President Joe Biden has invited his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy to the White House, days after his administration warned it would run out of money for Ukraine aid in weeks unless feuding US lawmakers act.

The meeting on Tuesday is intended “to underscore the United States’ unshakeable commitment to supporting the people of Ukraine as they defend themselves against Russia’s brutal invasion,” the White House said in a statement Sunday.

“As Russia ramps up its missile and drone strikes against Ukraine, the leaders will discuss Ukraine’s urgent needs and the vital importance of the United States’ continued support at this critical moment.”

Republican senators last week blocked $106bn in emergency aid primarily for Ukraine and Israel after conservatives balked at the exclusion of immigration reforms they had demanded as part of the package.

Zelenskiy’s office also said on Telegram on Sunday that the Ukrainian leader would arrive in Washington on Monday and that he would meet Biden during a working visit that would include “a series of meetings and discussions.”

Zelenskiy has also been invited to address US senators on Tuesday morning in the Capitol, a Senate leadership aide said.

A private meeting between Zelenskiy and US House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson will also be held in the Capitol on Tuesday, Johnson spokesperson Raj Shah said in an email to Reuters.

The Ukrainian leader had been scheduled to address US senators by video last week, but had to cancel the appearance, according to Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer of New York.

Congress has already allocated $111bn to assist Ukraine, and Biden’s budget director, Shalanda Young, said in a letter this past week to House and Senate leaders that the US would run out of funding to send weapons and assistance to Ukraine by the end of the year, which would “kneecap” Ukraine on the battlefield.

“It’s time to cut a deal that both sides can agree to,” Young said Sunday.

The stakes are especially high for Ukraine, secretary of state Antony Blinken said during two television interviews Sunday, given that “we are running out of funding” for the Ukrainians. “This is a time to really step up because if we don’t, we know what happens. Putin will be able to move forward with impunity and we know he won’t stop in Ukraine.”

Blinken noted that Biden has said he is willing to make significant compromises to get the aid package moving. “It’s something the president is fully prepared to engage on,” Blinken said.

Republican senator Mitt Romney said there was bipartisan agreement that something has to be done to address record numbers of migrants crossing into the US from Mexico.

“We want to solve that, to secure the border. I just saw the president of the United States say that we’ve got to secure the border. He’s right. So, any effort that doesn’t do that will be rejected by Republicans,” Romney said.

But Romney also said he supported the aid to Ukraine. “My own view is that it’s very much in America’s interest to see Ukraine successful and to provide the weapons that Ukraine needs to defend itself. Anything other than that would be a huge dereliction of our responsibility, I believe, to the world of democracy but also to our own national interest,” he said.

Republican senator JD Vance said the administration had yet to justify additional aid to Ukraine. “So what we’re saying to the president and really to the entire world is, you need to articulate what the ambition is. What is $61bn going to accomplish that $100bn hasn’t?” Vance said.

Hamas on Sunday threatened to kill all of its remaining hostages if demands such as more aid for Gaza and prisoner exchanges were not met, after suffering repeated losses in its battle with Israel.

The Palestinian terror group is still holding the bodies of 20 hostages who died in captivity, Israel said over the weekend.

Abu Obeida, a spokesman for Hamas’ armed wing, claimed Sunday that not another single kidnap victim will leave Gaza alive unless Israel agrees to all its demands in negotiations that broke down at the start of December. At least some of those demands have been for more aid for Gaza residents and the freeing of Palestinian prisoners.

“Neither the fascist enemy and its arrogant leadership… nor its supporters… can take their prisoners alive without an exchange and negotiation and meeting the demands of the resistance,” Obeida said in a televised broadcast.

The ultimatum came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that of the 137 hostages believed to still be in Hamas custody, 20 are dead. More than 100 were freed in an aid and prisoner pact last month.

Hamas had previously accused Israel of killing hostages during its relentless airstrike campaigns in northern Gaza, with the allegations reiterated in a Hamas video by hostage Yarden Bibas, who blamed Netanyahu for the death of his wife and two young boys.

Israel slammed the claims as propaganda, and it has accused the terror group of stooping so low as to even refuse to hand over the bodies of its dead.

Hamas is allegedly trying to leverage the corpses in the stalled hostage exchange negotiations in hopes of freeing more Palestinians from Israeli prisons and seeing more aid trucks arrive in Gaza.

The terrorists had freed more than 100 hostages during a seven-day ceasefire last month, but after the two sides failed to agree on an eighth wave of exchanges, the war resumed Dec. 1.

Since the end of the cease-fire, 3,500 Hamas targets have been taken out in the Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces said Sunday, with more than 22,000 targets destroyed since the war began Oct. 7 with Hamas’ deadly sneak attack on Israel.

A senior IDF official claimed that with Israel’s latest advancements in northern and southern Gaza, there are now “signs of Hamas breaking,” the Times of Israel reports.

“The extent of the destruction and damage creates command and control problems [for Hamas]. There are areas in the Gaza Strip that Hamas no longer controls militarily,” the official said.

But despite Israel’s latest victories across Gaza, the official said fighting will only intensify as Hamas continues to hold out for as long as it can.

After nearly two months of warfare in northern Gaza, including raiding and destroying multiple headquarters, the IDF is now focusing its bombardments around Khan Younis, the largest city in the south.

There has been heavy fighting reported in the center of the city, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have fled to after being evacuated from the north.

During the fighting, the IDF encircled the northern Gaza home of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, the man believed to have orchestrated the Oct. 7 massacre that killed more than 1,200 Israelis.

But Sinwar had already allegedly escaped south by hiding out in an evacuating humanitarian vehicle and is now believed to be in one of the tunnels in Khan Younis that is part of Hamas’ extensive underground network, the Times of Israel reported.

Along with taking out half of Hamas’ estimated 24 battalion leaders, the Israeli military estimates that about 7,000 Hamas terrorists have been killed during the war.

Gaza’s Hamas-linked Health Ministry believes the war has claimed more than 17,700 victims in all, the majority women and children, with an IDF spokesman previously describing the ratio of terrorist-to-civilian killed as “positive.”

In an eleventh-hour reversal, former President Donald Trump announced Sunday he will not go back on the witness stand in the New York civil fraud trial against him and his company.

“I have already testified to everything & have nothing more to say other than this is a complete & total election interference (Biden campaign!) witch hunt,” so “I will not be testifying on Monday,” Trump said in an all-caps, two-part post on his social media platform, Truth Social.

Resumption of the trial had been scheduled for Monday, but the Office of Court Administration, the administrative arm of the New York State Unified Court System, said late Sunday that it would instead resume Tuesday.

Trump had been scheduled to testify as one of the final defense witnesses in a trial that has lasted two months and is entering its final week of testimony.

He had been expected to tout his company’s success and push back on New York Attorney General Letitia James’ claims that he vastly overvalued his properties and his net worth in financial statements that he used to get favorable loans from banks that he otherwise would not have been entitled to.

Called as a witness by James’ team on Nov. 6, a combative Trump made similar claims while also launching attacks on the AG and the judge who will decide the case, Arthur Engoron. He called James a “political hack” who “should be ashamed of herself” and referred to Engoron as a “very hostile judge.” “He ruled against me, and he said I was a fraud before he knew anything about me, nothing about me,” Trump said, referring to the judge’s pretrial finding that Trump and his company had engaged in repeated acts of fraud.

“It’s a terrible thing you did,” Trump told the judge of the order, which he is appealing.

James shrugged off Trump’s change of heart in a statement. “Whether or not Trump testifies again tomorrow, we have already proven that he committed years of financial fraud and unjustly enriched himself and his family. No matter how much he tries to distract from reality, the facts don’t lie,” she said.

Trump was under no obligation to testify, because it’s his own defense case. His son Eric Trump similarly backed out of testifying this past Wednesday, which the elder Trump said in a social media post Tuesday night he’d directed him to do.

Like his father, Eric Trump had testified as a witness in the AG’s case. “Eric has already testified, PERFECTLY,” Trump wrote, “so there is no reason to waste any more of this Crooked Court’s time on having him say the same thing, over and over again, as a witness for the defense.”

Trump used a similar rationale in his Truth Social posts Sunday, writing in all-caps: “I have very successfully & conclusively testified” in the AG’s “rigged trial against me.”

“The only fraud committed was by the highly partisan & out of control judge, & racist A.G.,” he claimed.

In a statement, Trump attorney Chris Kise said, “There is really nothing more to say to a Judge who has imposed an unconstitutional gag order and thus far appears to have ignored President Trump’s testimony and that of everyone else involved in the complex financial transactions at issue in the case.” Kise insisted that the defense witnesses had already showed “there were no defaults, no victims and no fraud, adding that, “under such circumstances, there is no valid reason for President Trump to testify further in this case.”

Trump lawyer Alina Habba had told reporters Thursday — after Trump appeared as a spectator at the trial — that he was “looking forward to taking the stand.”

She said she had urged him not to testify again because of a gag order preventing him from criticizing the judge’s law clerk, who he had previously complained is biased against him. She said Trump was undeterred because “he is so firmly against what is happening in this court.”

“He will open himself up to whatever they want because he’s not afraid. People that are afraid cower. President Trump doesn’t cower,” she said.

The judge has fined Trump a total of $15,000 on two occasions after finding that he had violated the gag order, and he warned that the penalties would escalate if Trump were to violate it again.

The reversal on Trump’s testimony came after an accounting expert hired by his defense testified that James’ case had no merit and that he didn’t see any evidence of fraud in the financial statements that were being challenged by the AG.

Eli Bartov, an accounting professor at New York University, testified Thursday and Friday and told the judge he had found “no evidence whatsoever for any accounting fraud.”

Asked about discrepancies between Trump’s financial figures and much lower values used by one of the lenders whom James said he and his company deceived, Bartov said, “This is not fraud or an error, because they use a different definition of value.”

He added that valuations are subjective and that the bank and others who used the financial statements were aware they had to do their own due diligence. “My analysis shows the statements of financial condition for all the years were not materially misstated,” Bartov said.

He acknowledged that he has been paid $875,000 to date by the Trump Organization and Trump’s Save America PAC for his work on the case. Asked whether that affected his testimony, he said, “No.”

Bartov was the 19th defense witness to testify in the trial, which began Oct. 2. He’ll also be the last. The AG’s office was scheduled to continue its cross-examination of him after Trump’s testimony.

The AG’s office is expected to have two rebuttal witnesses testify for its case after Bartov is done. After that, both sides will be able to submit filings to the judge explaining why they believe they’ve proven their cases and will then return to court for closing arguments on Jan. 11.

Engoron has said he expects it will take him a few weeks to issue his ruling.

The Touch The Sky rapper, who goes by the name Ye, has been quietly developing the idea for months and has even launched a demo website which his team have been using to test their production.

A source said: “Ye is hugely ambitious but even his inner circle were shocked by these plans.

“He is convinced it could be a huge success if he does it the right way and his team have secretly been working on it for months.

“Ye’s plan is to give people something different than they get from the mainstream.

“It would be launched in the States but his fans could tune in from anywhere around the world.

“Ye is really invested in this project and has a team testing the production daily.

“If he manages to pull this off it has the potential to become absolutely massive.”

When Kanye was slammed last year for making anti-Semitic comments several broadcasters refused to give him air time and scrapped interviews with him, so I can imagine he sees this as a way of making sure his voice is always heard.

Alongside his secret project, he has been hard at work on a new album.

He has teamed up with TY DOLLA $IGN for the record, which insiders said could drop within weeks.

The album was initially set to be released in October but it ended up getting pushed back.

Kanye unveiled a song from it, Vultures, at London Fashion Week during the Mowalola catwalk show.

I revealed last month how Kanye had also splashed out thousands to win back his wife, Aussie architect Bianca Censori.

He took her on a lavish holiday to Dubai after their relationship hit the rocks.

I’m amazed Kanye was able to find the time to squeeze in a holiday.

Media tycoon Shari Redstone is in talks to sell controlling interesting in Paramount parent National Amusements to media and entertainment company Skydance, Puck and the New York Times reported Sunday.

On Friday, shares of Paramount Global Inc. rallied 13% after Deadline reported Skydance and private-equity firm RedBird Capital were kicking the tires on National Amusement, which has a 77% stake in Paramount.

According to the Times, Redstone — the daughter of late Paramount CEO Sumner Redstone — has held talks with Skydance in recent weeks, though the Times said it was unclear if a deal would be reached.

Skydance, which is led by David Ellison, son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison, is one of Hollywood’s top independent studios, and has produced Paramount blockbusters such as “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning” and “Top Gun: Maverick.” RedBird is a financial backer of Skydance.

A sale would be a major reversal for Redstone, who waged a bitter battle for control of the company in 2016, and who later led the effort to merge CBS Corp. and Viacom, which led to the creation of the current Paramount Global.

Deadline had reported that Skydance would be more interested in Paramount’s IP and movie studio, and could look to sell its TV assets, including CBS.

According to the Times, Redstone also discussed a deal earlier this year with Amazon, Apple and Netflix.

A deal could signal the start of a major shakeup across the media industry, as traditional TV companies are struggling to make money in the streaming age.

Comcast Corp. which owns NBCUniversal, could be looking to expand, while Warner Bros. Discovery could be a potential seller.

Disney CEO Bob Iger recently floated the idea of selling ABC, but quickly walked that back.

Paramount Global shares have surged nearly 40% in the past month, but are still about flat year to date.

The suspect who allegedly stabbed a Catholic priest to death in a small Nebraska community has been identified.

Kierre L. Williams, 43, of Sioux County, Iowa, was arrested for killing Rev. Stephen Gutgsell, 65, during an invasion at the rectory of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Fort Calhoun, Nebraska, police said.

Williams was charged with homicide and use of a weapon to commit a felony, the Washington County Sheriff announced.

Gutgsell, 65, placed a call to 911 around 5am, in which he told police that someone was attempting to break into the rectory.

Cops found Gutgsell injured and an alleged attacker inside and it is unclear what William’s motive was for killing Gutgsell.

Gutgsell was taken to an Omaha hospital, where he died from his stab injuries, church officials said.

The suspect was taken to Washington County Jail and the sheriff’s office said that the investigation is ongoing.

‘He is not from the area. He is not from Fort Calhoun or even Nebraska as far as we know about,’ sheriff’s officials said.

The statement from the local church said: ‘The Washington County Sheriff’s Office is investigating, and there are no further details at this time.’

‘Please join Archbishop George Lucas in prayer for the repose of Father Gutgsell, for his family and for the St. John the Baptist parish community in this tragic time,’ the church’s statement read.

Mike Fitzgerald, a parishioner at St. John the Baptist, said the regular 8:30am service at the church was canceled. He told Omaha World Herald: ‘Father Gutgsell has been here 11 years, and I thought he was a very holy man.

‘He did a lot of things for the community. He always made sure that the (church) bulletin had everything in it that we needed to know about things going on at the church.’

The sheriff’s office said that there is no threat to the community and that the investigation is ongoing.

A second person has been taken into custody in connection with the October murder of Samantha Woll, a Detroit synagogue leader, three weeks after police released a suspect from custody without filing charges.

Woll, 40, was fatally stabbed at her Lafayette Park home on October 21 as she returned from a wedding.

Authorities believe Woll was attacked inside her home before stumbling outside. She was found at around 6.30am and pronounced dead at the scene.

She had been stabbed several times, and a trail of blood led to her home.

The man arrested is not an acquaintance of Woll and, according to police, seems to be a ‘random stranger.’

The suspect arrested Sunday is not the same man who was detained weeks ago.

Sources reiterated to the Detroit News that there is no evidence of Woll’s murder being a hate crime.

In the weeks following Woll’s death, police interviewed several persons of interest.

An unidentified man was arrested in the Kalamazoo area on November 8. However, he was released the following weekend without charges.

At the time, the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office said the man was released due to a lack of police paperwork including a warrant request.

However, unnamed sources told WDIV that the suspect made ambiguous statements to detectives that were not enough to warrant murder charges.

The suspect reportedly stopped talking to police by the time he was taken to the Detroit area and hired an attorney.

Under Michigan law, suspects cannot be held without being charged for more than three days.

Woll was revered for her role as president of the board of directors for Isaac Agree Downtown Synagogue.

She was also a campaign staffer for Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, and a former aide to Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin.

Slotkin had led a bipartisan delegation of her colleagues for a moment of silence on the House floor.

‘From working in my very first congressional office to serving as the president of her synagogue in Detroit, Sam had profound faith,’ Slotkin said.

‘Not just as a Jewish woman, but an abiding faith in humanity and a passion for interfaith relations – something that right now is, more than ever, important to our country.’

The Detroit Police Department has asked the community for help in identifying a suspect.

‘We appeal to the community for any information and appreciate your patience as investigators thoroughly examine every aspect of this case,’ the department wrote in a statement.

‘Our heartfelt thoughts remain with Ms. Woll’s loved ones.’

Detroit Police Department Chief James E. White said investigators have ruled out antisemitism as a possible motive.

The attack is believed to be an isolated incident, and Woll’s killer is thought to have acted alone.

Colorado, America’s slimmest state, where Boulder is situated, is set to become the first state in the US for 50 years to ban ‘fat phobia’ by law. And it is not alone in its aims to legislate in this way. Across America, politicians have been planning laws to add a person’s weight to the list of characteristics such as race, age, religion and sexual orientation that are protected from discrimination.

Urged on by ‘fat pride’ groups which have sometimes served as official advisers, several other states are considering similar laws, including New York, Massachusetts, Vermont and New Jersey.

Meanwhile, cities across the country have already started passing laws aimed at preventing discrimination against the fat – San Francisco, Washington DC and, as of last month, New York City, among them.

As the case of super-fit Colorado shows, the drive for fat acceptance is more about ideology than health.

Conservative states such as West Virginia and Kentucky, with the worst obesity problems in the country, are having no truck with such laws. But staunchly Democrat Colorado, woke to its core, sees itself as one of the most progressive beacons in the US. In 2014, it became the first state to legalise ‘recreational’ cannabis.

In fact, in almost all cases it is Left-wing cities and states that are pandering to the ‘anti-fattist’ lobby with new legislation – and very often the same ones that have tried to decriminalise drug use with disastrous consequences in terms of increased addiction rates and crime.

Health experts warn that the new legal protections could further fuel the appalling problems of obesity in the US caused by sugared drinks, highly processed junk food and sedentary lifestyles by normalising the condition.

In America, some 42 per cent of adults are now technically obese (compared to around 30 per cent or so in Britain). The percentage of US children who are obese has quadrupled since the 1960s and now stands at around one in five.

The result of all this obesity is crushing health problems – drastically increased rates of heart disease, stroke, Type 2 diabetes and certain types of cancer – as well as a huge estimated annual medical cost of nearly $173 billion (£138 billion) in 2019.

Black and Latino people are disproportionately affected with half of adult African-Americans obese – which perhaps helps explain why Left-leaning politicians are so desperate to accommodate the anti-fattist lobby.

Intriguingly, the US fat acceptance movement has a long history. In 1967, 500 people staged a ‘fat-in’ in New York’s Central Park to protest against bias, where they ate, and burnt diet books and photos of notoriously skinny model Twiggy.

The same year, a writer called Llewelyn ‘Lew’ Louderback wrote an article in the Saturday Evening Post under the headline ‘More people should be fat’.

In 1969, Michigan became the first US state to ban workplace weight discrimination, followed by Washington state which classified obesity as a disability which could not be used as grounds for refusing to employ people.

But in the intervening years, nothing much changed with regard to obesity legislation – although campaign groups such as Fatties Against Fascism and the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance were emboldened by a controversial 2013 vote by the influential American Medical Association to designate obesity a disease.

But now things have changed. And many fear the consequences of the flurry of new laws – which, of course, appear deeply compassionate on paper – could be disastrous both for health and for business.

They warn that weight discrimination laws could not only end up fuelling obesity but open the floodgates to endless and often frivolous lawsuits against employers and businesses.

An employer who fails to give an oversized employee a sufficiently big desk or a restaurant that makes the mistake of seating a calorie-challenged diner at a cosy booth table could find themselves being sued. In the Big Apple – if such a nickname is still permissible – the new law introduced last month bans employers and businesses from discriminating against fat people in employment, housing and access to ‘public accommodations’ such as shops, hotels, schools and recreation facilities. It allows for limited exemptions, such as the police and fire department, when someone’s weight could hamper their ability to do their job.

An indication of the kind of law suits and discrimination claims that could soon face businesses and public services came from the evidence given by fat acceptance campaigners to New York politicians when they were considering the new legislation. Victoria Abraham, 22, who boasts 122,000 followers on Instagram where she calls herself ‘Fat Fab Feminist’, said she had trouble with subway turnstiles that were too narrow while desks at New York University were too small.

The ruling followed a lawsuit brought by a 28-stone A&E doctor who claimed she had been illegally sacked from her job over concerns she could not stand long enough to treat patients.

However, fat acceptance campaigners feel the momentum is going their way. These activists, many of whom reject the medical evidence of the health risks, have become more aggressive in promoting fat people as victims of oppression and denouncing anything that sounds like criticism of being overweight as a personal attack and even a hate crime.

Decrying obesity is even racist, some say. Academic Hailey Otis claims that, historically, fat phobia boiled down to racism.

‘White people tended to be thin, or at least that was kind of the common perception, and people of colour were larger and therefore less civilised,’ she says. Dr Otis grew up in Colorado and says she experienced ‘a lot of judgment’ from people there because they didn’t consider her to be healthy. ‘Fitness-and-health culture is a… coded way of still excluding fat people and enforcing stigma against them.’

It is this politicisation of obesity, making it an identity issue, that has fuelled the new legislation among liberal states such as Colorado which actually has the lowest US obesity rate of 25 per cent.

There, state lawmakers are working on two weight discrimination bills for next year’s legislative session that together would ban discrimination by employers and housing providers as well as ‘weight-based’ bullying in schools.

One proposal is to include weight in a stringent new anti-discrimination law which Coloradan law firms have warned could allow people to sue their employers simply because a colleague made a ‘disparaging’ remark.

The legislation is going ahead despite the fact that a comprehensive study by Colorado University earlier this year found that a staggering one in six deaths in the US is related to excess weight or obesity, and these conditions boosted the risk of dying by anything from 22 to 91 per cent.

‘Studies have likely underestimated the mortality consequences of living in a country where cheap, unhealthy food has grown increasingly accessible, and sedentary lifestyles are the norm,’ said Professor Ryan Masters, who led the research. ‘This study and others are beginning to expose the true toll of this public health crisis.’

Elon Musk reinstated Alex Jones on X, citing a poll on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter that showed 70.1% of respondents favored bringing back the Infowars host.

“Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” Musk wrote beneath the poll posted Saturday, sharing the Latin saying meaning the voice of the people is the voice of God.

“The people have spoken and so it shall be,” Musk then wrote early Sunday after more than 1.9 million people voted, according to the platform results.

A few hours later, Jones’ posts were visible again, and he retweeted a post about his video game. In 2022, Jones was ordered to pay nearly $1 billion to families of the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting for spreading lies about the 2012 massacre.

The account @RealAlexJones had more than 821,100 followers on X as of Sunday morning. When Jones was banned in September 2018, he had about 900,000 followers on Twitter, and Infowars had about 430,000, according to the Associated Press.

In 2018, Twitter permanently banned Jones and his Infowars show, saying an unrelated video he shared violated the company’s policy for abusive behavior.

The move came just a day after Twitter’s then-CEO Jack Dorsey had testified before Congress about alleged bias against conservatives on the platform. Jones shared a video of himself yelling at CNN journalist Oliver Darcy for some 10 minutes in between the two congressional hearings where Dorsey testified.

Before Musk’s takeover, Twitter had rarely banned anyone not associated with former President Trump, allowing international despots like Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and even terrorist groups to remain.

Musk, who purchased Twitter in October 2022 with the goal of restoring freedom of speech to the platform, said the move to reinstate Jones was about protecting free speech. In response to a user who posted that “permanent account bans are antithetical to free speech,” Musk wrote, “I find it hard to disagree with this point.”

The billionaire Tesla CEO also said it is likely that Community Notes, X’s crowd-sourced fact-checking service, “will respond rapidly to any AJ post that needs correction.”

Jones previously claimed on his Infowars show that the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 children and six educators never happened and was staged in an effort to tighten gun laws. Relatives of many of the victims sued Jones in Connecticut and Texas, winning nearly $1.5 billion in judgments against him.

In October, a judge ruled that Jones could not use bankruptcy protection to avoid paying more than $1.1 billion of that debt.

Relatives of the school shooting victims testified at the trials about being harassed and threatened by Jones’s followers, who sent threats and even confronted the grieving families in person, accusing them of being “crisis actors” whose children never existed. Jones is appealing the judgments, saying he didn’t get fair trials and his speech was protected by the First Amendment.

Musk previously said he would not let Jones back on the platform despite repeated calls to do so.

Last year, Musk pointed to the death of his first-born child and tweeted, “I have no mercy for anyone who would use the deaths of children for gain, politics or fame.”

Restoring Jones’ account comes as Musk has seen several big brands, including Disney and IBM, stop advertising on X after a report by liberal advocacy group Media Matters said ads were appearing alongside pro-Nazi content and white nationalist posts. Musk himself was accused of endorsing an antisemitic conspiracy theory by responding to an X user.

Musk later apologized and visited Israel, where he toured a kibbutz attacked by Hamas terrorists and held talks with top Israeli leaders. But in an on-stage interview late last month at The New York Times DealBook Summit, Musk told company CEOs instating an advertising boycott, and essentially trying to “blackmail” him with money, “Go f— yourself.”

After buying Twitter last year, Musk said he was granting “amnesty” for suspended accounts and has since reinstated Trump; Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West; and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was kicked off the platform for violating its COVID-19 misinformation policies.

Trump, who was banned following the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, has his own social media site, Truth Social, and has only tweeted once since being allowed back on X.

More than 5,600 federal-only ballots were cast in the 2020 presidential election in Arizona, without proof of U.S. citizenship required by the voters who cast them, according to data from the state’s counties.

Arizona is a state with the unusual situation of bifurcated elections, in which residents who provide proof of U.S. citizenship can vote in all elections while the others may vote only in federal elections, resulting in ballots cast by voters who haven’t proven their U.S. citizenship.

Arizona law requires residents registering to vote in the state to provide proof of U.S. citizenship.

However, after the Supreme Court ruled in 2013 that Arizona must accept U.S. voter registration forms because of federal requirements under the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, the state allows residents registering to vote who don’t provide proof of citizenship to receive ballots for federal races only.

Federal voter registration forms require those filling them out only to sign a sworn declaration that they are U.S. citizens.

When residents of Arizona register to vote or update their registration, an election system accesses their driver’s license records to verify whether they have proof of citizenship.

Those without documentation are ineligible to vote in state elections and registered as “federal-only” voters, according to the Associated Press.

Last year, Arizona enacted a law that requires counties to check federal-only voters for citizenship against multiple databases. The counties must reject any federal applications if they find the individual is not a U.S. citizen, and any official knowingly ignoring the requirement could receive a felony charge.

The Justice Department sued Arizona over the law in July 2022, claiming it is “a textbook violation of the National Voter Registration Act,” according to Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the agency’s Civil Rights Division. The agency also claims the law violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Former Arizona Assistant Attorney General Jennifer Wright told Just the News on Thursday that she believes Arizona is “one of the only states to have bifurcated elections” because the U.S. Election Assistance Commission didn’t allow the state to require driver’s licenses for voter registration, despite other states having the requirement.

Wright said that when a person registers to vote, their name is supposed to be compared to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ SAVE database by county recorders to determine if they’re non-citizens.

While there is not a system in place to ensure that the recorders are checking for non-citizens when registering voters, state law requires them to only register residents and certify that the voter roster is correct, she added, citing A.R.S. 16-183 and A.R.S. 16-169A.

If non-citizens register to vote before becoming naturalized citizens, then it could hinder their naturalization.

In fact, according to a report by the Public Interest Legal Foundation earlier this year, the most likely reason for a foreign national to admit that they have been registered to vote is that “they want to remain in the United States as future naturalized citizens.”

In the naturalization application process, foreign nationals are asked whether they have prematurely registered to vote. If there are voter registration records, then “they are often ordered by immigration officials to get said records cancelled,” according to the report.

PILF’s report also found that in Maricopa County, voter registrations for 222 foreign nationals have been canceled since 2015, with nine of them casting 12 ballots over four federal elections.

Below is a list of 13 of the 15 Arizona counties that provided information to Just the News regarding the number of federal-only ballots cast in the 2020 and 2022 general elections and the number of federal-only voters registered in both elections.

Cochise County required a public records request to obtain the information and informed Just the News on Wednesday that the request for the federal-only ballots and voter information was no. 125 in the queue.

However, according to state law, “the county recorder shall report to the secretary of state and shall prominently post on the recorder’s website the number of persons who are registered to vote using the federal or state voter registration form and who have not provided proof of citizenship to the county recorder and, after each general election, shall post on the recorder’s website the number of ballots cast by those persons who were eligible to vote a ballot containing federal offices only.”

At least 5,697 federal-only ballots were cast in the 2020 presidential election in Arizona, most of which came from Maricopa County. Only some of the counties specified as to whether all the federal-only ballots cast were also accepted.

The 2020 presidential election results showed former President Donald Trump with 10,457 votes less than President Joe Biden in the state.

Information for some counties regarding federal-only registered voters came from the numbers reported to the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office about a month before the elections, which includes both active and inactive voters (specified below as “all federal-only voters”). Other counties provided federal-only registered voters that were active. Voters are eventually moved to ‘inactive’ status if voting materials sent to their address are returned undeliverable.

Apache County:

• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 162
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 97

Cochise County:

• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 288
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 297

Coconino County:

• Federal-only ballots accepted and counted in 2020: 335
• Federal-only ballots accepted and counted in 2022: 116
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 2,381
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 2,841

Gila County:

• Federal-only ballots cast and accepted in 2020: 23
• Federal-only ballots cast and accepted in 2022: 5
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 88
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 67

Graham County:

• Federal-only ballots cast and counted in 2020: 8
• Federal-only ballots cast and counted in 2022: 5
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 40
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 45

Greenlee County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020 and accepted: 4
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022 and accepted: 1
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 9
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 6

La Paz County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020: 11
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 0
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 27
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 16

Maricopa County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020: 8,114, with 4,484 of those accepted and counted
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 2,749
• Federal-only voters registered in 2020: 14,298
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 27,441

Mohave County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020: 257
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 80
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 707
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 484

Navajo County:

• Federal-only ballots cast and counted in 2020: 14
• Federal-only ballots cast and counted in 2022: 2
• Federal-only voters registered in 2020: 46
• Federal-only voters registered in 2022: 82

Pima County:

• Federal-only voters in 2020: 1,942
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 27 provisional and conditional provisional ballots counted
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 7,211
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 9,095

Pinal County:

• Federal-only ballots accepted and counted in 2020: 96
• Federal-only ballots accepted and counted in 2022: 49
• All federal-only voters registered in 2020: 1,369
• All federal-only voters registered in 2022: 1,233

Santa Cruz County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020: 7
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 5
• Federal-only voters registered in 2020: 30
• Federal-only voters registered in 2022: 30

Yavapai County:

• Federal-only ballots cast and accepted in 2020: 279
• Federal-only ballots cast and accepted in 2022: 63
• Federal-only voters registered in 2020: 509
• Federal-only voters registered in 2022: 226

Yuma County:

• Federal-only ballots cast in 2020: 179
• Federal-only ballots cast in 2022: 53
• Federal-only voters registered in 2020: 333
• Federal-only voters registered in 2022: 403

Former President Trump will give the final word in his defense against claims his business engaged in a decade of fraud as the New York trial threatening his business empire nears its end.

The former president is expected to take the witness stand for a third time Monday, this time under questioning from his own legal team.

In testimony last month during the state’s case, Trump defended his business practices and declared the trial as corrupt.

“It’s a disgrace that a case like this is going on; all you have to do is read the legal scholars — the papers — and you’ll know,” Trump testified in November, raising his voice. “This is a political witch hunt.”

Throughout the defense case, which began in mid-November, several witnesses reprised previous testimony while offering up their own spin.

The first time Donald Trump Jr. testified in the New York attorney general’s case, he distanced himself from documents at the heart of the case — his father’s statements of financial condition, which detail the value of the Trump Organization’s various assets and were sent to banks and insurers to secure loans and deals. New York Attorney General Letitia James’s (D) lawsuit claims the Trump Organization falsely adjusted the value of its assets to receive tax and insurance benefits.

A defendant in the case, Donald Trump Jr. said he did sign off on Trump’s financial statements while his father was president. However, he said he counted on the work of accountants and executives including then-Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg to be correct.

“As a trustee, I have an obligation to listen [to] those who are expert — who have an expertise of these things,” Donald Trump Jr. testified.

But when he testified again in the defense case, the key financial statements were hardly the focus of his testimony. Instead, Donald Trump Jr. walked Judge Arthur Engoron through a glossy slideshow titled “The Trump Story” — a flashy narration of the Trump Organization’s origin story, complete with sleek photographs of the company’s luxury golf courses and hotels. Notably glossed over were the valuations of those properties.

Jeff McConney, the Trump Organization’s ex-corporate controller and another defendant in the case, had similarly variant testimonies when called as a state-versus-defense witness.

McConney’s testimony was used as a vehicle for state lawyers to show evidence that Trump’s statements of financial condition were integral to some loan deals. He also said he believed Trump reviewed those documents before they were finalized, linking Trump to the skewed documents.

But McConney’s testimony for the defense focused far less on logistics. Nearly in tears, he testified to the exhaustion caused by the Trump Organization’s barrage of legal issues, which ultimately led the 36-year veteran of the company to retire in February.

“I’m very proud of the work that I did,” McConney said before detailing all the investigations and legal proceedings he’s been pulled into.

“I just wanted to relax and stop being accused of misrepresenting assets for the company that I loved working for,” he said.

When Trump retakes the stand, arguments he attempted to make while testifying for the state could be bolstered and reframed after other defense witness testimony backed him up.

Several Deutsche Bank executives, for example, affirmed defense arguments including that the bank wanted to work with the Trump Organization, did its own due diligence and found no fraud. Trump made those points in his own testimony.

“Banks check the work,” Trump testified, arguing that his statements of financial condition weren’t just taken at face value by the bankers with which Trump Organization executives worked.

Deutsche Bank Managing Director David Williams testified last month for the defense that bankers viewed their clients’ statements of financial condition as “subjective or subject to estimates” — and, that the bank took its own look at reports of net worth.

“I think we expect clients’ provided information to be accurate,” Williams said. “At the same time, it’s not an industry standard that these statements be audited.”

“They’re largely reliant on the use of estimates,” he added, so bankers routinely “make some adjustments.”

In the month since he testified, Trump and his counsel have been locked in a battle with the trial judge, whom they claim has been biased against them from the start. The dispute began after Engoron imposed a gag order on Trump and his lawyers barring them from publicly discussing the judge’s staff.

The former president faces a combined 91 charges across four criminal cases, the first of which is expected to head to trial in Washington on March 4.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) suffered a blowout defeat Saturday night in Houston’s mayoral runoff election against Texas Sen. John Whitmire (D-15).

Whitmire, 74, focused his campaign on reducing crime in the city, the Associated Press reported, noting that he heavily outspent Jackson Lee.

With 57% of the expected votes counted, Whitmire was up 86,734 votes to 49,075 votes, 63.9% to 36.1%, NBC News reported.

Jackson Lee’s campaign was embroiled in controversy after an audio recording was released back in October in which Jackson Lee was allegedly berating staffers.

On the secret recording, obtained by Current Revolt, Lee could be heard allegedly berating a staff member because they did not know the exact date of an event.

“I don’t want you to do a g**d*** thing. I want you to have a f***ing brain,” she said. “I want you to have read it. I want you to say, ‘Congresswoman, with such and such date.’ That’s what I want. That’s the kind of staff that I want to have. So some stupid other motherf***er did it. And, and I don’t have the information. Nobody sent me the information. I need to, uh, ensure my, um, schedule and, uh, you know, if, if Boo Boo did it, s*** a** did it, f*** face did it. And nobody knows a g**d*** thing in my office. Okay? Nothing. I gave it to you. Your job was to get it on the calendar, imprint it in your brain, or send me the information back saying, ‘Congresswoman, I made sure that the Ovide Duncantell event that you gave me, uh, for a so-and-so date at seven is on the f***ing calendar.’ Not to, ‘oh, Jerome has it.’”

“So when I called Jerome, he only sitting up there like a fat a** stupid idiot talking about, uh, what the f*** he doesn’t know,” she allegedly continued.

“He doesn’t know. Okay? Both of y’all are f*** ups [inaudible]. It’s the worst s*** that I could have ever had put together. Two g**d*** big a** children f***ing idiots serve no g**d*** purpose. Ain’t managing nobody. Nobody’s respecting them. Nobody gives a s*** about what you’re doing and you ain’t doing s***. And this is an example of it. I gave it to Jerome. This is not child’s work.”

Lee responded to the recording by claiming in a statement that she “strongly believes that everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect,” including her staff.

She said that she was “not perfect” and that she had a lot of “zeal” for serving her constituents.

“To anyone who has listened to this recording with concern, I am regretful and hope you will judge me not by something trotted out by a political opponent that worked to exploit this, and backed by extreme Republican supporters on the very day that polls open, but from what I’ve delivered to Houstonians over my years of public service,” she said as she avoided giving a direct apology.

She then claimed that many who have worked for her have gone on to “bigger and better opportunities” and dismissed the leaked tape as a “political attack and stunt.”

The 53-year-old libertarian economist Javier Milei was sworn in as Argentina’s president on Sunday.

He has vowed there will be no “half-measures” as he confronts decades of overspending, debt and convoluted currency controls in Latin America’s third-largest economy.

“I swear to God and country … to carry out with loyalty and patriotism the position of president of the Argentine nation,” he said as he took the oath of office.

Meanwhile, thousands of his supporters lined the streets in front of the Congress in Buenos Aires, waving the blue and white flag of the country and chanting Milei’s rallying cry of “Freedom!”

‘No alternative to shock treatment’

After the swearing-in ceremony, Milei promised a new era for the country, but warned of painful austerity measures and an economic crisis that will “get worse” before it gets better.

“Today begins a new era in Argentina,” he said, highlighting that “no government has received a worse inheritance than what we are receiving.”

“The bottom line is that there is no alternative to austerity and there is no alternative to shock treatment,” Milei warned, saying his predecessors had left the country without funds and on a path to hyperinflation.

Milei faces enormous challenges

Inflation in Argentina has reached 140% year-on-year, and 40% of the population lives in poverty. Analysts have warned that foreign exchange reserves are deeply depleted, and the heavily indebted country has few options for borrowing.

Milei has said he plans to radically restructure the country, which is in the midst of a severe economic crisis. During the election campaign, Milei warned of spending cuts equivalent to 5% of Argentina’s gross domestic product.

He even said that he would abolish the central bank and adopt the dollar as the national currency due to extremely high inflation.

Guests from around the world

The ceremony’s guests included Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

Milei spoke briefly with Zelenskyy on the steps of Congress, and the two men shared a warm embrace. The Ukrainian leader said on social media that he had also held talks with the leaders of Ecuador, Paraguay and Uruguay as he sought to shore up support for war-torn Ukraine.

The right-wing former President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro was also present, as was Chile’s leftist president, Gabriel Boric. However, leftists Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the current Brazilian leader, and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador were some of the major absences.

Former President Donald Trump addressed a raucous crowd chanting his name at Cipriani’s flagship location on New York’s Wall Street Saturday evening, rallying the faithful and warning President Biden that indicting a former commander-in-chief would be a two-way street should he return to the White House.

“He’s opened up a Pandora’s box that will never let our country be the same. I can only say to Joe: Be very careful what you wish for, but you have done is a terrible thing,” Trump thundered to roughly 1,000 assembled guests, who dined on wild mushroom risotto and filet mignon.

The swanky event was sponsored by the New York Young Republican Club.

“I am being indicted for you. These are not indictments in the traditional sense. These are Biden indictments against their political opponent,” the 77-year-old 2024 frontrunner said.

Trump faces 91 felony counts from four separate state and federal probes — something he repeatedly bragged about.

“I am the first guy who ever got indicted whose poll number went up,” he said in jest while comparing himself to notorious gangster Al Capone.

Trump vowed to win the GOP primary and the White House in the 2024 presidential election — and said he would even win the deep blue Empire State.

“We’re going to take New York,” Trump said to applause. “I believe we have a great chance … With hundreds of thousands of people living on the sidewalks and streets and illegal aliens invading our city and state like nobody thought possible.”

Trump laced into his political enemies as well, mocking Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as “DeSanctimonious,” and his former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley as “birdbrain.” He savaged New York Attorney General Letitia James as “peekaboo James” and a “vicious lunatic.”

Trump spoke after a lengthy evening which also featured remarks from Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) and Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.).

About 30 minutes before speaking, Trump enjoyed dinner at a roped-off table and was spotted in deep conversation with New York Young Republican Club President Gavin Wax. He was also briefly treated to a personal serenade from the aptly named Hungarian violinist Zoltan Maga.

Master of Ceremonies Alex Stein made light of Trump’s legal troubles by joking that he hoped the former president went to jail because it would help with “the black vote.”

Among those spotted in a VIP cocktail hour ahead of the ceremonies included Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.) Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Col.) and Andrew Giuliani. Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon also purchased his own table for the event — where individual tickets ran about $700 a head.

New York City GOP Councilwomen Vickie Paladino and Inna Vernikov were also in attendance. Vernikov herself was honored by Trump on stage — who approvingly noted that he kept reading about her in the press.

“That’s why I wanted to see her,” Trump said after exchanging a kiss on both cheeks.

“Well, that was not planned,” Vernikov texted The Post from her table.

Former New England Patriots Defense End Jake Bequette was also on hand, carrying a Super Bowl ring he allowed admirers to pose for pictures with. Vish Burra, a top aide to former Rep. George Santos — who was expelled from Congress last week after a cascading series of corruption allegations — was also spotted schmoozing and defending his former boss, whom he lovingly called “the Princess Diana of our generation.”

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani sat at a table with his former NYPD Commissioner Bernard Kerik.

As in years past, the event has an international flair. Miklos Szantho, the head of the right-leaning Hungarian Center for Fundamental Rights, and Hungary’s Ambassador to the US Szabolcs Takács both delivered brief remarks from the main stage.

Viewers blasted “Saturday Night Live’s” cold opener after the show mocked this week’s congressional hearings on antisemitism on college campuses — hours after University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned amid a flurry of backlash over her testimony.

The opening sketch, set up as a C-SPAN broadcast, tried to poke fun at the presidents of Harvard, UPenn and MIT — portrayed by Ego Nwodim, Heidi Gardner and Chloe Fineman, respectively — as they testified before the House Education Committee.

There were few laughs to be heard from the audience.

Viewers took to social media to slam the sketch, which some saw as undermining the seriousness of incidents of antisemitism on college campuses in recent weeks since Israel’s war with Hamas began on Oct. 7.

Others thought it was just flat-out bad.

Newcomer Chloe Troast played Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), an outspoken Donald Trump supporter, and targeted her line of questioning during the hearing as the butt of the sketch.

“I’m going to start yelling questions at these women like Billy Eichner,” she says.

“Antisemitism — yay or nay?” she screams at the three women. “Yes or no! Is calling for the genocide of Jews against the code of conduct for Harvard?”

“Well, it depends on the context,” answers Nwodim’s Dr. Claudine Gay, the president of Harvard.

“What? That can’t be your answer,” Troast’s Stefanik shoots back.

“UPenn lady, same question, yes or no?” she asks Gardner’s Magill.

“Well, we are serious about stopping all forms of hatred, anti-semitism, Islamophobia,” she answers. Stefanik then poses the same question to Fineman’s Dr. Sally Kornbluth, president of MIT.

“If you don’t say yes, you’re going to make me look good, which is really, really hard to do,” Troast’s Stefanik says. “So I will ask you straight up. Do you think genocide is bad?”

Fineman’s Kornbluth responds: “Could I submit an answer in writing at a later date?”

“Am I winning this hearing?” an incredulous Stefanik says. “Somebody pinch me!”

The three presidents breathe a sigh of relief when Stefanik learns her time is up, but another member of the committee yields their time back to her, giving her another chance to speak.

“I am here today because hate speech has no place on college campuses. Hate speech belongs in Congress, on Elon Musk’s Twitter, at private dinners with my donors and in public speeches by my work husband, Donald Trump,” Troast’s Stefanik says.

The sketch also ridiculed the vague, evasive answers from the academic leaders.

“Only a hate-filled, anti-Semitic SNL could do a sketch about the anti-Semitic college presidents testifying in front of Congress and make the questioner Congresswoman Stefanik the target of the sketch,” radio host Mark Simone tweeted.

“Rather remarkable how few laughs there were in #SNL’s Cold Open. They – oddly – tried to skewer Elise Stefanik (who by all accounts won the day) as shrill. I guess I was under the misapprehension that calling a woman “shrill” was sexist,” one X user posted.

“The worst cold open on SNL I’ve ever seen the audience was barely laughing,” another wrote.

“Gotta be the worst cold open I’ve ever seen on SNL absolutely abysmal,” another said.

Another user remarked: “SNL is taking a big swing in the cold open and it looks like it’s going to be a miss…”

While largely falling flat, the sketch was somewhat saved by an appearance from show veteran Kenan Thompson, who played the president of the online University of Phoenix.

“Can you take a moral stance on anything? Can anyone here say yes to a single question?” Troast’s Stefanik shouts.

“I am willing to say yes to anything,” Thompson says.

“See, see, finally. A real president of a real university,” Stefanik answers.

“That’s actually our school motto: U of P: We are a real university,” he answers.

Her Stefanik asks if he would promise to eliminate antisemitism from the school’s campus.

“My campus is the internet. Antisemitism is kind of our most popular major, and our mascot is porn,” Thompson quipped.

The real Stefanik, meanwhile, gave a scorching response when news of Magill’s resignation broke.

“One down. Two to go,” the congresswoman posted on X.

Law enforcement officials in Michigan announced the creation of a new task force to combat a surge of burglaries in upscale neighbors by foreign gangs.

Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard announced the new task force, Southeast Michigan Collaborate Arrest Prosecute (SEM CAB), in partnership with multiple state and federal law enforcement agencies.

WXYZ reported that transnational gangs operating across the U.S. are targeting “high-end homes, jewelry stores, and cars” and are using sophisticated methods to carry out their crimes.

Crew of approximately four to six “highly functional and well-trained” gang members have targeted approximately 40 homes in the area over the last couple of months.

“They reportedly use a jammer to overcome wireless security systems that depend on WiFi to operate,” the report said.

“The crews are all dressed in black, with backpacks, and gloves. Bouchard says they are non-confrontational and their goal is to get in and out of the homes quickly.”

The gangs are “mostly from Latin America,” the report added, with Bouchard stressing that people should not use security systems that rely on WiFi.

The agencies involved in the new task force included:

• Auburn Hills Police Department
• Berkley Police Department
• Birmingham Police Department
• Bloomfield Hills Police Department
• Bloomfield Township Police Department
• Canton Police Department
• Chesterfield Township Police Department
• Farmington Hills Police Department
• Federal Bureau of Investigations
• Franklin Police Department
• Grosse Pointe Farms Police Department
• Homeland Security Investigations
• Keego Harbor Police Department
• Lake Angelus Police Department

Watch:

Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson launched a new subscription-based site on Saturday for paying fans to watch his interviews and exclusive content.

“Hey, it’s Tucker Carlson. We’ve been out of work for 7 or 8 months now, hard to know. Time flies when you’re unemployed, but actually we have been working in secret and producing an awful lot of material for months now, interviews, etc. And all of it has found its way to TuckerCarlson.com,” Carlson told his followers on Saturday.

Carlson added that the subscription service was apart of a larger plan, claiming “We’re launching a brand new thing very soon, and we’d love for you to see it. So go to TuckerCarlson.com to see it first.”

Join us. https://t.co/sLkXnGKCFd pic.twitter.com/G8Fv2VVAlo

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) December 9, 2023

Users have the ability to “join Team Tucker” by creating an account and paying $72 one-year subscription to become a “Founding Member.”

Carlson was fired from the cable news network back in April following the $787 million settlement with Dominion for defamation.

Since his removal, the former primetime host has used his account on X, formerly known as Twitter, to release interviews and monologues, including with Former President Donald Trump, Javier Milei, Andrew Tate, Alex Jones, and other.

Back in October, Axios reported that Carlson had raised $15 million to jumpstart his new media company. The new venture will share video content across social platforms as well as have it’s own website and app.

The money was raised via 1789 Capital, which was founded by investor Omeed Malik.

Former Fox News host and current X/Twitter star Tucker Carlson is garnering VP consideration from conservatives and members of President Trump’s team. Now, Tucker has responded to these calls.

As Semafor reported, Tucker gave the keynote speech Thursday night at the American Principles Project Foundation’s annual Christmas gala where he spoke about his Christian faith, optimism, and an America where “everything’s falling apart. Afterward, an audience member asked him to address the VP reports.

While Tucker did not wholly rule out serving as Trump’s sidekick, he said, “God would have to yell at me very loud.” He also expressed anxiety about transitioning from being a well-paid private citizen to becoming a politician.

“To go from being, like, a well-paid street corner schizophrenic to, like, a politician — it’s just kind of hard to envision,” Tucker said.

He also said he did not know Melania, his most prominent advocate for the VP slot, very well. That would change if he officially joined forces to create the ultimate MAGA team.

Despite Tucker’s hesitation, Semafor reported audience members erupted in cheers when Carlson left the door open.

One can understand Tucker’s skepticism about accepting the VP slot. This means bypassing potentially millions of dollars and ceding some of his influence.

But throughout American history, there have been political figures who have expressed great skepticism at the idea of becoming VP only to accept the position later on.

The most prominent example is the current White House occupant. Joe Biden was initially hesitant on accepting then-Senator Barack Obama’s offer to join forces back in 2008 before relenting.

Accepting the position would certainly make one man quite happy. The Gateway Pundit reported last month that Trump explained during an interview with conservative radio host Clay Travis why he would consider Tucker as his running mate.

“I like Tucker A LOT,” Trump said. “He’s got great common sense. We want to have safe borders, we want to have a wall because walls work.

Trump alone will make the ultimate call on who will become his sidekick, and he is anything but predictable. If Tucker receives that phone call, his response will be one of the most anticipated in modern American political history.

University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill has resigned Saturday after widespread public outrage over her testimony to Congress on antisemitism.

The announcement came after days of intense pressure from Penn alumni and elected officials following Magill’s botched Capitol Hill testimony earlier in the week. After refusing, along with the presidents of Harvard and MIT, to unequivocally condemn calls for genocide of Jews, Magill reportedly faced the likelihood the school’s board of trustees would fire her as soon as Sunday.

“I write to share that President Liz Magill has voluntarily tendered her resignation as President of the University of Pennsylvania. She will remain a tenured faculty member at Penn Carey Law,” Board of Trustees Chairman Scott L. Bok wrote in a statement.

Bok said that Magill agreed to stay on until an interim president is appointed.

“It has been my privilege to serve as President of this remarkable institution. It has been an honor to work with our faculty, students, staff, alumni, and community members to advance Penn’s vital missions,” Magill wrote in a statement.

Magill resigned days after major donor Ross Stevens rescinded a $100 million gift to the school in protest of the college’s handling of antisemitism on campus and her leadership. The board of Penn’s Wharton business school also asked Magill to resign and the university’s board of trustees held an emergency meeting Thursday as the school faced backlash over her comments.

Both Stevens and the Wharton board pointed to Magill’s disastrous Congressional testimony in statements explaining the reasons for their respective actions.

Magill will keep her position as a tenured faculty member at the university’s law school.

At issue were remarks Magill made before the House Education and Workforce Committee this week in which she refused to outright say that antisemitic chants and calls for the genocide of Jewish people violate the school’s code of conduct.

During the hearing on Tuesday, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., asked Magill if “calling for the genocide of Jews violate[s] Penn’s rules or code of conduct? Yes or no?”

“If the speech turns into conduct, it can be harassment. Yes,” Magill responded, later adding “It is a context-dependent decision.”

“This is unacceptable. Ms. Magill,” a stunned Stefanik responded. “I’m gonna give you one more opportunity for the world to see your answer. Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Penn’s code of conduct when it comes to bullying and harassment? Yes or no?” she asked again.

“It can be harassment,” the University of Pennsylvania president replied.

Those comments set off a firestorm of scathing condemnations of the university and extracted clarifying remarks from Magill posted on X a day later.

“There was a moment during yesterday’s congressional hearing on antisemitism when I was asked if a call for the genocide of Jewish people on our campus would violate our policies. In that moment, I was focused on our university’s long-standing policies aligned with the U.S. Constitution, which says that speech alone is not punishable,” Magill said. “I was not focused on, but I should have been, on the irrefutable fact that a call for genocide of Jewish people is a call for some of the most terrible violence human beings can perpetrate.”

At least six people are dead across two Tennessee counties and nearly two dozen injured after a gut-wrenching video posted to social media showed multiple twisters barreling through the south on Saturday.

Residents reported seeing twisters in Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee. Those states and Alabama are under a tornado watch that is expected to last at least until the end of the day.

Montgomery County, Tennessee officials confirmed that at least three people have died, including a child, and 23 more were being treated for injuries at a local hospital as a result of the storm.

In a separate report, The Nashville Emergency Operation Center said in a post on a social media account that three people were killed by severe storms.

Multiple municipalities have reported injuries, roofs torn off homes and knocked out power to thousands in Tennessee on Saturday as a line of severe storms ravaged the state.

Several people posted videos of the tornados across the South to social media, including one poster on X who saw a twister from a wrestling school in Madison that caused a huge explosion.

Tennessee tornado 2023. Please be safe.

Friend from my wrestling academy captured this insane video in Madison. Please be safe. pic.twitter.com/2JDWNznfUn

— BD (@BrandonDavisBD) December 9, 2023

A man in Clarksville – which is in Montgomery County – surveyed the damage to his home and said he had heard people were confirmed dead.

‘We’re safe but there are confirmed deaths and lives forever destroyed….my friend lost his home..it went right past our house and straight to my friends house,’ Vincent Welshman wrote.

In North Rutherford, another man surveying the damage said the twisters had destroyed a park and a fire department.

A reporter in Clarksville documented how the chaos had spread across multiple homes, businesses and a Pizza Hut parking lot.

Police and firefighters in Clarksville were responding to multiple reports of damage in the northern part of the city, which is north of Nashville near the Kentucky state line.

Photos posted by the local fire department on social media showed destroyed houses with debris strewn in the lawns, a tractor trailer flipped on its side on a highway and insulation ripped out of building walls.

‘This is devastating news and our hearts are broken for the families of those who lost loved ones,’ said Clarksville Mayor Joe Pitts in a statement.

‘The city stands ready to help them in their time of grief.’

No other information about the victims was immediately available Saturday.

Residents were asked to stay at home while first responders evaluated the situation. In a briefing shared on social media, Clarksville Mayor Joe Pitts said there was extensive damage.

‘So please, if you need help, call 911 and help will be on the way immediately. But if you can, please stay home. Do not get out on the roads. Our first responders need time and space,’ he said.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that a tornado touched down around 2 p.m.

The statement said that there were no confirmed injuries or missing people but that it was continuing to search the area.

A shelter was set up at a local high school.

Pancake stack supercell structure on #tornado warned supercell north of Falkner, MS. Live stream linked in comments pic.twitter.com/b6uAEUTGbY

— Reed Timmer, PhD (@ReedTimmerAccu) December 9, 2023

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee said he and his wife, Maria, were praying for all Tennesseans who had been affected by the storms.

‘We mourn the lives lost and ask that everyone continue to follow guidance from local and state officials,’ Lee said in a statement.