Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte has threatened to assassinate the President and the House of Representatives speaker if she is killed.
The shocking statement from Duterte came as she and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. have had a bitter fallout over the last two years over major policy differences and now Duterte is escalating tensions exponentially.
Duterte's threat has been referred to the elite presidential guards force “for immediate proper action," but it remains to be seen if actions will be taken against Duterte.
President Marcos’ security has been beefed up and the government is considering the vice president's “brazenly" and "public” threat a national security issue.
Presidential security reportedly is “coordinating with law enforcement agencies to detect, deter, and defend against any and all threats to the president and the first family," to ensure that all parties threatened by the Vice President are safe.
Relations between Duterte and Marcos have been on the decline since the pair won a decisive electoral victory in 2022, ironically on a platform promoting national unity.
The pair quickly fell into infighting over how to handle China’s aggressive actions in the disputed South China Sea and Duterte ended up resigning as Marcos's education secretary and head of an anti-insurgency body in June.
Since then, Duterte has been ramping up attacks on Marcos and his allies accusing them of corruption, incompetence and politically persecuting the Duterte family.
Sara Duterte is the daughter of former President Rodrigo Duterte, an infamous figure who became internationally recognized for his brutal crackdown on drug users and traffickers.
Marcos and his allies in the House of Representatives recently ordered the arrest of Duterte's chief of staff for allegedly hampering a congressional inquiry into the possible misuse of Duterte's budget as vice president and education secretary.
By all accounts, it appears that each side is engaged in political lawfare, much like what President-elect Donald Trump has been dealing with for years. With how bad things have gotten, Duterte is fearing for her life which has led to her threats against her enemies.
Following the arrest of her chief of staff, Duterte held a press conference where she stated, "Don’t worry about my security because I’ve talked with somebody. I said ‘if I’m killed, you’ll kill BBM, Liza Araneta and Martin Romualdez. No joke, no joke.'"
Filipino legal code contains provisions that make such statements like Duterte's possibly criminal but that remains to be seen if charges will be brought against her.
As for the international community, the situation in the Philippines remains closely watched. Some fear civil war could break out as Duterte and Marcos continue to splinter and amplify threats against each other.
Military Chief General Romeo Brawner issued a statement saying that the 160,000-member Armed Forces of the Philippines will remain uninvolved and respect democratic institutions, but there is reason to be concerned that that could change.
Melania Trump, the wife of President-elect Donald Trump, has announced that she is appointing her longtime aide Hayley Harrison as her Chief of Staff.
Melania will begin her second stint as First Lady of the United States in January when Donald Trump is sworn into his 2nd term as the 47th President of the United States.
Melania Trump issued a statement praising Harrison stating that she "has maintained an integral role and exceptional leadership on the First Lady’s team over the past seven years.”
The statement continued saying, "She has a strong understanding of White House operations, and as Chief of Staff, Mrs. Harrison will oversee and manage the East Wing’s team while strategically liaising with other parts of government."
Melania Trump is set for a big role in the White House as she is no longer primarily concerned with raising her son, Barron Trump, who has now graduated high school and is going to college. Harrison will play a key role in aiding Melania in her plans.
Now that she has more time for herself and her plans, Melania Trump is set to have an impactful time as she is once again America's First Lady.
Insiders have confirmed reports that Melania Trump will likely not be living full-time in Washington D.C. at the White House. She still plans on being very active but will likely be splitting time between D.C. and Mar-a-Lago in Florida.
Melania Trump has done things differently than her predecessors as she has kept a smaller staff and taken up less space in the White House.
During an appearance on Fox News, Melania stated that she is "not anxious because this time is different. I have much more experience and much more knowledge."
No amount of experience could have prepared Melania Trump for what she would experience in her first term as First Lady in her husband's historic first term.
It was open season for the Trump family after the 2016 presidential election and Melania Trump was torn between her duties as First Lady and protecting her family, especially her young teenage son. Now Melania is ready to take on the nastiness that will only intensify in the coming years.
Melania Trump was busy pushing initiatives to combat cyberbullying during her first term as First Lady especially after Barron Trump was attacked by leftists who speculated that he was autistic because of his quiet nature.
She will likely continue those efforts with an added emphasis on combatting political violence thanks to the attacks on her family from the left.
Melania Trump has already sent strong messages on these issues as she turned down a transition meeting invitation from First Lady Jill Biden and directly called out the Biden family for their attacks on the Trump family.
Melania is going to be doing things differently and will be throwing punches just like her husband will be for the next four years. She will need a dedicated and strong team around her and that will begin with Harrison.
The Biden administration acted like it was cracking down on illegal immigration before the election, but now, it seems to be quietly loosening all of the restrictions and trying to get as many migrants into the country as possible.
In New York City, Biden plans to start using an ICE Portal app that will allow illegal immigrants to skip in-person meetings and just check in online.
Sources at the DHS say the software is not reliable and often glitches, allowing migrants to escape authorities.
In addition, the app does not check for previous arrests or outstanding warrants, which is part of the in-person check-in process.
Another initiative from the administration allows migrants to contest orders to be tracked electronically while they wait for their asylum hearings.
In reality, most of the migrants that have been let in by the Biden administration don't qualify for asylum and could quickly have been evaluated and turned away at the border.
But that wouldn't accomplish the administration's goals to bring in millions of new potential Democrat voters--if they could have gained enough power to give them amnesty and make them citizens as they hoped to do.
Trump's election has thrown a monkey wrench into their plans and they are scrambling to make it as hard as possible for him to deport all the illegal immigrants they let in over the last four years.
“A lot of lawsuits get filed, maybe frivolously, but it just kind of stalls what the administration wants to do,” one DHS source said.
“This is an obstructionist transition,” former acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan said.
“What they’re trying to do in the last final day, they’re going to try to put up as many roadblocks and obstacles and throw as many grenades as they can on their way out.”
In New York, the ICE office is already "fully booked through October 2032" for appointments to process migrants, and many of them are now roaming the streets freely with no supervision.
A source familiar with the administration's plans said, "What it is doing is creating a lot of burdensome administrative paperwork justifying what they’re doing now. I can tell you a lot of employees would just look at this is this is too much work. Most cases, they’ll just terminate them from the program and not have to go through the appeal process."
Trump is adamant about fixing the crisis, despite these challenges. We will see what the next four years bring.
The news that Vince and Linda McMahon are no longer together was recently disclosed in a Washington Post article that was published this morning.
The article was a profile of Linda McMahon. In a statement, Laura Brevetti, who represents Mrs. McMahon, confirmed the news of the couple's separation, as The Daily Mail reported.
The news that President-elect Trump had declared that he had selected Ms. McMahon as his choice for Secretary of Education in his upcoming cabinet came just a few hours after the announcement was made public.
Neither of the McMahons has ever made a public announcement regarding their marriage or their divorce before.
According to a report that appeared in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter in 2022, Vince and Linda had separated but had not ended their marriage. Neither of the McMahons made any comments regarding the report at that time.
With the exception of the initial confirmation, no other information was provided concerning the separation, nor was it specified how long the McMahons have been apart together.
From 1980 to 2009, Linda McMahon served as the Chief Executive Officer of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). Prior to that, she was the administrator of the Small Business Administration during the first Clinton administration, starting in 2017. She resigned from her position in 2019 to take the helm of America First Action, a super PAC that supports Trump.
McMahon is also the chairperson of the America First Policy Institute, which is a think organization that supports Trump.
TKO Group Holdings was formerly led by Vince McMahon, who also served as the company's Executive Chairman. In January, after a lawsuit that had been filed by Janel Grant became public, he resigned from his position at the corporation.
Grant, who worked for WWE between the years of 2019 and 2022, has filed a lawsuit against Mr. McMahon, John Laurinaitis, and the entertainment business as a whole.
All of the charges have been refuted by Mr. McMahon. In addition, Mr. Laurinaitis has indicated that he was a victim and has denied any misconduct that may have occurred.
McMahon was nominated by President-elect Donald Trump for the position of Secretary of Education in a statement issued just days ago.
“It is my great honor to announce that Linda McMahon, former Administrator of the Small Business Administration, will be the United States Secretary of Education," the President-elect wrote in a statement, posted to his Truth Social account.
"For the past four years, as the Chair of the Board at the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), Linda has been a fierce advocate for Parents’ Rights, working hard at both AFPI and America First Works (AFW) to achieve Universal School Choice in 12 States, giving children the opportunity to receive an excellent Education, regardless of zip code or income. As Secretary of Education, Linda will fight tirelessly to expand ‘Choice’ to every State in America, and empower parents to make the best Education decisions for their families.”
On Monday, during his last Group of 20 summit, the departing American president showed up for a family photo with other world leaders—only to discover that someone else had taken the shot.
A number of world leaders, including Xi Jinping of China, Narendra Modi of India, and Keir Starmer of the United Kingdom, were present and took part in the customary summit set piece, which included smiling and linking hands, as Breitbart News reported.
The blunder in Rio de Janeiro, according to a high-ranking American official, was due to problems with logistics.
“Due to logistical issues, they took the family photo early before all the leaders had arrived. So a number of leaders weren’t actually there when they took the photo,” said the senior official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Before the shot was taken, Biden was nowhere to be seen. Reporters and photographers started scrambling to find him.
Along with Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, he was caught by one cameraman hiding behind a palm tree close by. Meloni and Trudeau were also absent from the picture.
The insider said, "It was just simply logistical issues" when asked if Biden purposefully avoided posing next to Sergei Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, for the photo.
During Sunday's opening session of the summit, Biden discussed his upcoming resignation as president.
“As you know, this is my last G20 summit. We’ve made progress together, but I urge you to keep going -- and I’m sure you will, regardless of my urging or not,” he told fellow leaders.
On Monday, a senior aide said many nations were expecting President-elect Donald Trump's different global leadership, but Biden remains in charge.
“We have a system, fundamentally, that’s predicated on one president at a time,” said Jon Finer, deputy national security adviser. “President Biden is that president; he will be handing off power in January, and it will be up to a new administration to decide what to do with it.”
In his own words, Biden acknowledged the limited time he has left in office on Sunday.
“It’s no secret that I’m leaving office in January,” he said. “I will leave my successor and my country a strong foundation to build on, if they choose to do so.”
Attendees at the G20 conference include the top officials from 19 member nations and two regional organizations: the EU and the African Union.
The member nations comprise over two-thirds of the global population, about 85% of the global GDP, and over 75% of global trade, as stated by the forum.
In the wake of the Asian financial crisis in 1999, the G20 was formed to provide a platform for central bank officials and ministers of finance to deliberate on ways to stabilize the global economy.
Over time, it transformed into a summit of world leaders.
The House Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Guest (R-MS) said over the weekend that it is likely to release its report on the investigation into Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), which could potentially throw a monkey wrench into his nomination by President-elect Donald Trump to be Attorney General.
Gaetz stepped down from the House as soon as Trump nominated him, meaning that technically, he is no longer under the purview of the committee.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) opposed releasing the report and personally conveyed this sentiment to Guest over the weekend, to no avail.
“I appreciate Mike reaching out,” Guest told Politico. “I don’t see it having an impact on what we as a committee ultimately decide.”
A decision on whether to release the report will happen Wednesday when the committee meets.
The investigation involved in part whether Gaetz paid women for sex, and paid for them to travel across state lines for sex. One of the women allegedly involved said she was 17 at the time of some of the encounters.
The Justice Department investigated the allegations for several years and declined to press any charges against him.
The Trump transition team spokesperson Alex Pfeiffer said of the allegations against Gaetz,
Matt Gaetz will be the next Attorney General. He's the right man for the job and will end the weaponization of our justice system. These are baseless allegations intended to derail the second Trump administration. The Biden Justice Department investigated Gaetz for years and cleared him of wrongdoing.
At this year's CPAC convention, Gaetz was vocal about the need to stop members of Congress including Guest, from trading individual stocks.
"For the same reason you don’t let the umpire bet on the game, members of congress should not be allowed to trade individual stocks,” he said. “How about the Ethics Committee take up those reforms?"
“He has become a brilliant stock trader while in office, and I admire the obvious genius,” Gaetz said of Guest. “He knew exactly the right time to buy online gambling stocks. His purchase in Evolution Gaming Securities netted him a hefty 36 percent gain — not too shabby. Now, I’m not saying this is insider trading, but this monetary affair is perhaps the most suspicious I’ve seen since Fani Willis and Nathan Wade."
Gaetz posted on X in February about the ethics probe, “Word is, I now have problems with the Ethics Committee — which seems really odd to me because I’m the one screaming loudest for actual ethics reforms.”
“Word is, I now have problems with the Ethics Committee — which seems really odd to me because I’m the one screaming loudest for actual ethics reforms.”
— Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) at CPAC rails against House Ethics probe into him and the panel’s chair, Rep. Michael Guest (R-MS) pic.twitter.com/XHRwJPyPnw
— The Recount (@therecount) February 23, 2024
It's possible that Gaetz is the only Republican congressman not to take money from PACs, for whatever that's worth.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Monday took up a case that will decide whether top election official Meagan Wolfe can remain in her position despite not being reappointed by the commission or confirmed by the Senate after her term ended in 2023.
Wolfe has been Elections Commission Administrator since 2019, and her reappointment was deadlocked in a 3-3 vote by the commission.
This means it was never sent to the Senate, which could vote to confirm or fire her from the role.
Republicans have been trying to remove Wolfe since 2020, when President Joe Biden won the state by 21,000 votes.
There were numerous challenges to the 2020 vote count, but none of them were successful. Republicans seem to think that Wolfe, who is supposed to be non-partisan, favored Biden at the time.
Because no new administrator was appointed, Wolfe has remained in the role, but Republicans argued that she shouldn't be allowed to do so because she didn't go through the confirmation process.
The Senate in particular is upset about being left out of the process. Senate Republicans did vote to fire her, but it didn't mean anything because procedurally, it was out of order.
“Here the question is, can three commissioners essentially cut the Senate out entirely forever?” Misha Tseytlin, attorney for the Republican-controlled Legislature, argued Monday.
Liberal Justice Janet Karofsky didn't think much of the Republicans' argument.
She pointed out that the court already ruled, albeit when conservatives were in charge, that it was perfectly legal for state Natural Resources Board member Fred Prehn, a Republican nominee, to remain in his role when no one else was appointed.
“You are trying to thread a needle here that has no eye,” she said after hearing their arguments.
But Tseytlin pointed out that Prehn's position did not require the appointment of a replacement, while Wolfe's did.
The court has a narrow liberal majority, which occurred when Karofsky was elected in 2023.
The case could have long-reaching effects for Wisconsin electoral politics.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan is opening investigations into a reported flurry of political actions taken by President Joe Biden's lame-duck Department of Justice.
Jordan did an interview with Just The News on Friday and he raised the alarm about Biden's DOJ going wild with the limited time they have left before President-elect Donald Trump comes through to clean house.
One example that Jordan pointed out was the DOJ's targeting of Elon Musk and his companies after his overt support for Donald Trump’s campaign.
In fact, Biden's DOJ may have broken the law by sending a letter to Musk that essentially amounted to a threat from a federal agency against someone who was campaigning on behalf of a presidential candidate.
There are numerous other accusations of abusive antitrust inquiries as examples of potentially abusive DOJ behavior that may be the last gasp of the Biden administration to punish their political opponents.
Biden's DOJ has engaged in thuggery and intimidation against red states and conservatives for years but now they only have a couple of months before Trump is sworn into office and it will be game over for nearly everyone working there.
Jordan told JTN that, "This pattern of turning these agencies on the very people they're supposed to serve -- we the people, the taxpayers -- has been a concern from the get-go. We're concerned now with what they may be doing with the antitrust issue, going after companies as they're heading out the door."
Biden's DOJ was busy trying to stop Republican states from combating voter fraud and most notably tried to prevent non-citizens from being purged from voter rolls.
Jordan touched on this saying, "Of course, right prior to the elections, we saw the Civil Rights Division in the Justice Department going after Virginia for simply keeping noncitizens from voting in our elections. Imagine that we got the same thing in Ohio, our Secretary of State was sent a letter three weeks before Election Day saying they were concerned about the good work he was doing. So we're always concerned about this. We're going to keep working.”
Jordan also wrote a letter to Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter warning him and the rest of Biden's DOJ that there political actions in the wake of the presidential election were inappropriate and would be punished.
Jordan stated, "We have received allegations that the Division sent demand letters to numerous businesses indicating an intention to start enforcement actions in the final days of the Biden-Harris Administration. With the American people clearly rejecting the failed policies of the Biden-Harris Administration, the Division's actions are inappropriate and inconsistent with the will of the American people."
With Trump making his return to the White House, federal agencies will be purged of leftists and other anti-American individuals who have targeted conservatives. Former Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) will be leading that effort.
Trump nominated Gaetz, who promptly resigned from his position in Congress, this past week and the announcement has already incited panic among both Democrats and establishment Republicans.
Gaetz himself has been hounded by Biden's DOJ and has a personal stake in clearing out leftists that used the Justice Department's power to target a political opponent.
Conservatives have been living in fear of Biden's DOJ for years and now that will be coming to an end. The leftists who corrupted our law enforcement systems for political gain will finally be held accountable for their actions.
A federal judge overseeing the exonerated Central Park Five’s defamation lawsuit against President-elect Trump has recused himself after it was discovered he had close ties to the plaintiff's lead attorney.
The Hill reported that U.S. District Judge Michael Baylson was asked to recuse himself by Trump's lawyers after it was discovered that Baylson and Shanin Specter, the Central Park Five’s lead attorney, had close ties.
Baylson and Specter have been friends since childhood and Specter had represented Baylson and his wife in legal matters.
This represented a serious conflict of interest and Baylson could not be trusted to function as an impartial judge in this matter and as such has recused himself from the case.
This led to a motion from Trump's attorney which read, "Defendant respectfully submits that a reasonable person would question the Court’s impartiality in this matter, and therefore seeks recusal."
Baylson, who was appointed by former President George W. Bush, quickly stepped aside but interestingly he first consulted plaintiffs who declined to oppose his recusal.
This begs the question of what Baylson would have done if the plaintiffs had opposed his recusal. Would Judge Baylson have stayed on the case despite his close relationship with his plaintiff's lead attorney if the plaintiffs wanted him to?
However, thankfully this situation was avoided and the case will be assigned to a different judge in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
The case was filed against Trump by the Central Park 5 in response to comments made by Trump during September’s presidential debate about the circumstances around the group’s wrongful conviction.
The Central Park 5 were found guilty of the 1989 rape and assault of a woman jogging in New York City’s Central Park in a case that shocked America for its brutality and violence.
Their conviction was overturned later but the circumstances around both their overturned conviction and the original case are still being debated. Trump pointed out how all five teens had "pled guilty” and they “killed a person ultimately” in a brutal rape.
Trump has long been vocal about the Central Park 5 and believes their conviction was wrongfully overturned thanks to political reasons. Now the Central Park 5 are doing their best to drag Trump into court on defamation charges.
The Central Park 5 are going to have serious issues dragging Trump into court now that he is the President-elect and will be sworn in as the 47th President of the United States in January.
Like the other legal actions against Trump, his ascendency to the presidency all but crushes any hopes that his opponents had. Democrats launched multiple indictments against Trump all of which are in the process of winding down now that Trump is back in the White House.
Nonetheless, as the Central Park 5's case is a civil lawsuit not brought by the Department of Justice, this case could carry on for a while but is unlikely to be of consequence.
It didn't turn out well for Democrat nominee Vice President Kamala Harris to back out of the Joe Rogan podcast, which was hugely successful for President-elect Donald Trump.
It turns out that she pulled out because she feared a backlash from her woke constituency, according to Jennifer Palmieri, the advisor to second gentleman Doug Emhoff.
“There was a backlash with some of our progressive staff that didn’t want her to be on it, and how there would be a backlash,” Palmieri said Wednesday at a conference organized by The Clearing House.
The Harris campaign originally said she was pulling out of the agreement to do the podcast due to a scheduling conflict.
Unfortunately for her, the decision led to speculation that she could not handle a long-form interview that did not allow a teleprompter or prepared questions.
The speculation was founded on her history of gaffes and vapid comments, so it's very possible that she might have flubbed the interview, had she done it.
President-elect Donald Trump did a three-hour interview with Rogan, which eventually got 50 million views and may have helped him get more of the single male vote.
Rogan, who was not a typical Republican voter, ended up endorsing Trump on the eve of the election.
Trump has since credited son Barron Trump, an 18-year-old freshman at NYU's business school, for advising him about which podcasts to do, including Joe Rogan's.
Trump got 5% more of the youth vote than he did in 2020, making Barron rather successful in the advice he gave his dad.
It's not the first time Trump has used his family members as advisors.
His oldest daughter Ivanka Trump advised him in 2016 and served in the campaign. Her husband Jared Kushner was also a trusted advisor, but neither one of them was involved in the campaign this time around after they relocated to Florida.
Lara Trump, the wife of his son Eric, also served as a campaign advisor in 2020 and 2024.
Trump has big plans for his second term, including fixing the border mess and reviving the economy.