National and international media news & headlines compiled by CLG

Biden Administration Considers Banning Gas Stoves Over ‘Health Concerns’ | 9 Jan 2023 | The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is set to open public comment on the dangers of gas stoves sometime this winter. The commission could set standards on emissions from the gas stoves, or even look to ban the manufacture or import of the appliances, commissioner Richard Trumka, Jr., told Bloomberg News. “This is a hidden hazard,” Trumka told the outlet. “Any option is on the table. Products that can’t be made safe can be banned.” The stoves, which are used in about 40 percent of homes in the U.S., emit pollutants including nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and fine particulate matter at levels deemed unsafe by the EPA and World Health Organization. The emissions have been linked to illness, cardiovascular problems, cancer, and other health conditions. Senator Cory Booker (D., N.J.) and Representative Don Beyer (D., Va.) wrote a letter to the agency last month urging the commission to address the issue and calling the harmful emissions a “cumulative burden” on black, Latino and low-income households.  

Air Force Records Reveal Tens of Thousands of Taxpayer Dollars Spent to House Ashli Babbitt Shooter and His Pet for Several Months in ‘Distinguished Visitor Suite’ at Joint Base Andrews – Judicial Watch| 6 Jan 2023 | Judicial Watch announced today it received 31 pages of documents from the Department of the Air Force, Joint Base Andrews, MD, that show U.S. Capitol Police Lieutenant Michael Byrd was housed at taxpayer expense at Joint Base Andrews after he shot and killed U.S. Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt inside the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. The records were obtained in response to a September 2022 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after Joint Base Andrews, the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, and the FBI failed to respond to three July 2022 FOIA requests about Byrd’s housing at Joint Base Andrews while his name as the shooter of Ashli Babbitt was being withheld from the public by the government (Judicial Watch v U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:22-cv-02948))… The documents show that Lieutenant Byrd and a pet stayed in a “Distinguished Visitor Suite” at the “Presidential Inn” (part of Air Force Inns) under a “Capitol Police Presidential Inn Reservation” for the period July 8, 2021, through January 28, 2022.

Pfizer Board Member Pressured Twitter to Censor Posts on Natural Immunity, Low COVID Risk to Children – Emails | 9 Jan 2023 | A Pfizer board member who used to head the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lobbied Twitter to take action against a post accurately pointing out that natural immunity is superior to COVID-19 vaccination, according to an email released on Jan. 9. Dr. Scott Gottlieb wrote on Aug. 27, 2021, to Twitter executive Todd O’Boyle to request Twitter take action against a post from Dr. Brett Giroir, another former FDA commissioner. “This is the kind of stuff that’s corrosive. Here he draws a sweeping conclusion off a single retrospective study in Israel that hasn’t been peer reviewed. But this tweet will end up going viral and driving news coverage,” Gottlieb wrote. Giroir had written that it was clear natural immunity, or post-infection immunity, “is superior to vaccine immunity, by ALOT.” He said there was no scientific justification to require proof of COVID-19 vaccination if a person had natural immunity.

Air Force service member says the military could still enforce a vaccine mandate, fight not over yet | 9 Jan 2023 | Even though the COVID-19 vaccine mandate was repealed through the National Defense Authorization Act, the NDAA, there isn’t anything preventing the government from implementing it again, or others like it in the future, says Air Force Second Lt. Addie Hulet. “That NDAA only repealed one memorandum and that one memorandum came from the Secretary of Defense,” Lt. Hulet said on the “Just the News, No Noise” TV show. “So there are other memorandums which apply to the National Guard and the reserves, and those memorandums are not being repealed and they are still pursuing kicking service members out of the military who are in the National Guard and the reserves.” Lt. Hulet has been in an ongoing legal and financial battle with the government along with 10 other officers who refused to get the vaccine and as a result, were denied the ability to do their job. “We were being told that if we wanted to go active duty, we had to be vaccinated,” Hulet explained.

More Than 260 Deaths in US Athletes After Vaccination – Peer-Reviewed Letter | 4 Jan 2023 | Over 260 athletes and former athletes in the United States have died from cardiac arrests or other serious issues after taking COVID-19 vaccines, according to data from a recent peer-reviewed letter to the editor. Authored by structural biologist Panagis Polykretis, and board-certified internist and cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough, the letter’s cited data found that from 2021 to 2022, at least 1,616 cardiac arrests or other major medical issues have been globally documented in vaccinated athletes, with 1,114 of those being fatal. The global data also showed that between 2021 to 2022, former and current American athletes made up 279 of the mortalities. Athletes have a lower chance of cardiac arrest and sudden cardiac death as compared to non-athletes. A 2016 U.S. study calculated that non-athletes, compared to athletes, have a 29 times higher chance of sudden cardiac death.  

Newly Discovered Emails in MO and LA Government Lawsuit Reveal Biden Regime Pressured Facebook to Censor Tucker Carlson and Targeted Robert Kennedy, Jr. | 7 Jan 2023 | In May 2022, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry and former Missouri Attorney General and current Senator Eric Schmitt filed a lawsuit alleging the President of the United States and other senior officials in the Biden Administration violated the First Amendment by directing social-media companies to censor viewpoints that conflict with the government’s messaging on Covid-19 and election integrity concerns relating to the 2020 general election… Dr. Tony Fauci, Nina Jankowicz, Vivek Murthy, and Karine Jean Pierre were served subpoenas along with several more Biden officials, the five social media giants as well as NIAID and the CDC in the Missouri and Louisiana lawsuit alleging collusion between the Biden administration and Big Tech in silencing conservative speech. The subpoenas request all communications between government officials and bodies and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. On Friday, January 6, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry released communications between Joe Biden’s Director of Digital Strategy, Joe Flaherty, pressuring Facebook to censor Tucker Carlson of FOX News.  

Supreme Court Rejects Case Seeking to Overturn 2020 ‘Election’ | 9 Jan 2023 | The U.S. Supreme Court on Jan. 9 turned down a case that sought to overturn the results of the 2020 ‘election.’ Justices decided against hearing arguments in Raland Brunson v. Alma Adams. They didn’t explain their reasoning. The move came after the case was distributed for justices to consider during their Jan. 6 conference. Brunson, a Utah man, had asked the court to review the case after an appeals court in October 2022 upheld a lower court order dismissing his case. Brunson originally filed his case in state court. He argued that federal officials, including all members of Congress, failed to meet their oath of office because they “intentionally refused” to investigate evidence that the 2020 election was fraudulent. The case was later moved to federal court.

Crenshaw loses key chairmanship to GOP Rep. Green after calling colleagues ‘terrorists’ | 9 Jan 2023 | House Republicans rejected Texas GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw to chair the House Homeland Security Committee following his much-maligned labeling of dissident GOP lawmakers as “terrorists.” Crenshaw was a vocal critic of House Republicans who opposed the leadership of now-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and repeatedly derided them as “grifters” and “performance artists” last week while McCarthy struggled to win over their support. His vitriol reached a peak in a Wednesday interview with Fox News’ Guy Benson in which he referred to them as “terrorists.” He has since apologized. The Texas Republican has already fallen under scrutiny from his GOP colleagues for his support of so-called red flag laws and a bill that funded state immunization information programs, which some conservatives have labelled “vaccine databases.” In Crenshaw’s place, the House Steering Committee tapped Tennessee GOP Rep. Mark Green to chair the Homeland Security Committee.

McCarthy Reveals First Bill After Being Elected House Speaker | 9 Jan 2023 | Newly elected House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) says that the first bill he wants to see passed is one to cut back funding for 87,000 new IRS agents, following a several-day-long fight over the speaker’s gavel. “I know the night is late, but when we come back, our very first bill will repeal the funding for 87,000 new IRS agents,” McCarthy said on Jan. 7, moments after being nominated as speaker. McCarthy didn’t say exactly when the Republican-backed bill would be introduced on the House floor but said Republicans “believe government should be to help you, not go after you.” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) in a recent letter said there’s legislation that’s “ready to go” that Republicans will bring to the House floor during the first two weeks of 2023. 

IRS targeted poorest taxpayers while millionaires went mostly unscathed in 2022 – report | 7 Jan 2023 | A study of 2022 IRS tax audit data found that a taxpayer in the lowest income bracket is five times more likely to face an audit that would a member of the highest income bracket… The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) at Syracuse University examines internal IRS management reports each month, and the group noticed different trends by reviewing 2022 data. Most notably, the group looked at audits, particularly considering the agency relying more heavily on automatically produced letters sent to taxpayers. The data showed that the IRS conducted 85% of its audits through these letters, which request additional information and documentation related to specific items of interest. The rate of income tax audits for those in the lowest income bracket hit 12.7 per 1,000, compared to 2.3 per 1,000 among theose in the highest — a nearly five-fold increase. The odds of a millionaire facing an audit were around 1.1%.

Buttigieg took gov’t jet to NYC for interview, ACLU meeting before flying back just hours later | 10 Jan 2023 | Transportation Secretary [and WEF dirt-bag] Pete Buttigieg took a government-managed jet to New York City in April for a radio interview and two brief meetings before returning hours later, Fox News Digital has learned. On April 7, Buttigieg flew on a government jet operated by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Washington, D.C., to a small executive airport near New York City, according to internal agency calendars obtained by Americans for Public Trust (APT) and shared with Fox News Digital. Later that same day, Buttigieg returned to Washington, D.C., on the same jet, a Cessna Citation 560XL, to attend a White House meeting. During the short trip, Buttigieg had a 40-minute meeting with Deborah Archer, the president of the American Civil Liberties Union, and a 20-minute meeting with Department of Transportation (DOT) employees, his calendar showed. He was also interviewed for nearly an hour on the radio program Breakfast Club. 

Texas AG sues Biden admin over illegal immigration rule ‘increasing burden’ on taxpayers –Texas AG Ken Paxton said that the Biden administration is ‘committed to opening the borders’ | 5 Jan 2023 | Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing the Biden administration over a newly implemented rule that he says places a burden on American taxpayers as a result of illegal immigration. Paxton filed the lawsuit on Wednesday, alleging that the Biden administration is ignoring a federal law that bars the admission of “illegal aliens from residing in the country if they are likely to rely on taxpayer-funded programs” The new rule, adopted in December 2022, “prevents consideration of statutorily required factors when determining whether an alien is likely to become a ‘public charge,'” according to Paxton’s office. “Aliens often provide documentation of financial support from family as proof that they won’t become a burden on taxpayers. But the Biden rule prohibits a robust and meaningful investigation into the veracity of this documentation. Attorney General Paxton’s lawsuit alleges that the December 2022 rule was adopted in violation of federal law and is arbitrary and capricious,” a press release states.

California weather: Death toll from parade of storms reaches 14 as flooding, mudslides prompt evacs | 10 Jan 2023 | Another powerful storm is moving into Southern California after forcing thousands to the north to evacuate, prompting dozens of water rescues, causing widespread damage and bringing to 14 the tally of people killed in the state’s parade of storms in recent weeks. More than 11 million people in western Los Angeles, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties were under a flood warning Tuesday morning, while some 34 million people across California — about 10% of all Americans — are under flood watches as the risk of mudslides also shifts to the Los Angeles and San Diego areas. Tuesday’s storms are just the latest in a wave of atmospheric rivers to thrash the West Coast in recent weeks… Over 24 hours as of Monday night, 2 to 7 inches of rain had fallen across much of the state’s lower elevations.