Tag Archives: DonaldJTrump47

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The Broadside | At 50 Days There Are (At Least) 50 Wins

When Brandon was in office, every day seemed to crawl by. Months were like molasses, years like decades. Every moment he was in the White House with his cabal was a moment he could use to consolidate power and corrupt the institutions he controlled. I couldn’t wait for his four-year term to be done.

Now that the shoe is on the other foot, I can’t believe it’s been 50 days since Trump the Magnificent took office. The days and months fairly fly by. They’re going too fast! Slow down! It’s only four years! There’s so much more to accomplish!

But he’s off to a great start, as Paula Bolyard catalogues in 50 wins in 50 days. Here’s a few to whet your appetite:

1.    President Trump secured the border in unprecedented fashion.

  • Illegal border crossings have declined to the lowest level ever recorded — down 94% from last February and down 96% from the all-time high of the Biden Administration. In one sector, illegal border crossings are down 99% over 2023.
  • Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin: “If Fox were to send me down there right now, I would have trouble finding a single migrant on camera.”
  • CBS immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez: “Typically, when we go to the U.S./Mexico border, we at least see one group of people who are trying to cross into the U.S. illegally. We did not see a single migrant.”

 4. President Trump’s tariffs are leveling the playing field for American workers.

  • President Trump restored a 25% tariff on steel imports and elevated the tariff to 25% on aluminum imports to protect these critical American industries from unfair foreign competition – a move praised by the Steel Manufacturers Association, the Aluminum Association, and businesses across the country.
  • President Trump unveiled a plan for fair and reciprocal trade, making clear to the world that the United States will no longer tolerate being ripped off. 

6.    President Trump has secured billions of dollars in new U.S.-based investments.

  • Apple announced a historic $500 billion investment that will create 20,000 new U.S.-based jobs.
  • TSMC announced an unprecedented $100 billion investment in U.S.-based semiconductor chip manufacturing.
  • President Trump announced the largest artificial intelligence infrastructure project in history, securing $500 billion in planned private sector investment — with major CEOs agreeing it would not have been possible without President Trump’s leadership.
  • President Trump secured a $20 billion investment by DAMAC Properties to build new U.S.-based data centers.
  • CMA CGM announced a $20 billion investment in U.S. shipbuilding and logistics, which will create 10,000 new jobs.
  • Eli Lilly and Company announced a $27 billion investment in its U.S.-based manufacturing.
  • The Trump Administration announced an $18 billion investment by American liquefied natural gas (LNG) exporter Venture Global into their Plaquemines LNG export facility — made possible by President Trump’s energy policies.
  • Wisconsin-based Clarios, a leader in low-voltage energy storage, announced a $6 billion plan to expand its U.S.-based manufacturing.
  • Saudi Arabia declared its intention to invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years.
  • Taiwan pledged to boost its investment in the United States.

7.    President Trump is bringing manufacturing back to America.

  • The U.S. gained 10,000 manufacturing jobs in President Trump’s first full month in office — led by the auto sector, which gained the most new jobs in 15 months. This is a swift turnaround after losing an average of 9,000 manufacturing jobs per month in the final year of the Biden Administration.
  • Stellantis will reopen its assembly plant in Illinois, build its next-generation Dodge Durango in Michigan, and make new investments in their Ohio and Indiana facilities.
  • Nissan is expected to move some production to the U.S.
  • Mercedes-Benz announced plans to “grow” its vehicle production in the U.S.
  • Honda is expected to produce its next-generation Civic hybrid model in Indiana.
  • Electronics giants Samsung and LG “are considering moving their plants in Mexico to the U.S.” now that President Trump is back in office.
  • Siemens announced a $285 million investment in U.S. electrical product manufacturing, which will create more than 900 new skilled manufacturing jobs.

12.    President Trump unleashed American energy.

  • President Trump declared a National Energy Emergency to unlock America’s full energy potential and bring down costs for American families — and the U.S. is now the largest net exporter of natural gas in the world.
  • President Trump re-opened 625 million acres for offshore drilling, which Biden banned in his waning days, in order to “drill, baby, drill.”
  • President Trump established the National Energy Dominance Council to maximize use of America’s extensive energy resources.

19.    President Trump is ending waste, fraud, and abuse in government.

  • President Trump established the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to maximize government productivity and ensure the best use of taxpayer funds — which has already achieved tens of billions of dollars in savings for taxpayers.
  • President Trump stopped the waste, fraud, and abuse within USAID — ensuring taxpayers are no longer on the hook for funding pet projects of entrenched bureaucrats, such as sex changes in Guatemala.

27.    President Trump designated English as the official language of the United States.

49.    President Trump is ending China’s chokehold over the Panama Canal as he seeks its rightful return to U.S. ownership.

  • Following a visit from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino agreed to withdraw from the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative, a debt-trap diplomacy scheme the Chinese Communist Party uses to gain influence over developing nations.
  • CK Hutchison Holding sold ports operating on both sides of the Panama Canal to a U.S.-based consortium, effectively placing the ports back in American control.

These are some of my favorites. There’s much more at the link. Go read them all and be amazed.

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The Broadside | Trump Delivers a Side-Winder and Exposes the True Conflict Between Left and Right

I watched Trump’s first joint address to Congress since retaking the White House and it was one for the history books. Here’s some highlights along with one simple observation I have.

This was a new one: Churlish Rep. Al Green gets booted after disrupting Trump’s speech and refusing to sit or to quiet down. “Remove this gentleman from the chamber.” I haven’t seen that before.

Trump on the border: “All we needed was a new president.” Trump calls out the lies that the Dems have told for the last four years while letting foreign invaders overrun our southern border.

Trump asked, presumably rhetorically, how many want to see the war in Ukraine go for another five years. Some Democrats applauded and Trump specifically called out Elizabeth Warren, using her preferred name, Pocahontas, who continued to applaud for FIVE MORE YEARS OF WAR while the cameras were on her.

Like a clapping seal that doesn’t know why it’s applauding. It just does because it’s been trained to.

Here’s the investments Trump has secured less than two months into his presidency:

In total, President Trump has secured nearly $2 trillion in new U.S. investments.

  • TSMC announced an unprecedented $100 billion investment in U.S.-based semiconductor chip manufacturing.
  • Apple announced a historic $500 billion investment that will create 20,000 new U.S.-based jobs.
  • President Trump announced the largest artificial intelligence infrastructure project in history, securing $500 billion in planned private sector investment — with major CEOs agreeing it would not have been possible without President Trump’s leadership.
  • President Trump secured a $20 billion investment by DAMAC Properties to build new U.S.-based data centers.
  • Wisconsin-based Clarios, a leader in low-voltage energy storage, announced a $6 billion plan to expand its U.S.-based manufacturing.
  • Eli Lilly and Company announced a $27 billion investment in its U.S.-based manufacturing.
  • Saudi Arabia declared its intention to invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years.
  • Taiwan pledged to boost its investment in the United States.
  • Electronics giants Samsung and LG “are considering moving their plants in Mexico to the U.S.” now that President Trump is back in office.

Needless to say, the Democrats sat on their hands for the vast majority of speech. Trump even addressed the obvious.

Full Text: “I look at the Democrats in front of me – I realize, there’s nothing I can say to make them happy, stand, or smile or applaud. I could find a cure to the most devastating disease…or announce the answers to the greatest economy in history, or the stoppage of crime to the lowest levels ever. And these people – sitting RIGHT HERE – will not clap, stand or cheer for these achievements. They won’t, no matter what. 5 times I’ve been up here.”

The Democrats are reflexively, automatically, predisposed to oppose anything and everything that Trump represents, and nowhere was it more obvious than in the joint session of Congress tonight, as enthusiastic Republicans cheered and chanted USA! USA! USA! while the childish Democrats sat on their hands or held up their virtue signaling signs. The contrast between the two groups couldn’t have been clearer.

We used to be a country that agreed on what was important. What we disagreed on was how to address those issues. Democrats (generally) wanted bigger government intervention; Republicans (generally) wanted less.

Now, we can’t even agree on the issues. We’ve got one party who left the impression last night that they support taxes on tips, taxes on overtime, taxes on Social Security, the war in Ukraine, men participating in women’s sports; that they hate the popular vote, cutting waste, eliminating Social Security fraud; and that they couldn’t care less about every one of Trump’s special guests, including the mothers and sisters of children murdered by illegal aliens, a steel worker who has fostered more than 40 children, and a child battling brain cancer his whole life who was deputized as a Secret Service agent. The party of “joy” they’re not.

The Democrat party isn’t dead—yet, but they made it clear last night that it’s really not a fight between good ideas (left v. right), but a fight between good and evil.

Pick a side.

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The Broadside | Trump Announces Dan Bongino As Deputy Director of the FBI and Things Are About to Get Real

Trump has put together one of the strongest and most unified teams in the history of our country, with Bongino being the latest high-profile addition.

What makes Bongino such a great pick is that he sees clearly the malfeasance of the FBI in its persecution of Trump and the January 6 prosecutions, along with the Russia! Russia! Russia! hoax. As a former Secret Service agent he understands how Washington runs. I think the Bondi, Patel, Bongino combo is truly a triple threat.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the three of them could start rooting out the rot at the FBI and investigate the who and how behind the weaponization of the agency. Most of all, I want to see bad actors go to jail. I mean, that’s what they tried to do to Trump, right? Put him in jail. We were constantly told that “no one is above the law,” correct? Well, let’s get to it, then.

Here’s a list to start with: James Comey. Adam Schiff. Nancy Pelosi. Tony Fauci. Barack Hussein Obama.

If you missed Kash Patel’s comments after being sworn in, I’ve embedded them below. The most inspiring thing he says is that he’s “living the American dream.”

He can hardly believe it.

This is the guy leading the law enforcement community across the country, and his deputy director is just as committed to defending and preserving the U.S. constitution.

Buckle up!

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The Broadside | Trump Plaza in Gaza-Lago

I predicted here that the Kansas City Chiefs would beat the Philadelphia Eagles by six points in Super Bowl LIX. If the Chiefs had shown up, that may have happened. They kept Saquon Barkley in check, but the Eagles shut down any Chiefs offense and sacked Mahomes six times. That must be the “six” I sensed in my prediction.

Did you know the flu is going around? I had no idea until it flattened me last week. I hope all of you are staying well.

Just when you think Trump can’t shock you with something new.

The U.S. will “take over the Gaza Strip,” level it and rebuild the area, President Donald Trump said during a press conference Tuesday evening after meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House.

Wut?

“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it, too,” Trump said Tuesday evening in a joint press conference with Netanyahu. “We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous, unexplored bombs and other weapons on the site.”

“Level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out, create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area,” he said. “Do a real job. Do something different. Just can’t go back. If you go back, it’s going to end up the same way it has for 100 years.”

Even more amazing is that instead of laughing off the idea, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu embraced it.

Netanyahu, when also asked about the Gaza Strip, reiterated to the media that he has three goals, one of which is to “make sure that Gaza never poses a threat to Israel again.”

“President Trump is taking it to a much higher level,” the Israeli leader said. “He sees a different – he sees a different future for that piece of land that has been the focus of so much terrorism, so much, so many attacks against us, so many, so many trials and so many tribulations. He has a different idea, and I think it’s worth paying attention to this.”

It’s so radical, it might work.

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The Broadside | Trump Is Quickly Remaking American International Policy

Starting a third week of Team Trump that’s firing on all eight cylinders—let’s take a look at his international disruptions.

Trump slapped 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada and 10% on China over the weekend (to take effect Tuesday) with threats to increase the rates if the targeted countries don’t reel in illegal immigration and the deadly drug, fentanyl, which is sourced in China.

In the executive order, Trump said that the tariffs stem from an “extraordinary threat posed by illegal aliens and drugs, including deadly fentanyl, [that] constitutes a national emergency.”

The tariffs have invited international criticism from leaders and citizens alike in Canada and Mexico. During his exchange with reporters on Sunday evening, Trump accused Canada of being “abusive” toward the U.S. in terms of trade.

He was particularly blunt about Canada.

“Canada has been very abusive of the United States for many years. They don’t allow our banks,” Trump claimed. “And you know that Canada does not allow banks to go in, if you think about it. That’s pretty amazing. If we have a U.S. bank, they don’t allow them to go in.”

“Canada has been very tough for oil on energy. They don’t allow our farm products in, essentially. They don’t allow a lot of things in. And we allow everything to come in as being a one-way street.”

Trump also claimed that the U.S. subsidizes Canada “by the tune of about $200 billion a year.”

“And for what? What do we get out of it? We don’t get anything out of it,” he added. “I love the people of Canada. I disagree with the leadership of Canada and something is going to happen there.”

He’s got a point. Why do we subsidize our northern neighbor who simply takes advantage of the U.S. relationship? Why should U.S. taxpayers be supporting Canada without some benefit? Plus, Canada relies on the U.S. military for their protection. Okay, then, pony up, eh?

Trump also threatened the EU.

The Republican leader also said that he will “definitely” impose tariffs against the European Union, which he said the U.S. has a $300 billion trade deficit with.

“They don’t take our cars, they don’t take our farm products, they take almost nothing,” Trump said. “And we take everything from them. Millions of cars, tremendous amounts of food and farm products. So the UK is way out of line and we’ll see the UK, but the European Union is really out of line.”

Interestingly, he also said he was cutting off American money to South Africa, in a post on Truth Social.

In this article, we learn that “the United States obligated nearly $440 million in assistance to South Africa in 2023, the most recent US government data showed.”

During his first administration, Trump said the US would investigate unproven large-scale killings of white farmers in South Africa and violent takeovers of land. Pretoria at the time said Trump was misinformed. It is unclear whether the Trump administration carried out an investigation.

I don’t believe South Africa is aligned with our interests, so why do we send welfare checks to them?

Then there’s Greenland. Trump initially raised the idea of acquiring the island during his first term and is being loud about it in his second.

Veep JD Vance on Sunday refrained from setting expectations too high about President Trump’s chances of usurping Greenland from Denmark, although he still called it “possible” and dismissed European opposition.

Trump, 78, had set his sights on acquiring the icy island since his first administration and has rekindled those aspirations in recent weeks. Vance, 40, stressed Sunday that the territory is important for US security.

“I think it’s possible,” Vance added to Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” when asked about whether the US will acquire Greenland.

“It’s really important to our national security. There are sea lanes there that the Chinese use, that the Russians use,” Vance said. “Frankly, Denmark, which controls Greenland, [is] not doing its job, and it’s not being a good ally.”

Trump is also adamant about reclaiming the Panama Canal. From the same article above:

The vice president also defended Trump’s objectives of reclaiming the Panama Canal.

“They have violated a core tenet of the agreement,” Vance said, referring to Panama. “When we gave over the Panama Canal to the country of Panama, what we said is, you have to make sure that this canal respects American sovereignty and that you don’t give special benefits to the Chinese.”

The US agreed to give the canal zone to Panama in the 1970s under late former President Jimmy Carter in exchange for the South American country agreeing to keep the key waterway between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans neutral.

Trump has long decried Cater’s decision to relinquish control of the canal, the construction for which was largely funded by the US.

On Sunday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio trekked over to Panama and met with Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino, saying he “made clear that this status quo is unacceptable,” according to a readout from the US.

There’s another reason why we need to control the Panama Canal.

The situation in the Panama Canal is worse than we thought. Not only does a Chinese company control container ports at each end of the waterway, but a Chinese construction battalion is slowly building a bridge right across the middle.

How slowly? Well, the bridge won’t be completed until 2027 and Sen. Ted Cruz thinks he knows why.

As Cruz, who is chairman of the Commerce Committee, noted at a hearing this week, “the partially-completed bridge gives China the ability to block the canal without warning…This situation poses acute risks to US national security.”

What kind of risks?

Imagine that China announces a blockade of Taiwan and that we want to surge forces from the Atlantic into the Pacific to counter it.

A US aircraft carrier is midway through the canal, passing under China’s bridge when, without warning, the unfinished bridge collapses, crushing the ship.

China pretends it’s an accident, offering its condolences to the families of the thousands of US sailors who lost their lives. Unable to break the blockade on its own, the island of Taiwan capitulates two months later, and the largest chip-manufacturing factory in the world falls into China’s hands.

Finally, as if he didn’t kick up enough dust yet, Trump weighed in on the conflict in Gaza and Israel with a stunning idea.

President Donald Trump recently floated a fantastic idea: Arab nations, he said, should accept large numbers of Gazans as refugees, a move that “could be temporary or long term.”

The accommodation would allow Israel to eliminate the remnants of Hamas, which, in turn, would allow the international community to rebuild Gaza.

Not only would such a policy enhance the prospects of peace, but it’s also humane.

Neither Jordan nor Egypt want the Palestinians in Gaza. But there is a compelling reason for Jordan to take them.

“Our rejection of the displacement of Palestinians is firm and will not change. Jordan is for Jordanians, and Palestine is for Palestinians,” the nation’s foreign minister said after Trump’s comments.

Well, the biggest problem with the statement is that it reminds us that Jordan is “Palestine.”

Jordan, with a population of over 70% Palestinians, sits principally on land set aside during the British Palestine Mandate to create a new Arab state that was to sit next to the Jewish one.

We already have a two-state solution. We just choose to ignore it.

What’s amazing is that no one else in recent memory has floated any of these ideas. Trump has not only promoted them, but has done so with an edge of belligerence. Who else has thought about our national security from the standpoint of the Arctic and China’s delcaration that they are esablishing a presence there? Who else has looked strategically at the Panama Canal and realized that China has set itself as a threat there, too? Who’s looking at our trade imbalances and doing something about it? Who has put American interests first?

Nobody. Nobody but Trump, that is.

Henry Kissinger once noted that Donald Trump, though he may not do it knowingly, was “one of those figures in history who appears from time to time to mark the end of an era and to force it to give up its old pretenses.”

And it is undeniable that many of Trump’s declarations, perhaps because they are unfettered by the norms of policy debate, end up changing the dynamics of policy.

Greenland. Panama. Canada. South Africa. Israel. Gaza. The EU. Mexico. China.

Trump is remaking American policy while we watch. It’s fascinating.

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The Broadside | No, We Are Not a Nation of Immigrants

One of my pet peeves—hmm, correction—one of my deeply held frustrations with the ruling class has been their refusal to address the invasion over our southern border for decades. It’s not just been the Democrats, although they have exacerbated the problem through their anti-American hostility, while the Republicans just ignored the problem.

Fortunately, President Donald J. Trump, who just won his third election and has been sworn into office for the second time, is wasting no time in closing the border and deporting illegal aliens at a record pace.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, taking directions from President Donald Trump’s border czar Tom Homan, have arrested over 2,500 illegal immigrants since Trump was sworn into office last Monday.

One of the arguments made by Dilutionists (those who want to dilute the unity of American culture by importing unvetted hordes of third-world welfare cases into the country) is the “but, we’re a nation of immigrants.” In fact, Vice-President J.D. Vance faced off with Margaret Brennan, the propagandist of “Face the Nation” on CBS Sunday morning.

At 3:57 in the video below (cued to that time), after JD Vance says he doesn’t know why we’d allow a person born to parents living temporarily in the US to be automatically conferred US citizenship since there’s no other nation that does that, Brennan replies, “Well, this is a country founded by immigrants,” and gives him a wry “gotcha” smile.

His response wiped the smile off her face. “Just because we were founded by immigrants doesn’t mean that 240 years later, we have to have the dumbest immigration policy in the world.”

Exactly. We were founded by some immigrants. So?

In a terrific article at The Federalist, Brianna Lyman dismantles that argument.

Britain began establishing the 13 original colonies in the early 1600’s. Over the next century or so, hundreds of thousands of Brits moved to the British colonies that were established by settlers — not immigrants. There was no “nation” being immigrated to by the first settlers. The Brits didn’t come to America to join a pre-existing country. It was just land. There were no laws, borders, maps, or written language. The British settlers came to uncharted land to establish colonies under British rule. They were entrepreneurs building this nation from scratch, not immigrants joining a pre-existing nation.

[…]

America was never just a multicultural experiment that began with and requires an endless influx of immigrants (both legal and illegal) to sustain itself. The settlers were not a hodge-podge of random cultures and religions and languages and customs. America was founded by Anglo Protestants who pulled ideas of liberty and independence from Anglo-liberalism, which grounded itself in the idea of equality, freedom, and government controlled by the people (it was most commonly associated with thinkers like John Locke). These settlers forged a new nation, instituted customs, traditions, and a national identity.

And our Founders understood the importance of a national identity, with Thomas Jefferson writing in 1776 that while he is “for extending the right of suffrage (or in other words the right of a citizen) to all who had a permanent intention of living in the country … Whoever intends to live in a country must wish that country well, and has a natural right of assisting in the preservation of it.”

In simpler terms, assimilation was a requirement of anyone coming to America.

But what exactly is to be preserved or assimilated into if the left is correct in that America was “founded” by immigrants and therefore is just a nation of immigrants? Such a premise presupposes that we are merely an ever-changing mixture of the dominant immigrant groups at any point in time.

Most helpful is Lyman’s distinction between “settlers” and “immigrants.” Immigrants are traveling to an established nation; settlers are traveling to an unsettled land to establish a nation. Immigrants are expected to assimilate into the nation they’re joining, not act like settlers establishing their own distinct culture within the host nation.

Yes, foreigners emigrated to the United States after it had become an established nation, and they still do today. But it should be controlled immigration that protects our unique American culture and values, not an uncontrolled mass invasion of third-world peasants and criminals who burden our nation with the cost of their presence and destroy cultural cohesion.

Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s 27-year-old press secretary, held her first press briefing yesterday and addressed this administration’s attitude toward illegals.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was taking questions during her first press briefing since President Donald Trump returned to the White House last week when she was asked about the mass arrests.

“The 3,500 arrests that ICE (U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement) has made so far since President Trump came back into office. Can you just tell us the numbers? How many have a criminal record versus those who are just in the country illegally,” one reporter asked.

“All of them, because they illegally broke our nation’s laws, and therefore, they are criminals as far as this administration goes,” Leavitt replied. “I know the last administration didn’t see it that way. So it’s a big culture shift in our nation to view someone who breaks our immigration laws as a criminal, but that’s exactly what they are.”

The reporter then asked if they all have criminal records.

“If they broke our nation’s laws, yes, they are a criminal,” Leavitt said.

More like that, please.

For another great article on immigration from The Federalist, read, “Birthright Citizenship Is A Pernicious Lie That’s Destroying America” by John Daniel Davidson.

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The Broadside | Trump Accomplished More in One Week Than Biden Did in Four Years

I stopped watching the NFL after they started taking knees during the national anthem, but I’m aware of the standings and, just so you know that I’m a well-rounded guy, I was rooting for Buffalo yesterday. But Mahomes and Co. are headed back for their third consecutive Super Bowl to face Philadelphia.

My prediction: Chiefs by 6.

Trump’s only been in office for a week and I already can’t keep up with all the winning.

Deportations. Firings. Pardons. A blizzard of executive orders.

And the Gulf of Mexico became the Gulf of America.

President Donald Trump moved with dizzying speed during his first week back in power as he began the process of enacting his agenda.

Trump’s aggressive use of presidential power out of the starting gate left some observers stunned and his supporters cheering as he wasted little time delivering on a slew of campaign promises, sometimes in provocative and boundary-testing ways.

Shock and awe, I’d say. Just like the Left does when they’re in power.

Health agencies went quiet after a pause was ordered on external communications. Employees overseeing diversity efforts in the federal workforce were put on leave, with plans to fire them. At least one plane was loaded with undocumented immigrants to whisk them out of the country. Pardons were handed out to nearly every person convicted for storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

The moves sent shock waves from Washington to the nation’s southern border as Trump’s disruptive agenda came into clearer focus.

That is a perfect description of Trump’s agenda. “Disruptive” in the most positive sense of the word.

Much of the transformation was foretold by the president’s hard-charging campaign, where he railed against former President Joe Biden’s policies and promised a radically different approach, and by a transition period that saw him stock his administration with people viewed as eager to dramatically remake government.

Yet the breadth and the tempo of the changes were remarkable.

Trump only has four years to fix what’s broke, or only two years if Democrats were to retake one or both chambers of Congress in the mid-terms. He needs to move at a blistering pace if any of his larger objectives are going to grab and take root.

I like what I’ve seen so far. He’s adopted the “move fast and break things” mindset of tech companies, which iterate quickly. He came into office with a plan and is rapidly putting it into place.

He’s also reacting quickly to unforeseen developments that threaten his agenda. Over the weekend, Colombia’s socialist president, Gustavo Petro, refused to take two planeloads of deported Columbians. Trump and his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, reacted swiftly, threatening to slap 25 percent tariffs on Columbian imports, revoking visas and financial sanctions.

“These measures are just the beginning,” Trump added. “We will not allow the Colombian Government to violate its legal obligations with regard to the acceptance and return of the Criminals they forced into the United States!”

Less than an hour later, Petro folded. Hardcore.

“Colombian President Gustavo Petro is offering his presidential plane to help repatriate deportees from the US who were set to arrive in the country Sunday morning, the presidency said,” CNN reported.

America is back, baby.

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The Broadside | Donald J. Trump Is Our President

I spent most of the day Monday watching the proceedings of the 60th inaugural featuring President Donald J. Trump, and later that day we hosted a party with about 20 friends to celebrate his return to the White House.

We also celebrated the end of the interminable and disastrous cabal known as the Biden administration, arguably the worst and most corrupt “president” in American history—worse even than Jimmy Carter or Barack Obama. After issuing a slew of pardons and commuting death sentences for thousands of condemned criminals, Biden literally signed last-minute preemptive pardons for his criminal family, preposterously claiming that they had been unfairly targeted and were at risk for revenge from the incoming administration.

Biden wasn’t righting wrongs; he was flipping off American citizens and protecting his cronies on his way out the door as he exonerated Anthony Fauci, Liz Cheney and other political scum who served on the J6 committee. The only upside is that now they can’t plead the Fifth Amendment if they are called to testify. And Congress should get busy putting them under oath to find out what they did and how deeply we are compromised.

All that to say that the word that describes the feeling most of us have is one of “relief.” A couple of our friends said separately to me that that’s how they felt. I certainly feel that. It’s like we’ve been granted a reprieve from the destructive forces that have taken over our most sacred civil institutions like government and education and system of justice.

Certainly, Trump feels like he’s been given a mandate to make America great again.

Trump has wasted no time, hitting the ground running with executive orders that begin to turn the ship of state around. A partial list from the NY Post:

  • Withdraw from the Paris climate accord
  • End all federal cases and investigations of any Trump supporters
  • Revoke protections for transgender troops
  • Pardon about 1,500 people criminally charged in the Jan. 6 attack, while commuting the sentences for six
  • Declare a national emergency at the US-Mexico border
  • Designate drug cartels and Tren de Aragua as foreign terrorist organizations
  • Reverse several immigration orders from the Biden administration, including one that narrows deportation priorities to people who commit serious crimes, are deemed national security threats or were stopped at the border
  • Rescind the 2021 Title IX order, which bans discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation in education programs that get federal funding
  • Revoke Biden’s recent removal of Cuba from US state sponsors of terrorism list
  • Order federal employees back to work in office five days a week
  • Direct every governmental department and agency to address the cost-of-living crisis
  • Restore freedom of speech and prevent censorship of free speech
  • End the “weaponization of government against the political adversaries of the previous administration”
  • Impose 25% tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada as of Feb. 1
  • Reverse Biden order requiring 50% of new cars sold in 2030 be EVs
  • Proclaim that there are two biological sexes: male and female
  • End diversity, equity and inclusion programs within federal agencies
  • Establish Department of Government Efficiency
  • Reopen Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas exploration
  • Order attorney general, secretary of state and secretary of homeland security to “take all appropriate action to prioritize” prosecution of illegal aliens who commit crimes
  • Withdraw US from Global Minimum Tax agreement
  • Order the attorney general to pursue the death penalty for killing of a law enforcement officer or any capital crime committed by an illegal immigrant
  • Order the secretaries of commerce and the interior to restart efforts to route water from California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to other parts of the state
  • Withdraw the US from the World Health Organization
  • Order Treasury Department to explore creation of External Revenue Service
  • Revoke security clearances for ex-national security adviser John Bolton and 51 intelligence officials who said Hunter Biden laptop bore “classic earmarks” of Russian disinformation.
  • Declare the border crisis an “invasion” and order the attorney general and secretaries of state and homeland security to “take all appropriate action to repel, repatriate, or remove any alien engaged” in such
  • Formally rename the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” and Alaska’s Mt. Denali to “Mt. McKinley”

There’s more, but that’s a flavor of what he’s doing, and it’s all answering the call from the American people to close our border and end the woke nonsense that has consumed our culture for the last four years (and longer).

Yesterday, he also announced a half-trillion-dollar ($500 billion) investment in AI (Artificial Intelligence) data centers featuring a company called “Stargate” and tech investors Larry Ellison (Oracle CEO), Sam Altman (OpenAI CEO) and Masayoshi Son (Softbank CEO). Exactly what its purpose will be remains a bit unclear, but they talked about curing cancer and designing treatments for illnesses that might change your mRNA—which is what the clot shot did for Covid—setting off alarm bells in my mind.

As Ronald Reagan said, “Trust, but verify.”

We’re off to a good start. I’m sure we’ll have plenty to document as the Left tries to cope with all the winning and not be the hypocrites they are.

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The Broadside | It’s Go Time!

I can tell you that I have NEVER been this excited about a Monday as I am today! No, not because it is MLK day, even though that’s a noble moment. No, today marks the end of one of the most radical and destructive administrations in our nation’s history, the end of which I and more than half of America have been waiting for four long years.

Joe Biden, after more than 50 years in Washington, is finally, permanently, leaving office. May he ever be encumbered by his disastrous, fake, and failed [p]residency. His term is one of the greatest frauds ever perpetrated on the people of the United States, starting with his sham victory in 2020 through the cabal that ran his brain for four years.

Trump is primed to go full force starting at 12:01 today.

“The American people have given us their trust, and in return, we’re going to give them the best first day, the biggest first week, and the most extraordinary first 100 days of any presidency in American history. To implement this historic agenda, I have assembled an all-star cabinet of patriots and visionary reformers for America, and together we will win, win, win for America,” he said before giving a shout out to his cabinet picks.

In addition to undoing Biden’s outrageous Executive Orders, pardoning the vast majority of the citizens in jail over J6, Trump is also going to suspend the security clearances of the 51 intelligence officials who claimed in the face of common sense that Hunter Biden’s laptop was a Russian op.

President-elect Donald Trump, on Day 1, plans to suspend security clearances of the 51 intelligence officials who claimed reporting tied to Hunter Biden’s laptop had “the classic earmarks” of Russian disinformation ahead of the 2020 election, according to a report.

Trump will repeal the clearances of the so-called “Spies Who Lie” as part of a flurry of executive orders he’s expected to sign on his first day back in the Oval Office, Fox News reported, citing a senior administration official familiar with the matter.

[…]

Following the bombshell reporting, a slew of former senior intelligence officers signed a letter alleging the lot of emails “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation” without presenting any new evidence.

OK, it’s not prison terms, but at least they’re suffering some consequences for their election interference.

Trump has a lot to do in the next couple of years. We’ve got an economy in shambles, we’ve got disasters on both coasts in North Carolina and California, we’ve been overrun by foreign invaders. Internationally we’re being threatened by China, the Middle East is unstable, Russia and Ukraine are locked in a death spiral, and Iran is nearing nuclear viability.

But Trump is an optimist and has declared that we are entering a new era of American prosperity and growth, a “golden age.” He’s put a great team together with rockstars like Mike Hegseth, Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard, Mario Rubio, Kristi Noem, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, Pam Bondi, and so on.

With a talented team like that, Trump can brag that, “We’re not going to stop winning. We’re going to win like never before.”

I hope so.

I trust so.

May it be so.

Enjoy the day!

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The Broadside | Trump’s Boast Is Coming True (Again) and We’re All Happier For it

Remember when during his first campaign in 2016 Trump predicted that there would be so much winning that we’d get sick of it? “We will have so much winning if I get elected, that you may get bored with winning.”

Salon, from which that quote is taken, dismissed it as so much bluster. But as we’ve come to learn, Trump seems to embody winning. And before he’s even taken office for his second term, there is a great amount of winning.

His approval numbers during his transition are exponentially higher than during 2016.

“Take a look here,” Enten began, pointing to data from November 2016. At that time, Trump’s net approval during his transition was only “plus one point.” Enten emphasized, “That was well, well, well below the historical norm.” Fast forward to today, and Trump’s approval during this transitional phase has skyrocketed to +18—a remarkable 17-point increase. “The bottom line is this: if eight years ago Americans were lukewarm on Donald Trump, at this particular point, they’re giving him much more of the benefit of the doubt,” Enten noted. “A lot more Americans are in love with this transition.”

All of the outstanding legal assaults on Trump have been dismissed, including Jack Smith’s two cases. The totally made-up documents case that ignores the Presidential Records Act, in which the feds raided Mar-a-Lago and tossed Melania’s underwear drawer, was in turn tossed by the federal judge overseeing the case because of Smith’s illegal appointment by Merrick Garland. Plus, Smith dropped his January 6 “Insurrection” case against Trump.

Nevertheless, in a filing on Monday, Smith noted that he was dropping the charges without prejudice, meaning that he or someone with the notion to continue the weaponization of the law against political opponents, could reanimate them. 

Then, there’s the stock market up and renewed optimism in the air as restaurants, always a bellwether for how the economy is doing, experience a surge of customers.

Financial markets rallied early Monday as stocks and bonds positively responded to President-elect Donald J. Trump‘s announcement that he is naming macro and hedge fund manager Scott Bessent as his Secretary of the Treasury. Bessent, the founder of Key Square Group, is perceived as a stabilizing influence anticipated to effectively manage the $28 trillion Treasuries market. Dow futures were up nearly one percent before the opening bell. Meanwhile, S&P 500 futures had risen 0.5 percent.

One of the most shocking results of a new poll shows that nearly 3 in 4 Americans support Trump’s plan to deport foreigners who are here illegally. That’s a huge majority and a solid mandate.

Quick Hit:

A CBS News poll reveals that 73% of Americans, including a majority across racial lines, believe President-elect Donald Trump should focus on repatriating illegal migrants. More than half also support a nationwide program to deport all illegal immigrants.

Key Details:

  • CBS News/YouGov poll shows 45% of Americans view deportations as a “high priority,” with 28% considering it a “medium priority.” Only 27% say it’s “not a priority.”
  • 57% back a national program to locate and deport all illegal immigrants.
  • 74% of whites, 70% of blacks, and 69% of Hispanics support making deportations a priority.

Diving Deeper:

As President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office, a CBS News poll conducted by YouGov shows that deportation policy is a top concern for many Americans. The survey of 2,232 adults indicates a near-consensus, with 73% calling for prioritizing the removal of illegal migrants.

Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, are already self-deporting from that city to (most-likely) sanctuary cities in other states. Not that that will protect them from being evicted from the country, since Tom Holman, Trump’s newly appointed border czar, has made clear.

Mexico and Canada have already responded to Trump’s threats to levy tariffs of 25% on goods imported from those countries. Mexico’s president has already agreed to stop caravans of migrants.

There’s lots more, but I think Benny Johnson sums it up nicely.

I also feel optimistic about Trump’s election and what he will accomplish over the next four years. I’m praying that it will be a start of a resurgence in American prosperity and the dawn of a new “morning” in America that will last more than his term in office.