Kentucky leaders toast to record-breaking growth in the Bourbon industry
Fifteen years ago, bourbon barons poured whiskey out on the steps of the Kentucky Capitol to protest a looming tax increase on the spirits industry. On Tuesday, industry leaders reassembled with a bipartisan group of Kentucky leaders to toast the bourbon sector’s record growth. Kentucky’s bourbon industry pumps $9 billion into the Bluegrass State’s economy each year, creating more jobs and attracting more tourists than ever before, according to a study released Tuesday. More rounds of growth are expected as Kentucky producers make billions of dollars in capital investments. KENTUCKY HOUSE CLEARS MEASURE FOR MOMENT OF SILENCE AT START OF SCHOOL DAY Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear praised the bourbon industry for its “unique and enormous role in driving our economy and representing Kentucky to the rest of the world.” Top Republican lawmakers pointed to a series of legislative actions credited with helping propel the industry’s growth. Kentucky distillers produce 95% of the global bourbon supply, according to the Kentucky Distillers’ Association. Bill Samuels Jr. attended the celebration on Tuesday. He also took part in the protest years ago, when he was the top executive at Maker’s Mark and joined other industry leaders in pouring bourbon onto the statehouse steps. It marked a turning point for the legislature and distillers, Samuels said in an interview Tuesday. “I think it was the end of ignoring the industry. And it really was a fruitful beginning of a partnership that has paid huge dividends” for the state, said Samuels, now retired. It was a vastly different business climate for Kentucky bourbon producers in 2009, when they had much smaller inventories totaling about 4.6 million barrels. “It seemed kind of silly because most of us were short of whiskey, to be pouring it out on the steps,” Samuels quipped. Kentucky distillers produced a record 2.7 million barrels of bourbon in 2022 — the fifth consecutive year that production topped 2 million barrels, according to the economic impact report, which was commissioned by the distillers’ association. Producers had a record inventory of 12.6 million bourbon barrels aging in warehouses at the start of 2023, it said. Those massive inventories are a bet on the future because most bourbons typically age four to eight years before reaching their market. Bourbon gets its flavor and golden brown color during aging. Kentucky has 100 licensed distilleries operating in more than a third of the state’s 120 counties. Distilling generates more than 23,100 Kentucky jobs with annual wages exceeding $1.6 billion. Bourbon tourism has flourished, with attendance surpassing 2.5 million visitors last year along the Kentucky Bourbon Trail and the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour, which showcases smaller distilleries. The distilling industry generated $358 million in state and local taxes last year, the study said. And distilleries have become big buyers of Kentucky corn and other grains. TENNESSEE MAN ACCUSED OF RUNNING ILLEGAL MOONSHINE OPERATION, DEPUTIES CONFISCATE 81 QUARTS OF BOOTLEG ALCOHOL The frosty relationship between distillers and the legislature back in 2009 thawed long ago. And it produced a series of laws that the industry says helped spark the growth of bourbon production and bourbon-related tourism. Most notably a decade ago, Kentucky lawmakers approved a credit to offset the cost of a tax on aging barrels of distilled spirits. Distillers still paid the tax — mostly benefiting public schools — but they got the money back through the tax credit. Distillers responded by making massive investments to expand their operations. Other measures passed by lawmakers catered to bourbon tourism. The industry’s growth is an example of “what happens when government works with stakeholders and risk takers,” said Kentucky House Speaker David Osborne, a Republican. The event itself showed bourbon’s clout in the Bluegrass State. Attending the event in the State Reception Room at the Capitol were statewide constitutional officers and legislators from both parties. “We like to say bourbon brings people together, but when’s the last time you all saw this many leaders of Kentucky in one room? And we didn’t even have to promise samples to get them here,” quipped Eric Gregory, president of the distillers’ association. Samuels, who oversaw the rise of Maker’s Mark into a global brand recognizable by its red wax seal, said the industry’s prospects are “a thousand times better” than they were 15 years ago. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “When I started, we couldn’t recruit anybody,” Samuels said. “And now, we have people from Ivy League schools …. contacting us about a job. Some of the smartest young people have moved to Kentucky. So the brainpower that the industry has brought to Kentucky is enormous.”
Israel aid bill sinks in House with 166 Democrats and 14 Republicans against
A package aimed at giving $17.6 billion to Israel failed to pass the House of Representatives on Tuesday. It had been facing a veto threat from the White House, which is pushing for Congress to consider Israel aid as part of a larger $118 billion supplemental security package, along with pushback from GOP hardliners who wanted the price tag offset by spending cuts elsewhere. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., unveiled the legislation over the weekend while blasting the Senate and White House for excluding the House from talks over a supplemental security funding and border policy bill. The House GOP bill was fast tracked for a vote on Tuesday under suspension of House rules — meaning it would bypass a procedural hurdle known as a rule vote in exchange for raising the threshold for passage to two-thirds of the chamber rather than a simple majority. It ultimately failed to reach enough support, despite 250 lawmakers voting for it and 180 against. Forty-six Democrats voted in favor of the bill while 166 voted against. On the Republican side, 14 lawmakers voted down the Israel aid and 204 voted for it. BLINKEN LANDS IN EGYPT FOR HELP MEDIATING AN ISRAEL-HAMAS DEAL Rep. Michelle Steel, R-Calif., criticized lawmakers on both sides who did not support the bill after the failed vote. “It is disappointing and unacceptable that so many Members failed to stand behind Israel as they defend their citizens from terrorists intent to wipe them off the map,” Steel told Fox News Digital. “We must have absolute moral clarity and resolve…History will remember those who choose to stay silent.” Leaders of the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus came out against the bill on Sunday over its lack of offsets. One of Johnson’s first acts as speaker was putting a $14.3 billion Israel aid bill on the House floor, but the funding would have been offset by money Biden allocated to the IRS. The move was dismissed as a “poison pill” and a nonstarter by the Democratically-held Senate. “Well, it’s unpaid for and our borders are wide open. I’m not gonna, can’t go to my constituents say here’s $17 billion, even for someone who I love like Israel, and a good friend, somebody I fully support, I can’t do that,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital. But Rep. Greg Murphy, R-N.C., a conservative not part of the Freedom Caucus, argued that offsets such as the ones hardliners are demanding would do next to nothing to tackle the national debt, which he said would be solved by “[cutting] interest rates, [growing] the economy, and [reforming] mandatory spending.” JOHNSON RIPS BIDEN’S THREAT TO VETO $17B ISRAEL AID BILL AS ‘ACT OF BETRAYAL’ “Many people pleaded, please have a pay-for, or else they’re gonna vote against it,” Murphy said of a Tuesday morning House GOP meeting. “And I get it. I understand it, absolutely. But in this particular instance, it’s just dust…we’re not going to make a dent in our debt.” “People aren’t looking at the big picture…you have to understand a much greater geopolitical picture to really comprehend it.” Meanwhile the White House and Democratic leaders in the House provided enough cover to their rank-and-file to kill the bill. The Biden administration panned the bill as a “cynical political maneuver” made in response to the Senate’s bipartisan negotiations on security funding and border policy. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., and his fellow Democrat leaders, announced on Tuesday afternoon that they would vote against the bill, declaring, “We are prepared to support any serious, bipartisan effort in connection with the special relationship between the United States and Israel, our closest ally in the Middle East. Unfortunately, the standalone legislation introduced by House Republicans over the weekend, at the eleventh hour without notice or consultation, is not being offered in good faith.” Johnson suggested to reporters that he would bring the bill up for a vote again but via the regular order process including a rule vote and debate.
House fails to impeach DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in major blow to GOP
The Republican-led House of Representatives on Tuesday failed to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over his handling of the crisis at the southern border – marking a major blow for House Republicans who have pushed for Mayorkas’ removal. The House voted mostly along party lines, but Republicans suffered a number of defections which torpedoed the vote. Four Republicans ultimately voted no: Rep. Tom Clintock, R-Calif., Ken Buck, R-Colo., Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., and Blake Moore, R-Utah, who switched his vote at the last minute in a procedural move to be able to bring the resolution back to the floor. But Democrats remained united. The vote was 214-216. Lawmakers voted on a resolution combining two articles of impeachment that accused Mayorkas of having “refused to comply with Federal immigration laws” and the other of having violated “public trust.” A Cabinet secretary has not been impeached since 1876, when Secretary of War William Belknap was impeached. GOP LAWMAKER ON KEY IMMIGRATION SUBCOMMITTEE SLAMS MAYORKAS IMPEACHMENT The move is a crushing defeat for the Republican majority, which held hearings throughout 2023 on Mayorkas’ “dereliction of duty” and additional hearings on the impeachment articles themselves earlier this year. Lawmakers accused Mayorkas of disregarding federal law with “open border policies” that have made the ongoing crisis at the southern border worse. They have pointed to the rolling back of Trump-era policies like border wall construction and Remain-in-Mexico as well as reducing interior enforcement and expanding “catch-and-release.” They say it has fueled record numbers at the southern border, where numbers breached the 300,000 mark in December. “Under Secretary Mayorkas’ watch, Customs and Border Protection has reported more than 8.5 million encounters at our borders, including more than seven million apprehensions at the Southwest border,” Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green said on the House floor. “Even more terrifying is the approximately 1.8 million known gotaways, that Border Patrol agents detect, but are unable to apprehend. Millions of those inadmissible aliens who are encountered are eventually released into our communities. This has never happened before in our history. And it doesn’t happen by accident.” Green said that Republicans had been left with “no other option” than to proceed. “We, the people’s representatives, have no opinion, no option but to exercise this duty when branch officials blatantly refuse to comply with the laws we have passed threaten the separation of powers, imperiled the constitutional order, and expose Americans to untold suffering and death,” he said. Democrats and the administration had painted the impeachment push as politically-motivated on nothing more than policy disagreements, and nothing that approaches high crimes and misdemeanors. “Far from alleging high crimes and misdemeanors, this resolution relies on the same tired and untrue Republican talking points that Democrats have demonstrated for months are not true,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., said. Homeland Security Committee Ranking Member Bennie Thompson called the push a “travesty” and an “affront to the Constitution.” “Rather than doing what’s right for America because it’s clear that Republicans have failed to make the case for impeachment. They have failed to articulate a single high crime and misdemeanor. The other side of the aisle reeks of desperation,” he said. Mayorkas himself had attacked the push against him, calling the allegations “false” and “baseless.” MAYORKAS LASHES OUT AT ‘BASELESS’ GOP ALLEGATIONS AHEAD OF KEY IMPEACHMENT VOTE “I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me and do not divert me from the law enforcement and broader public service mission to which I have devoted most of my career and to which I remain devoted,” Mayorkas said. DHS has pointed to more than 500,000 removals since May and record seizures of fentanyl at the border to counteract claims that it has pursued open border policies. It has also called on Republicans to provide more funding and to work with the administration to fix a “broken” immigration system. Meanwhile it has pointed to Republicans and former DHS officials who have opposed the impeachment effort. “This farce of an impeachment is a distraction from other vital national security priorities and the work Congress should be doing to actually fix our broken immigration laws,” a DHS official said in a recent memo. After the vote failed, Democrats were gleeful. “House Republicans just tried to impeach Secretary Mayorkas purely as a political stunt: AND THEY FAILED,” Jayapal said on X, formerly known as Twitter. “As they keep wasting their time in the majority, Democrats will continue working for the American people.”
Michigan school shooter’s mother found guilty of involuntary manslaughter
In 2021, Ethan Crumbley walked out of a toilet, pulled a gun from his backpack at school and killed four students. A Michigan jury has convicted a school shooter’s mother of involuntary manslaughter in a first-of-its-kind trial to determine whether she had any responsibility in the killing of four students in 2021. Prosecutors said on Tuesday that Jennifer Crumbley was negligent when she failed to tell Oxford High School that the family owned guns, including a 9mm handgun that her son, Ethan, used at the November 30 attack. Crumbley, 45, faced four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one for each of the victims. Her husband, James, 47, is set to face his trial next month. Oakland County prosecutors argued during the trial that the mother, despite not pulling the trigger herself, negligently stored the gun and ammunition and, therefore, should be held criminally responsible for the deaths. They said that she and her husband knew Ethan was mentally in a “downward spiral” and posed a danger to others but allowed him access to the fateful pistol. Ethan Crumbley, in Pontiac, US, February 22, 2022 [File: David Guralnick/Pool via Reuters] They added that Crumbley had a duty under Michigan law to prevent her son, who was 15 at the time, from harming others. But Shannon Smith, the lawyer for Crumbley, argued that she was not responsible for buying or storing the gun used by her son and that there were no warning signs that he would harm his classmates or to foresee a crime taking place. Crumbley testified in her defence during the trial and said her husband was responsible for securely storing firearms at home and that her son had been anxious about getting into college. During Smith’s closing arguments, she asked the jury, comprising six men and six women, including some gun owners, to find her client not guilty since her son’s crimes were “unforeseeable”. “Can every parent really be responsible for everything that their children do?” Smith asked. School shooting On the morning of the school shooting, staff members who were concerned with Ethan’s drawing of a gun, bullet and wounded man next to the words “Blood everywhere,” “My life is useless,” and “The thoughts won’t stop – help me”, on his math assignment, met the Crumbleys. According to prosecutors, Ethan’s parents were told that he needed counselling and they needed to take him home, but the couple resisted taking him and did not search his bag or ask about the gun. However, Jennifer challenged that account, telling jurors they had mutually agreed that Ethan could remain in school that day and did not think he posed a danger to other students. Hours later, Ethan walked out of a toilet, pulled a gun from his backpack and shot 10 students and a teacher, killing four students. The gun used was a Sig Sauer 9mm that his father, James, had bought just four days earlier. Jennifer had also taken her son to a shooting range that weekend. Ethan, now 17, pleaded guilty to murder and “terrorism” and is serving a life sentence. Adblock test (Why?)
Pakistan’s upcoming election explained
NewsFeed Pakistan is heading to the polls to choose its next prime minister. Al Jazeera’s Abid Hussain explains 4 things you need to know about the upcoming election. Published On 6 Feb 20246 Feb 2024 Adblock test (Why?)
Chile ex-president Sebastian Pinera dies in helicopter crash
The 74-year-old billionaire tycoon has died in a crash in the popular vacation spot Lago Ranco in southern Chile. Chile’s former President Sebastian Pinera, a billionaire tycoon who twice held the South American nation’s top job, has died in a helicopter crash, his office said in a statement. “It is with deep regret that we announce the death of the former president of the Republic of Chile,” said the statement on Tuesday, adding that 74-year-old Pinera had died in the popular vacation spot Lago Ranco, some 920km (570 miles) south of Santiago. Chile Interior Minister Carolina Toha confirmed the death of the former president. No further details were immediately released about the cause of the accident. Chile’s national disaster agency SENAPRAD confirmed that one person had been killed and three people injured. The government did not immediately name who was aboard. Pinera, also a successful businessman, oversaw quick economic growth and a steep fall in unemployment during his first 2010 to 2014 presidency, at a time when many of Chile’s trade partners and neighbours were facing sharply slower growth. His second presidency from 2018 to 2022 was marked by violent protests against inequality that led to accusations of human rights violations and ended with the government promising to draft a new constitution. Pinera was the owner of the fifth largest fortune in Chile, estimated at some $3bn. He worked as an academic in several universities for almost 20 years and as a consultant for the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank. As a businessman in the 1970s through the 1990s, he worked in a variety of industries, including real estate. He held shares in major airlines as well as telecommunication, real estate and electricity companies. He also created one of the largest credit card companies in the country. In 2009, he handed over the management of his businesses to others. He entered politics representing the centre right, which was the civilian support of the military regime. At the same time, he distanced himself from the 1973-1990 rule of General Augusto Pinochet, when more than 3,000 suspected leftists were killed or “disappeared.” Pinera ran three times for president of Chile. In 2006, he lost to socialist Michelle Bachelet; then in 2010, he defeated former President Eduardo Frei. Four years after his first term, in 2018, he won a second four-year term after defeating a leftist independent. Twelve days before the beginning of his first term, an 8.8 magnitude earthquake and a tsunami claimed the lives of 525 people and devastated the infrastructure of central-southern Chile. Pinera’s government agenda was postponed in order to take on emergency reconstruction. In 2010, he also led the unprecedented rescue of 33 miners trapped for 69 days at the bottom of a mine in the Atacama desert, which captured the world’s attention. The event became a global media sensation and was the subject of a 2014 movie, The 33. He closed his administration having created an estimated one million jobs. Adblock test (Why?)
KJP dodges question on Biden’s mental health after he claimed to recently meet with long-dead French leader
White House Press Secretary Karine Jeane-Pierre on Tuesday dodged a question on President Biden’s mental and physical health after the president appeared to confuse French President Emmanuel Macron with French President François Mitterrand, who has been dead for nearly 30 years. The gaffe came during a campaign stop in Las Vegas on Sunday. The president was recalling a meeting he had with Macron at the G7 summit in England, shortly after he assumed the White House in 2021. But instead of Macron, Biden dropped the name of “Mitterrand,” who was the President of France between 1981 and 1995 and died in 1996. Fox News’ Peter Doocy on Tuesday questioned how the president could convince large swathes of voters who are worried about his physical and mental health after making those comments. Jean-Pierre, looking visibly annoyed, told Doocy: “I’m not even going to go down that rabbit hole with you, sir. We’re going to go ahead.” “What is the rabbit hole?” Doocy asked. “You saw the president in Vegas, in California. You’ve seen the president in South Carolina. You saw him in Michigan. I’ll just leave it there,” Jean-Piere said. HISTORIAN WHO CORRECTLY PREDICTED ALMOST EVERY ELECTION WINNER SINCE 1984 REVEALS WHO IS LIKELY TO WIN IN 2024 Later in the press conference, a reporter asked Jean-Piere to respond to criticisms that Biden has given far fewer interviews during his presidency than his predecessors. The reporter noted that no press conference was scheduled during Biden’s hosting of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, nor was the president scheduled to give an interview during the Super Bowl. “It just seems, again, like we’re in one of these instances where the president is not communicating with the press,” the reporter said. “Stay tuned. That is the answer for you,” Jean-Pierre said, challenging the notion that the president was not engaging with the press. The reporter pushed back, noting that President Biden has given less than half the number of interviews his predecessors have given at this point in the presidency. Jean-Pierre said the president communicates in “nontraditional ways.” As to why the president is not doing a Super Bowl interview – missing out on a “massive audience in an election year” – Jean-Pierre said people “want to see the game.” “The president will find many other ways to communicate with Americans, the millions of Americans out there,” Jean-Pierre said. “And we will find those ways to do it, where we think the time is right.” Presidents have given pre-taped interviews with the networks broadcasting the NFL championship game for years now. This year the game is being broadcast by CBS. The practice became consistent starting during President Obama’s first term, though former President Trump skipped an NBC interview in 2018. 2024 will be the second Super Bowl interview in a row that Biden has declined.
Top Republican says Dems ‘will answer’ at ballot box for not backing Mayorkas impeachment
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer on Tuesday predicted Democrats will pay at the ballot box for failing to back the impeachment of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, ahead of a vote on impeachment articles later in the evening. “I think the Democrats are making a mistake once again, especially some of the folks in South Texas, some of the people in New York and other states where immigration has become a huge issue, Illegal immigration. I think they’re making a mistake by not supporting this. And they will answer for that at the ballot box,” he said. Emmer spoke to Fox News Digital ahead of votes on two articles of impeachment which accuse Mayorkas of having “repeatedly violated laws enacted by Congress regarding immigration and border security” and of having “made false statements to Congress” that the border is secure and closed and that DHS is in operational control of the border. GOP LAWMAKER ON KEY IMMIGRATION SUBCOMMITTEE SLAMS MAYORKAS IMPEACHMENT ‘FANTASY’ The vote is expected to go mostly along party lines, but Republicans have so far seen two lawmakers announce they will be voting against the articles. Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., issued a scathing statement against the articles earlier Tuesday, while Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., is also expected to vote against the legislation. The House majority is slim and Republicans can only afford three defections if all lawmakers are present and all Democrats vote against impeachment. Emmer says he doesn’t share whip counts with anybody, but rejected criticism that Republicans were impeaching Mayorkas over policy differences and said that the House will “perform our constitutional obligation tonight.” “This literally is about somebody who has willfully, willfully, and systematically, created an agency’s ability to subvert our laws. They are literally violating our laws,” he said. HOUSE TEES UP VOTE ON IMPEACHING MAYORKAS OVER BORDER CRISIS Republicans have accused Mayorkas and the administration of fueling the crisis with “open border” policies including “catch-and-release,” reduced interior enforcement and the rolling back of Trump-era policies they believe helped secure the border. Mayorkas has denied those claims even amid record numbers at the border, and found support from Democrats and some former DHS officials among others. Former Bush-era DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff recently called on Republicans to “drop this impeachment charade” and work with Mayorkas to solve the crisis. Mayorkas himself defended himself against impeachment last week in a letter to Republicans, in which he slammed the allegations as “false” and “baseless” and called on Congress to reform a broken system and provide more funding. “I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me and do not divert me from the law enforcement and broader public service mission to which I have devoted most of my career and to which I remain devoted,” Mayorkas said. Should Mayorkas be impeached it’ll be the first such impeachment of a cabinet secretary since the 1800s. “This vote is appropriate because of the individual who has purposely, willfully violated the law, and refused to do his job,” Emmer told Fox. “I think that’s one, but two, it’s also the only thing we can do at this point. It’s the only tool we’re left with. Because, we have got a White House that refuses to do anything, and we have one-half of one-third of government.” MAYORKAS LASHES OUT AT ‘BASELESS’ GOP ALLEGATIONS AHEAD OF KEY IMPEACHMENT VOTE Meanwhile, in the upper chamber, a Senate border deal announced this week has faced significant opposition in the House — but looks like it won’t even make the chamber amid massive opposition in the Senate as well. Emmer said he was not surprised at the bill’s struggles, and took aim at the inclusions in the package — including the emergency border authority that would kick in to allow expulsions if there was a 7-day average of over 5,000 encounters a day. “Five thousand a day before you have shutdown authority? One coming across the southern border is too many at this point and that just wasn’t going to fly,” he said. “I think the rumors we heard turned out to be true and worse. In effect, that bill is codified catch and release…it’s making into law the very law that Mayorkas is violating.” “I think once the senators saw the text filing and read it, they realized how bad this was and this is not where the American people are. They’re going to side with the American people instead of this lawlessness that we’re seeing out of the Biden administration,” he said. Emmer stressed that a deal should deal with five issues he believes the House package dealt with: Restoring the Trump-era Remain-in-Mexico policy; reforming the broad use of humanitarian parole; restricting asylum laws; ending “catch-and-release”; and finishing the construction of a wall at the southern border. “You’ve got to address those five things that are in H.R. 2. You have to have all well, maybe you can’t get them all because we only have one-half of one-third of our federal government. But at a minimum, you should be restoring of remain in Mexico and you should be ending catch and release,” he said. Fox News’ Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.
Obama veteran who boasted about using ‘know nothing’ reporters to push Iran deal re-launches anti-Trump group
A former Obama administration official who infamously used inexperienced reporters to manufacture support for the former president’s failed Iran nuclear deal is reviving an advocacy group with the sole purpose of keeping Donald Trump out of the White House. Ben Rhodes, the former deputy national security advisor to the 44th president, alongside other Obama administration veterans, is set to re-launch National Security Action (NSA) in an effort to boost President Biden’s re-election bid by touting his foreign policy, a Tuesday report by Axios said. According to the report, the group plans to unite Democrats divided over the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, and make the case that Biden is better than another four years of Trump. TIM SCOTT RESPONDS TO TRUMP CONSIDERING HIM FOR VICE PRESIDENT: ‘THE ONLY THING I CAN TELL YOU IS…’ NSA was founded in 2018 to help Democrats in that year’s midterm elections and in 2020, by countering Republicans, including Trump, on national security-related issues. It was largely inactive during the 2022 midterm elections, but decided to jump back into the fray this year amid Trump’s surge toward becoming his party’s likely presidential nominee. Although he’s been critical of Biden’s approach to Israel, Rhodes told Axios that this year the group would seek to “remind people that this is a choice that Trump represents a different approach to foreign policy that is very dangerous, and rather than making the crises in the world better, he is likely to make all of them worse.” Rhodes became a nationally recognized name in 2016 after boasting in an interview with The New York Times Magazine that he and Obama’s foreign policy team built an “echo chamber” of experts to help sell the controversial Iran nuclear deal. SWING DISTRICT DEMOCRAT WITH CLOSE TIES TO LARGEST TEACHERS UNION SILENT ON CALLS TO RESCIND BIDEN ENDORSEMENT The article detailed how Rhodes’ “war room” worked to influence Capitol Hill lawmakers and reporters as the details of the Iranian nuclear deal were being hammered out in negotiations. According to Rhodes, the “echo chamber” was created by using arms-control experts that appeared at think tanks and were then used as sources for hundreds of reporters – whom the article described as “clueless.” Of those experts, Rhodes said: “They were saying things that validated what we had given them to say.” He then took a shot at the modern media landscape, lamenting the closure of many newspapers’ foreign bureaus and the level of experience of many political reporters. “Most of the outlets are reporting on world events from Washington. The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old, and their only reporting experience consists of being around political campaigns. That’s a sea change. They literally know nothing,” he said. Trump later pulled the U.S. out of the Iran deal in 2018, calling it “defective at its core.” Fox News Digital reached out to National Security Action for comment. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
West Virginia lawmakers advance ballot measure for noncitizen voting ban
West Virginia’s House of Delegates passed a resolution Tuesday that would let voters decide whether to prohibit people who are not U.S. citizens from voting in elections. WEST VIRGINIA HOUSE ADVANCES BILL REQUIRING STATE ID TO ACCESS INTERNET PORNOGRAPHY The resolution passed on a 96-0 vote with little debate and now moves to the state Senate. Both chambers are overwhelmingly Republican. If the 34-member Senate passes the resolution by a two-thirds vote, it would be placed on the general election ballot in November. Republican Delegate Tom Fast of Fayette County said in explaining the resolution that a citizen of West Virginia is currently defined by residency in the state constitution. Federal law already requires U.S. citizenship to vote in national elections. According to the group Americans for Citizen Voting, 11 states have adopted the “only citizens” alternative in their state constitutions.