(DCNF)—The Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) coalition — a United Nations–sponsored collection of financial services companies that have pledged to negate their portfolio’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 or sooner — suspended activities after investment firm BlackRock announced its departure from the group, according to a press release.
BlackRock, which manages more than $10 trillion and has been a leader in environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing, announced its exit from NZAM Thursday, with its Vice-Chair Philipp Hildebrand saying the firm’s involvement in the environmental coalition “caused confusion regarding BlackRock’s practices and subjected us to legal inquiries from various public officials.” Now, NZAM has pressed pause altogether, halting operations while it conducts a review of its activities, an NZAM press release published Monday said.
“Recent developments in the U.S. and different regulatory and client expectations in investors’ respective jurisdictions have led to NZAM launching a review of the initiative to ensure NZAM remains fit for purpose in the new global context,” NZAM reportedly wrote in the letter. “As the initiative undergoes this review, it is suspending activities to track signatory implementation and reporting. NZAM will also remove the commitment statement and list of NZAM signatories from its website, as well as their targets and related case studies, pending the outcome of the review.”
JUST IN: The UN-backed Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) group has announced that it will be shutting down completely, following @BlackRock's departure. pic.twitter.com/o5htgvFEiH
— Will Hild (@WillHild) January 13, 2025
A slew of other financial services had left NZAM prior to BlackRock’s Thursday exit, including Goldman Sachs Group, Wells Fargo & Co., Citigroup, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase & Co. BlackRock’s exit came amid a broader corporate strategy shift away from ESG investing, with the firm only supporting about 4% of the 493 environmental and social investment proposals that shareholders put forward between the end of June 2023 and the end of June 2024, down from a rate of 47% in 2021.
BlackRock was a major supporter of ESG investing in years prior, with CEO Larry Fink saying in 2020 that “climate risk is investment risk” and that climate change would lead to a “fundamental reallocation of capital.”
“The destruction of NZAM is a huge win for consumers,” Will Hild, executive director of the conservative nonprofit Consumers’ Research, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Although there is a lot of work left to be done, what was effectively a cartel of asset managers has finally ceased taking the focus of businesses off of consumers, raising prices for everyday Americans everywhere from the gas pump to the grocery store.”
When reached for comment, NZAM referred the Daily Caller News Foundation to its press release.
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]]>(DCNF)—Los Angeles Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong admitted Monday that his outlet erred by endorsing Democratic Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass during the 2022 election.
The Los Angeles Times backed Bass in May 2022 and she won the November election that year against real estate developer and former Republican Rick Caruso. Soon-Shiong, who purchased the Los Angeles Times in 2018, suggested on “The Morning Meeting” that Bass is incompetent, echoing a viral post X post he made Thursday, in which he argued that the California wildfires may have highlighted the importance of choosing leaders based on “competence” rather than political affiliation.
“Well, first of all, we’ll accept some blame, right? So at the LA Times, we endorsed Karen Bass. I think, right now, up front, that’s a mistake, and we admit that. So, I thought it was very important early on for me to come out, and I think we were one of the few to say competence matters,” Soon-Shiong said. “Got like maybe 20-23 million views to show how that was really due to the heart of most people, whether you’re right or left. And it’s an interesting thing is that maybe we should think about how we elect people on the basis of, did they actually run a job? Did they actually make a payroll?”
“Do they understand what it is, and rather than having professional politicians whose only job is really to run for office? I’m not trying to be disparaging, but I think we’re at the stage now, of the nation and the world … that you really need people to understand how it affects a man in the street, how it affects the working type of person,” he continued. “And I think President Trump, in this election, has understood that … So competence absolutely matters, and I’m glad that that’s been taken up as almost a meme now — that competence matters.”
Bass said at the beginning of her mayoral campaign in 2021 that she would not travel overseas while in office, but she traveled to Ghana to attend the inauguration of Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama as flames and high winds devastated Los Angeles.
Californians have become enraged by Bass’ travel during the fires, which have thus far caused at least 24 deaths and the destruction of an estimated 12,000 homes, businesses and schools. Bass appeared to stare blankly at a wall and stayed silent as Sky News reporter David Blevins questioned her about whether she owes her constituents an apology for being absent as the wildfires commenced.
EATON FIRE: This is the current state for some homeowners right now who aren’t even that far up the mountain in #Altadena @DailyCaller #Pasadena | #California pic.twitter.com/4Il84D14JD
— Hailey Grace Gomez (@haileyggomez) January 8, 2025
The Los Angeles Times did not endorse a 2024 presidential candidate for the first time in two decades at the direction of Soon-Shiong, according to Semafor.
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]]>(DCNF)—Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg told podcast host Joe Rogan on Friday that officials in President Joe Biden’s administration would yell and hurl profanities at his company’s employees over content censorship.
The Biden administration pushed Facebook to censor posts about COVID-19 that it deemed misinformation, according to documents published by House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan in July 2023. Zuckerberg, on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” revealed that also Meta faced investigations and backlash after Biden accused Facebook of “killing people” in July 2021 for not censoring so-called COVID-19 misinformation.
“Basically, these people from the Biden Administration would call up our team and like scream at them and curse,” Zuckerberg said. “And it’s like these documents are — it’s all kind of out there.”
Rogan asked if Meta had recorded any of the calls, but Zuckerberg said he did not believe so.
“I mean, there are emails. The emails are published. It’s all kind of out there …. And basically, it just got to this point where we were like, ‘No, we’re not going to — we’re not going to take down things that are true. That’s ridiculous,’” Zuckerberh said. “They wanted us to take down this meme of Leonardo DiCaprio looking at a TV, talking about how ten years from now or something, you’re going to see an ad that says, ‘Okay, if you took a COVID vaccine, you’re eligible, like for this kind of payment,’ like this sort of like class-action lawsuit-type meme. And they’re like, ‘No, you have to take that down.’”
“We just said, ‘No, we’re not going to take down humor and satire. We’re not going to take down things that are true.’ And then at some point, I guess — I don’t know — it flipped a bit,” he added. “I mean, Biden, when he was — he gave some statement at some point, I don’t know if it was a press conference or to some journalist, where he basically was like, ‘These guys are killing people.’ And I don’t know. Then like all these different agencies and branches of government basically just like started investigating and coming after our company. It was brutal.”
Facebook executives believed they were engaged in a “knife fight” with Biden’s White House on COVID-19 censorship, according to a House Judiciary Committee report published in May.
Zuckerberg in August expressed remorse that Facebook caved to pressure from the Biden administration to censor content in a letter to Jordan. He wrote that senior Biden administration officials “repeatedly pressured” Facebook teams to censor COVID-19 content that the platform otherwise would not have suppressed, and voiced frustration when Facebook disagreed.
“I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it,” Zuckerberg wrote. “I also think we made some choices that, with the benefit of hindsight and new information, we wouldn’t make today.”
Zuckerberg also alleged in 2022 on “The Joe Rogan Experience” that the FBI warned Facebook of a “Russian propaganda” dump just before the Hunter Biden laptop story broke.
“The FBI basically came to us and some folks on our team and said, ‘Hey, just so you know, you should be on high alert, we thought there was a lot of Russian propaganda in the 2016 election and we have noticed that basically there’s about to be some kind of dump that’s similar to that, so be vigilant,’” he said.
The Meta CEO said he could not recall whether the FBI specifically mentioned the Hunter Biden laptop story, but asserted it fit “the pattern.”
The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
Meta referred the DCNF to documents released by the House Judiciary Committee and Jordan.
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]]>(DCNF)—MSNBC host Joe Scarborough said the “complete failure of government” in California allowed for the destruction of residences and communities by the five wildfires that set ablaze in areas of Los Angeles.
The city lacked the budget to adequately fill fire hydrants which allowed for the destruction of thousands of homes and the deaths of at least 10 people. Scarborough said it is still unknown what has caused Newsom’s administration’s “complete failure” to protect Californians’ homes and livelihoods, and argued that the lack of readiness by state governments to properly handle natural disasters has been a recurring phenomenon for several years.
“Happy Friday, if we can even say that with just the hellscape that is Los Angeles … We don’t know the exact causes for the complete failure of government to be able to protect these homes, I don’t think we can say it’s the smelt alone,” Scarborough said. “We don’t know what it is. But I do think it is going to be like Hurricane Katrina. I mean, the infrastructure has been slashed. You can’t just say it’s [Los Angeles Mayor] Karen Bass, you can’t just say it’s Gavin Newsom. This has been a trend for 30 years. Infrastructure has been slashed across America and you do have climate change, so you have wildfires sweeping into urban areas. They’re kind of like fighting the last war.”
“But I just … the longer we get into this, the more I think about how New Orleans didn’t invest in their levee system, how they didn’t invest in critical infrastructure, and people died because of it. It’s just hard to hear people say in one of the richest cities in the world say ‘Oh, we don’t have enough water to protect people’s homes,’” Scarborough continued.
An analysis from OpenTheBooks, a government transparency organization, found that the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) lacked the budget to adequately fund fire hydrants despite having received substantial taxpayer-funded salaries. Several fire hydrants in the impacted areas ran dry and failed to combat the flames that spread across hundreds of neighborhoods.
Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristin Crowley committed significant resources to an internal “racial equity plan” and other diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
Over 100,000 residents in Pacific Palisades, Eaton Canyon and other communities had to evacuate their homes, with thousands returning to find their houses in ashes, according to the Los Angeles Times. Residents impacted by the fires told the Daily Caller News Foundation Wednesday that they were told to evacuate without warning and unexpectedly lost their houses and personal belongings.
EATON FIRE: Additional footage from today #California | #Altadena | #CaliforniaWildfires pic.twitter.com/FNUBvJMkm0
— Hailey Grace Gomez (@haileyggomez) January 9, 2025
EATON FIRE: Another shot from tonight obtained by @DailyCaller News Foundation. Being told winds are still pushing embers around making it incredibly hectic for officials to slow anything down. #Pasadena | #California pic.twitter.com/sqf1qlR3bl
— Hailey Grace Gomez (@haileyggomez) January 8, 2025
Democratic Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass traveled to Ghana for the inauguration of Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama as the fires raged across her constituents’ backyards. Sky News reporter David Blevins caught the mayor off guard Wednesday as he asked if she owes an apology to the citizens of Los Angeles.
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]]>(DCNF)—Less than two weeks before President-elect Donald Trump takes the oath of office, prosecutors refuse to back down from using dead cases to attack him.
In New York, Judge Juan Merchan scheduled Trump’s sentencing for Friday — a decision Trump is urging the Supreme Court to block. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice (DOJ) is pushing to release special counsel Jack Smith’s final report following Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling blocking its release.
“There is no question that Merrick Garland is going to release Special Counsel Jack Smith’s final report, quite possibly for the same reason that Judge Juan Merchan is going to sentence President-Elect Trump this Friday — to get in a last-minute dig just before Trump’s inauguration,” John Malcolm, vice president of the Heritage Foundation’s Institute for Constitutional Government, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Malcolm noted it remains an “open question” whether Smith has authority to write the report after Cannon found his appointment unconstitutional.
The DOJ indicated in a filing Wednesday that the first part of Smith’s report concerning the 2020 election investigation would be released, noting it is “in furtherance of the public interest in informing a co-equal branch and the public regarding this significant matter.”
Smith already handed off his entire report, which consists of two volumes, to Attorney General Merrick Garland, according to a filing at the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Garland determined he would not release volume two of the report, which focuses on Trump’s classified documents case, while proceedings for Trump’s co-defendants are ongoing.
Both of Smith’s cases against Trump were dismissed after he won the election, though the DOJ did not drop charges against Trump’s co-defendants in the classified documents case.
Cannon blocked the DOJ on Tuesday from releasing Smith’s report until the Eleventh Circuit issues a ruling.
Trump, who is no longer directly a party to the case, filed an amicus brief Wednesday arguing that Garland “cannot issue a report of an unconstitutionally appointed and funded Special Counsel.” Releasing the final report now would also violate the Presidential Transition Act, his attorneys wrote in the brief.
“In sum, public release of the Final Report threatens the same, if not more, stigma and opprobrium as an indictment and, thus, represents an equal, if not greater, infringement on the exercise of the executive power, and completely disregards Congress’s intent in the Presidential Transition Act,” the brief explains.
Former federal prosecutor Andrew Cherkasky told the DCNF that “transparency is vital, but it must not come at the cost of justice or constitutional order.”
“In light of the unique national interests at stake, including the ongoing presidential transition and the need to restore public confidence, the Attorney General should exercise prudence and defer any release until a proper review is conducted by the incoming administration,” he told the DCNF.
Cherkasky said he is also concerned about “the emergency nature of rushing a complex and novel legal issue.”
“There is no pulling back the report once it is released, and to do so before the court, and appellate courts are able to weigh in with due time and consideration is shortsighted and obviously political given the few days AG Garland has before he leaves his post,” he said. ‘This is lawfare of the highest order in cases that have been dismissed. It is outrageous to think Smith didn’t seek to release this report while the cases were pending (prosecutors rarely would release such because it gives away their strategy).”
Fromer AG Meese & Professor Calabresi file amicus in Trump's petition to Supreme Court for Stay. Denying stay just got that much harder.
— Margot Cleveland (@ProfMJCleveland) January 9, 2025
‘One County Prosecutor’
If Trump wants to avoid a sentencing hearing in New York set for 9:30 a.m. EST on Friday, the Supreme Court will likely need to rule on Thursday, after his other effort to block the hearing was shot down by a judge on New York’s highest court.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg urged the justices Thursday to let the hearing proceed, writing there is “no basis” for taking the “extraordinary step of intervening in a pending state criminal trial.”
“It is axiomatic that there is only one President at a time,” Bragg’s brief states. “Non employees of the government do not exercise any official function that would be impaired by the conclusion of a criminal case against a private citizen for private conduct.”
Former Attorney General Edwin Meese III and Northwestern law professor Steven G. Calabresi wrote in an amicus brief that it is “intolerable that one county prosecutor in one State could besmirch a President’s reputation and reduce his effectiveness in carrying out his extensive duties at this time.”
“Today, moreover, there are fifty states with roughly 2,300 county prosecutors, some of them quite partisan,” they wrote. “This Court should not allow such a prosecutor to impair the President’s or congressionally certified President-Elect’s ability to perform his
duties.”
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]]>(DCNF)—An emotional mother personally impacted by the wildfires confronted Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom Thursday and begged him to answer how he will help Californians affected by the natural disaster.
The woman, whose daughter’s school burned down, approached the governor in her neighborhood demanding to know how he plans to aid the communities devastated by the five destructive fires that rapidly spread across parts of Los Angeles. Newsom claimed he was attempting to call President Joe Biden, leading the woman to bluntly tell him she did not believe he was about to call the president.
“Can I hear it? Because I don’t believe it,” the woman said. Newsom claimed that he tried “five times” to make the call, prompting the mother to ask why the president was not taking his calls.
“It’s not going through, so I have to get cell service,” Newsom explained.
“Let’s get it, let’s get it, I want to be here when you call the president,” she responded.
“I appreciate [that], I’m doing that right now and we need to get immediate reimbursements, individual assistance to help you. I’m devastated for you, I’m so sorry, especially for your daughter,” Newsom said.
The woman then asked Newsom why the state’s hydrants lacked the water needed to put out the fires. The governor assured her that he is taking all of the necessary steps to provide Californians with the necessary resources before cutting the conversation short and stepping into his vehicle.
“What are you gonna do? I would fill up [the hydrants] personally you know that,” she said. “I would fill up all of the hydrants myself. But would you do that?”
“I would do whatever I can,” the governor replied.
“But you’re not,” she interjected. “I see — do you know there’s water dripping over there, governor? There’s water coming out of there, you can use it.”
“I appreciate that, I’m gonna make the call to address everything I can right now, including making sure people are safe,” the governor answered.
An analysis from OpenTheBooks, a government transparency organization, said that Los Angeles lacked the budget to fund adequate fire hydrants despite the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) having received substantial taxpayer-funded salaries. Several fire hydrants in the state ran dry as the LADWP and fire department officials attempted to combat the flames that destroyed thousands of homes, neighborhoods and communities in the area.
— Hailey Grace Gomez (@haileyggomez) January 9, 2025
Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristin Crowley committed significant resources to an internal “racial equity plan” and other diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
Over 100,000 people had to evacuate their homes and at least five people have died, though officials believe the death toll is higher, according to the Los Angeles Times. About 1,000 homes in Pacific Palisades and the same number of residences in Eaton Canyon perished after the areas were set ablaze.
Residents told the Daily Caller News Foundation Wednesday that they did not expect their homes and personal belongings to completely perish, and that they received notice to evacuate without any prior warning.
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]]>(DCNF)—Political analyst Mark Halperin expressed confidence on Wednesday that there was additional “coordination” behind the legal cases against President-elect Donald Trump than what is currently known.
Trump faced four criminal cases during the 2024 election, with only one resulting in a conviction before the November election. Halperin, on “The Morning Meeting,” suggested that Trump’s lawyers, some of whom he has tapped to positions within the Department of Justice (DOJ), will likely investigate how the charges against him unfolded, predicting that further troubling information may be uncovered.
“The victories that Trump had in lawfare, they weren’t perfect, right? He did get one conviction, but mostly they had victories. And I think a lot of people in the media and Democrats say it was because the judges were corrupt and the Supreme Court was corrupt and the Trump people used unhanded legal tactics,” Halperin said. “That legal team, just from a competency point of view, did an extraordinary job, and some of them are going into the Justice Department now. And so it’s going to be interesting to see how they use their newfound government power, particularly related to [special counsel] Jack Smith.”
Following his election victory, Trump announced in Truth Social posts that he named several of his defense attorneys to key DOJ roles in his upcoming administration. He tapped Todd Blanche to be deputy attorney general, Emil Bove to be principal associate deputy attorney general and Dean John Sauer to be solicitor general.
“But the other piece of that equation is I have zero doubt that there was more coordination on lawfare that [than] has been reported. I have zero doubt of that, and I think it could be extensively more. And I think that we may see a congressional investigation about that,” Halperin continued. “We may see a Justice Department investigation. Maybe we’ll see someone in the media look into it, but I think that lawfare is not going to age well.”
“And again, just from a zeros and ones results point of view, that legal team did an incredible job for Donald Trump. Cost him millions, but did an incredible job. And by the way, he’s now in this term unburdened by that, at least so far, in terms of investigations,” he added. “And the Democrats have a real credibility problem, not just with the MAGA base, but with a lot of Americans because of what was done. That’s my view on lawfare.”
Matthew Colangelo, who was President Joe Biden’s acting associate attorney general, spent two years in Biden’s DOJ before joining the Manhattan District Attorney’s office as senior counsel in December 2022.
Colangelo was appointed while Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg was still investigating Trump in relation to a $130,000 payment made to porn star Stormy Daniels for her silence regarding an alleged affair. He delivered opening statements for the prosecution against Trump in April, arguing that he falsified business records corresponding to the payment as part of a broader initiative to “corrupt the 2016 election.”
A Manhattan jury convicted Trump in May on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records pertaining to the nondisclosure agreement with Daniels and the president-elect is set to be sentenced either in-person or virtually on Jan. 10.
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]]>(DCNF)—Dr. Emmanuel “Manny” Hostin, the longtime husband of “The View” co-host Sunny Hostin, is being accused of fraudulently billing an insurance company in a new lawsuit filed in December, the Daily Mail first reported Tuesday.
Hostin, an orthopedic surgeon, is among nearly 200 defendants named in one of the largest RICO cases filed in New York, according to the Daily Mail. Hostin, along with the other defendants, are accused of performing fraudulent healthcare services and billing American Transit, an insurance firm that covers taxi companies and Uber drivers, in exchange for “kickbacks and/or other compensation which were disguised as dividends or other cash distributions,” according to the lawsuit.
Sunny Hostin's surgeon husband Emmanuel accused of insurance fraud in bombshell lawsuit https://t.co/LE77GwP15U pic.twitter.com/7uSl5U0NJY
— Daily Mail US (@DailyMail) January 7, 2025
The lawsuit, filed on Dec. 17, states that Hostin has been the owner of Hostin Orthopaedics in New York City since February 2006, according to the lawsuit. He allegedly “knowingly provided fraudulent medical and other healthcare services” and billed the insurance company.
“Defendant Hostin is the record owner of Hostin Orthopaedics and purportedly provided examinations to Covered Persons through Hostin Orthopaedics, and fraudulently billed American Transit for medical and other healthcare services, pursuant to a fraudulent predetermined treatment protocol irrespective of medical necessity in exchange for kickbacks and/or other financial compensation paid by one or more of the Controllers and/or other entities owned, controlled, and operated by them and/or one or more of the John Does 2 through 20 or ABC Corporations 1 through 20,” the lawsuit stated.
William Natbony, an attorney representing the insurance company, said his client is fighting “no fault fraud” which has reportedly become a major problem in the state of New York.
“American Transit filed a lawsuit as part of its statutory responsibility to fight such fraud,” Natbony said.
Daniel Thwaites, an attorney for Hostin, said his client denies all of the allegations and called the lawsuit a “blanket, scattershot, meritless lawsuit by a near-bankrupt insurance carrier,” according to the Daily Mail. The attorney accused the insurance company of “abusing the legal system to limit and restrict healthcare benefits” to its customers.
“[The lawsuit] is meant to intimidate and harass doctors from collecting for care given to American Transit insureds and their passengers,” Thwaites said.
The lawsuit accused Hostin of seeing two patients in January 2023 who were involved in “low impact” collisions that would have caused “no more than soft tissue injuries,” according to the Daily Mail. The surgeon reportedly performed arthroscopic surgery on the patients within two months without checking to see if they had recovered through less invasive care.
The insurance company pointed fingers at the “No-Fault Law,” a New York law from 1974 which requires insurers to pay up to $50,000 for medical expenses for those hurt in car accidents regardless of who is at fault, for the reported rise in “rampant” insurance fraud, the Daily Mail reported. American Transit is seeking $450 million in damages, according to the Daily Mail.
Hostin’s wife, Sunny, has previously worked as a federal prosecutor and an attorney for the Justice Department before joining “The View” as a co-host in 2016.
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]]>(DCNF)—Most young adults believe discontent with the nation’s health insurance system and the killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO, Brian Thompson, share equal responsibility in the executive’s murder, according to a new poll.
Nearly 70% of U.S. adults between the ages of 18 and 29 said “a great deal” or “moderate amount” of responsibility for the Thompson’s murder can be attributed to “denials for health care coverage by health insurance companies,” “profits made by health insurance companies” and “the individual who committed the killing,” according to a survey from NORC at the University of Chicago conducted between Dec. 12-16 with 1,001 adults participating.
Adults between the ages of 18-29 are also the least likely age cohort to believe “a great deal” of the blame for Thompson’s murder falls on Luigi Mangione, the executive’s suspected killer, according to the AP’s interpretation of the poll results. Though roughly 80% of adults over the age of 60 believe “a great deal” of responsibility falls on the Thompson’s killer, only about 40% of adults under 30 state the same.
The majority of adults under 30 also stated that “wealth and income inequality in general” has at least a “moderate amount” of responsibility for Thompson’s murder.
Roughly three in ten of the poll’s participants answered that their immediate family or close friends experienced difficulties in getting coverage from their health insurer over the past year, according to page three of the survey.
The poll’s findings follow a wave of public support for Mangione and fury at the American healthcare system that has spread online since the executive was gunned down walking into a midtown Manhattan hotel on Dec. 4.
Social media users have fawned over Mangione’s looks and scrutinized whether the suspected killer and his attorney wore matching outfits during an appearance in court.
Saturday Night Live’s crowd cheered for Mangione following SNL Weekend Update host Colin Jost mentioning the suspected killer’s name during an episode on Dec. 21.
SNL Weekend Update mentions CEO kiIIer Luigi Mangione and the crowd applauds & cheers pic.twitter.com/Hn6k2kTBp2
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) December 22, 2024
Several left-wing lawmakers have attempted to place Thompson’s assassination in the context of Americans’ alleged broader discontent with the healthcare system.
“What I see happening in this country, though, is a real, visceral anger that the outrage at Brian Thompson’s death, or the outrage at the death of any powerful person, isn’t matched by the anger over the thousands of people who die often anonymous deaths every single day in this country at the hands of a healthcare industry that mostly doesn’t give a sh*t about people and only cares about profits,” Democratic Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy said in a video posted to social media on Dec 16.
“The business model of the healthcare industry is to deny care — necessary medical care — to people who need it and force them into bankruptcy, or worse, let them die, in order to grow profit,” Murphy added.
Taylor Lorenz, a high-profile internet trends reporter who has frequently courted media controversies, also made derogatory comments about Thompson and the health insurance industry following the executive’s murder.
“And people wonder why we want these executives dead,” Lorenz posted in a now-deleted tweet in response to Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield releasing a now-retracted policy to deny claims for certain anesthesia procedures.
Lorenz also tweeted out a photo and the name of Blue Cross Blue Shield’s CEO shortly after Thompson was murdered.
President-elect Donald Trump criticized Americans glorifying Mangione during a press conference at Mar-a-Lago on Dec. 16.
“I think it’s a terrible thing. It’s really terrible some people seem to admire him,” Trump said.
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]]>(DCNF)—Fox News contributor Marc Theissen, a speechwriter for former President George W. Bush, suggested President-elect Donald Trump scale back his proposal to make Canada the 51st state, citing its “bigger government.”
Trump proposed admitting Canada to the United States as the 51st state in a Christmas Day post on Truth Social, saying Canadians would see their taxes cut by 60%. Theissen told “The Story” guest host Rich Edson that a better idea would be take to take certain portions of America’s northern neighbor instead.
“Canada is a lot like America with bigger government, higher taxes and less freedom and less prosperity, so I don’t know that we necessarily want Canada as the 51st state,” Theissen said. “Because they have got a lot of problems. They’ve got a healthcare system where you have to wait two years for brain surgery. They’ve got, you know, a massive immigration problem, where they brought in a lot of people who certainly don’t love Canada and don’t love America, and are marching in the streets for Hamas. They’ve got problems.”
“I think we might take Alberta, they have got a lot of oil and they’re conservative. We might want the Northwest Territories and maybe Nunavut, maybe Newfoundland and Labrador,” Thiessen continued. “If we attach Greenland, we have the Northwest Passage and the Arctic Passage under U.S. control.”
President Joe Biden halted construction on the Keystone XL pipeline in January 2021, angering Alberta officials, who called the decision a “gut punch” to the province.
“Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary suggested an economic union between the United States and Canada to help counter China, but said many Canadians didn’t want Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to negotiate the deal.
“If Canada was to become our 51st State, their Taxes would be cut by more than 60%, their businesses would immediately double in size, and they would be militarily protected like no other Country anywhere in the World,” Trump said.
Trump floated buying Greenland from Denmark during his first term in office, but the Danish government rejected the idea. He again raised the possibility in a Dec. 23 post on Truth Social, while also musing about retaking control of the Panama Canal.
Trump announced plans to impose a 25% tariff on goods from Mexico and Canada in a Nov. 25 post on Truth Social, insisting the two countries do more to halt the flow of illegal immigrants and drugs across their borders with the United States.
Shortly after Trump posted the threat to impose tariffs, Trudeau flew down to Palm Beach, Florida, to meet with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago residence.