Twitter Says OANN Report of Gateway Pundit Investigation is Disputed – How Could This Be When We Are the Only Ones Who Wrote About It?

On Tuesday night President Trump tweeted a Gateway Pundit video where we identified Georgia ballot workers jamming ballots into tabulators multiple times late on election night.

President Trump retweeted our video where we revealed Georgia poll workers jamming multiple ballots through tabulators multiple times.

We shared this video on December 4, when we pointed out that one of the participants in the suitcase ballot hoist grabbed the ballots and started jamming the ballots into the Dominion tabulators three times.

Of course, within a minute after the President uploaded the tweet to Twitter the tech giant slapped on a warning that video.

The Twitter warning said the tweet was “disputed.”

This was interesting considering the report is an actual video and that The Gateway Pundit, Newsmax and OANN were the only outlets to carry this report on voter fraud.

The video has not been disputed. Twitter is just recklessly tagging President Trump’s tweets with malicious warnings. This is outrageous.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/12/wth-twitter-says-oann-report-gateway-pundit-investigation-disputed-ones-wrote/

Exiled Turkish journalist, whose paper reported on arms sent to Syria, gets 27-year jail term for espionage and aid to terrorism

A Turkish journalist, whose newspaper reported on an alleged 2014 Turkish intelligence operation to supply arms to anti-government fighters in Syria, was sentenced in absentia to over 27 years in jail.

Can Dundar, the former editor-in-chief of the opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet, was found guilty by an Istanbul court of military espionage and providing material assistance to a terrorist group. He was given 18 years and nine months for publishing state secrets and eight years and nine months for supporting FETO, an organization that Ankara considers terrorist. This amounts to 27 years and six months in total and is less than the 35 years, which prosecutors asked for.

There is little chance that Dundar will see the inside of a Turkish prison anytime soon. He spent over 90 days in custody during his previous trial, but now lives in exile and was tried in absentia. In 2016, Dundar was sentenced to five years and ten months, but managed to leave Turkey as his appeal made it through the court system and has been living in Germany ever since. Berlin refused Turkish requests to extradite him.

Both trials relate to Cumhuriyet’s 2015 publication of a video showing the search of military trucks loaded with weapons. The search was conducted by Turkish law enforcement a year earlier and exposed an apparent Turkish intelligence operation to supply Syrian rebels fighting against the government in Damascus. The video served as evidence that the truck convoy indeed carried weapons rather than some other cargo.

The case against Dundar alleged that he knowingly published footage that he knew was classified with the goal to hurt the Turkish government. The journalist was a vocal critic of Turkish President Recep Erdogan and a supporter of mass protests against him, which first erupted in 2013. Ankara believes that the demonstrations had been orchestrated by US-based cleric Fetullah Gulen and his organization, FETO, and that the same force was behind a failed attempt to overthrow Erdogan in the 2016 military coup.

https://www.rt.com/news/510546-turkish-journalist-sentence-espionage/

Insurrection Act nullified in latest coronavirus bill? Wrong, it was sneaked into legislation back in summer, Twitter discovers

Congress’ Covid relief bill is packed full of under-the-table provisions, but does it really include a line restricting President Trump’s ability to deploy the military? No, but lawmakers managed to sneak that one in elsewhere.

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he’ll veto the long-awaited Covid-19 relief bill, calling its provision for $600 stimulus checks to American citizens “a disgrace,” alongside billions of dollars for foreign countries – $1.3 billion to Egypt, $700 million to Sudan and $500 million to Israel, for example. The president said he would send the bill back to congress, asking for $2,000 checks, and the removal of other “wasteful and unnecessary items.”

One partisan passage doing the rounds on Twitter on Wednesday was an amendment that nullified the president’s use of the Insurrection Act to quell domestic lawlessness with the military. The act was used by George H.W. Bush to send marine and army units into Los Angeles to crack down on race riots there in 1992, and some conservatives had urged Trump to do the same this summer, as violent protests and arson overtook numerous American cities following the death of George Floyd.

The recent bill is a hefty one, amounting to more than 5,500 pages. As Senators voted to pass the bill only a few hours after receiving it from the House of Representatives, it was up to commentators and pundits to actually read the text and find its most egregious inclusions – such as its provision of tax credits for racehorse owners and a clarification of the US stance on the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama.

The Insurrection Act amendment, however, was not one of them. Held up as an example of partisan pork, the amendment, clearly an attempt to curtail Trump’s powers, never featured in the coronavirus relief bill.

Hey idiots going off about the Insurrection Act, the amendment in question was part of the NDAA, not the covid relief (it also got dropped in the senate) Check the date btw - July 20, 2020 pic.twitter.com/0jqukbqSaz

— Nolan (@ImMalding) December 23, 2020

Instead, it managed to find its way into the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a yearly military spending bill that regularly becomes a vehicle for attaching obscure and unpopular legislation to. Written by Texas Rep. Veronica Escobar (D), the amendment passed the house in July, in a party-lines vote of 215-190.

https://www.rt.com/usa/510563-covid-bill-insurrection-act/

Dominion Security Director Files Lawsuits Against Trump, Conservative Media

A security director at Dominion Voting Systems, the company charged by many of playing a role in ‘rigging’ the US election via voting machines, is suing the Trump campaign and several conservative news outlets.

Eric Coomer has filed suit, claiming he has received death threats stemming from the accusations that Dominion helped sway the election in Joe Biden’s favour.

The defamation suit identifies the Trump campaign, as well as Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and the conservative news organisations Gateway Pundit, Newsmax, and One America News Network (OANN).

The suit also personally targets conservative talking heads Michelle Malkin and Joseph Oltmann.

Mr Coomer has been identified as the individual referred to by Oltmann as “Eric from Dominion” in statements made to OAN and other conservative outlets regarding alleged bragging to Antifa activists about making sure Trump wasn’t going to get re-elected:

The lawsuit states that Mr Coomer has been made “the face of false claims” in relation to Dominion’s alleged influence over the election.

The suit further states that photos of Coomer, as well as his home address and personal family details have been made public by some pro-Trump websites.

Mr Coomer has stated that “I’ve worked in international elections in all sorts of post-conflict countries where election violence is real and people are getting killed over it. And I feel that we’re on the verge of that.”

In an op-ed posted by the Denver Post, Coomer declared that he has “no connection to the Antifa movement” and “did not ‘rig,’ or influence the election.”

The lawsuit comes on the heels of a similar threat of legal action by voting machine company Smartmatic, which has issued legal notices to Fox News, OAN and Newsmax, accusing the networks of a “campaign [that] was designed to defame Smartmatic and undermine a legitimately conducted elections.”

The legal notice is also said to have specifically named Fox News hosts Lou Dobbs, Jesse Watters, and Maria Bartiromo, and indicates that Smartmatic could pursue legal action against them personally.

The Smartmatic letter names Fox News hosts Lou Dobbs, Jesse Watters, and Maria Bartiromo as individuals who spread the conspiracy theories. A spokesperson told me that suing them individually is an option on the table. https://t.co/vb2kKDHmXg

— Jacob Shamsian (@JayShams) December 14, 2020

Both Fox News, via Lu Dobbs, and Newsmax have since aired segments that critics say constitute ‘walk backs’ on previous allegations:

This is very bizarre. Lou Dobbs ran a segment tonight basically debunking his own lies about Smartmatic voting machines pic.twitter.com/FDM91SPtT1

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 19, 2020

Newsmax just aired this note to "clarify" its coverage of Smartmatic and Dominion. pic.twitter.com/I5XZ7CQpAk

— John Whitehouse (@existentialfish) December 21, 2020

Dominion itself has not yet issued any legal notices to media outlets. It has, however, sent a letter to Sidney Powell, demanding she retract some “wild and reckless” allegations she has made about them.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/dominion-security-director-files-lawsuits-against-trump-conservative-media

‘I’m kicking myself and I’m sorry’: Scotland leader Sturgeon apologises after maskless photo in pub

Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has admitted to violating the strict mask-wearing rules after visiting the funeral of a civil servant who reportedly died from Covid-19.

“Last Friday, while attending a funeral wake, I had my mask off briefly. This was a stupid mistake and I’m really sorry,” Sturgeon said in a statement to the media on Wednesday.

I talk every day about the importance of masks, so I’m not going to offer any excuses. I was in the wrong, I’m kicking myself, and I’m sorry.

The Scottish Sun earlier published a photo of a maskless Sturgeon talking to three elderly women at a pub outside Edinburgh.

EXCLUSIVE: Nicola Sturgeon says sorry for ‘no mask’ in pub Covid breachhttps://t.co/VH7wlyoJNcpic.twitter.com/beu5rCpdMl

— The Scottish Sun (@ScottishSun) December 22, 2020

According to the media, this happened after the first minister attended the funeral of a senior Scottish government civil servant who had died from Covid-19.

Under the law in Scotland, people are required to wear masks in pubs and restaurants.

Just like the rest of the UK, Scotland was forced to impose tougher restrictions in an effort to tackle the rise in Covid-19 infections. Sturgeon said on Tuesday failing to take action quickly would lead to “another period of exponential growth” of the virus next year.

Numerous public figures have expressed regret or apologised for breaking Covid-19 rules, including Tory MP Tobias Ellwood, former Labour Party chief Jeremy Corbyn, Sky News presenter Kay Burley, leading infectious disease expert Neil Ferguson, and Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s father, Stanley Johnson.

https://www.rt.com/uk/510510-sturgeon-mask-apology-rules/

Rules are for the little people

Countries around the world spent over $13 TRILLION to combat Covid-19 pandemic – report

Global leaders have committed trillions of dollars to battle the coronavirus pandemic and support the global economy, Japanese business newspaper Nikkei reported on Wednesday, citing its experts.

According to estimates, the total amount has now exceeded $13 trillion across the world. It includes the $900 billion stimulus package, which has been passed by the US Congress this week.

The adoption of additional programs to stimulate the global economy has sent public debt skyrocketing in the world’s leading countries, said the report. Experts project it will reach 125 percent of their total GDP in 2021.

International organizations have all been warning that the global economy won’t return to pre-pandemic levels ‘for a long time.’ According to the United Nations, it will contract by 5.6 percent this year as more and more countries have plunged into recession due to the coronavirus crisis. The UN also said that another 207 million people could be driven into extreme poverty by the severe long-term impact of the pandemic, bringing the total number to more than one billion by 2030.

More than 78 million cases of coronavirus have been registered in the world to date. Over 1.7 million people have died.

https://www.rt.com/business/510506-global-economy-covid-fight/

‘It’s a cult’: Ex-Hillsong members claim church demanded ‘slave labor’

This House of God is run more like a corporation — or a sweat shop — than a place of worship.

So say former members of once celebrity-beloved megachurch Hillsong, who continue to come forward with stories slamming the institution as more “slave labor” than sanctuary after the bombshell firing of adulterous pastor Carl Lentz.

“It’s like you work for a major company” — only worse, Nicole Herman, who helped found Hillsong LA in 2013, told The Post.

Herman alleges the “abuse of volunteers and real, amazing people” by Hillsong leadership to fulfill their “petty needs” (a practice called “honoring”) reminded her of instant Cup Noodles: Leaders think they can just add water, no emotional investment necessary, and get a flock of loyal, unpaid laborers.

A former service pastor — “I was beneath [the senior pastors] but I did everything” — Herman says that, in her seven years working for the Australia-born temple chain, she routinely watched its cult of personality enchant wide-eyed parishioners.

This weekend Herman made her Instagram public, so anyone could reach out with church-related complaints. “I’m here to help anyone with a broken heart as well as a million other amazing people who left this cult,” she wrote in an Insta Story on Saturday.

She says she has since been inundated with traumatic Hillsong stories.

Yolandi Bosch was so disturbed by her time at Hillsong that she and hundreds of other former staffers, students and volunteers are currently looking for representation so they can take a complaint of what they claim is “industrial slave labor” against the church to the Parliament of Australia.

https://nypost.com/2020/12/23/ex-hillsong-members-claim-church-is-cult-with-slave-labor/

Klobuchar: ‘We Have the Votes’ to Override COVID Relief Veto, Trump ‘Should Not Be Doing This Right Now’

On Tuesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Rachel Maddow Show,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) reacted to President Donald Trump’s criticism of the coronavirus relief bill by stating that “he should not be doing this right now,” and that there are the needed votes to override any potential veto of the bill.

Klobuchar said, “It is the second biggest stimulus in the history of America, and for him to turn this down — obviously, we have the votes to override his veto in the houses. We have those votes. But he should not be doing this right now, when his own Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, was involved in the negotiations from beginning to end.”

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/12/22/klobuchar-we-have-the-votes-to-override-covid-relief-veto-trump-should-not-be-doing-this-right-now/

Biden Ignores China Ties To SolarWinds, Blames Russia For Breach With No Evidence

Joe Biden blamed Russia for the devastating cyber attack, failing to mention SolarWinds questionable ties to China.

In a pre-Christmas statement, Joe Biden blamed the SolarWinds cyber attack on Russia with zero evidence, citing similar claims made by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Attorney General William Barr.

Biden failed to mention anything about the breached company’s questionable ties to China.

Biden partially blamed the cyberattack on President Trump’s decision to fire the Director of the Cyberspace and Infrastructure Security Agency. Former CISA Director Chris Krebs served as the head of the agency from November 16, 2018-November 17, 2020. It should be noted that according to the federal government, SolarWinds was compromised in March while Krebs was still in office.

“Initial indications, including from Secretary Pompeo, Secretary of State, and Attorney General William Barr, suggest that Russia, Russia is the responsible for this breach” said Biden. He added that he “was pleased to see leaders in both parties in the Congress speak out loudly and clearly on this attack. Again, I want to thank prominent Republicans in the Senate particularly for speaking out.”

The former Vice President failed to mention anything about the questionable ties between SolarWinds and China beginning to make their way into public view, as National File reported.

SolarWinds director Seth Boro, a man who was instrumental in starting the private equity firm known as Thoma Bravo, “currently serves on the board of directors of several software and technology service companies in which certain investment funds advised by Thoma Bravo hold an investment,” according to his biography on the SolarWinds website.

In 2019, Thoma Bravo bought JD Power for $1.88 billion from XIO Group, a mysterious Chinese company based in Hong Kong.

“Thoma Bravo has agreed to purchase JD Power, a Delaware-based provider of data analytics and market research for dozens of industries, from China’s XIO Group, with Axios reporting a price of $1.88 billion. XIO bought JD Power for some $1.1 billion in 2016,” Pitchbook reported.

SolarWinds investors such as Thoma Bravo and Silver Lake, who have questionable ties to China, dumped hundreds of millions in SolarWinds shares just days before the announcement of the breach, as National File reported.

According to his biography on the Silver Lake website, Kenneth Hao “led the establishment of the firm’s offices in China and Japan and led Silver Lake’s investments in Alibaba Group” from 2008-2011.

Silver Lake also notes that “Hao currently serves as a director on the boards” of several companies, including SolarWinds.

https://nationalfile.com/biden-ignores-china-ties-to-solarwinds-blames-russia-for-breach-with-no-evidence/

Pope Francis’ Instagram account appears to ‘like’ another model’s racy pic

He’s scrolling in mysterious ways.

Pope Francis’ Instagram account is being accused of liking another racy photo by an X-rated model.

“Hey thats me,” wrote Margot Foxx Tuesday as she shared a screenshot seemingly showing the pontiff’s verified Franciscus account among more than 2,500 liking a shot of her in a risque black bodysuit.

“The pope liked my picture that means i’m going to heaven,” wrote the self-styled “tiddy queen” and popular OnlyFans model.

It comes weeks after Natalia Garibotto, 27, said the pontiff’s verified account “liked” an image of her standing at a school locker with a white crop top and a skirt barely reaching her behind.

“My mum may hate my ass pics but the Pope be double-tapping,” the Brazilian joked with Barstool Sports at the time.

Not everyone is shocked at the possibility, however. “Dude’s just admiring God’s creation leave him alone,” one of Foxx’s fans wrote.

https://nypost.com/2020/12/23/pope-francis-ig-account-appears-to-like-another-models-racy-pic/

Joe Biden: Two Million Migrants May Hit the Border

Two million migrants may arrive at the nation’s borders if officials do not properly manage the rewrite of border and asylum rules, President elect Joe Biden said Tuesday, as he offered a new “family reunification” justification for mass migration into Americans’ workplaces and communities.

“We already started discussing these issues with the President of Mexico and our friends in Latin America, and the timeline is to do it so that we in fact make it better, not worse,” Biden told a press conference:

The last thing we need is to say we’re going to stop immediately the [curbed] access to asylum the way it’s been run now and end up with 2 million people on our border. It’s a matter of setting up the guardrails so we can move the direction. I will accomplish what I said I would do — a much humane policy based on family unification.

Biden’s emphasis on family identification is a new twist. It may signal an effort to ostentatiously block the rush of new migrants while also quietly helping many resident Central American illegals settle into the United States by helping them import their spouses, children, and parents under the claim of “family reunification.”

Joe Biden’s pro-migration policies are inviting another blue-collar migration flood across the southern border, say his Democrat allies. https://t.co/N8Twl45ynE

— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) November 26, 2020

Roughly three million Central Americans arrived between 2009 and 2019, starting with President Barack Obama’s relaxed rules and ending with President Donald Trump’s 2019 reforms.

That “family reunification” population could far exceed a million people — or roughly one-quarter of the roughly four million Americans turn 18 each year — even if there is accurate identification of nuclear families. This huge inflow would nudge down blue collar wages, push Americans out of jobs, crowd public schools, and drive up housing prices — while also allowing college graduate progressives to portray themselves as the noble protectors of victimized refugees.

The new border policies will take six months to implement, Biden said:

But it requires getting a lot in place and requires getting the funding to get in place, including just asylum judges for example. It will get done, and it will get done quickly, but it’s not going to be able to be done on Day One, [because we could] lift every restriction that exists … and go back to what it was 20 years ago, and all of a sudden, find out that we have a crisis on our hand that complicates what we are trying to do … It is going to take probably the next six months to put that in place.

But Biden will likely fail to balance his support for migration with the essentially infinite demand from migrants worldwide for getting into the United States, said Mark Krikorian, the director of the Center for Immigration Studies:

[Biden’s aides] are not stupid. They understand [their pro-migration goals are] unpopular with the public, so they’re going to try to manage expectations — both of the voters and of potential migrants — so that two things happen. One, the changes are introduced. slowly, not all once, and [second] they do what they can to hide the consequences … So that the Biden people can say ‘Look, we’re not crazy on immigration.’ And they hope to dampen the enthusiasm of prospective illegal aliens. I don’t think they’re going to succeed at that, but that’s their objective.

https://www.breitbart.com/economy/2020/12/23/joe-biden-two-million-migrants-may-hit-the-border/

Kennedy Center – Set To Get Another $40 MILLION – Has Over Half A BILLION In Assets

The Kennedy Center, under fire for receiving over $40,000,000 in recent Congressional finance packages, has over $661,000,000 in assets and has been paying its executives high seven and six-figure salaries as of 2019.

The outrage at the Kennedy Center’s stimulus gains comes in response to it receiving $40,400,000 to be used for “operations and maintenance” and “repair and restoration” in the second stimulus package and $25,000,000 in the first. This, despite the Center remaining closed.

Washington D.C.’s Kennedy Center appears to be in no financial need of stimulus funds, which are ostensibly meant to aid American workers and families struggling from the impacts of COVID-19.

The center’s latest tax filings from 2019 show it retains $661,370,760 in total assets, with just $159,712,775 in the form of liabilities. In the same year, a total of $113,112,179 was doled out to “salaries, other compensation, and employee benefits.”

The center’s primary source of revenue is donations from wealthy benefactors, as $206,224,574 of its total revenue of $326,464,245 were itemized as “contributions and grants.” That’s over 63 percent.

Its second-highest source of revenue, which is most likely to be impacted by COVID-19 is its “programs”, which account for just 33% of its total revenue.

The center’s executives and employees have raked in six-figure salaries, including Executive Director Gary Ginstling profiting $446,307 in reportable compensation and an additional $29,539 in “estimated” compensation and Senior Vice President of Artistic Planning Robert Van Leer making $332,077 in salary and an additional $34,438 in “estimated” compensation.

What’s more, President Deborah Rutter took a salary of $1,255,901 with an additional $34,438 reported in 2019.

https://thenationalpulse.com/news/kennedy-center-assets-salaries/

All Over by Christmas? Boris Holding Calls with Eurocrats to Deliver Deal Farage Warned Is ‘Brexit in Name Only’

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is engaged in intense “hotline” talks with his European counterparts, amid claims a Brexit deal could be struck within hours — a deal Brexit leader Nigel Farage has warned could be a betrayal of the British interest.

A Brexit deal could be agreed between the UK government and the European Union today (Wednesday) or even tomorrow, Christmas Eve, according to claims made in Britain’s The Sun newspaper. The Reuters wires service makes similar claims, citing unnamed senior European figures who say the deal could arrive Wednesday evening.

Yet despite British and European negotiators agreeing on a deal, the matter of ratifying the terms remains. For the European Union, this process can take weeks or months, but it has been widely reported that the bloc has developed a special truncated process, perhaps bypassing the usual channels and going directly to member states’ national capitals for assent.

For the UK, it means a debate and vote in Parliament — but dumping what is reported to be a highly technical and complex 2,000-page document on Parliamentarians at very short notice and expecting them to make a snap decision on whether to back it or not may lead to anger in the chamber. MPs have already said they will want to go through the document with a “fine-tooth comb”.

Whether a deal does emerge or not, the recent news escaping from Brussels — the so-called ‘tunnel’ phase of talks specifically formulated to cut out journalists and other observers, ostensibly to remove distractions for negotiators — indicated significant disagreements remain, particularly on regulatory alignment and fishing. If a last-minute deal is agreed now, it remains the case that the cost of that deal would be the United Kingdom or the European Union making significant concessions to the other.

Just last night, the EU called the United Kingdom’s latest counter-offer on fishing unacceptable, suggesting a breakthrough may remain some way off in this area.

Brexiteers Threaten to Veto Any Brexit-in-Name-Only Deal https://t.co/CdAHS2pRga

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 21, 2020

Seeking to advance these talks, the prime minister has been engaged in “hotline” talks with the European Union which the pro-Europe business newspaper the Financial Times has characterised as “intensified” regular contact between Johnson and the EU’s Ursula von der Leyen.

The paper also noted that while talks could continue after Christmas and towards the New Year, there was a desire to wrap things up before Christmas Eve.

That British negotiators may be bounced into a last-minute agreement by Brussels is a major concern of UK Brexiteers, who have suspected for some time that getting a deal to keep trade flowing without tariffs would mean unacceptable failures in Brexit-critical concerns around sovereignty.

British pro-Brexit parliamentarians have threatened to veto the Brexit deal if it is a “Brexit in name only” document, revealing concerns over what exactly the British government will be pressured into agreeing to in Brussels. Nigel Farage warned Britons earlier this month that the government would try to spin a Brexit betrayal as a “fantastic victory” in order to get the people to accept whatever Europe gives them.

Reflecting on the late stage of talks, he said: “This is all, in my view, an act. This is a giant charade. It’s to make us think that they are really, really fighting hard to get us a good deal.”

Farage: We Will be Told a Brexit-in-Name-Only Is a ‘Fantastic Victory’ https://t.co/mecbzG8DON

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 15, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/12/23/all-over-christmas-boris-holding-calls-eurocrats-deliver-deal-farage-warned-brexit-name-only/

UK Expands Lockdown After Christmas, Announces Discovery of Another New Coronavirus Mutation

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced that the Tier 4 lockdown will be extended to other parts of the country the day after Christmas. He also revealed that scientists have discovered another new Chinese coronavirus mutation.

Last week, the government announced the existence of the first “new variant” of the Chinese coronavirus in the UK, which informed the decision to plunge much of the south-east of England into a newly-created Tier 4, disrupting Christmas plans for 16 million people.

Addressing media from Downing Street on Wednesday, Mr Hancock said that because of the spread of this variant, more parts of the country would have to come under the restrictions, in the east and south-east of England, with areas of the south-west also going into higher tiers.

From midnight on Boxing Day, Sussex, Oxfordshire, Suffolk, Norfolk, and Cambridgeshire, those parts of Essex not yet in Tier 4, Waverley in Surrey, and Hampshire (including Portsmouth and Southampton, but with the exception of the New Forest), will all be escalated to Tier 4, joining London, the Home Counties and other parts of the East and South East in the highest coronavirus restrictions in England.

Other parts of the country will also go up a tier in restrictions on the day after Christmas, including Bristol, Cheshire and Warrington, Gloucestershire, the Isle of Wight, the New Forest, Northamptonshire, Somerset, and Swindon which will go into Tier 3, while Cornwall and Herefordshire will go into Tier 2.

Mr Hancock said: “I know that these actions have consequences, I know how difficult it is, but I also know that it is right to take the actions necessary to control this virus.”

NHS Gets Political, Chiefs Call for Brexit Delay Because of Coronavirus https://t.co/L7lzEWzbOM

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 23, 2020

Continuing: “We simply cannot have the kind of Christmas that we all yearn for. Of course, it’s the social contact that makes Christmas so special, but it is that social contact that the virus thrives on, and that’s how the virus is spreading from one person to another. So it’s important that we all minimise our social contact as much as is possible this Christmas and that will help protect ourselves, our loved ones, and the whole country.”

“This is not news that anybody wants to deliver, and I am truly sorry for the disruption that it causes, but I think people know how important it is that we take decisions to keep people safe and to protect the NHS,” he added.

Health Secretary Hancock announced the discovery of another new strain of the virus, originating from South Africa with two confirmed cases in the UK. He warned citizens that if they have returned from South Africa or had close contact with people who have travelled from the country in the past two weeks to immediately self-quarantine. Travel from South Africa is also being restricted.

The health secretary also announced that the team involved in developing the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine submitted their data package to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) for approval.

UK Govt Begins Work on QR Code Coronavirus ‘Freedom Passports’, Denies System is ‘Imminent’ https://t.co/jDZvgFCsXO

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 23, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/12/23/uk-expands-lockdown-after-christmas-announces-discovery-another-new-corona-mutation/

100 People-Smuggling Gangs Running Illegal Migrant Routes to the UK, Says French Investigator

A French immigration investigator has claimed that some 100 people-smuggling gangs are running illegal migrant routes across the English Channel to Britain.

Following the bust of a trafficking network in the UK — which was raking in some £1 million per month by offering a “VIP” service to illegal migrants — officials have uncovered a vast network of people-smuggling gangs operating in France.

Speaking to The Times, a senior investigator for France’s national immigration policing unit said that he believes there are about 100 gangs providing safe houses for migrants and hiding speedboats to help launch the migrants in the Channel.

“I’m not talking about the bloke, who knows another bloke who knows a third bloke with a boat. I’m talking about structured networks capable of bringing migrants across borders,” the investigator said, adding: “At a very rough guess, I’d say [there are] about 100.”

The French investigator claimed that the Vietnamese networks are typically the most advanced in their operation, often employing Bulgarian, Lithuanian, Polish, and Romanian truck drivers to transport migrants through Eastern Europe to Germany, stashing them in safe houses along the route, before finally sending them off to the UK.

He noted that the Vietnamese networks are not the only sophisticated operations, however, saying: “I am very struck by the logistical prowess of the Iraqi Kurd networks that have taken control of the crossings in small boats.”

“They are capable of buying boats in Germany, hiding them in France and transporting them to the coast at precisely the time when the migrants have been told to gather at the shore. That sort of operation requires a lot of organisational capacity,” he added.

Report: Illegal Boat Migrants Sign Slave Labour ‘Pact’ with Traffickers to Reach UK https://t.co/XwrAXiDP8m

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) September 21, 2020

The revelations come as four people have been convicted in relation to the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants who suffocated to death in a shipping lorry last year.

On Monday, the ringleader of the operation Gheorghe Nica, 43, of Basildon, Essex, and the lorry driver Eamonn Harrison, 24, from Mayobridge in Northern Ireland, were convicted of 39 counts of manslaughter at the Old Bailey. Two other members of the network, who were not involved on the day of the tragic deaths, were also convicted of people-smuggling charges.

Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten said the people smuggling gang, which netted millions during its operation, charging up to £13,000 per head, was “greedy” but “complacent”, adding: “You would not transport animals in that way.”

The victims — all of whom were Vietnamese nationals aged between 15 and 44 years old — died in the back of the shipping container after trying to puncture holes in the lorry in order to breathe.

It is understood that police are still searching for a London-based Vietnamese fixer named Phong and three other men in connection to the smuggling ring.

Last year, the Central Office for the Repression of Illegal Immigration and the Employment of Foreigners Without Documents (OCRIEST) successfully shut down 61 human trafficking networks bringing migrants to the UK. In total, around 300 people were arrested for transporting 4,700 illegal migrants.

Major Channel Migrant Human Trafficking Network Busted in France https://t.co/mC3JzIif7Q

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) November 25, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/12/23/100-people-smuggling-gangs-running-illegal-migrant-routes-uk-says-french-investigator/

U.S. Joint Caribbean Operations Capture 3700 Pounds of Cocaine

CBP Air and Marine Operations teamed up with other federal departments and a foreign government to seize more than 3,700 pounds of cocaine during a 10-day period. The joint air and sea operation in the eastern Caribbean Sea resulted in the arrest of 19 suspected drug smugglers.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Air and Marine Operations (AMO) agents teamed up with the U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Navy, and the Dutch Coast Guard to interdict seven drug smuggling operations off the coast of Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, according to information obtained from CBP officials. The interdictions led to the seizure of $64 million worth of cocaine and the arrest of 19 people suspected of trafficking the drugs.

CBP officials report the utilization of the following air and sea assets in the two-week operation:

CBP Air and Marine Operations DHC-8 and UH-60 aircraft

Coast Guard Cutter Reliance

Coast Guard Cutter William Trump

Coast Guard Cutter Joseph Napier

Coast Guard Cutter Joseph Doyle

Coast Guard Cutter Donald Horsley

Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter

USS Comstock

A Dutch coast guard DH-8 aircraft

“The fight against drug cartels in the Caribbean Sea requires unity of effort in all phases from detection, monitoring, and interdictions, to criminal prosecutions by international partners and U.S. Attorneys Offices in districts across the nation,” CBP officials said in a written statement. “The law enforcement phase of counter-smuggling operations in the Caribbean Sea is conducted under the authority of the Coast Guard 7th District, headquartered in Miami, Florida. The interdictions, including the actual boardings, are led and conducted by members of the U.S. Coast Guard.”

A report obtained from CBP shows that during Fiscal Year 2020, which ended on September 30, AMO agents working with non-CBP agencies seized more than 113,000 pounds of cocaine. During the first two months of FY21, AMO assisted in the seizure of more than 23,500 pounds of cocaine.

https://www.breitbart.com/border/2020/12/23/u-s-joint-caribbean-operations-capture-3700-pounds-of-cocaine/

Google and Facebook formed 'Jedi Blue' pact to dominate online ads and 'plotted to team up' if they were hit with antitrust probe, lawsuit claims

Google and Facebook set up a pact called 'Blue Jedi' to completely dominate the online advertising industry and plotted to work together if they were hit with an anti-trust lawsuit accusing them of being monpolies, a lawsuit claims.

An unredacted version of a lawsuit filed last week alleges the Silicon Valley giants were involved in a quid-pro-quo scheme where Facebook agreed not to challenge Google's advertising business if they were given special treatment in Google's ad auctions, the Wall Street Journal reported late on Monday.

Google's code-name for the pact is 'Jedi Blue', an apparent reference to the fictional Jedi knights of the Star Wars film franchise. 'Blue' could be a reference to Facebook's color scheme.

The draft states that starting in the deal's fourth year, Facebook is locked into spending a minimum of $500 million annually in Google-run ad auctions, and alleges that 'Facebook is to win a fixed percent of those auctions.'

Google and Facebook denied the allegations, saying there was nothing improper about the deal, and a Google spokesman noted that the partnership had been public for years.

We don't manipulate the auction,' a Google spokesperson told DailyMail.com, saying the states' 'ad tech claims are inaccurate.'

The spokesperson said that Facebook 'participates in several similar auctions on rival platforms.'

'There's nothing exclusive about their involvement and they don't receive data that is not similarly made available to other buyers,' the spokesperson said.

Facebook, which was not accused of wrongdoing in the suit, did not immediately respond to an inquiry from DailyMail.com. 'Any allegation that this harms competition or any suggestion of misconduct on the part of Facebook is baseless,' a Facebook spokesperson told the Journal.

The deal cut in September 2018 saw Facebook agree not to compete with Google's online advertising tools in return for special treatment when it used them, according to the unredacted suit.

The new allegations emerged from a draft version of the lawsuit that was filed last week, showing claims that were redacted in the final version.

http://www.yourdestinationnow.com/2020/12/revealed-google-and-facebook-formed.html

The Nuremberg Code And Its Impact On Clinical Research

The Nuremberg Code is one of the most influential documents in the history of clinical research.

Created more than 70 years ago following the notorious World War II experiments, this written document established 10 ethical principles for protecting human subjects.

We'll take a closer look at its origins, its guidelines and its enduring impact.

What Is the Nuremberg Code?

When World War II ended in 1945, the victorious Allied powers enacted the International Military Tribunal on November 19th, 1945. As part of the Tribunal, a series of trials were held against major war criminals and Nazi sympathizers holding leadership positions in political, military, and economic areas. The first trial conducted under the Nuremberg Military Tribunals in 1947 became known as The Doctors’ Trial, in which 23 physicians from the German Nazi Party were tried for crimes against humanity for the atrocious experiments they carried out on unwilling prisoners of war. Many of the grotesque medical experiments took place at the Auschwitz concentration camp, where Jewish prisoners were tattooed with dehumanizing numbers onto their arms; numbers that would later be used to identify their bodies after death.

The Doctors’ Trial is officially titled “The United States of America v. Karl Brandt, et al.,” and it was conducted at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Bavaria, Germany. The trial was conducted here because this was one of the few largely undamaged buildings that remained intact from extensive Allied bombing during the war. It is also said to have been symbolically chosen because it was the ceremonial birthplace of the Nazi Party. Of the 23 defendants, 16 were found guilty, of which seven received death sentences and nine received prison sentences ranging from 10 years to life imprisonment. The other 7 defendants were acquitted.

The verdict also resulted in the creation of the Nuremberg Code, a set of ten ethical principles for human experimentation.

What Are The Nuremberg Code's Ethical Guidelines For Research?

The Nuremberg Code aimed to protect human subjects from enduring the kind of cruelty and exploitation the prisoners endured at concentration camps. The 10 elements of the code are:

1 Voluntary consent is essential

2 The results of any experiment must be for the greater good of society

3 Human experiments should be based on previous animal experimentation

4 Experiments should be conducted by avoiding physical/mental suffering and injury

5 No experiments should be conducted if it is believed to cause death/disability

6 The risks should never exceed the benefits

7 Adequate facilities should be used to protect subjects

8 Experiments should be conducted only by qualified scientists

9 Subjects should be able to end their participation at any time

10 The scientist in charge must be prepared to terminate the experiment when injury, disability, or death is likely to occur

https://www.imarcresearch.com/blog/bid/359393/Nuremberg-Code-1947

Trump loyalist Sebastian Gorka CUTS OFF MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell on Newsmax for pushing voting machine fraud claims after manufacturing firms threaten to sue network

Former Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka was forced to cut off MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell on Newsmax for repeating debunked conspiracy theories on the presidential election.

Gorka, who served as deputy assistant to the president in 2017, interviewed Lindell, a fellow Trump supporter, while filling in for Newsmax anchor Greg Kelly on Monday night.

Lindell, who has publicly supported Trump's claims that the election was 'stolen' by Democrats, was asked to weigh in on the president's ongoing legal battle to overturn the results.

The businessman, 59, however, was quickly shut down when he began repeating allegations that election technology company, Dominion Voting Systems had engaged in fraud to help Joe Biden win the presidential race.

Newsmax and other networks including Fox News and One America News have had to roll back their election fraud claims because Dominion and software company Smartamatic have threatened to sue.

Over the weekend, Fox News ran a package debunking their own hosts' claims the election was 'stolen' from Trump in response to their claims they would launch legal action.

'Well, I believe in this president, and I'll tell you what. Nobody realizes something, what a miracle we had on election night at 11.15,' Lindell began.

'You know, you talked about all this fraud, Doctor. The biggest fraud is the Dominion machines. And on 11.15 on election night, our great president - ' Lindell continued before he was cut off by Gorka.

'Mike, Mike, we're not going to get into the minutiae of the details,' Gorka interjected.

'I want to ask you, because this show is about courage. It's hosted by a former Marine. I want to know why you, Mike Lindell, are supporting the president in these legal cases?'

'Because everything's on the line here, everything's on the line, our freedoms, my American dream that I've lived, everybody's American dream,' Lindell replied.

He then went on to rehash his voter fraud claims once again, alleging that the Democrats had stolen millions of votes.

'If you let them steal this, which I 100 per cent know that's what they went on. This is over six million votes that got flipped, over six million,' Lindell said.

Gorka responded, this time agreeing with Lindell's remarks.

'You nailed it, Mike, you nailed it. This is the biggest political crime ever that we have to stop it,' he said. 'And without people like you, it would be impossible. God bless you.'

The interview came after both Fox News and Newsmax were forced to shoot down their own aired claims on the matter, amid legal threats from Dominion and Smartmatic, another election technology company.

Both companies were referenced in the campaign's suggestion that vote counts in swing states were manipulated to the advantage of President-elect Joe Biden.

The companies denied several statements made about them, and there is no evidence any voting system switched or deleted votes in the 2020 election.

In their statement, Newsmax said there were 'several facts our viewers and readers should be aware,' among them the lack of a business relationship between the two companies or that Dominion had any ownership relationship with George Soros, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others.

http://www.hideoutnow.com/2020/12/trump-loyalist-sebastian-gorka-cuts-off.html

Are we Americans so broken that we need mainstream media outlets to tell us when it’s appropriate to protest? This Covid bill is BEYOND pathetic. NOW IS THE TIME TO DEMAND REAL CHANGE

I get that it’s time for the holidays and we’re all playing our video games and watching our tv and fcking about on social media, but all that stuff is a fcking opiate for the masses. It has made us lazy and complacent.

This Covid “relief” bill is a f*cking JOKE. I won’t even go into what bullshit was pushed into it as it’s being covered everywhere else, but NO ONE in congress has the strength or balls to do what’s right here. Where are the real leaders? And are we as citizens really all so neutered that we can only protest when it’s being pushed by a mainstream news source?

Regardless of how you felt about the George Floyd protests, we HAD power and momentum there to demand real meaningful changes that would have helped not just minorities, but all Americans. A rising tide lifts all boats! We should have pushed for an end to the failed War on Drugs, should have demanded average citizens’ voices be able to be heard again by getting money out of politics, should have fought for anti-trust legislation to break up the mega-corporations’ foothold on our daily lives. But those protests fizzled out without much real change and people hopped back on Twitter and Reddit once the corporate overlords decided it was time to dial it down because it was becoming dangerous to their existence and stopped pushing it. Compare that to say, France, whose citizens riot over something f*cked up every other month. I commend them.

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/are-we-americans-so-broken-that-we-need-mainstream-media-outlets-to-tell-us-when-its-appropriate-to-protest-this-covid-bill-is-beyond-pathetic-now-is-the-time-to-demand-real-change/

Huge ball of fire 'falls from the sky and crashes into a Chinese county', leaving locals stunned

Giant fireball was spotted flashing across the sky today over Nangqian, China

Footage shows the burning sphere exploding and plummeting into the county

Local media suggested the fast-moving object could be a very bright meteor

China's earthquake authority said a suspected bolide hit the earth at 7.25am

A giant fireball has been spotted flashing across the sky and crashing into a county in southern China.

Footage taken by stunned locals shows an unidentified object exploding into a blazing sphere as it plunges at a fast speed towards the earth.

It is not immediately clear what the ball of fire is, but local media are suggesting the possibility of a very bright meteor. No casualties have been reported.

Various clips on the Chinese social media show the suspected meteor lighting up the sky as it plummets into the county of Nangqian in north-western China's Qinghai Province.

The incident is said to have occurred at around 7am on Wednesday. Local residents reported they had heard loud bangs.

One of the videos, shared by a science blogger on Twitter-like Weibo, captures the moment the fireball soars through the darkness as it is seen by a passenger on a flight from Xi'an to Lhasa.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9082441/Huge-ball-fire-falls-sky-crashes-Chinese-town.html

Pfizer, U.S. strike 100 million COVID-19 vaccine deal with 70 million due by June

The U.S. government will pay Pfizer Inc nearly $2 billion for 100 million additional doses of its COVID-19 vaccine to bolster its supply as the country grapples with a nationwide spike in infections.

Under the new agreement, Pfizer will deliver at least 70 million doses by June 30 and the rest no later than July 31, the company said on Wednesday, bringing the total number of doses to 200 million for a total price of about $4 billion.

The purchase price amounts to $19.50 per shot and is slightly higher than the $18.90 per dose that Reuters has reported the European Union has agreed to pay. The shot has been authorized for use in EU and the United States.

The U.S. deal comes after growing concern that the government had not done enough to secure doses of one of the two authorized vaccines, made more pressing amid a COVID-19 surge that has left hospitals struggling to find beds for the sick.

Pfizer’s two-dose vaccine, developed with German partner BioNTech, is being rolled out across the United States after the shot won emergency use authorization earlier this month. The country has also authorized a vaccine from Moderna Inc.

Pfizer and the government have said that they had been negotiating the terms of the agreement, with the company indicating it was trying to work out how to deliver the doses in the second quarter.

Pfizer and BioNTech have said they expect to produce 1.3 billion doses in 2021, but executives at the German biotech have said they were trying to boost manufacturing. Governments around the world are scrambling to get enough supplies of the vaccine to tame the pandemic that has killed about 1.7 million people globally and crushed economies.

“This new federal purchase can give Americans even more confidence that we will have enough supply to vaccinate every American who wants it by June 2021,” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said in a statement.

“Securing more doses from Pfizer and BioNTech for delivery in the second quarter of 2021 further expands our supply of doses across the Operation Warp Speed portfolio.”

Pfizer said last week it may need the U.S. government to help it secure some components needed to make the vaccine. While the company halved its 2020 production target due to manufacturing issues, it said last week its manufacturing is running smoothly now.

The government also has the option to acquire up to an additional 400 million doses of the vaccine.

More than 600,000 Americans have received their first COVID-19 vaccine doses as of Monday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The first wave of shots have so far gone to healthcare workers and nursing home residents, as well as some top government officials. Americans in “essential” jobs and those over 75 will likely start to receive vaccines in January while general population vaccinations will start in a few months.

http://www.tathasta.com/2020/12/pfizer-us-strike-100-million-covid-19.html

10 years in prison for illegal streaming? It's in the Covid-19 relief bill

Tucked away in the more than 5,000-page long Covid-19 stimulus bill is a new law that severely punishes streamers that pirate large amounts of copyrighted content.

You probably have nothing to worry about: The "Protecting Lawful Streaming Act," which was introduced earlier this month by Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina, doesn't target casual internet users. The law specifies that it doesn't apply to people who use illegal streaming services or "individuals who access pirated streams or unwittingly stream unauthorized copies of copyrighted works."

Rather, it's focused on "commercial, for-profit streaming piracy services" that make money from illegally streaming copyrighted material.

Tillis said that this practice costs the US economy nearly $30 billion yearly.

"This commonsense legislation was drafted with the input of creators, user groups, and technology companies and is narrowly targeted so that only criminal organizations are punished and that no individual streamer has to worry about the fear of prosecution," he wrote in a statement.

If a violator is prosecuted, they could be imprisoned up to 10 years for multiple offenses, and they could be fined.

The bipartisan bill has support from five Democratic senators and four Republicans. It also has support from two groups including Public Knowledge, a consumer advocacy group, which called the bill "narrowly tailored" so it doesn't affect regular internet users.

"We appreciate Senator Tillis' decision to release the text of his proposal, and his leadership in bringing in consumer groups to the table, listening to our concerns, and working to prevent risk to end users and legitimate streamers and streaming platforms," Meredith Rose, Public Knowledge's senior policy counsel, said in a statement.

In a separate response, the National Association of Broadcasters said it "strongly supports" the law.

Last year, the Department of Justice charged two computer programmers from Las Vegas for illegal pirating thousands of hours of television shows from Netflix (NFLX) and Hulu and streaming them on websites called iStreamItAll and Jetflicks. One man admitted to earning more than $1 million from his piracy operations.

The "Protecting Lawful Streaming Act" could become a law as soon as this week when President Donald Trump is expected to sign the stimulus legislation.

http://www.yourdestinationnow.com/2020/12/10-years-in-prison-for-illegal.html

Joe Biden Rips Trump for Hack Response, Vows Retaliation

Biden suggests Russia was behind the cyberattack but says President Trump should handle attribution

Adding to the hysteria surrounding a recently revealed hack of the software company SolarWinds that has affected several US government agencies, Joe Biden slammed President Trump over the incident.

“This attack constitutes a grave risk to our national security. It was carefully planned and carefully orchestrated,” Biden said. “It was carried out by using sophisticated cyber tools. The attackers succeeded in catching the federal government off guard and unprepared.”

Biden said the Trump administration did not prioritize cybersecurity enough to prevent the intrusion. He said the incoming administration will “probably respond in kind” after assessing the full scope of the cyberattack. Biden’s Chief of Staff Ron Klain said on Sunday that the administration’s response will be more than “just sanctions.”

Sources close to Biden told Reuters that the administration is considering sanctions against Moscow or attacks on Russia’s cyber infrastructure as a response, despite a lack of evidence that Moscow was involved. So far, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Attorney General William Barr have said Russia was likely behind the hack, while Trump shifted the blame to China and downplayed the incident altogether.

On Tuesday, Biden said the cyberattack “fits Russia’s long history of reckless disruptive cyber activities, but the Trump administration needs to make an official attribution.” Russia is Washington’s favorite suspect when it comes to cyberattacks and is often blamed for such incidents. But attributing cyber activity is difficult, and the US rarely offers evidence to substantiate its claims.

One example often cited by the media when discussing Russia’s history of hacking the US is the DNC emails that were published by WikiLeaks in 2016. Russia was first accused of hacking the DNC server in June 2016 by the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. In its investigation into alleged Russian election interference, the FBI relied on CrowdStrike’s work.

Earlier this year, testimony from CrowdStrike President Shawn Henry before the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 was declassified. Under oath, Henry admitted the firm had no “concrete evidence” that alleged Russian hackers took data from DNC servers. “There are times when we can see data exfiltrated, and we can say conclusively. But in this case it appears it was set up to be exfiltrated, but we just don’t have the evidence that says it actually left,” he said.

https://news.antiwar.com/2020/12/22/joe-biden-rips-trump-for-hack-response-vows-retaliation/

Once Part of the Invasion Force, Christopher Miller Returns to Afghanistan to Close Down the War

KABUL, Afghanistan Acting Defense Secretary Christopher C. Miller jokes that he was the very last of the first 200 U.S. special operations soldiers to invade Afghanistan in December 2001 something like landing on Omaha Beach a second before the stroke of midnight on D-Day.

That's a bit of an undersell, though. While he was a company commander with the 5th Special Forces Group for the invasion, a "Horse Soldier" who never mounted a horse, he did end up playing a historic role. On Dec. 5, 2001, when an errant Air Force munition hit the town of Tarin Kowt, killing U.S. and Afghan troops and wounding Afghan President Hamid Karzai,

Miller, then a major, led a quick-reaction force into the region, relieving the soldiers on the ground and supporting recovery efforts.

In any case, his role as he landed in Afghanistan's capital Dec. 22 for the first time since 2007 felt poetic: He was there to close down the 19-year fight and summon the last troops home.

"I feel like the circle's complete," he told reporters traveling with him. "This was the first time I was in combat. … Now to be here, to see the contours now with the war winding down, it's hugely, I don't want to say emotional, but pretty significant."

Miller was suddenly elevated from a comparatively low-profile position as the head of the National Counterterrorism Center to become acting head of the Pentagon after President Donald Trump fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Nov. 9, in the wake of the election. The suddenness and timing of the move drew protests from critics and sparked some outrage on Capitol Hill, particularly when, 12 days later, Miller announced a tight new timeline for troop withdrawal: a drawdown from 4,500 U.S. service members in Afghanistan to just 2,500 by mid-January. The same announcement included a plan to withdraw 2,200 troops from Iraq leaving 2,500 by the same deadline.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/12/23/once-part-of-invasion-force-christopher-miller-returns-afghanistan-close-down-war.html

Trump slams US' $1.3bn in military aid due to Egypt

US President Donald Trump criticised a draft resolution approved by Congress that includes aid to foreign countries while accusing the Egyptian army of using US aid to buy military equipment from Russia.

This came within the framework of Trump's rejection of the draft resolution approved by Congress on Monday, into law, which includes a plan for economic recovery against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic.

Trump said, in a video message from the White House, broadcast on Twitter yesterday evening, that "this bill contains $85.5 million for assistance to Cambodia, $134 million to Burma, $1.3 billion for Egypt and the Egyptian military which will go out and buy, almost exclusively, Russian military equipment."

He continued: "The draft resolution is called the Covid Relief Bill, but it has almost nothing to do with covid."

Statement by Donald J. Trump, The President of the United States

Full Video: https://t.co/avKfYctPAD pic.twitter.com/i8IMLhH53Q

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2020

"Congress found plenty of money for foreign countries, lobbyists, and special interests while sending the bare minimum to the American people who need it. It wasn't their fault, it was China's fault. Not their fault."

Trump, who leaves office on 20 January, was expected to sign the new draft resolution approved by Congress, however, he rejected the bill on the pretext that the money should be spent on Americans who are suffering. He went on to describe the project as a "disgrace".

He urged adjustments to the new budget, which amounted to $900 billion, to increase the stimulus amount for Americans from $600 per person to $2,000 for individuals, or $4,000 for couples.

Under the heading of "Procurement, Defense-Wide", the act also detailed a total of $500 million for the "Israeli Cooperative Programs".

Of that amount, "$73,000,000 shall be for the Secretary of Defense to provide to the Government of Israel for the procurement of the Iron Dome defense system to counter short-range rocket threats," it said.

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201223-trump-slams-us-1-3bn-in-military-aid-due-to-egypt/

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