9 Jul, 2025 14:27

French investigators raid HQ of biggest opposition party

The National Rally has denounced the action as “a new harassment campaign” by the government

French financial investigators raided the Paris headquarters of the right-wing National Rally (RN) party on Wednesday. Its leader accused the government of conducting a campaign of harassment.

The early morning search targeted documents and communications related to the party’s political campaigning, according to RN President Jordan Bardella. The party is closely associated with former presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, who was previously barred from running in the 2027 race.

Bardella criticized the search as “a new harassment campaign” and a blow to democratic principles.

”This display of force has only one purpose: to provide a spectacle for news channels, to rummage through the private correspondence of the leading opposition party, to seize all our internal documents,” he wrote on X. “Nothing to do with justice, everything to do with politics.”

Wednesday’s raid came roughly three months after a French court found senior RN figures, including Le Pen, guilty of embezzling European Union funds. The ruling imposed an immediate five-year ban from seeking public office, controversially offering no delay for appeal.

The party has condemned the verdict as an undemocratic attempt to sideline its co-founder and former leader from the 2027 presidential race. Le Pen narrowly lost to French President Emmanuel Macron in the 2022 runoff election.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said the search was part of an investigation into loans the RN received from private individuals.The party reportedly turned to private lending after being denied traditional bank financing, according to Le Parisien.

French campaign finance laws impose strict limits on party loans, including maximum values and repayment conditions. Investigators are reportedly searching for potential violations but have not filed any charges. Christian Charpy, head of the French campaign finance watchdog CNCCFP,previously suggested that some loans may have amounted to undeclared donations.

The RN has grown in prominence in recent years andnow holds the largest single faction in France’s parliament. During last year’s snap elections,mainstream parties coordinated to block the anti-immigration, Euroskeptic party from securing enough seats to form a government. President Macron has had to contend with a more challenging domestic political environment since losing his legislative majority in 2022.

https://www.rt.com/news/621239-national-rally-hq-raided/

Macron copying Bidan’s playbook, put them all in jail.

9 Jul, 2025 15:05

‘Time to go’: Orban demands von der Leyen’s departure

The Hungarian PM mocked the EU chief ahead of Thursday’s no confidence vote over her handling of vaccine deals

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has called for the resignation of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, posting a parody image ahead of a scheduled no confidence vote in the European Parliament. The motion, set for Thursday, targets her handling of COVID-19 vaccine procurement.

On Tuesday, Orban shared an image stylized as a Time magazine cover, depicting a red background and a retreating von der Leyen under the caption “time to go.”

The image was a spoof on a Biden-themed cover of the magazine from 2024 which followed the then-US president’s announcement that he would withdraw from the election campaign.

Orban has long been one of von der Leyen’s harshest critics, accusing her of undermining EU institutions and interfering in the domestic affairs of member states. He has frequently clashed with Brussels over rule-of-law disputes and sanctions policy, and has claimed the bloc’s leadership has tried to isolate Hungary politically.

Within the EU, von der Leyen has faced growing criticism, particularly over her conduct during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her refusal to release private texts exchanged with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla during vaccine procurement talks has fueled ongoing controversy. A European court ruled earlier this year that her office had failed to provide a legitimate justification for withholding the messages.

Critics from both the political left and right, as well as Eurosceptic factions, have accused her of centralizing power, bypassing traditional Commission proceduresand parliamentary oversight, as well as overriding national sovereignty in sensitive matters.

Thursday’s no confidence vote was initiated by Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea, who cited a pattern of “institutional overreach” in von der Leyen’s conduct. The motion needs a two-thirds majority and support from an absolute majority of the European Parliament’s 720 members to pass—a threshold observers say is unlikely to be met.

In response, von der Leyen has lashed out at her opponents, labeling them “conspiracy theorists” and “anti-vaxxers” backed by Russia. Speaking at a plenary session this week, she claimed some of her critics were acting “on behalf of their puppet masters in Russia.”

Moscow has repeatedly accused von der Leyen of harboring Russophobic views. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov earlier this year referred to her as “Führer Ursula” and accused her of pushing militarization across the EU while deflecting attention from pandemic-era financial mismanagement.

Kremlin officials have also criticized her support for Ukraine and her role in expanding sanctions targeting Russia, calling her one of the key drivers of the EU’s confrontation with Moscow.

https://www.rt.com/news/621252-orban-demands-leyen-resignation/

9 Jul, 2025 11:09

Moscow not fazed by Trump’s harsh rhetoric – Kremlin

Russia is well aware that it is the US president’s style, spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said

Russia takes the harsh recent rhetoric by US President Donald Trump calmly and intends to continue dialogue with Washington, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said.

Trump told journalists on Tuesday that he was “unhappy” with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, accusing him of not wanting to settle the Ukraine conflict. “We get a lot of bullsh*t thrown at us by Putin,” the US president claimed. Referring to their phone calls, the latest of which took place last week, Trump said Putin “is very nice all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless” in terms of ending the fighting. Moscow maintains that it is ready for a diplomatic solution with Kiev, but insists that it should be legally binding and address the root causes of the crisis.

When asked about Trump’s latest comments on Wednesday,Peskov replied that “we treat them quite calmly.”

The US president’s “style, generally, is quite harsh in terms of the phrases that he uses,” he added.

“We are calm about this. We are committed to continuing our dialogue with Washington and our policy of repairing the significantly damaged bilateral relations,” the spokesman noted.

Peskov stressed that Trump’s other comment, in which he acknowledged that settling the Ukraine conflict “turned out to be tougher” than he thought, was much more “important.”

“This is something that we [Russia] have been talking about from the very beginning because such an issue is impossible to resolve overnight,” Peskov stated.

The spokesman expressed hope that despite the US president’s recent statements, “Trump and his team will continue their efforts to shift the process of the Ukrainian settlement into… a diplomatic field.”

Moscow is waiting for a response from Kiev to its proposal on holding a third round of bilateral talks in Istanbul, Peskov added. “This should be in the interests of the Ukrainian side because the situation on the ground changes daily. We are moving forward,” he explained.

Peskov also commented on the audio released by CNN on Tuesday, which allegedly captures Trump telling donors in 2024 that he had once threatened Putin that he would “bomb the sh*t out of Moscow” if Russia attacked Ukraine.

The spokesman said he could not confirm the authenticity of the tape,adding that “whether it is fake or not, we do not know either. There is a lot of fake news these days.”KEK, look at the picture they use

https://www.rt.com/news/621225-trump-putin-kremlin-peskov/

9 Jul, 2025 08:49

EU must rethink Russia policy – Czech president

Kiev and its Western European backers cannot fight Moscow endlessly, Petr Pavel has said

The EU should engage in talks with Russia on European security and restoring business ties once the Ukraine conflict ends, Czech President Petr Pavel has said. The comments mark a notable shift from his previously hardline stance toward Moscow.

Pavel has been a harsh critic of Russia during the Ukraine conflict and a strong advocate of more Western military aid to Kiev. He also spearheaded a plan to supply Ukraine with 1.8 million artillery shells, although the scheme has faced funding issues. Moscow has repeatedly condemned Western arms deliveries, warning they only prolong the conflict.

Speaking to BBC News Ukraine on Tuesday, Pavel said the EU should rethink its approach to Russia and try to find a “compromise” with Moscow.

“It is very difficult to agree to that. But we also live in reality. What alternatives do we have, both us and Ukraine?To fight Russia endlessly?Such an approach will probably lead to great human losses for all of us and serious damage to our economies,” he argued.

If a peace deal between Moscow and Kiev is reached, Western Europe “will be able to start rebuilding Ukraine and, perhaps, depending on how Russia reacts to this, to bring Russia back to the negotiating table on security in Europe, to discuss cooperation and business that we had before,” Pavel said.

“A significant part of our population would prefer good relations with Russia. These people do not want to submit to its interests, but believe that negotiations are always better than conflict,” he added.

The Czech president, who previously served as chairman of NATO’s Military Committee, said Kiev must seek peace with Moscow because even “with all the support of the West” it would be unable to recapture territory lost to Russia “in a short time without significant human casualties.” However, he insisted that the EU would never legally recognize regions which have voted to join Russia from Ukraine.

In an interview with Hungarian newspaper Magyar Nemzet earlier this week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reiterated that Moscow’s key demand in settling the Ukraine conflict is international recognition of Crimea, as well as the Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye regions as part of Russia. Crimea joined Russia after a 2014 referendum, with similar votes held in the other four regions in 2022.

Lavrov also criticized what he described as the EU’s transformation into a “military-political bloc”and “an appendix to NATO,” warning that this “dangerous trend… could have far-reaching consequences for all Europeans.”

https://www.rt.com/news/621219-eu-ukraine-czech-pavel/

9 Jul, 2025 16:01

France not fit to replace BlackRock in Ukraine – party leader to RT

Paris must immediately disengage from Kiev both financially and militarily, Florian Philippot has

The reported plans by the French government to replace US investment holding BlackRock in Ukraine are “unacceptable” for the EU nation’s people, the leader of France’s Patriots party, Florian Philippot, told RT in an exclusive interview on Tuesday.

BlackRock had been actively involved in developing a multibillion-dollar Ukraine recovery fund aimed at financing post-war reconstruction projects, with plans to attract $15 billion from public and private investors, including commitments from Germany, Italy, and Poland. The fund, which was set to be unveiled at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Rome on July 10-11, is now on hold, and France is reportedly working on an alternative plan.

Last week, Bloomberg claimed, citing informed sources, that BlackRock halted the search for investors for its fund earlier this year due to US President Donald Trump’s rocky relations with the authorities in Kiev. The sources also claimed that France has been trying to set up an alternative structure that could take the spot freed by the US company in the country. However, they questioned if the reported French initiative could succeed without the American money.

Philippot told RT that the report by Bloomberg came as a “complete surprise” for him.He reminded that France is €3.4 trillion (around $4 trillion) in debt and is about to face “extreme austerity,” blaming the situation on the policies of President Emmanuel Macron.

”We are no longer properly funding hospitals, farmers, security and many other expenditure items. How are we going to replace a behemoth like BlackRock in Ukraine under conditions of total military, diplomatic, financial and economic uncertainty?” the politician wondered.

The general public will be against the alleged plans by the government in Paris once more people learn about them, Philippot insisted. “This is obviously unacceptable for the French,” he added.

The Patriots party leader said that Macron’s movesregarding Kiev “make no sense,” urging France’s immediate and “total military and financial disengagement from Ukraine.”

He also suggested that BlackRock withdrew from Ukraine because it realized that it is inevitably going to suffer a defeat at the hands of Russia.“You do not invest in a country that is going to lose,”Philippot explained.

BlackRock, which controls roughly $11.6 trillion in assets, owns substantial shares in military-industrial giants such as Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and Northrop Grumman, among many others. Armaments produced by these firms, which are supplied to Kiev by its Western backers, have seen extensive use in the conflict.

https://www.rt.com/news/621249-france-blackrock-ukraine-philippot/

Zohran Mamdani’s SAT Score Revealed

The elite mayoral candidate played racial shell games in pursuit of prestige.

CHRISTOPHER F. RUFO

JUL 07, 2025

Over the long weekend, the New York Times scooped a story about New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s application to Columbia University, in which he claimed that his ethnicity was “Asian” and “Black/African American.” In his defense,Mamdani claimed that his parents are both Indian, which is why he checked Asian, and that he was born in Uganda, which is why he checked black.

If only it were so innocent. As any ambitious youth in America understands, there is a huge payout in marking “black” for college applications. Mamdani’s father is a professor at Columbia, and his mother is a famous filmmaker,so the idea that he did not understand the Ivy League’s racial calculus is not credible.

The Times story captured the details of Mamdani’s box-checking, but gently avoided the underlying question:With such an elite background, why did Mamdani feel the need to falsely portray himself as black?

I have obtained Mamdani’s full Columbia application, which might help unravel this mystery.According to the materials, Mamdani scored a 2140 out of 2400 on the SAT. At the time, this was below the median SAT score for admitted students at Columbiaand, given the prevailing distribution by race,well below the median SAT score for Asian students, but likely above the median SAT score for black students—hence, the advantage of marking “black.”

The wrinkle in the story, however, is that, despite having a father on the faculty and marking black on his application, Columbia rejected Mamdani. There are two plausible theories for why this happened.

First, in general, Columbia is a highly competitive university with an admissions rate of less than ten percent, which means that many candidates around the median will not make the cut.

Second, there is a possibility that Mamdani’s box-checking gambit backfired. The full application includes the name and contact information for his father, Mahmood Mamdani, and his mother, Mira Nair, both of whom are public figures and neither of whom is black. The application also included a flag noting that the elder Mamdani appeared to be “affiliated with Columbia” and another line noting the family’s address in an exclusive Manhattan neighborhood. With even cursory research, an admissions officer could have seen that Mr. Mamdani was neither black, nor underprivileged.

https://christopherrufo.com/p/zohran-mamdanis-sat-score-revealed

Gunther Eagleman™

@GuntherEagleman

Democrat terrorists are now putting bounties on JD Vance for $1 million

This has to stop!

Why won’t democrats denounce this?

https://x.com/GuntherEagleman/status/1942677874676228561

Gunther Eagleman™

@GuntherEagleman

HOLY CRAP! New details are just now being reported about this incident, and it proves why Antifa MUST be labeled as a domestic terror organization:

"The ambush in Alvarado, Texas, appears to be the most coordinated of all the recent attacks on ICE and border patrol agents and facilities."

"That attack began with at least 10 people, all dressed in what investigators describe as black military style clothing, shooting fireworks at the Prairie Detention Center."

"Around ten minutes later, one or two of them broke off from the main group and began spray painting the facility and vehicles parked there with words like traitor and other slogans."

"A police officer arrived responding to a 911 call, and at that point, one of the group who had apparently hidden in trees near the facility opened fire, hitting the officer in the neck, while another attacker also across the street fired dozens of rounds at officers from the facility."

"It was a planned ambush with the intent to k*ll ICE corrections officers. Make no mistake. This was not a so-called peaceful protest. It was indeed an ambush."

"Police also discovered anarchist literature and flyers in one of the vehicles used by the attackers and a Faraday bag, a type of bag that blocks phone signals and which is commonly used by criminals to prevent law enforcement tracking their locations."

1:18

(https://x.com/GuntherEagleman/status/1942608772989399217

Mamdani stokes Italian American outrage after resurfaced tweet shows socialist giving the finger to Christopher Columbus statue: ‘Take it down’

By Published July 7, 2025, 9:49 p.m. ET

He’s no paesan.

Italian Americans were outraged at mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani Monday after a social media post resurfaced showing him flipping the bird at a statue of Christopher Columbus and calling for its removal.

The socialist Mamdani is seen in the tweet from June 2020 giving the middle finger to the back of the towering figure in Astoria, which is part of his state Assembly district.

“Take it down,” wrote Mamdani, who was running for state office at the time.

The tweet left a bad taste in the mouth of Italian American groups in the Big Apple this week, including the Columbus Heritage Coalition.

Angelo Vivolo, the group’s president, vowed not to support the lefty candidate come November.

“We will defend Columbus Day and Columbus statues,” he told The Post.

“He is being disrespectful to the Italian American community” said Vivolo, who is the former head of the Columbus Citizens Foundation, which runs the city’s Columbus Day Parade. “If you offend one community, you offend all communities.

“I don’t think he will be mayor for all the people of New York City.”

The Italian voting bloc that Mamdani disrespected makes up about 8% of the city’s population, noted Joseph Scelsa, the founder and president of the Italian American Museum.

“To eliminate such a large population of people would be a travesty,” he said. “It’s not inclusive. It’s exclusionary.

“Who’s to say who is a hero and who is not a hero? Columbus is our hero.”

An email to Mamdani’s campaign about the brewing controversy was not immediately returned.

The wet behind the ears socialist shocked ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo in June’s Democratic primary, putting him in the driver’s seat for November.

Mamdani could face Cuomo again in the general election — the longtime Italian American pol is mulling a run as an independent — along with Mayor Eric Adams, who is running as an independent, and GOP candidate Curtis Sliwa.

Lefties have made a habit of targeting Columbus statues and Columbus Day because of the famed explorer’s treatment of Native Americans when sailing to North America.

But supporters argue he’s important to Italian Americans and his voyage was a critical moment in history.

The statue Mamdani condemned in his tweet is one of the five in Big Apple parks, according to city officials.

https://nypost.com/2025/07/07/us-news/mamdani-stokes-italian-american-outrage-after-christopher-columbus-tweet-resurfaces/

(Even though the Mafia doesn’t exist, many generations after them exist. Don’t FAFO with Italians!)

Charlie Kirk

@charliekirk11

WATCH Vice President JD Vance absolutely TORCH the next likely Mayor of NYC for disrespecting America on our Independence Day:

“Mamdani's family fled violent racial hatred only for him to come to this country—a country built by people he never knew, overflowing with generosity to his family, offering a haven from the kind of violent ethnic conflict that is common place in world history, but it is not common place here—and he dares on our 249th anniversary to congratulate it by paying homage to its ‘incompleteness,’ and to its, as he calls it, ‘contradiction.’"

https://x.com/charliekirk11/status/1942582956461285475

Citizen Free Press

@CitizenFreePres

TEXAS OFFICIALS PUT MOUTHY CNN REPORTER ON WATCH.

3:43

https://x.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1942689671181656450