Texas Weekly Online

Texas-trans-white
Menu
Menu

Author:

Taiwan’s APEC envoy chatted with Biden but not Xi

Taiwan’s APEC envoy chatted with Biden but not Xi

Taiwan’s APEC envoy Morris Chang said on Friday that he had informal interactions with U.S. President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the group’s summit in San Francisco but not with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Israeli offensive in crowded south Gaza will put civilians in crosshairs

Israeli offensive in crowded south Gaza will put civilians in crosshairs

An Israeli military push into the crowded south of the Gaza Strip, expected in the coming days, may prove more complicated than its ground offensive in the north, with higher casualties likely for civilians and soldiers, a senior Israeli security source and two former top officials said.

GOP lawmakers renew calls to ban TikTok after Usama bin Laden’s ‘Letter to America’ trend went viral

GOP lawmakers renew calls to ban TikTok after Usama bin Laden’s ‘Letter to America’ trend went viral

GOP lawmakers are renewing their call for the federal government to ban the Chinese-owned app TikTok after Usama bin Laden’s 2002 “Letter to America” went viral on social media and received sympathy from hundreds of young users.  The letter, published by The Guardian but taken offline Wednesday, blamed U.S. policies for the Sept. 11 attacks.  “We should ban it,” Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told Sean Hannity Thursday. “It tracks everything you do on your phone. It tracks everywhere you go, every text message you send, every email you write, and it’s — all that information — all of it’s available to the Chinese Communist Party. “It’s an espionage tool. It’s a propaganda machine, and we ought to ban it.” ‘THE VIEW’ CO-HOST WARNS TIKTOK IS ‘CREATING A RADICAL YOUNG MOVEMENT’ IN THE US Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., called the app “toxic” in a post on X, formerly Twitter, Thursday.  “It’s outrageous that Chinese Communist Party controlled TikTok is pushing terrorist propaganda on American kids,” Cotton wrote. “This toxic app should have been banned years ago.” TikTok users reacted to the letter, and some said it changed their worldviews. Others went as far as to say they realized bin Laden “was right.” Part of bin Laden’s letter blamed America for supporting the “Israeli oppression of the Palestinians” and “the occupation” in the Holy Land.  Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., condemned the trend on TikTok on Fox News Thursday, calling the sympathy “absolutely disgusting” and “further evidence that we need to ban TikTok or force a sale before a Chinese-controlled app, before the Chinese Communist Party, checkmates the free world by controlling the dominant media platform in America that can spread this dangerous, disgusting nonsense. “It is time for a ban or forced sale before it is too late.”  USAMA BIN LADEN’S INFAMOUS ‘LETTER TO AMERICA’ AFTER 9/11 PROMOTED BY TIKTOK INFLUENCERS, GOES VIRAL  After the trend gained some traction on TikTok, with 274 videos posted under the hashtag from Tuesday to Wednesday, a compilation of videos was uploaded again to X and gained over 35 million views, surpassing the 1.85 million views originally gained on TikTok.  One TikTok influencer, Lynette Adkins, was banned from the app Friday morning after she shared a video of her reaction to reading the letter. She provided Fox News Digital with a statement. “I read the letter after some other creators shared it and was surprised because I never knew it existed,” Adkins said. “I posted it to my page so others could read it as well. “I did not share the letter to promote any form of hate or violence against anyone, nor do I agree with the extremism in it. I was just shocked by what I had read and wanted to have a conversation about it with my followers. I was 3 in 2001 and was always taught 9/11 happened because other people were jealous of our democracy in the U.S.  “Now that I’m older and am able to learn about history beyond the narrative of mainstream media, I’m realizing that there is more to the story. I think we all deserve a right to access the information being presented to us and form our own conclusions without subscribing to extreme or radical ideologies. “The letter was taken off of The Guardian’s site after being on there for over 20 years. My TikTok was banned as of this morning, and many people who are sharing the letter are getting their videos removed as well. If we live in a true democracy, I think we should be allowed to have open and peaceful conversations about what’s happening in the world.” Montana is the only state to have passed legislation banning TikTok from all personal devices. More than 30 states have banned it from state-issued devices. And a bipartisan law drafted by Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., and John Thune, R-S.D., introduced earlier this year would crack down on communication technologies developed by foreign adversaries like China and Russia.  ISRAELI PM NETANYAHU WARNS AMERICA: ‘IF WE DON’T WIN NOW, THEN EUROPE IS NEXT AND YOU’RE NEXT’ “I will never look at life the same, I will never look at this country the same,” one user said. “Please read it, and if you have read it let me know if you are going through an existential crisis in this moment.”  “It becomes apparent to me that the actions of 9/11 and those acts committed against the USA and its people, were all just the build up of our government failing other nations,” another user said.  CLICK TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP By Friday morning, the hashtag #lettertoamerica was removed from TikTok.  “Content promoting this letter clearly violates our rules on supporting any form of terrorism,” a TikTok spokesperson told Fox News Digital in a statement. “We are proactively and aggressively removing this content and investigating how it got onto our platform. The number of videos on TikTok is small and reports of it trending on our platform are inaccurate. This is not unique to TikTok and has appeared across multiple platforms and the media.” A spokesperson for The Guardian previously told Fox News Digital, “The transcript published on our website 20 years ago has been widely shared on social media without the full context. Therefore, we have decided to take it down and direct readers to the news article that originally contextualized it instead.”

Ramaswamy blasts GOP rival DeSantis for ‘shameful’ ban of pro-Palestinian campus groups

Ramaswamy blasts GOP rival DeSantis for ‘shameful’ ban of pro-Palestinian campus groups

Ron DeSantis’ move to shut down pro-Palestinian campus groups is receiving pushback both from civil libertarian groups and at least one 2024 presidential hopeful. Earlier this week, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit against the Florida governor’s administration arguing its demand for public universities to “deactivate” local Students for Justice in Palestine chapters is an attempt to “stifle” student speech protected by the First Amendment. A spokesperson for the governor stood by DeSantis’ decision in light of the lawsuit, saying he was right “to disband a group that provides material support to a terrorist organization.”  But a DeSantis’ rival for the Oval Office, Vivek Ramaswamy, slammed the order as “utter hypocrisy,” while a libertarian-leaning group that fights for free speech on college campuses is also weighing in critically of the move. DESANTIS HIT WITH LAWSUIT OVER DEACTIVATION OF UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA PRO-PALESTINIAN GROUP “Free speech doesn’t just protect the ideas we love. It protects the ideas we hate,” Ramaswamy told Fox News Digital in a statement.  “The idiotic college ‘pro-Palestine’ student groups are dead wrong to excuse genocidal attacks against Jews and spout disgusting antisemitism, but one of the things that makes us different from Islamic terrorists is we don’t silence dissent,” he said.  On Oct. 24, Chancellor Ray Rodrigues of the state university system, in consultation with DeSantis, sent a memo to all state university presidents, noting that, after the deadly Hamas attacks that terrorists labeled Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, the National Students for Justice in Palestine (National SJP) released a “toolkit” that refers to Operation Al-Aqsa Flood as “the resistance” and said, “Palestinian students in exile are PART of this movement, not in solidarity with this movement.” Having identified at least two local SJP chapters active in Florida schools, Rodrigues ordered that, because of National SJP’s support of terrorism, those local chapters “must be deactivated.” FORMER ACLU PRESIDENT CAUTIONS THAT AMERICAN SELF-CENSORSHIP IS ERODING FREE SPEECH The chancellor anchored his “deactivation” order for the student groups with Florida law, which makes it a felony to “knowingly provide material support … to a designated foreign terrorist organization.” “Here, National SJP has affirmatively identified it is part of the Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, a terrorist-led attack,” the chancellor said.  The ACLU filed a lawsuit on behalf of an SJP chapter at the University of Florida (UF SJP), arguing the memo is “an attempt to stifle” students’ speech protected by the First Amendment and “fosters an atmosphere of mutual suspicion.” DESANTIS REJECTS DEMS’ CLAIM HE’S ACTING MORE LIKE PRESIDENT THAN GOVERNOR AFTER WEAPONRY SHIPPED TO ISRAEL “UF SJP is fully autonomous from both NSJP and other SJP chapters around the country. The Chancellor’s order provides no basis for attributing the speech of NSJP to Florida SJP chapters, including the UF SJP. Moreover, NSJP’s independent political advocacy — no matter its viewpoint — is fully protected by the First Amendment,” the ACLU said in a press release.  “The deactivation order is an attempt to stifle student groups’ pro-Palestine advocacy on campus at a time when the Palestine–Israel conflict is a matter of vital public discourse and concern.”  Ramaswamy called the memo “a shameful political ploy” by DeSantis “to ban the existence of pro-Palestinian student groups at Florida universities.”  “It’s unconstitutional. It’s utter hypocrisy for someone who railed against left-wing cancel culture,” he said.  “Conservatives should be allowed to criticize BLM or vaccine mandates, and crazy liberals should be able to criticize Israel or the West even if they’re dead wrong about it. If government can censor who can speak vs. not, the rest of it really doesn’t matter: We’re no different than those we pretend to fight.”  Adam Steinbaugh, an attorney for the free-speech advocacy nonprofit Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), seems to agree, arguing “advocacy alone” does not amount to providing “material support.” “Public universities are bound by the First Amendment and cannot derecognize a student organization because of its protected expression,” said Steinbaugh.  CLICK TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “Advocacy alone is not material support for terrorism and cannot be the basis to sanction students organizations.”  FIRE issued a previous warning in October when the memo was issued, saying “if it goes unchallenged, no one’s political beliefs will be safe from government suppression.”  FIRE added there’s no indication from the letter that any action from Florida’s SJP groups “went beyond expression fully protected by the First Amendment.” 

Pompeo slams Biden admin officials who signed dissent letter on Israel-Hamas: ‘Moral compass is broken’

Pompeo slams Biden admin officials who signed dissent letter on Israel-Hamas: ‘Moral compass is broken’

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo unleashed a fiery response to Biden administration officials who signed on to a dissent letter over President Biden’s pro-Israel stance in its fight against Hamas terrorists — with the former top diplomat saying their moral compass “is broken.” “People who serve our country in any government institution, whether in the military or the State Department, swear allegiance to the United States and should commit to the mission of the President — elected by the American people — and his Administration,” Pompeo said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “If they are unable or refuse to do so, they should resign or face termination.” Hundreds of government officials from 40 departments and agencies within the administration signed an anonymous letter demanding a “cease-fire” and opposing the president’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war. BIDEN OFFICIALS REBEL AGAINST PRESIDENT ON ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR, SIGN DISSENT LETTER  “We call on President Biden to urgently demand a cease-fire; and to call for de-escalation of the current conflict by securing the immediate release of the Israeli hostages and arbitrarily detained Palestinians; the restoration of water, fuel, electricity and other basic services; and the passage of adequate humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip,” the letter reads, in part. Biden and others have argued that a cease-fire would only benefit Hamas, who launched a brutal terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7, in which militants murdered over 1,000 Israeli civilians. The administration has pushed for humanitarian pauses in fighting, which Israel has carried out. Pompeo said the dissent was a problem that plagued him during his time in office “when hundreds of State Department employees worked to subvert the mission of the Trump administration.” “Then as now, these dissenting staff fundamentally misunderstand their role and authority. Not a single American voted for them or their personal views on foreign policy. Their job is to serve the State Department as it executes the elected President’s foreign policy objectives to keep America safe,” he said. “To do otherwise is not just inappropriate; it is deeply at odds with our Constitutional order and subverts the will of the American people.” BIDEN ALLIES CONDEMN FAR-LEFT CALLS FOR CEASE-FIRE IN ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR: ‘AMERICANS REMAIN PRO-ISRAEL’ Apart from their general outspokenness about government policy, Pompeo argued that the staff “are also dead wrong.” “Their moral compass is broken,” he said.  “It is absolutely right for America to back Israel in its war against the barbaric Hamas terrorists who committed the worst massacre against Jews since the Holocaust. Supporting Israel right now isn’t about politics. It’s about enabling the triumph of good over true evil,” he asserted. “Any staffer who fails to recognize this does not deserve the honor of serving the American people at the State Department or any other government agency.” Meanwhile, President Biden on Wednesday said he believes that Israel’s military operation in Gaza will stop when Hamas “no longer maintains the capacity to murder, abuse, and do horrific things to the Israelis.” CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “Hamas said they plan to attack Israelis again and this is a terrible dilemma,” he said. Fox News’ Anders Hagstrom and Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.