This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A woman who works at Scotland's National Health Service is going to court to be punished after she objected to a man using a changing room for women.
The situation is becoming more and more common as men who say they are women invade spaces that society for millennials has deemed for women only.
The newest case is being profiled by the Christian Institute, which explained the woman, whose name is not being released, complained to NHS Fife after she "encountered a male worker in the female-only changing room late at night."
In response, the politically correct officials in her organization suspended her for three months.
Her legal team was successful in getting that repealed, but NHS Fife has continued to pursue punishing her, and now the woman plans to take her employer to an employment tribunal.
NHS Fife stands accused of violating the nation's Equality Act 2010.
The report said the NHS at this time allows men into spaces previously reserved for women only, if they claim they are women.
Fiona McAnena, of the women's group Sex Matters, said: "Making a female employee share changing facilities with a man who identifies as a woman and then suspending her from work for raising her concerns shows that gender ideology has been allowed to trump all other considerations.
"Do women who work in NHS Scotland not deserve privacy from the other sex? This looks like a Scottish government body prioritizing the feelings of men over the safety and wellbeing of female staff members."
A Daily Mail report on the fight confirmed that the nation's Equality Act has provisions "for possible exemptions concerning single-sex spaces."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Government censorship of people's ideas, statements and thoughts is flourishing not only in the United States, according to a new report from the Foundation for Freedom Online.
In America, the Supreme Court essentially gave such First Amendment-trashing operations a pass, in the recent Murthy lawsuit, by claiming that states and individuals weren't being injured by the instructions from the Joe Biden administration to social media companies on what ideas to suppress.
But that's minor next to what's going on in Europe, the report explained.
There, there's a new censorship "superweapon" in place.
Ready to use.
Each country now has a "digital services coordinator" with the power to penalize online platforms if they fail to adequately address "systemic risks," the report pointed out.
Included is "hate speech" and "misinformation," which is known to include speech that is correct and reasonable, but just conflicts with the politically correct talking points. Comments, for example, about there existing in science two sexes, male and female, has been condemned as both hate speech and misinformation.
"These official speech commissars can deputize third party entities to act as 'trusted flaggers,' empowering the global network of NGOs, research institutes, and private companies that make up the censorship industry," the report said.
The act actually went into effect at the beginning of the year, and is "the European Union’s flagship online censorship law," the foundation said.
"Other than China’s Great Firewall, it is arguably the most elaborate and wide-reaching instrument of government control of online content in the world."
It categorizes its targeted communities as Very Large Online Platforms and Very Large Online Search Engines, and can be used to impose fines "for non-compliance" of up to 6% of a providers' global annual turnover.
Those corporations, under the law, are required to "identify, analyze, and assess systemic risks" and then install procedures to oppose those "risks."
"In other words, the EU wants platforms to identify and suppress content proactively — something that, realistically, can only be accomplished at scale using AI censorship tools," the foundation reported.
Included in its vast overreach is information dealing with "public security and electoral processes," "gender-based violence," "discrimination" or "illegal content."
Also "hate speech," which, the foundation confirms, "has been used as a pretext to criminally penalize political candidates and members of the public for political expression in a number of European countries."
Also, the law boosts the censorship industry by requiring for "vetted researchers" to have access to the data from platforms, opening the door for more censorship.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
After a disastrous presidential debate, President Joe Biden is back at it, this time on a Pennsylvania radio show, ranting about how he is proud to be the "first black woman" to serve a black president, before stating he was the first president to get elected statewide in Delaware.
Co-owner of Trending Politics Collin Rugg, shared part of the audio of the Biden interview, which shows Biden’s steady cognitive decline.
Of course, the response from social media users on X was swift and brutal.
This isn’t the first time Biden has gone on rants that were not well understood, after he famously told The Breakfast Club host Charlamagne Tha God during the 2020 presidential campaign, that if a black person doesn't vote for him, then they "ain't black."
However, graduating students from Howard University – a black research university located in Washington D.C. – called out Biden after he ranted during a speech.
"This is the worst graduation of my life, this is a campaign speech," one graduate is seen on camera saying, "We got this white man here Howard, what is going on?"
Another compilation posted on X in 2019 by 2022 Republican Arizona State House Nominee Christian Lamar shows some of the disparaging comments Biden has made about the Black community during his 50+ years in government.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Midway through 2024, members of the U.S. Armed Forces continue to demand answers regarding the thousands of denials of religious accommodation service members requested in response to the military's controversial 2021 COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
One of them is Lt. Chad Coppin, who retired Monday after 22 years, three months and five days in the U.S. Coast Guard. Toward the end of his career, Coppin faced an uphill battle against the Department of Homeland Security's enforcement of the now-rescinded mandate.
Like thousands of others across all branches of service, Coppin's request for religious accommodation was initially denied. In the months to follow, his appeal of the decision was also denied. He found himself in the process of being discharged via an administrative separation board for refusing to comply with the mandate.
"The only reason I did not get discharged when others did was because it is much more difficult to get rid of a commissioned officer as per U.S. law," Coppin told WND. "An enlisted member is on a contract and can be kicked to the curb for little more than the 'needs of the service.'"
For Coppin, he was in the middle of the formal separation process from the Coast Goard when the mandate was rescinded in January 2023. "I was left in my job to continue on as normal, as if nothing happened," he told WND.
"Meanwhile, the fallout was huge, trust was lost and hundreds of Coast Guard families lost their careers and were treated horribly."
Although he is now retired after two decades of honorable service, Coppin still questions the Coast Guard's blanket denial of religious accommodation, particularly the "Religious Accommodations Appeal Generator" that allowed Coast Guard adjudicators to "select from a pre-populated list of two dozen possible religious objections or noted defects that applicants had raised in the initial dismissal decision."
According to Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, a letter to Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda L. Fagan alleged that the nation's premiere maritime first responder "created a digital tool to assist in more efficiently denying appeals."
Knowing this, Coppin told the Gateway Pundit he began to investigate the Coast Guard's refusal process. Working for Fox News at the time, Kelly Laco shared a document with him that had "wording on how to deny religious accommodation based on where an individual was stationed." For example, the locations included an air station, a cutter or a land unit, he explained.
Upon reading the document concerning his own religious accommodation denial, he noticed that the job description did not match his actual assignment as a Chief Inspections Division of Sector Southeast Alaska. "I worked shoreside," Coppin told WND, "but it made it sound like I was attached to a cutter or small boat station."
In other words, said Coppin, "[The Coast Guard] copied and pasted the wrong paragraph into [my] denial, one that would have fit best with a member of a small boat station – the exact opposite of my actual job!"
Coppin responding by writing an affidavit and entering the error into the court record. He also approached senior leadership and a Coast Guard headquarters office to no avail. Despite explaining the "ridiculous" mishap, he was simply told by a commander at Coast Guard Headquarters (CG-133) to resubmit his religious accommodation request. For Coppin, this was a "foolish response."
In March 2022, Coppin submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to the U.S. Coast Guard Commandant (CG-6P), asking for any and all information related to the denial of his religious accommodation request and denial.
"I've asked for everything electronic, voice-related, or written," he told WND, adding that "I submitted a signed statement that I would pay their $192 estimated fees for their response as they requested."
"It's now closing in on two-and-a-half years and I still haven't received any of the information I requested," he said. To date, the only information he has received from the Coast Guard FOIA office was "a 38-page document about all these other people's FOIAs information and requests, including private entities and various law firms." For Coppin, this should be "an incredible embarrassment" to the sender.
"At a minimum, they just committed a Privacy Act violation and they don't care. They've never gotten back to me or acknowledged their blunder," he explained.
"It's not like I asked one time and I quit," Coppin noted. "I've asked multiple times for follow-ups on all this and I've been ignored." He is aware of other "Coasties" who have been subject to the same situation and have also had their FOIA requests ignored. Still others, he said, "have gotten their FOIA requests, and they've come to them so heavily redacted that you can't make any sense of them."
"These heavily redacted FOIA requests are not new for the Coast Guard," he told WND. "On June 11, 2024, at an oversight committee hearing with Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Fagan," he said, "Sen. Johnson held up an almost all-blacked-out piece of paper the USCG had submitted in relation to the Operation Fouled Anchor sexual assault scandal that the USCG is being accused of covering up." Redacted documents can be viewed at the 14-min mark on the video hearing covered by C-SPAN.
"The Coast Guard is not being transparent, and Congress needs to hold them accountable. Someone needs to ramp up their oversight efforts," Coppin asserted. "I and the other 1,200-plus Coast Guard members that were unjustly denied, just want the truth and accountability because we know 100% that they illegally used a method to deny us all."
"If the Coast Guard was serious about us being a family and looking out for each other as shipmates," he argued, "they need to start with accountability." For Coppin, "Accountability is the foundational element to bring back trust in senior leadership, and until that happens, we will have a broken service. … The American public deserves so much better."
"Our Coast Guard exists to safeguard and serve the American public, to rescue those in distress, stop illegal drug trafficking and protect our environment," he stated. "How are we to continue to do that well if we can't trust our own leadership? The COVID shot mandate debacle is just one instance of many, as to why the efforts of the Declaration of Military Accountability are so important for the integrity of our military to our nation." Readers can sign the petition there, in support of 231 service members and veterans who originally signed the declaration.
"Is there any chance Congress will hold someone accountable for the unlawful mandate and its ridiculous implementation?" Coppin asked.
Coast Guard Office of FOIA and Privacy (CG-6P) didn't respond to requests by WND for comment about the status of Coppin's request.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Apparently, all that would be needed now, to bring to a conclusion the discussion over Joe Biden's mental decline and whether he should be in the race for the 2024 election, is to put a speech on a teleprompter and have him read it.
At least that's the suggestion that can be taken from the Washington Post, which posted a commentary titled, "What if Biden spoke these words?'
Speculation about Biden's ability to continue as a candidate, or president, has exploded in the last week after his catastrophic performance at a presidential debate where he stumbled, mumbled, slurred, lost focus, stared into space, and worse.
President Donald Trump, at one point, told the moderators that he didn't have any idea what Biden said, "And I don't think he does either."
The White House has insisted that Biden is the candidate and will win, and legacy media outlets like the AP, who long have been his supporters, described him as sharp and focused but sometimes confused.
The Post even gave Biden "the words to say in a concession speech."
The Examiner explains that Biden, in fact, is facing questions from those within his own party about withdrawing.
It explained the speech references Biden's decades in the Washington establishment and "cited George Washington’s decision to step down from office 'though the Constitution at the time did not require it.'"
The proposed speech said, "Between now and November, I will do all I can to support the next Democratic nominee — and to encourage Americans to rediscover the optimism and energetic spirit that built this nation."
Some Democrats already have conceded that they expect Trump to win the election in November, and they're all right with that.
The White House has dismissed discussion of any issues regarding Biden's capabilities.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A homeowner fighting a Seattle law that demands $75,000 for permission to build a home for one family is vowing to continue the battle.
The promise comes from Anita Adams, who sued over the city's "Mandatory Housing Affordability" scheme that could set her back a huge sum just for a permit.
A lower court dismissed her case, but she says it's not over.
The Institute for Justice is helping her.
"Despite its name, Seattle's Mandatory Housing Affordability law does the opposite of what it intended—it makes it unaffordable for people like Anita to build housing on their own property," explained Suranjan Sen, of the IJ.
"At a time when Seattle faces a housing crisis it boggles the mind that the city would impose fees on someone who is doing her best to build affordable housing for her family. While frustrating, today’s decision is not the last word on the constitutionality of the law. We firmly believe that Seattle’s MHA program violates the constitutional rights of homeowners and small developers and we are appealing this decision to ensure justice for Anita and others like her."
The IJ reported, "Adams grew up and raised her family in the city's Central District. With Seattle's housing costs frustratingly high, Anita’s family members were forced out of their neighborhoods. That didn’t sit right with her, so she started to dream about building an addition to her property with room for her two kids and father-in-law. But when she started to research the process, she determined that although the city’s zoning code made her plans permissible, the MHA effectively made it too expensive to build her addition: the law could force her to pay tens of thousands of dollars in fees just to get a building permit. That made Anita’s dream unattainable."
William Maurer, of IJ's Washington office, pointed out, "The court’s decision today is very limited, holding that there may be circumstances in which the city may apply the law constitutionally, and that Anita needed to seek a waiver of the MHA conditions and be rejected before she could sue."
He said, "The court’s decision does not lift the specter of unconstitutionality from this law. It simply holds that any challenger to the law must first go through the city’s waiver process before she may file suit. That is incorrect, as the waiver process itself is often prohibitively expensive, as it was for Anita. We expect that the Ninth Circuit will recognize that forcing property owners to undergo—in the name of affordability—a long and expensive waiver process to avoid an unconstitutional condition just to build on their own property is a real harm."
The lawsuit challenged the city based on the Fifth Amendment's limitations on government takings." That requires "just compensation" when a government takes property, or imposes regulations that deprive the owner of the effective use and value of a property.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
The now-deceased shooter who killed three children and three adults at Nashville's Covenant school a year ago had been diagnosed with five mental health disorders, according to a new report from the Tennessee Star.
The report explains that's what her parents, Ronald and Norma Hale, told Metro Nashville police in 2023 during an interview.
The parents, with their lawyer, "provided the list of mental disorders after MNPD investigators questioned whether Audrey Hale was formally diagnosed with autism," the report explained.
Those issues, the report said, were identified as "anxiety disorder, social phobia, dysthymia disorder, major depressive disorder, and autism spectrum disorder."
The diagnosis came in 2011 when she was in high school, the report said.
Those with an anxiety disorder could “respond to certain things and situations with fear and dread” or “experience physical signs of anxiety, such as a pounding heart and sweating,” according to the Cleveland Clinic, which similarly explains that social phobia causes “fear and anxiety” when “around people in social situations.”
The report citing various sources, said dysthymia disorder is a persistent depressive disorder characterized by chronic depression that is not as severe as some, but lasts longer, while major depressive disorder is when "an individual has a persistently low or depressed mood, anhedonia or decreased interest in pleasurable activities, feelings of guilt or worthlessness, lack of energy, poor concentration" and more.
Further autism spectrum disorder has symptoms appearing early in life and is characterized by limited interests, repetitive behaviors, and difficulty communicating.
The report explained, "Ronald Hale and Norma Hale told MNPD investigators that Audrey Hale was given the diagnosis after a series of tests were administered by an individual who appears to be employed by Vanderbilt University and affiliated with Vanderbilt University Medical Center, where police documents revealed Audrey Hale was a 22-year mental health patient before her March 27, 2023, attack…"
Audrey Hale also was evaluated twice for commitment at VUMC after episodes of suicide ideation, but was not committed, the report said.
The report noted, "Star News Digital Media, Inc., which owns and operates The Star, and Editor-in-Chief Michael Patrick Leahy are plaintiffs in the ongoing lawsuits which seek to compel both MNPD and the FBI to release Audrey Hale’s full writings, including those sometimes called a manifesto."
A political upset dominated headlines in North Carolina as a mainstay in the state General Assembly served his last day in office.
Just a few days after the first work session of this year's General Assembly came to a close, the state senator from North Carolina who was instrumental in the leadership of a prominent committee took his resignation, as The Associated Press reported.
According to a letter that Senator Jim Perry, a Republican from Lenoir County, sent to the Senate Principal Clerk's Office on Monday, his resignation became effective on Tuesday.
In the fall of 2018, Perry, who had previously served as a majority whip and co-chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, had already decided not to run for reelection to the Senate.
Additionally, on Thursday of last week, he made his goodbye address to his fellow senators on the floor of the Senate.
Perry was appointed to the Senate at the beginning of 2019, succeeding Senator Louis Pate, who was retiring from his position. The counties of Beaufort, Craven, and Lenoir have all been represented by him.
“It is a special privilege to serve in the North Carolina Senate,” Perry wrote Monday. “I am appreciative of those who sacrificed their time to help me to gain a little more knowledge on each day of this journey.”
Perry made the announcement in December of last year that he would not be running for reelection, stating that he was unable to effectively fulfill the time commitment required to serve as a senator for another two-year term.
“I am entering a season of life where I will need more time to support those closest to me,” he said at the time.
Republican activists in Perry's 2nd Senate District will select a candidate to take his seat for the balance of his tenure, which will begin at the beginning of this year and expire a year later.
The law of the state requires Democratic Governor Roy Cooper to nominate the individual of their choosing.
Although the district will be renamed the 3rd District, Republican Bob Brinson and Democrat Charles Dudley are already vying for the same Senate seat in the predominantly Republican territory in the November election.
While the state of North Carolina might be awaiting the results of District 3's November election, the nation is waiting to see not just who will take the White House but also the balance of power in the House and Senate.
Currently, a razor-thin majority in the House has Republicans with the majority, and Democrats find themselves in the same position in the Senate. Projections about the upcoming election are still controversial about who will hold the controlling power in Washington in 2024 for the 119th Congress.