there’s going to be a lot of assessment about that as well in the days ahead. That wasn’t the only edit. When Johnson said there was going to be “some cheating” in this election, Brennan pounced. CBS didn’t want to spread any notion that Republicans are the ones for election integrity. MARGARET BRENNAN: You know that it is against– SPEAKER JOHNSON: Glenn Youngkin, the governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia - BRENNAN: The law for noncitizens to vote in federal elections that’s established law. JOHNSON: Of course it is, of course it is, but of course it is. But here’s the problem, there's a number of states that are not requiring proof of citizenship when illegals are noncitizens register to vote. We know that’s happening. [Look, Glenn Youngkin in Virginia, I was going to say he issued an executive order to clean up their voting rules heading into the election. Less than 30 days out, a couple of days ago, the Obama, I mean, the Biden administration, Department of Justice, Biden Harris administration, sued the governor and the state, the Commonwealth of Virginia, to try to prevent them from cleaning up their voter rolls. Their voter rolls. See, that kind of thing creates a lot of doubt and concern in the minds of a lot of the American people. Why would they do that?] BRENNAN: But respectfully, Speaker – JOHNSON: Everybody should want the law to be followed. The biggest removal of Johnson’s argument came shortly after, when Brennan suggested Johnson was undermining the integrity of elections by suggesting non-citizens will vote!  CBS didn’t want any discussion of a “SAVE Act,” or how Chuck Schumer and the Democrats oppose any attempt to insure illegal immigrants don’t vote.  MARGARET BRENNAN: Respectfully, Speaker, you both, in the course of this interview, said that you do believe that states have taken measures that will help the integrity of this election SPEAKER JOHNSON: That’s true- BRENNAN: – and then you just also seem to undermine confidence in the integrity of the state elections – JOHNSON: No, no. Margaret. Hold on. Wait a minute. Wait, wait just a minute. It's not me undermining it. It’s the actions of the Biden-Harris administration and some of these states. Noncitizens are not allowed to vote under federal law. [BRENNAN: Right. JOHNSON: But the states have prohibited it. We passed the SAVE act. You know, in the house, the SAVE Act says you gotta have proof of citizenship before you register to vote. And Chuck Schumer and the Democrats blocked that in the Senate. We could have prevented this, the questions that people have about that, but the Democrats chose not to. They opened the border wide. A lot of people theorize that that was so that they could have non citizens to vote. These are realities, Margaret. I wish it weren’t true, but that's what’s, that’s the concern that people have. And Wisconsin– [CROSSTALK] BRENNAN: – But, but. People can have lots of concerns, but it is already law that noncitizens cannot vote in federal elections. JOHNSON: It is a law. That’s correct, but we have to make sure the law is followed. And that is the whole point. That has always been the whole point of the SAVE Act and all the measures that we've tried to ensure. I believe, by my count, we have about 16 million illegal aliens in the country since Mayorkas and Harris and Biden opened the border wide. And because of that, there's concern, because those people are distributed all around the country, as you know, there's concern some of those people will try to participate in the elections. Look, some of our House races. I believe the Republicans are going to win the House, grow the House majority, win the Senate and the White House. But in some of our House races, I mean, I have a colleague who was elected by six votes in 2020. Some of these are decided by hundreds or a few 1000s of votes. So if you have non citizens participating against the law, and you have no mechanism in some states to stop it. That is the root of so much of the concern. And of course, you know, in California, they have ballot harvesting right? Ballot harvesting is notorious for opening the door for fraud in Wisconsin, they're going to put — BRENNAN: — Mr. Speaker, you seem to be JOHNSON: – In some counties unmanned ballot boxes in public parks, again BRENNAN: Contradicting yourself. The states are run by the state government – JOHNSON: No. I'm stating the facts, Margaret. BRENNAN: – Not the federal government. JOHNSON: That’s right. That's correct. And that's yeah we hope and pray- ] BRENNAN: So if your issue is with certain governors, shouldn't you be talking to them?  JOHNSON: We have been- we have been and the Republican governors have done heroic work. They’ve done their own audits of the voter rolls to try to ensure and do their best duty to make sure that this is a free, fair and legal election. We're calling on all the governors to do the same thing, Democrat governors as well, and Democrat led states in the legislature, they need to do the same thing.   4. CBS Moderators Trample All Over Debate Rules to Fight with GOP VP Pick, Cut Off Vance’s Mic     Liberal moderators Margaret Brennan and Norah O’Donnell were so desperate to make Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) look bad, that they repeatedly broke the rules of the debate to fact-check him. And their so-called fact-checks were so wrong that Vance had to call them out for it. CBS News agreed that they would not fact-check either candidate and would leave it up to the debaters to do that. But throughout the debate, the moderators either offered up fact-checks against Vance.  Things came to a head when Brennan delivered a dubious fact-check overlooking how the asylum process was being abused by illegal immigrants. Vance spoke up to lay out the real facts of how the system was being manipulated, ultimately leading to O’Donnell to cutting off his microphone.   5. CBS’s Lesley Stahl Scolded Trump In 2020: Hunter Biden Laptop Emails “Can’t be Verified” CBS tried to suppress the news about Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop and the emails it contained when it came to light in 2020 after the New York Post broke the story in the final weeks of the presidential campaign. It was such a taboo subject for CBS that when President Donald Trump brought up the subject during an October 2020 60 Minutes interview with Lesley Stahl, it was edited out of the final broadcast.  Fortunately, the Trump campaign recorded the segment left on the 60 Minutes cutting room floor so you can see Stahl claim over and over that the information on Hunter Biden’s laptop “can’t be verified”:     PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Lesley, you’ve discredited yourself. When you say that you’re not going to cover Biden, you’re going to ask him what flavor ice cream he has, okay. LESLEY STAHL: That’s not me. TRUMP: Instead of, “Why did Hunter get three and a half million dollars from Moscow?” Instead of, “Why is an energy company paying your son $183,000 a month, or whatever they’re paying him?” And he has no experience in energy. You discredit yourself. I don’t have to discredit you. STAHL: So this story about Hunter and his laptop, some repair shop found it, the source is Steve Bannon and Rudy Giuliani. TRUMP: I don’t know anything about that. I just know it’s a laptop and they haven’t- STAHL: And you’re making this one of the hottest, most important issues... TRUMP: I don’t know about the two gentleman you mentioned. STAHL: It’s an important issue- TRUMP: It’s a very important issue to find out whether or not a man is corrupt, who’s running for president. Who’s accepted money from China, and from Ukraine, and from Russia. Yeah, I think that’s an important issue. STAHL: All these things have been investigated and discredited. TRUMP: It’s incredible the way you can try and say this and sit there and look me in the eye and say it. He accepted money, his family, from Russia, from Ukraine, from China and from other places. His brother who didn’t have experience became a big builder in Iraq, without experience. Take a look at what’s going on, Lesley. And then you say that shouldn’t be discussed? It’s the biggest scandal out there, Lesley. STAHL: And you think it’s the biggest issue to campaign on? TRUMP: I think it’s one of the biggest scandals I’ve ever seen, and you don’t cover it. You want to talk about- STAHL: Well, because it can’t be verified. TRUMP: You want to talk about insignificant things. STAHL: I’m telling you. TRUMP: Of course it can be verified. Excuse me, they found a laptop. Lesley, listen. STAHL: It can’t be verified. TRUMP: What can’t be verified? STAHL: The laptop. TRUMP: Why do you say that? Even the family hasn’t… The family on the laptop… He’s gone into hiding for five days, he’s gone into hiding. STAHL: He’s preparing for your debate. TRUMP: Oh, it’s taking him five days to prepare? I doubt it, I doubt it. Okay, go ahead.   6. Connie Chung Cons Newt’s Mom: “Whisper It to Me, Just Between You and Me” Hoping to boost the ratings for an upcoming Eye to Eye with Connie Chung, CBS News managed to mar Newt Gingrich’s first day as Speaker on January 4, 1995. The day before, CBS released the text of an exchange taped 14 days earlier between Connie Chung and Newt’s mother. Chung coaxed Kathleen Gingrich into telling what Newt thought of Hillary Clinton. Posing the now infamous “Why don’t you just whisper it to me, just between you and me,” Mrs. Gingrich whispered “She’s a bitch.” CBS was engulfed in criticism for using a statement which many thought Chung made clear was “off the record.”  CBS News President Eric Ober bizarrely complained to The Washington Post: “It’s a legitimate, very good interview that has unfortunately been reduced to one five-letter summary.” Chung introduced the actual piece on the January 5, 1995 Eye to Eye by saying, “You may have heard one small portion of this interview. Now you will see it in context.” It seems both forgot it was CBS which promoted the excerpt and showed it on CBS This Morning, CBS Evening News and Up to the Minute.   7. DeSantis Smashes CBS Reporter’s Fake Vaccine Narrative, So CBS Takes Him Out of Context     CBS ran a malicious and deceptive hit piece against the Florida governor Ron DeSantis on the April 4, 2021 edition of 60 Minutes. Correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi’s whole report proposed DeSantis led a “pay for play” rollout of the COVID vaccine in his state. She spent the majority of the time speaking to his critics, including West Palm Beach Mayor Keith James who alleged wealthy communities were “jumping the line” to procure the vaccine. “It sounds like the Hunger Games!” an alarmed Alfonsi, seriously said. She touted other critics like Democrat State Rep. Omari Hardy blasting DeSantis for not prioritizing minorities for getting the vaccine before seniors. At a press conference, the CBS correspondent confronted DeSantis, accusing him of a “pay for play” scheme with the vaccine rollout, because he gave the most popular grocery chain in the state, Publix, the rights to distribute the vaccine in certain counties, weeks after receiving donations to his campaign from the store (which also donated to Democrats.)  However, CBS completely cut out DeSantis’s thorough takedown of Alfonsi's claim. In the original press conference, he explains for nearly two minutes how wrong the media’s assessment of this has been. “You don't care about the facts,” he blasted Alfonsi. Emails from the camp of DeSantis revealed the shady way the CBS 60 Minutes team operated before their hatchet job suggesting (without actual connecting evidence) that DeSantis engaged in a “pay to play” scheme with the Publix supermarket chain on vaccine distribution.   While there is less than three weeks to go until Election Day 2024, there is still time for CBS to get in a few more cheap shots against conservative candidates. Consider this a warning to be on the lookout for more CBS shenanigans.

The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show was lauded by many on the left for including two biologically male models who identify as women.The fashion show was canceled for six years after numerous scandals related to accusations of misogyny, fat-shaming, and the connection between the brand's founder and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. 'Inclusivity is crucial to the world we’re building, and I’m honored to walk with pride, love and the hope of inspiring the next generation.'On Tuesday, the show returned to Brooklyn in New York but with more "inclusive" models. In order to appease critics on the left, the show returned with transgender models Valentina Sampaio and Alex Consani. The Daily Beast and Newsweek both characterized the inclusion as making "history." Consani is 21 years old, but the Californian began modeling at the shockingly early age of 12 in 2015. 27-year-old Sampaio, who is Brazilian, told People that being in the fashion show has been a long-held dream. “This moment is one I will cherish for a lifetime. Today, the Victoria’s Secret family has shown the world that being trans is just as exceptional and beautiful as anyone else on that runway," the 27-year-old said. "Inclusivity is crucial to the world we’re building, and I’m honored to walk with pride, love and the hope of inspiring the next generation."Victoria's Secret has been criticized by conservative critics of commodifying sexuality and promoting immoral lasciviousness. In January, the company's CEO resigned after trying to rebrand its image to appeal to woke tendencies of younger people. The brand has also been criticized for links to convicted rapist Harvey Weinstein.ABC News has video from the fashion show in its news report 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!

Republican Senate candidates may have a leg up going into November thanks to former President Donald Trump's down-ballot momentum. The most likely pickup opportunity for the GOP lies in Montana, where Democratic incumbent Sen. Jon Tester is lagging an average of seven points behind his Republican challenger Tim Sheehy, according to RealClearPolling. Other Senate polls across the Blue Wall states are closer, but the Republican Party's policy priorities are tightening races that have historically been layups for the Democratic Party. “These voters just feel a greater degree of cultural synergy with the Trump-Vance ticket, and it’s having a downwind effect," Len Foxwell, a Democratic strategist based in Maryland, told Blaze News. "These Senate candidates are in a region of the country where economic concerns such as inflation and cost of living remain paramount," Foxwell told Blaze News. "Voters simply invested a greater degree of trust in Donald Trump's perspective towards the economy, and I think we're seeing that reflected in the Senate races." Democratic Senate candidates in the Rust Belt, such as incumbent Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, incumbent Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, and Rep. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, are all polling just a few points ahead of their respective Republican challengers. Republican Senate candidate Eric Hovde of Wisconsin closed in on Baldwin's nearly seven-point advantage from August to just three points in October, despite the fact that she won her seat by 5.6 points in 2012 and 10.8 points in 2018. In the Michigan race to replace Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow, Republican candidate Mike Rogers slimmed Slotkin's advantage from five points in August to less than three points in October. At the same time, Stabenow won her seat by 20.8 points in 2012 and 6.5 points in 2018. Similarly, Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania shrank Casey's eight-point lead in August to just three points in October. In contrast, Casey won his seat by 17.3 points in 2006, 9.1 points in 2012, and 13.1 points in 2018. The Ohio Senate race reflects the same trend, with incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown currently scraping by with just a 2.6-point average lead over GOP challenger Bernie Moreno. Previously, the three-term senator won his seat by 12.3 points in 2006, by 5.2 points in 2012, and by 6.8 points in 2018. These polling trends across the Rust Belt and the Midwest are a reflection of a shift toward Trump but, more importantly, away from Vice President Kamala Harris and Democratic policies. “The fact of the matter is that presidential administrations get the credit when things are going well, and they shoulder the blame when things aren’t," Foxwell continued. "So when voters, not only in the Rust Belt but anywhere in the country, go to the grocery store and see the price of milk and eggs, not to mention gasoline, continue to go up, they’re going to hold the current White House occupant accountable.” The economy ranks as the top priority, with 28% of Midwestern likely voters saying it is the most important issue in deciding their vote in November, according to the New York Times/Siena poll from Oct. 8. At the same time, 47% of Midwestern likely voters trust Trump to handle the issue they think is most important, while 45% said the same for Harris. “This election is to be based upon economics," Foxwell told Blaze News. "Victory is going to go to the candidates, be it at the presidential level or in the Senate races, who are able to make the case they represent the straightest, most correct line to economic recovery and prosperity." Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Former UFC welterweight Donald Cerrone says he plans to return to the sport — but needs time to come off performance-enhancing drugs.Cerrone amassed a record of 36-17 over the span of 15 years with the UFC and its former promotion WEC, which focused on lower weight classes. He noted that he is 'chasing greatness' and hoping to break records surrounding the most wins, finishes, and fights in UFC history."Cowboy" Cerrone initially ended his career in July 2022 when he lost his sixth-straight fight to Jim Miller with a guillotine choke. Since his retirement, Cerrone has appeared in about a dozen TV and movie projects, including the Daily Wire film "Terror on the Prairie."In a recent Instagram post, Cerrone spoke about using steroids and testosterone replacement therapy as well as his plans to come out of retirement.“I want to go back and get two more fights,” Cerrone said in the video. “When I retired, I told you I was getting my hair done and getting on steroids."Cerrone has spoken about TRT at length, referencing the Transcend Company as being his guide for raising his testosterone levels. The fighter also said he has been taking peptides, which are used for hormone regulation."The last two years, taking TRT and a bunch of peptides. Now we've got a protocol. For all you people that [said], 'Oh, what if you get on it and you can't ever come off?'" Cerrone asked rhetorically. "Well, now I have to come off and piss clean. Fight in a few months. So watch this."In the Instagram caption, Cerrone expressed his desire to return for two more fights and acquire UFC records. He noted that he is "chasing greatness" and hoping to break records surrounding the most wins, finishes, and fights in UFC history."The number 50 [has] been sitting on my mind for a while," Cerrone added. However, that number seems unattainable at this point for the 41-year-old, as he would need another 12 fights to reach that goal, which likely would take at least another four years.Regarding 16 finishes, Cerrone also is unlikely to pass record-holder Charles Oliveira's 20, especially considering Oliveira is just 34 years old. Likely a better possibility is Cerrone's wish to eclipse rival Miller — who is also 41 — for the most wins in UFC history. Miller has 26 while Cerrone has 23. Miller has remained active though, and will fight again at UFC 309 in November, well before Cerrone will be eligible to step into the cage.Fighters are typically required to be in the drug testing pool for six months before they are cleared to fight, assuming they pass their tests. Due to Cerrone's acknowledgment that he's used testosterone, it's highly likely that he'll face more scrutiny from the powers that be. The UFC started a new partnership this year with Drug Free Sport International, the company that oversees the anti-doping programs of the NCAA, MLB, NFL, and NBA.Cerrone currently holds the UFC record for most knockdowns scored with 20.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Last Saturday on Oct. 12, Donald Trump spoke at a presidential campaign rally in Coachella, California. At the event, a man by the name of Vem Miller was arrested and accused of plotting a potential third assassination attempt against Donald Trump. According to reports, Miller was allegedly in possession of fake passports, license plates, and VIP passes and brought illegal guns that were loaded to the rally. Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco even said that they likely prevented a third Trump assassination attempt. However, Miller, who posted bail on the 13 and was released from jail, is now speaking out about his version of the story — which is nothing like the mainstream’s reports. Yesterday, he joined Sara Gonzales on “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered” to counter what he claims are lies. - YouTube www.youtube.com Miller is not only a Trump supporter, he’s also a Sara supporter. “He follows me on Instagram,” said Sara. According to reports, Miller “had multiple passports with different names, an unregistered vehicle, a fake license plate,” she recounts. “Can you set the record straight on that?” “If I had fake passports or fake IDs, that's actually a crime, and at the end of all this, I wasn't cited for any of the things that [Bianco] mentioned,” Miller explained. “I have my citation right here,” he continued, holding the document up to the camera. “It says nothing about, you know, fake IDs, counterfeit passports; it says nothing about, you know, fake license plates. Therefore, you know, if it didn't appear on that, then obviously what I was doing was not unlawful.” “You were telling [law enforcement at the rally], ‘Hey, I showed up, I’ve got VIP credentials, I do have loaded weapons in the back of my car,”’ Sara said, asking Miller to confirm that he “self-reported.“ “Yeah, I just report to them; they usually say, you know, ‘Just leave [the guns] in your car,’” Miller explained, adding that this has always worked for him at previous Trump rallies. He also clarified that there is “a quarter of a mile of distance,” perhaps even “half a mile,” between the parking lot and the rally. “These are two separate locations, so this idea that I was going into a Trump rally with guns is not true,” he assured. “I watched your video that you put out on social media, and you say that this arresting officer was verbally making statements that were very anti-Donald Trump. Do you think that this is why he treated you like this? Do you think that this is where this narrative came from?” Sara asked, noting the difference between the arresting officer and Sheriff Bianco, who “does seem to be a Trump supporter.” “I overheard [the arresting officer] saying derogatory remarks,” responded Miller, adding that “maggots and stupid Trump people” were among the slurs used. Miller suspects that the officer who apprehended him was either trying to “put a Trump fan into a torturous experience,” or Sheriff Bianco has “governor aspirations” and was trying to orchestrate an opportunity for himself to be the hero. According to reports online, it wouldn’t be the first time Bianco has done something to gain the attention of the media. “In 2020, he was seen kneeling at BLM riots after saying that he was part of the Oathkeepers,” Miller told Sara. He assumes that Bianco is just another “slave to the media.” To learn more about what comes next for Miller (likely a lawsuit), watch the episode above. Want more from Sara Gonzales?To enjoy more of Sara's no-holds-barred take to news and culture, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

New York Police Department Detective Bureau Assistant Chief Jason Savino warned that young and violent members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua are not facing any real consequences for their criminal actions in the Big Apple.During a Tuesday interview with WNYW, Savino explained that the transnational gang has a significant presence in the Times Square area, particularly around the former Roosevelt Hotel turned immigrant shelter. He warned that the violent group has even started recruiting children.'It's a product of bail reform.'Savino stated that the police department is aware that the group has gotten its hands on many firearms, as evidenced by photographs posted online by alleged gang members.He described TDA as "tremendously brazen" and "absolutely ruthless." "Individuals ... have committed a multitude of crimes with basically no repercussions," Savino told WNYW.The assistant chief explained that in the New York City area, the group started out as a robbery crew."Twenty individuals arrested for upwards of 50 robberies," Savino said. "And out of those 20 individuals, every single one of them is on the streets today."According to Savino, the young gang members are not facing consequences because of their age and bail reforms."We put a lot on our DA [Alvin Bragg]; we have to look at our judges as well," he added.As the gang has continued to establish itself in the city, its recruiting process has become more organized, he added."Formerly, it was kind of scattered all over the place," Savino said of TDA's recruiting efforts. "But now we're seeing that structure where there's actually kick-ups where people are recruiting these young members — as young as 11, and they've been described in some of these robbery incidents as young as eight years old."Savino is deeply concerned there will soon be a gang war because the TDA subset in Times Square, which refers to itself as "Los Diablos de la 42" or "Little Devils on 42nd Street," has "called out" the Latin Kings, one of the city's most notorious gang. "It's a recipe for potential disaster," Savino told WNYW. He told the New York Post that the gang is communicating with one another using group chats "on their government-issued phones.""It's a product of bail reform," Savino added. "We tried to try some in criminal court, somewhat unsuccessfully."Bragg's office did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

The Harris-Walz campaign appeared to backtrack on the exclusive nature of the "Opportunity Agenda for Black Men" on Wednesday after many ridiculed the policies on social media. The Democratic presidential campaign pushed out the agenda with a list of items meant to appeal to black men after polling showed that Vice President Kamala Harris was hemorrhaging support from the black community, especially males. 'There are KKK members less racist than this document.' Only two days later, the campaign confirmed to the Wall Street Journal that the policies would be available to other Americans on a "race-neutral" basis.The policies included 1 million fully forgivable loans for black entrepreneurs, decriminalization of marijuana possession, protection of cryptocurrency investments of black men, and support for job training and education programs for blacks. A post from the Harris account on social media garnered more than 34 million views, but many of those contained mockery and ridicule from those who saw it as racist and patronizing. "If 40% of your scheme to enrich black men involves crypto and weed you’re probably doing it wrong," read one popular response. "Constitutionally dubious pandering aside; if you people start talking like this all the time, I may actually lose my mind," replied another critic. "Wait her agenda for helping Black guys promotes crypto and weed?" read another response. "There are KKK members less racist than this document." Others pointed out the bizarre incongruity of supporting marijuana decriminalization after Harris imprisoned so many for marijuana offenses during her time as California's attorney general. CNN polling analyst Harry Enten documented how the black vote was turning away from supporting Democrats over many decades, but especially black males. Although the black vote is still reliably in favor of Democrats, the margin has eroded away more and more. "This is part of a long-standing trend of young black men moving away from the Democratic Party," said Enten. "Kamala Harris is just the latest to face that magnitude of younger black men going toward Republicans."Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Lebanon has a real chance to escape Hezbollah’s influence — if the country’s leaders care to seize the opportunity.