Day: January 29, 2026
Socialist Mamdani’s tax assault on NYC’s rich begins — claims Adams forced his hand with fiscal crisis
New York City’s newly inaugurated mayor, Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani, revealed plans to increase taxes on “the richest New Yorkers” less than one month into his term, blaming former Mayor Eric Adams (D) for a budget shortfall.
On Thursday, Mamdani held a press conference to detail the “Adams Budget Crisis,” claiming that the former mayor “misled and misinformed” New Yorkers about the “true state” of the city’s finances.
‘And here’s the part socialists hate saying out loud: “Free” is a lie.’
“I will be blunt: New York City is facing a serious fiscal crisis. There is a massive fiscal deficit in our city’s budget to the tune of at least $12 billion. We did not arrive at this place by accident. This crisis has a name and a chief architect,” Mamdani said.
“This is the Adams Budget Crisis.”
He accused Adams of handing the new administration “a poisoned chalice” by “systematically” under-budgeting necessary services, including rental assistance, shelter, and special education.
“Knowing his time in office was likely coming to an end, Mayor Adams chose political self-preservation over fiscal responsibility. This is not just bad governance. It is negligence,” Mamdani remarked.
“The Adams administration dramatically and intentionally understated the problem.”
Mamdani vowed to balance the budget over two fiscal years by implementing “bold solutions,” including “recalibrating the broken fiscal relationship between the state and the city.” He argued that New York City contributes 54.5% of the state’s revenue but receives only 40.5% of its operating expenditures.
RELATED: ‘Proud to be a sanctuary city’: Mamdani announces another handout for illegal aliens in NYC
Zohran Mamdani. Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images
“Working people did not cause this crisis, and they cannot be made the victims of its solution,” Mamdani stated.
“The time has come to tax the richest New Yorkers and most profitable corporations,” he declared.
Mamdani stated that he could “build a stronger city for everyone” if New York’s top 1% earners paid an additional 2% in income taxes, while claiming that the increase was not significant enough to drive wealthy individuals to leave the state.
Eric Adams. Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images
Adams fired back at Mamdani in several posts on X, denying that he left a deficit in the city’s budget.
“Facts have a way of getting in the way when slogans replace math and blame replaces leadership,” Adams wrote. “I didn’t leave a ‘budget hole.’ I left over $8 BILLION in reserves. Only someone who can’t read a balance sheet would call that a crisis.”
“And here’s the part socialists hate saying out loud: ‘Free’ is a lie. Every so-called free program comes with a price tag, and someone always pays for it,” he added.
Adams argued that Mamdani’s real motive behind his press conference was to find a way to pay for the “laundry list of ‘free’ giveaways” he promised New Yorkers “to buy votes.”
“Now that the math doesn’t work, instead of owning the fact that he misled New Yorkers, he’s blaming me,” Adams said. “This is the same Mamdani who spent years attacking me for not spending enough during the migrant crisis. The only reason those reserves exist is because I ignored him and his socialist comrades who demanded we blow billions more with no guardrails.”
Adams mocked Mamdani in a third post on X, writing, “When you promise ‘free’ everything on Sunday, boldly declare that millionaires and billionaires shouldn’t exist on Monday, and by Tuesday you’re scrambling to fund your giveaways with the very people you wanted gone just yesterday.”
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Top Oklahoma Democrat forced to resign after trying to pay Ethics Commission with a forged check
A Democrat Oklahoma state representative is resigning after she got caught trying to pay the Ethics Commission with a forged check.
Rep. Ajay Pittman, whose district includes part of Oklahoma City, announced her resignation Wednesday after pleading guilty to a felony charge related to the forged check. She was in her fourth term.
The Democrat had previously agreed to pay $12,000 in restitution and a fine over similar accusations in 2020 and 2022.
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said that part of the sentence for Pittman included her resigning from her office.
“I believe stepping aside allows my district to be served without distraction,” Pittman said. “Leadership is not only about holding office, but it’s also about knowing when to close a chapter with grace and clarity.”
Pittman was accused of violating the Oklahoma Computer Crimes Act in relation to campaign finance records, as well as forgery and embezzlement. Investigators searched Pittman’s office in October.
Drummond said that she forged a check to the Oklahoma Ethics Commission to avoid paying back funds to her campaign account.
“Public officials hold a sacred trust with the people they serve,” read a statement from Drummond in a press release. “When that trust is violated for personal gain, it strikes at the very heart of our institutions. This office will continue to hold elected officials accountable when they abuse their positions and betray the public’s confidence. No one is above the law in Oklahoma.”
Pittman also received a deferred sentence of seven years and has to pay full restitution for the campaign funds she is accused of embezzling.
RELATED: Congresswoman’s staffer indicted for spreading her intimate videos and photos online
The Democrat had previously agreed to pay $12,000 in restitution and a fine over similar accusations in 2020 and 2022.
Pittman either authored or co-authored more than 160 pieces of legislation during her time in the legislature. KOCO-TV said she was an influential and prominent politician in Oklahoma.
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‘They can’t take us all down’: Actor Giancarlo Esposito declares it’s ‘time for a revolution’ in unhinged rant
“Breaking Bad” actor Giancarlo Esposito has a message for old white men: If you want civil war, you might just get it.
The 67-year-old told a reporter at the Sundance Film Festival that it is “time for a revolution” and that the powers that be “don’t even know that’s what they’re starting.”
‘They’ll kill 500, 50 million, however [many], but the rest of us would survive with a new [world].’
Esposito, who has also starred in “The Mandalorian” and “Better Call Saul,” elaborated on his theory at the premiere of his latest project on Tuesday in Park City, Utah.
Fring-a-ling
“You know, some very rich old white men are exerting their power to suppress our own people, thus creating a feeling of civil war in the streets, preparing the haters to hate, teaching them how to shoot — they’re not even trained right — to kill,” he explained. “This is all preparation for a very insidious problem that’s happening in our world.”
Esposito then told a reporter from Variety that while tens of millions may die from a revolution, the rest would get to live on in the new world.
RELATED: Sundance VIPs take 10-minute protest break in between screenings
Collateral damage
“I have to speak out that we will not be ICE’d out,” the actor continued. “This is not going to happen. They can’t take us all down. If the whole world showed up on Putin’s doorstep or on the Iranians’ doorstep or in Washington, it would stop [them]. They’ll kill 500, 50 million, however [many], but the rest of us would survive with a new [world].”
The TV actor went on to say that the unnamed forces don’t know what the revolution is that they are starting, but “we have to be strong enough to know that we can change the world. We have to change it from within.”
“Not by deporting immigrants” and “not by killing off brown … people,” the actor stressed.
RELATED: Brave Hollywood stars hit Sundance red carpet in defiance of ICE ‘gestapo’ terror
Photo by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images
Talk show
This year’s Sundance has seen the “premiere” of many celebrity political opinions. Edward Norton, for example, wowed audiences by comparing Immigration and Customs Enforcement to Nazi gestapo.
Not to be upstaged, actress Natalie Portman told Deadline that what the Trump administration is doing is “really the worst of the worst of humanity,” while actor Elijah Wood of “Lord of the Rings” fame showed up for a 10-minute demonstration on Main Street to protest ICE with cell phones.
Wood said “folks” had been “unlawfully gunned down in Minnesota” and that the crowd at Sundance is “coming together” and is not divided.
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‘We will be exposing all of it’: H-1B visa applications shut down in Texas as Sara Gonzales warns H-4 visas are next
After BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales exposed the truth hiding behind H-1B visas in Texas, Governor Greg Abbott (R) decided to open an investigation into H-1B visa abuse and has directed all Texas state agencies to freeze new H-1B visa applications.
“In light of recent reports of abuse in the federal H-1B visa program, and amid the federal government’s ongoing review of that program to ensure American jobs are going to American workers, I am directing all state agencies to immediately freeze new H-1B visa petitions as outlined in this letter,” Abbott wrote in a statement.
“Evidence suggests that bad actors have exploited this program by failing to make good-faith efforts to recruit qualified U.S. workers before seeking to use foreign labor. In the most egregious schemes, employers have even fired American workers and replaced them with H-1B employees, often at lower wages,” he continued.
“Rather than serving its intended purpose of attracting the best and brightest individuals from around the world to our nation to fill truly specialized and unmet labor needs, the program has too often been used to fill jobs that otherwise could — and should — have been filled by Texans,” he concluded.
“Credit where credit is due,” Gonzales comments. “Let this play out. Let this investigation play out. Let them prove to us how far they are willing to go. This is step one of many different steps that need to take place in order for us to take our country back, in order for displaced American workers to be able to find work again.”
“So we’re not stopping. Obviously, public pressure works. We’re going to expose every aspect of this racket from the H-1B visas to all of the other visas that feed off of them, like H-4 visas,” she continues.
“But it turns out, yeah, your spouse can just get a visa too, if you’re on an H-1B. The kids too. There’s a visa for that. And so these H-4 visas have even less oversight on the rules of the kinds of jobs that they can get on and take on an H-4 visa,” she explains.
If an immigrant here on an H-4 visa wants to work at a place like McDonald’s, “there’s nothing stopping them,” Gonzales says.
“The whole thing is a racket,” she continues. “We will be exposing all of it.”
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Illegal alien ‘monster’ accused of throwing rock into school bus, fracturing skull of young girl placed on ICE detainer: Feds
A criminal illegal alien accused of throwing a baseball-sized rock into a New Jersey school bus and fracturing the skull of an 8-year-old girl was placed on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer, the Department of Homeland Security said earlier this week.
The DHS, citing local reports, said the school bus was traveling on the New Jersey Turnpike to Yeshivat Noam — a local Jewish day school — after a field trip at Liberty Science Center on Jan. 7.
‘We hope New Jersey’s sanctuary politicians will help us keep him off American streets for good.’
Officials said Hernando Garcia-Morales of Mexico threw a rock at the vehicle, breaking a window and hitting the third-grade student, who was forced to have surgery.
The DHS said two days later — Jan. 9 — New Jersey Turnpike State Police arrested Garcia-Morales for aggravated assault, resisting arrest, and possession of a weapon. The Bogota (New Jersey) Police Department also charged him for aggravated assault, criminal trespassing-defiant, criminal trespassing-peering, and criminal mischief-damage property, DHS said.
NJ.com added that Garcia-Morales was found in a self-made campsite within Old Croaker County Park in Bergen County.
Garcia-Morales has had an extensive criminal history while living in sanctuary state New Jersey, the DHS said, noting that he was arrested for burglary in 2023 and for possession of a weapon and theft in 2006.
In addition, the investigation also linked him to multiple rock-throwing incidents in Bogota Borough, NJ.com reported, citing state police.
Garcia-Morales has since been placed in ICE custody, NJ.com added.
DHS said Garcia-Morales entered the United States on an unknown date.
“Violently targeting a school bus full of children is extremely wicked and heinous,” said Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, who called the suspect a “monster.”
“Hernando Garcia-Morales should have never been in this country, let alone released, after multiple arrests, into New Jersey communities,” McLaughlin also said, adding that “we hope New Jersey’s sanctuary politicians will help us keep him off American streets for good. Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, criminal illegal aliens have no place in the U.S.”
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China expects record 9.5 billion passenger trips during Lunar New Year
China expects a record 9.50 billion passenger trips to be made during the 40-day spring festival holiday travel period, higher than the 9.02 billion domestic trips last year, a state planning official said on Thursday.
Missing child of slain policewoman found dead in Tarlac
The missing child of the policewoman who was found dead in Pulilan, Bulacan last Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026 was found dead in Victoria, Tarlac, according to the report of GMA Integrated News’ Bea Pinlac.
UN’s Guterres: global problems will not be solved by one power ‘calling the shots’
Global problems will not be solved by one power “calling the shots,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Thursday, warning that international law was being trampled and cooperation eroded.
Nawawalang anak ng pinaslang na policewoman, nakitang patay sa Tarlac
Patay na nang matagpuan sa Victoria, Tarlac ang nawawalang anak ng policewoman na unang nakita ang bangkay sa Pulilan, Bulacan noong Enero 24, 2026.
