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Year: 2023

Haley spotlights need for ‘new conservative president’ in ad blitz on Iowa and New Hampshire airwaves

Haley spotlights need for ‘new conservative president’ in ad blitz on Iowa and New Hampshire airwaves

FIRST ON FOX – Nikki Haley takes aim at President Biden for being “too old” and indirectly targets former President Trump over the “chaos and drama of the past” as she calls for a “new generation” of leadership in the latest spot of her massive early state ad blitz. “I’ll just say it. Biden’s too old, and Congress is the most exclusive nursing home in America,” the former South Carolina governor who later served as ambassador to the United Nations during the Trump administration argues at the top of her commercial, which was shared first with Fox News on Monday. Haley declared her candidacy for the White House in early February, but didn’t launch her first TV ads until the beginning of this month. The new spot is the third commercial in her ongoing $10 million ad blitz in Iowa and New Hampshire, the first two states to vote in the GOP presidential nominating calendar. “We have to leave behind the chaos and drama of the past with a new generation and a new conservative president,” Haley said to the camera in the spot, swiping at the former president without mentioning his name. HALEY’S MOMENTUM IN THE GOP PRESIDENTIAL RACE APPEARS TO BE PAYING OFF Haley highlighted the need for a new generation of conservative leadership when she formally launched her presidential campaign in her hometown of Charleston, South Carolina, ten months ago. She also reiterated her calls for mental competency tests for politicians age 75 and older – something she first did days into her White House bid. DESANTIS TURNS UP THE HEAT ON TRUMP AND HALEY  Haley is 51 years old, a full generation younger than 81-year-old Biden and 77-year-old Trump. Trump remains the commanding front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination in his third straight White House bid. He made history earlier this year as the first former or current president to be indicted for a crime with his four indictments, including in federal court in Washington, D.C., and in Fulton County court in Georgia on charges he tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election. WHERE TRUMP, DESANTIS, HALEY AND THE REST OF GOP 2024 FIELD STAND IN NEW FOX NEWS POLL The indictments have only boosted Trump’s standing in GOP presidential nomination polls. He holds a massive 57-point lead over the rest of the remaining field of Republican rivals for the nomination in the latest Fox News national poll, which was released on Sunday. Trump’s margin jumped by seven points from the previous Fox News poll conducted a month ago. Haley has enjoyed plenty of momentum in the polls in recent months, thanks in part to well-received performances in the first three GOP presidential primary debates. She leapfrogged Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for second place in New Hampshire, which holds the first primary and second overall contest in the Republican nominating calendar.  She also aims to make a fight of it in Iowa, where the polls indicate DeSantis is a distant second behind Trump. Iowa’s Jan. 15 caucuses are followed eight days later by New Hampshire’s Jan. 23 primary. Haley landed the endorsement of New Hampshire’s popular Republican Gov. Chris Sununu last week. A couple of weeks ago, she was endorsed by Americans for Prosperity Action, the political wing of the influential and deep-pocketed fiscally conservative network founded by the billionaire Koch Brothers. AFP Action has pledged to spend tens of millions of dollars and mobilize its formidable grassroots operation to boost Haley and help push the Republican Party past Trump. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.

CCP-tied group is quietly fueling US-based climate initiatives: tax filings

CCP-tied group is quietly fueling US-based climate initiatives: tax filings

FIRST ON FOX: A climate-focused nonprofit with significant operations in Beijing has wired millions of dollars to fund climate initiatives and environmental groups in the U.S., according to tax filings first obtained by Fox News Digital. While the Energy Foundation’s financial filings indicate that the group is technically headquartered in San Francisco, a Fox News Digital review determined that the majority of its operations are conducted in China with a staff that boasts extensive ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its recently filed tax form show the group, which refers to itself as “Energy Foundation China,” contributed $3.8 million to initiatives in the U.S. like phasing out coal and electrifying the transportation sector. “The Energy Foundation’s ties to China are both extremely disturbing and reprehensible,” Tom Pyle, the president of the Institute for Energy Research, told Fox News Digital in an interview. “These environmental organizations, the recipients of this money, are, in essence, sacrificing our national security and empowering China.” “We are the richest energy nation in the world with respect to coal, oil and natural gas,” he continued. “And yet the Biden administration and the environmentalists fueled by China are promoting policies that would increase our dependence on China, which controls all the minerals and materials needed for batteries and wind and solar, and curtail our production of oil and gas here at home.” REPUBLICANS ACCELERATE INVESTIGATION INTO FOREIGN INFLUENCE OF US CLIMATE GROUPS, ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY According to its financial filings, the Energy Foundation’s grant revenue declined 30% year over year to $56.7 million in 2022, but its grant contributions to outside groups and initiatives worldwide increased to $52.1 million, up 27% compared to last year. Among its more than a dozen grants in the U.S. last year, the group wired $900,000 to the Rocky Mountain Institute, a Colorado-based think tank that has engaged the White House on climate policy and advocates phasing down fossil fuel reliance and net-zero policies. The group also funded a study in 2022 highlighting the dangers of natural gas-powered stovetops, which ultimately led to calls for bans on the appliance. US MILITARY BASE’S GREEN ENERGY PROJECT WITH CCP TIES DISCONNECTED OVER NATIONAL SECURITY CONCERNS The Energy Foundation sent another $480,000 to the Washington, D.C.-based International Council on Clean Transportation, which advocates for widespread EV adoption and policies decarbonizing the transportation sector broadly. It also wired grants — one to the University of Maryland and another to the Jackson Hole Center for Global Affairs — worth a total of $450,000 and earmarked for projects to phase out coal power reliance. It further sent $375,000 to the Natural Resources Defense Council, a group founded as “America’s first litigation-focused nonprofit dedicated to making dirty industries clean up their pollution” and which has filed dozens of legal challenges pushing far-left green measures. Through its legal efforts, the NRDC has opposed domestic fossil fuel drilling, coal plants, the Keystone XL oil pipeline and critical mineral mining projects. And the Energy Foundation contributed $350,000 to Harvard University, a grant earmarked for “outreach to build a clean energy future.” JOE MANCHIN GOES SCORCHED-EARTH ON BIDEN ADMIN OVER EV ACTIONS BOOSTING CHINA “The Energy Foundation’s grant-making is almost exclusively focused on making it hard to produce energy and move it around here at home,” Pyle told Fox News Digital. “These organizations have little to do with the environment and everything, almost everything, to do with advancing this redistribution agenda.” “If they’re successful, they’ll make America weaker and China stronger,” he said. The group — which, according to its 2022 financial statement, leases two office facilities in China under operating leases that have terms through April 2024 — has significant ties to the CCP. For example, Energy Foundation CEO and President Ji Zou previously served as the deputy director general of China’s National Center for Climate Change Strategy, an agency within the Chinese government’s National Development and Reform Commission.  Liu Xin, who heads the group’s environmental management division, previously served in a high-ranking role at the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau. And Ping He, the program director of the group’s industry program, worked for eight years at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a leading state-run research institution. DARK MONEY GROUP PUSHING GAS STOVE CRACKDOWN HAS SIGNIFICANT FINANCIAL STAKE IN GREEN ENERGY The revelation of the Energy Foundation’s extensive funding for U.S.-based climate initiatives comes amid an ongoing congressional probe led by House Natural Resources Committee Republicans over the CCP’s growing influence on the American environmental activist movement. The panel has probed a series of nonprofits with ties to China. “For years, the CCP has used U.S. nonprofits to influence American public opinion and policy decisions,” a Natural Resources Committee aide told Fox News Digital. “The vast and well-funded CCP nonprofit influence machine is particularly focused on promoting Chinese energy interests and weakening America’s competitiveness.” “Sadly, radical eco-activists in America do more to advance the interests of the CCP than promoting commonsense energy and environmental policies in the United States,” the aide added. Overall, while the U.S. is the largest global producer of oil and gas, which still drives every major industry from transportation and power to manufacturing and construction, Chinese companies have established a major foothold in green energy markets. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), for example, China produces about 75% of all lithium-ion batteries, a key component of EVs, worldwide. The nation also boasts 70% of production capacity for cathodes and 85% for anodes, two key parts of such batteries. In addition, more than 50% of lithium, cobalt and graphite processing and refining capacity is located in China, the IEA data showed. Those three critical minerals, in addition to copper and nickel, are vital for EV batteries and other green energy technologies. Chinese investment firms have also been aggressive in purchasing stakes in African mines in recent years to ensure a firm control over mineral production. China also continues to dominate the global solar supply chain even as Western nations attempt to increase domestic manufacturing capabilities. According to

Gavin Newsom’s 10-year plan to end San Francisco homelessness marks 20-year anniversary

Gavin Newsom’s 10-year plan to end San Francisco homelessness marks 20-year anniversary

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, commands a Golden State that has turned into a deep blue “Sapphire State.” As Newsom took over following the 2003 San Francisco mayoral election, the then-mayor-elect said that December he intended to “aggressively” make ending homelessness in his city his administration’s top priority. The plan involved a 10-year strategy to end chronic homelessness with “tens of millions” of federal dollars in funding to create 550 “supportive housing” units for the troubled homeless, SFGate reported at the time. CALIFORNIA CITY REMOVES HOMELESS IN BEAUTIFICATION BEFORE BIDEN’S SUMMIT WITH CHINESE PRESIDENT XI Fast-forward to December of this year and the announcement of that strategy is now two decades old. San Francisco, along with the rest of California, is far from solving the problem. In fact, the growing homeless population has become a central issue in California’s political debate. “Twenty years ago, then-Mayor Newsom laid out his 10-year plan to end homelessness in San Francisco,” California GOP chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson told Fox News Digital. “Not only does the problem remain unsolved today, but in the time since, he has taken his failures statewide, where communities across California are grappling with the devastating homeless crisis.” “Instead of focusing on bashing red states or hitting the late-night talk show circuit while foolishly eyeing a promotion to the White House, Gov. Newsom should pay attention to the actual job he was elected to do and work with Republicans to find real solutions for the Golden State,” Patterson continued. The nonpartisan think tank Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) found that, as of 2022, 30% of homeless Americans lived in the Golden State, “including half of all unsheltered people (115,491 in California; 233,832 in the US).” “Since 2020, California’s overall homeless population has increased about 6%, compared to just 0.4% in the rest of the country,” PPIC wrote in February. “A 17% increase in the homeless but sheltered population accounts for almost all of California’s change, while the more visible unsheltered population increased 2%.” “The rest of the country’s unsheltered population grew faster than California’s (4%), while its sheltered population actually shrank (-2%),” they added. During Newsom’s successful 2017 run for governor, the California Democrat pledged that he would “lead the effort to develop the 3.5 million new housing units we need by 2025 because our solutions must be as bold as the problem is big.” “I realize building 3.5 million new housing units is an audacious goal – but it’s achievable,” Newsom said. “There is no silver bullet to solve this crisis.” “We need to attack the problem on multiple fronts by generating more funding for affordable housing, implementing regulatory reform and creating new financial incentives for local jurisdictions that produce housing while penalizing those that fall short,” he continued. A 2022 Department of Housing and Urban Development report found that 67% of California’s homeless population is unsheltered. Additionally, a 2023 report found that California has spent $20 billion fighting homelessness over the last five years. Newsom was elected governor in 2018 and re-elected in 2022, with 2023 marking his fifth year in office. Newsom took some heat earlier this year after San Francisco cleared out its homeless encampments ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s summit with President Biden in the city. “I know folks are saying, ‘Oh they’re just cleaning up this place because all those fancy leaders are coming to town,’” Newsom said at that time. “That’s true, because it’s true – but it’s also true for months and months and months before APEC [Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit], we’ve been having conversations.” During an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, Newsom expressed his pride in his 10-year plan to address homelessness in San Francisco while also calling the crisis “disgraceful.” Newsom’s office did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

Biden’s daughter owes thousands in income taxes, lien documents show

Biden’s daughter owes thousands in income taxes, lien documents show

FIRST ON FOX: Ashley Biden, President Biden’s daughter, owes $5,000 in income taxes beginning in 2015, according to a recent tax lien docket first obtained by Fox News Digital. Liens are legal claims imposed by the government on a property or assets to secure unpaid taxes after repeated attempts to collect.  On Dec. 1, the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue in Philadelphia County notified Biden that the “amount of such unpaid tax, interest, additions or penalties is a lien in favor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania upon the taxpayer’s property – real, personal, or both – as the case may be,” according to the notice. The period start date listed on the lien begins Jan. 1, 2015 – when Joe Biden was vice president in the Obama administration – and ends Jan. 1, 2021, days before he was sworn in as president.  MAN, WOMAN PLEAD GUILTY TO STEALING ASHLEY BIDEN DIARY, SELLING IT TO PROJECT VERITAS Ashley Biden and her attorney did not respond to multiple requests for comment. “The scale is not anything like Hunter, but… Joe is constantly talking about how wealthy and connected people do not pay their fair share and can’t afford to pay more, and it just so happens that both of his living children did not pay their taxes,” Garrett Ziegler, the founder of nonprofit Marco Polo and former President Trump aide, told Fox News Digital in an interview Friday.  “This is just another example of the Bidens being careless,” he said. “Like, you’d think that they would show a little bit more prudence when you’re the first when you’re the American first family to make sure you don’t have any tax liens on you, especially going into an election year.” Ziegler founded the website BidenLaptopMedia.com, which contains nearly 10,000 photos from Hunter’s infamous laptop between 2008 and 2019. Ziegler said his team found Ashley’s lien while conducting a routine search in the Philadelphia County courthouse system.  When Ziegler published the findings on the laptop, he told Fox Digital at the time, “We’re not Republican activists.” “None of us are registered Republicans,” he continued. “In fact, I loved and still love Trump precisely because he wasn’t a standard Republican. So this is not a hit job. We’re going to keep all the photos that paint the Bidens in a good light and keep all the photos that paint the Bidens in a bad light. The American people can judge for themselves what they think about their first family through this.” TOP WHITE HOUSE AIDE WORKED AT LAW FIRM HEAVILY INVOLVED WITH CORPORATE ENTITIES TIED TO HUNTER, BIDEN FAMILY Born on June 8, 1981, Ashley Biden is the youngest of Joe Biden’s children and the only child with Jill Biden. Ashley has primarily focused on social work, activism and philanthropy throughout her career. She works for the Delaware Center for Justice, focusing on criminal justice reform, according to her Linkedin. Ashley worked as a social worker in the Delaware Department of Services for Children, Youth and Their Families from 2007 to 2012. She received her master’s degree in social work from University of Pennsylvania’s School of Social Policy and Practice in 2010. In 2017, while working at the Delaware Center for Justice – a nonprofit criminal justice reform organization – she launched a charitable fashion brand Livelihood. In 2019, she left her job at the Delaware Center for Justice to help her dad’s presidential campaign. HUNTER BIDEN FACES BACKLASH AFTER DEFYING SUBPOENA WITH PRESS CONFERENCE ‘STUNT’: ‘HOLD HIM IN CONTEMPT!’ In March, she was reportedly applying for a doctorate in clinical social work at the University of Pennsylvania to study the neurobiology of trauma and plans to develop her own curriculum.  Last summer, two Florida residents pleaded guilty in federal court in New York City to stealing the diary and other possessions of Ashley and selling them to the conservative watchdog group Project Veritas during the final weeks of the 2020 presidential election. Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment.