FBI Director Kash Patel has revealed that phones belonging to Dr. Anthony Fauci during the COVID-19 pandemic response have been recovered, Newsmax reported. Patel said this during Friday's broadcast of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast.
Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, played a crucial role in coordinating the nation's response to the virus during President Donald Trump's first term. Even five years later, questions about the origins of the virus and the decision-making process for the response persist.
Data from the phones, which were previously missing, could shed light on those issues. "It is of public importance to figure out: Did that guy lie? Did he intentionally mislead the world and cause countless deaths?" Patel told host Joe Rogan. The clip was shared to X, formerly Twitter on Friday.
Uncovering Secrets
Patel was excited to share that the devices that could spill Fauci's secrets have been recovered. "We just had a great breakthrough this week on Fauci," Patel shared.
"They had always been looking for phones and devices he used while he was back in Trump one during COVID, and nobody had found it until two days ago," he added. Although this appears to be great news for transparency, Patel carefully managed expectations.
"Everybody listening to us shouldn't jump to the conclusion that everything's in there. Maybe it's deleted, maybe it's not," Patel continued.
"But at least we found it. And at least now we can tell people that we have been looking, because it is of public importance," the FBI director added. Many people, including Trump, believe that Fauci's actions during the COVID-19 pandemic were not entirely above board.
"We think that there was definite foul play, but my opinion is irrelevant. It only matters what I can show the American people and prove," Patel noted.
Accountability
Republican lawmakers have sought accountability regarding Fauci's role in the pandemic response. Last year, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said Fauci should go to jail as his support of gain-of-function research potentially caused "between 10 [million] and 20 million" deaths.
Fauci has denied this, of course, and said during a 2024 House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic that there was no "lab leak" that caused the virus, nor was there a cover-up. Fauci has maintained that his COVID-19 response policies were lifesaving.
If that's true, it's a wonder why former President Joe Biden would bother to grant Fauci a preemptive pardon on his way out of office. According to the Associated Press, Biden granted Fauci a "full and unconditional" pardon all the way back to Jan. 1, 2014.
"These are exceptional circumstances, and I cannot in good conscience do nothing. Even when individuals have done nothing wrong — and in fact have done the right thing — and will ultimately be exonerated, the mere fact of being investigated or prosecuted can irreparably damage reputations and finances," Biden wrote in the pardon.
There is likely more to the story about the origins of COVID-19 and Fauci's role in it, and his phone records may reveal that. In the meantime, it's enough to know that the issue has not been swept under the rug.
An accomplice in the recent bombing of a fertility clinic in Palm Springs was arrested by FBI agents at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York.
Daniel Park, 32, was taken into custody after being deported from Poland. He is accused of supplying ammonium nitrate to the 25-year-old primary suspect, Guy Edward Bartkus, who died in the blast on May 17.
Clinic attacker caught
Park, of Kent, Washington, spent months plotting the attack with Bartkus, traveling to his California home for about two weeks to experiment with bomb-making materials in his garage, United States Attorney Bill Essayli said.
Park shipped another 90 pounds of ammonium nitrate, a chemical that can be used to make bombs, just days before the attack, and used an AI chatbot to assist with building the device.
FBI officials called the explosion an act of terrorism and possibly the largest bombing in Southern California's history. No human embryos were damaged at the American Reproductive Centers, which provides services like in-vitro fertilization (IVF) to help couples struggling to conceive children.
The blast injured four people and damaged the fertility clinic and other buildings in the vicinity. A cellphone at the crime scene linked Park to the attack.
A search of Park's home uncovered a large volume of explosive materials and handwritten chemical equations, including "an explosive recipe that was similar to the Oklahoma City bombing,” FBI Assistant Director in charge Akil Davis said.
Suspects shared anti-life views
Park is charged with providing and attempting to provide material support to a terrorist. He appeared at a federal court in Brooklyn on Wednesday, where he waived a probable cause hearing until his prosecution in California.
He was arrested in New York following his deportation from Poland, where he had fled four days after the bombing.
"Bringing chaos and violence to a facility that exists to help women and mothers is a particularly cruel, disgusting crime that strikes at the very heart of our shared humanity," Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement.
"We are grateful to our partners in Poland who helped get this man back to America and we will prosecute him to the fullest extent of the law."
The two suspects met on the internet, where they exchanged nihilistic, anti-natalist views calling for humans to be wiped out.
"They don't believe that new life should be created, [or] that it should not be created without consent," Essayli said. "That is the reason that we believe they likely targeted the location that they did. That's why we're calling this a terrorist attack. The location was not a coincidence."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Kristi Noem, President Donald Trump's head of the Department of Homeland Security, has announced that the "Quiet Skies" program, used by the government to surveil airline passengers, is being shut down.
"Today, I'm announcing TSA is ending the Quiet Skies Program, which since its existence has failed to stop a SINGLE terrorist attack while costing US taxpayers roughly $200 million a year," she announced.
"DHS and TSA have uncovered documents, correspondence, and timelines that clearly highlight the inconsistent application of Quiet Skies. The program, under the guise of 'national security,' was used to target political opponents and benefit political allies of the Biden administration," she continued.
"In addition to conducting our own internal investigation, I am calling for a full and thorough congressional investigation to uncover further corruption through this program. TSA will continue performing important vetting functions to stop security threats and ensure the safety of the American traveler. REAL ID, implemented on May 7 of this year, will further help bolster TSA security. The Trump administration will return TSA to its true mission of being laser-focused on the safety and security of the traveling public. This includes restoring the integrity, privacy, and equal application of the law for all Americans."
The program dates back several administrations, to Barack Obama in 2012, and was "to gather intelligence on passengers who presented a national security concern."
"It is clear that the Quiet Skies program was used as a political rolodex of the Biden administration — weaponized against its political foes and exploited to benefit their well-heeled friends," Noem said in a statement.
Multiple members of Congress had already criticized the program, including Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rand Paul, who revealed the TSA actually tracked Tulsi Gabbard, now the director of National Intelligence.
The report this week also said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat, contacted TSA about her husband, William "Billy" Shaheen, being subjected to enhanced screening and seeking an exemption.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
SpaceX billionaire Elon Musk, who has been working for months now with President Donald Trump in the Department of Government Efficiency to eliminate criminal activity, fraud, waste and corruption from the government, unleashed what amounts to a nuclear bomb in his battle with Trump now.
The two have had a falling out over the congressional plan to implement some of President Trump's agenda points: cutting some spending, making tax cuts permanent and such. Musk appears to want much bigger spending cuts while Trump is faced with the reality of a Congress where he has only a slim majority in the House, and split factions among the GOP members.
Musk recently left his role as a special government employee working with DOGE, which reports having found some $170 billion in waste that has been cut.
Trump said he asked Musk to leave, and suggested cutting government contracts with Musk, such as for use of the SpaceX ships to reach space; Musk responded with a threat to decommission SpaceX ships so they would not be available for the government.
Then Musk unleashed his big shot.
"Time to drop the really big bomb: @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files," he said.
Jeffrey Epstein, dead by apparent suicide several years ago while in jail awaiting further sex crime charges, reportedly had connections to some of the biggest names in America, including Bill Clinton, who traveled to Epstein's island, and Bill Gates.
Musk offered no evidence for his claim. But he called for Trump to be impeached.
But a report from Fortune said the two now are engaged "in a mud-slinging battle online."
Trump said he was very disappointed in Musk, and Musk claimed Trump would have lost the 2024 election without him.
The report said Trump is mentioned in Jeffrey Epstein's flight logs and the two men were photographed together, Trump long ago distanced himself from Epstein.
"So it's unclear what Musk is accusing Trump of, exactly. Fortune has reached out to Musk for more information. It's worth noting that Musk himself was also photographed with Ghislaine Maxwell, who in 2021 was found guilty of child sex trafficking, among other offenses, in connection with Epstein," the report said.
The Department of Justice is working on reviewing and releasing information about Epstein that the government holds, but many are unhappy it's not happening faster.
The back-and-forth began when Musk criticized the pending implementation of Trump's campaign promises, and Trump point out it cuts off $7,500 electric-vehicle subsidies from which the Musk-owned Tesla has benefited for years.
The two often have been compatriots, and enemies, consecutively. Musk was on two of Trump's advisory councils during his first term, but later stepped down. They also were at odds off and on in 2022 in social media.
Analysts have said both men could ramp up their dispute even further.
The murder rate is dropping fast under President Trump, with one crime analyst predicting that 2025 could see a record low.
“Since President Trump took office, murder rates have plummeted across the entire United States,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Tuesday.
“American families were promised their communities would be safer and President Trump swiftly delivered by vocally being tough on crime, unequivocally backing law enforcement, and standing firm on violent criminals being held to the fullest extent of the law.”
According to analyst Jeff Asher, the murder rate has already fallen 20% this year.
Murder rate dropping
In a SubStack post, Asher argued that it's possible 2025's numbers will represent a record low since 1960, when reliable FBI data first became available.
The current record low was in 2014 when there were 4.45 recorded murders per 100,000. In 2020, the murder rate rose sharply to 6.83 per 100,000 as racial unrest swept the nation.
The most recent FBI data, from 2023, shows the murder rate dropping 12% to 5.75 per 100,000. Asher's Real-Time Crime Index (RTCI), which compiles crime data from hundreds of agencies, found the murder rate falling another 14% in 2024.
Assuming that figure is accurate, then the murder rate in 2024 would be 4.97 per 100,000, which is roughly in line with pre-2020 levels and only slightly higher than 2014's low of 4.46 per 100,000.
“[I]t’s fairly clear that a decline in the direction we’re currently seeing would safely give 2025 the title of lowest US murder rate ever recorded," Asher wrote on Substack.
Administration takes victory lap
While it's still early in the year, and crime data is always incomplete, we're looking at the "lowest rate ever recorded" if the decline holds steady, Asher noted.
An additional drop of 10% would be sufficient to tie the old record. Meanwhile, the Gun Violence Archive has murder dropping by 14%, while the Real-Time Crime Index (RTCI) has murder falling by over 20% through February.
Some of the deadliest cities have seen starker declines: according to local police data, murder has fallen in Baltimore and New Orleans by 24% and 25%, respectively.
“Good policy fosters good outcomes,” FBI spokesperson Ben Williamson said Tuesday. “Under this administration’s leadership, our federal law enforcement teams are receiving the tools and support they need to crush violent crime and keep the American people safe, and that’s exactly what they’re doing. We have much more to do, but let good cops be cops, and the results will follow."
According to an arrest report that was acquired by NBC News, a man from Texas was taken into custody on Tuesday and charged with trespassing on the premises of President Donald Trump's club in Palm Beach, Florida.
After arriving at the Mar-a-Lago resort shortly after midnight, the Palm Beach police department said that they were greeted by Secret Service personnel who had detained Anthony Reyes, who was 23 years old, as The Daily Caller reported.
An apparent allusion to the president's granddaughter Kai, who is 18 years old and the eldest daughter of Donald Trump Jr., was made by Reyes when he allegedly informed police that he had climbed a wall that surrounded the property in order to "spread the gospel" to Trump and "marry Kai at the same time."
According to the arrest report, officials from the Secret Service stated that they discovered Reyes on the property and that he informed them that "he had jumped over the wall to get into property."
Report details
According to the authorities, Reyes was not authorized to access the protected area. The police report stated that he had an arrest record for trespassing on the premises on New Year's Eve.
A representative from the Secret Service confirmed in a statement that Reyes was apprehended by agents following his actions of "scaled a perimeter fence and triggered alarms."
"No Secret Service protectees were present at the time of this incident," the spokesperson added.
An official from the White House informed NBC News that Trump had received a briefing about the incident but had asked the Secret Service for more details.
About the suspect
Court documents indicate that Reyes was detained at the Palm Beach County Jail and given a bond of $50,000. Among the conditions of the release was a prohibition on any communication with Trump or his family members, including Kai Trump. He pleaded not guilty, according to the report.
Following an attempted assassination at a Trump campaign rally in July, the Secret Service designated Mar-a-Lago as a nationally protected location.
The targeting of Trump's Florida property took place before Tuesday's arrest.
Another attempt
Last October, a man from Florida was charged with plotting Trump's assassination at his West Palm Beach golf course.
The alleged scheme has resulted in charges being brought against Ryan Routh at both the state and federal levels.
Additionally, Idaho's Warren Jones Crazybull was indicted for threatening to murder Trump via phone calls to his Mar-a-Lago home.
An aide to Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler was arrested by federal agents during an immigration-related confrontation that was caught on video.
The tearful staffer was briefly detained by Homeland Security officers who said that Nadler's office was "harboring rioters."
Nadler staffer arrested
The aide was released without being charged after a security check was completed, the Department of Homeland Security said.
“Based on earlier incidents in a nearby facility, FPS officers were concerned about the safety of the federal employees in the office and went to the location to ensure the safety and wellbeing of those present,” Homeland Security officials said.
There were tensions building up to the arrest at Nadler's office in a federal building in downtown Manhattan, where an immigration courthouse is located one floor below. President Trump's escalating immigration crackdown has begun targeting courthouses to speed up deportations.
In the video, an agent is seen arresting a crying woman and telling her to "stop resisting" while another woman stands in a doorway and asks to see a warrant.
“I’m a federal officer, we’re here checking on something,” one of the agents says. "We have the right to check. You are harboring rioters in the office."
Staffer "blocked access"
The Trump administration and Nadler's team have offered conflicting narratives of what transpired.
According to DHS, the Nadler staffer became "verbally confrontational and physically blocked access to the office” even after federal officers identified themselves and their purpose for being there.
“The officers then detained the individual in the hallway for the purpose of completing the security check," the DHS said.
Nadler's office said they invited a pair of immigration advocates to come inside Nadler's sixth floor office to "de-escalate" a situation on the fifth floor. Federal agents had threatened to arrest anti-ICE activists for loitering in a public hallway outside the immigration court, the New York Times reported.
Nadler decries 'fascism'
The confrontation is the latest dramatic clash over immigration between Democrats in Congress and federal law enforcement. A House Democrat was arrested and charged in May for an assault outside an ICE facility in New Jersey.
Following last Wednesday's incident inside Nadler's office, police arrested several people for blocking ICE vans outside the building, the Gothamist reported. 18 protesters received criminal summonses and five were arrested and charged.
Nadler, a longtime Trump foe who, accused Trump of using a "fascist" playbook to intimidate critics.
“The Trump administration is really using totalitarian or even authoritarian practices,” Nadler told the New York Times. “We have to fight them. We don’t want to be a fascist country.
Trump and his Republican allies, in turn, have accused Democrats of sympathizing with illegal aliens and turning a blind eye to violent crimes committed by foreigners.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Trump warns attacks on Jewish interests 'WILL NOT BE TOLERATED'
State criminal charges are being filed by prosecutors against Mohamed Sabry Soliman, the 45-year-old Egyptian national who is in the United States illegally and is accused of launching a flamethrower and Molotov cocktail attack on participants of a "Run for their Lives" event in Boulder, Colorado, in support of the hostages held by the terrorists in Hamas.
Now he's facing a federal "hate crime" charge, too.
Soliman was taken into custody immediately after the attack on marchers in Boulder Sunday, who had been protesting in support of the hostages in the Middle East.
Authorities in Boulder said the suspect arrived at the rally after noon on Sunday, "waited for participants to begin their walk," then throwing incendiary devices at them, "igniting a fireball that left multiple victims with serious burns.
He also allegedly had an improvised flamethrower to use, as well as 16 additional unlit Molotov cocktails and a backpack sprayer filled with gasoline in his care.
A Washington Examiner report said Soliman is being charged with "violating 18 U.S.C. §§ 249(a)(1) and (a)(2), federal hate crime statutes involving acts of violence motivated by actual or perceived religion or national origin"
Various state charges also are pending.
Twelve people were injured as they were attacked by a suspect shouting "Free Palestine."
The report said, "According to an FBI affidavit filed Monday, Soliman confessed after his arrest that he researched how to make Molotov cocktails on YouTube, purchased the materials, and traveled to Boulder specifically to attack the event."
"He stated that he wanted to kill all Zionist people and wished they were all dead," the affidavit said.
President Donald Trump said such hate "WILL NOT BE TOLERATED" in the U.S., blaming Joe Biden's open borders strategy for allowing him in.
Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon told the Examiner, "The Department of Justice has swiftly charged the illegal alien perpetrator of this heinous attack with a federal hate crime and will hold him accountable to the fullest extent of the law. Our prayers are with the victims and our Jewish community across the world.":
Soliman came into the U.S. on a tourist visa in 2022, and then sought asylum while staying in the country illegally. The Biden administration later gave him a work permit.
President Donald Trump's Department of Homeland Security (DHS) arrested a 16-year-old illegal immigrant from Columbia last week, who was convicted of killing a 24-year-old Colorado woman while speeding in July 2024 but was let off with no jail time by Colorado's Democrat Attorney General.
ICE agents in Colorado arrested the teen, whose name was not given, and expect to deport him after a hearing.
The teen was offered a plea deal and given two years probation and 100 hours of community service despite an initial charge of vehicular manslaughter.
He admitted guilt in killing Kaitlin Weaver as she drove home from work, crashing into her while driving 90 miles per hour when the speed limit was 45 miles per hour.
"Arrest and removal"
“For the [Arapahoe County District Attorney’s Office] justice is no jail time and probation for this criminal alien who killed a young woman while driving more than 90 mph,” ICE officials wrote on X. “For ICE, justice is arrest and removal. A 16-year-old citizen of Colombia, with a conviction for reckless driving resulting in death was arrested by ICE Denver officers last week and will remain in ICE custody pending an immigration hearing.”
News of the arrest was greeted with approval by Weaver's family, including dad John Weaver, who were outraged by the lenient sentence the teen migrant received.
“Immigration and the criminal justice system and all these things landed together one day in Aurora and now I sit here today without a daughter,” Weaver previously said.
The reversal
“I appreciate ICE taking enforcement action, and I really appreciate the outpouring of support from everyone,” John Weaver told Fox News Digital after the arrest.
According to Breitbart, the Weavers were told that their daughter's killer would not qualify for a plea deal in the case.
Months later, however, he was offered the sweetheart deal.
Weaver lamented the reversal at the time and said if the case had involved a firearm, it would have been prosecuted differently.
“Why the change? If he had taken a firearm and recklessly just shot it and killed someone, this would be a different case. They would be pushing it completely differently,” John Weaver previously said. “There’s no deterrence.”
But that was before Trump took office and the official posture toward migrants who commit crimes changed. Now, justice will be done.
An energy watchdog group reported to Breitbart News after an investigation that it found evidence of "criminal" impersonation of the president in how the autopen was used to approve legislation and executive actions.
Energy expert Daniel Turner, founder of Power the Future released a report last week alleging that at least eight major actions by Biden were signed with the autopen, including several bans on offshore drilling.
“You know, I get so angry when I have these conversations about this because I deal with the people whose livelihoods were destroyed. It takes a lot of effort to not curse and be profane because what they did to the American people is not just criminal, it’s evil,” Turner told radio show host Matt Boyle. “It’s genuinely morally reprehensible. The damage that we did, that we continue to do, to the American people, all because we’re ‘worried about Donald Trump.'”
Turner wondered whether the staffers who used the autopen in this way had presidential immunity against prosecution but argued that "people died" from the actions of those who used Biden's autopen.
"People died"
"People died as a result of this, quite literally," he said, connecting some of the actions to the war in Ukraine. "So there is no hiding behind presidential privilege. There is no saying, ‘Well, I was working for the president, and you can’t subpoena me.’"
"These are really criminal, criminal, allegedly criminal acts that are worthy of investigation," he argued. "You can’t act in Persona Presidente, right? You can’t commandeer the president’s autopen and put forward policies."
He used some of what was presented in the new book "Original Sin" about Biden's cognitive decline and how staffers dealt with it to explain what happened.
“As they said in the book, when they’re willing to do undemocratic things to protect democracy, those people are admitting they’re willing to do undemocratic things to stay in power. And that’s what they did the last four years with the auto pen," he said.
"Process crimes"
The group noted that Biden never spoke of or acknowledged the actions they allege were autopenned without his knowledge.
Group leadership said this proves he didn't know about them.
Last week, Power the Future wrote letters to the Department of Justice (DOJ), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Department of the Interior (DOI), and the Department of Energy (DOE) asking the agencies to investigate the autopen usage.
Turner said on Fox News that letters were also sent to the House and Senate Oversight committees.
"When you have an executive order to ban offshore oil and gas drilling … That’s a pretty damn big ban,
Turner said to Boyle. "When you have that and you sign it by autopen, there are process crimes.”
"The chief of staff had to know what was going on," he accused. "The staff secretary — every time Donald Trump signs an executive order, we see the staff secretary hand him that order, explain it, the president signs it. There are personnel involved in processes.”
