Day: December 1, 2025
Trump’s boat strikes may leave one Venezuelan drug-smuggling pirate haven in ruins
The Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal drug smuggling has reportedly prompted an economic collapse of one Venezuelan city.
Güiria, a port city dependent on the smuggling of illicit narcotics and other contraband, is facing economic challenges following the Trump administration’s strikes on suspected drug trafficking boats.
‘Everything is practically dead.’
The administration has launched numerous strikes in the Caribbean Sea in waters close to Venezuela in an effort to end the trafficking of drugs into the U.S.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,'” Secretary of War Pete Hegseth stated. “The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people. Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
“Our current operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law, with all actions in compliance with the law of armed conflict — and approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command,” Hegseth added.
Several Güiria residents claim the strikes have brought their town’s economy to a standstill, according to a Friday report from Reuters.
RELATED: Trump confirms call with Maduro after report of alleged regime-change ultimatum
Pete Hegseth. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
The news outlet noted that Güiria “survives mostly on maritime smuggling of contraband, including drugs,” and it is also “partly sustained by informal trade in food and other goods with Trinidad and Tobago.”
“There was only movement in stores recently because of government bonus payments; otherwise, there’s no money circulating,” a food store clerk told Reuters.
“No boats of any kind are leaving for Trinidad and Tobago any more — not migrants, not people buying goods there to sell here, and certainly not those taking Venezuelan products to sell there, which was another way to make money. Everything is practically dead,” she stated.
Nicolas Maduro. Photo by Alfredo Lasry R/Getty Images
The residents also reported an increase in the number of security personnel in the town since mid-September.
“They pass through the same areas many times, at all hours. Before, they weren’t so persistent; now they’re everywhere all the time,” a community leader told Reuters, referring to the security personnel.
“They’re all organized by the government — civilians and police go together supervising the streets,” another individual told the news outlet. “Everything seems calm except for the increased surveillance in the town.”
President Donald Trump has reportedly presented Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro with an ultimatum to relinquish control and flee the country.
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Suspect in National Guard shooting was part of CIA-backed unit that hunted down Taliban commanders
More information is being uncovered about Rahmanullah Lakanwal, the 29-year-old Afghan who allegedly shot two National Guard members in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.
Lakanwal was a member of a secret military operation backed by the CIA to hunt down Taliban commanders, according to multiple reports. The members of the “Zero Units” were highly vetted and praised by those who knew about them.
‘This animal would’ve never been here if not for Joe Biden’s dangerous policies which allowed countless unvetted criminals to invade our country.’
One of the guardsmen has since died, and the other is in critical condition. Both are members of the West Virginia National Guard.
Refugee advocates say that many Zero Units members have fallen into despair over their inability to gain work permits in the U.S. after fleeing from Afghanistan when it was retaken by the Taliban. Former intelligence and military officials say Lakanwal would have undergone significant vetting to be accepted into a Zero Unit operation.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe confirmed Lakanwal’s CIA connection. “In the wake of the disastrous Biden withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Biden administration justified bringing the alleged shooter to the United States in September 2021 due to his prior work with the U.S. government, including CIA, as a member of a partner force in Kandahar, which ended shortly following the chaotic evacuation,” he said in a statement to Fox News Digital.
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson blamed the Biden administration for allowing Lakanwal into the U.S. after the withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.
“This animal would’ve never been here if not for Joe Biden’s dangerous policies which allowed countless unvetted criminals to invade our country and harm the American people,” she said.
Lakanwal was brought in under Operation Allies Welcome and was granted asylum under the Trump administration in April. President Donald Trump has halted all asylum applications after the shooting.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi seemed to imply that more information about Lakanwal’s radicalization would be forthcoming.
“You’re going to hear a lot more about that,” she said on Fox News.
Lakanwal is facing one count of first-degree murder and two counts of assault with intent to kill while armed.
RELATED: MS NOW reporter obliterated online for unbelievable comment on National Guard shooting
A statement from No One Left Behind, a group advocating for Afghan allies who fought for the U.S., condemned the shooting.
“No One Left Behind serves Afghan and Iraqi allies who earned Special Immigrant Visas through direct service alongside U.S. military forces,” the statement reads. “These wartime partners risked everything to protect American troops, walking into firefights as interpreters, identifying threats that saved convoys, standing watch beside our service members in the most dangerous places on earth.”
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FDA finally admits COVID-19 vaccine killed kids: ‘This is a profound revelation’
Millions of Americans across the country were told during the pandemic to offer up their arms for the COVID-19 vaccines — the first-ever mRNA vaccines approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration — if they wanted to keep their jobs, eat in public, stay in school, or visit their loved ones.
Government officials, the establishment media, and pharmaceutical representatives claimed that the vaccines were “safe and effective.” Those who dared to suggest otherwise about the experimental drugs that were making liability-shielded vaccine manufacturers record profits were often attacked and censored.
Months after the Department of Health and Human Services concluded that “mRNA technology poses more risks than benefits for these respiratory viruses,” the Food and Drug Administration admitted in an internal letter that the COVID-19 vaccines killed numerous children.
‘Healthy young children who faced tremendously low risk of death were coerced.’
Dr. Vinay Prasad, chief medical officer at the FDA and director at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, noted in an email to staff on Friday that FDA Office of Biostatistics and Pharmacovigilance career staff “have found that at least 10 children have died after and because of receiving COVID-19 vaccination.”
In the email, which was reviewed by multiple publications and shared online by the Washington Post, Prasad indicated that the OBPV performed an analysis of 96 deaths between 2021 and 2024 and concluded “that no fewer than 10 are related. If anything, this represents conservative coding, where vaccines are exculpated rather than indicated in cases of ambiguity. The real number is higher.”
“These deaths are related to vaccination (likely/probable/possible attribution made by staff). That number is certainly an underestimate due to underreporting, and inherent bias in attribution,” wrote Prasad. “This safety signal has far-reaching implications for Americans, the U.S. pandemic response, and the agency itself.”
RELATED: Pfizer COVID shot sales plummet after Trump administration ends universal recommendations
Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
Despite the strong improbability of a healthy child getting seriously ill from COVID, former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci, former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky, and other health officials championed injecting kids with the novel vaccines.
On Nov. 2, 2021, then-President Joe Biden’s health officials gave final approval to Pfizer’s COVID-19 shot for kids ages 5 to 11. Biden said at the time, “It is a major step forward for our nation in our fight to defeat the virus.”
COVID-19 vaccination for children younger than 5 began across the U.S. in June 2022.
“These vaccines are safe, highly effective, and will give parents the peace of mind of knowing their child is protected from the worst outcomes of COVID-19,” said Biden.
Prasad noted in his Friday letter that despite evidence that the COVID-19 vaccine put boys and young men at great risk of myocarditis, Biden health officials “did not quickly attempt mitigation strategies such as spacing doses apart, lowering doses, omitting doses among those with prior COVID-19.”
Myocarditis is inflammation of the heart muscle that can manifest as various symptoms, including heart palpitations, chest pain, fainting, and weakness, and can also cause fatal cardiac arrest.
“Worse, the FDA delayed acknowledgement of the safety signal until after it could extend marketing authorization to younger boys 12-15,” continued Prasad. “Had the acknowledgement come early, these younger boys, who likely did not require COVID-19 vaccination, may have chosen to avoid the products.”
The FDA’s chief medical officer stressed that the OBPV’s finding that the COVID vaccine contributed to the deaths of children amounted to “a profound revelation.”
“For the first time, the U.S. FDA will acknowledge that COVID-19 vaccines have killed American children,” continued Prasad, whose agency revoked emergency-use authorization for COVID vaccines earlier this year. “Healthy young children who faced tremendously low risk of death were coerced, at the behest of the Biden administration, via school and work mandates, to receive a vaccine that could result in death. In many cases, such mandates were harmful.”
Peter Marks, Prasad’s predecessor, complained to the New York Times about the “political tone” of Prasad’s letter and noted, “I would not be surprised if the attributions turn out to be debatable, as these cases are often quite complex.”
FDA commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said in a “Fox & Friends” interview on Saturday that his agency would no longer “rubber-stamp things with no data,” adding that such a “mockery of science” was alternatively “the M.O. in the Biden administration with the eternal COVID booster approvals for young, healthy kids.”
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Millions of Americans shared Thanksgiving with family who voted differently — Jimmy Kimmel’s wife cut hers off
Last week, many of you likely sat around the Thanksgiving table with people who don’t share your worldview, but it didn’t stop you from breaking bread. In the end, family trumped ideological disputes.
But not everyone was willing to set aside their differences in the name of community and celebration. Jimmy Kimmel and his wife, Molly McNearney, for example, have cut contact with their family members who voted for Donald Trump.
On November 6 during an episode of the “We Can Do Hard Things” podcast, McNearney said, “It hurts me so much because of the personal relationship I now have where my husband is out there fighting this man, and to me, them voting for Trump is them not voting for my husband and me and our family, and I unfortunately have lost relationships with people in my family because of it.”
“I feel like I’m kind of in constant conflict, and I’m angry all the time. … I personalize everything now. When I see these terrible stories every day, I’m immediately mad at certain aunts, uncles, cousins who put him in power. … I wish I could deprogram myself in some way, but I get really angry,” she added.
“It’s weird how things have changed now,” Glenn Beck says in response. “But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think politics was not the sacred altar that it is now. Washington was not the center of our personal universe. Family was, community was, how we treated each other was. We had room to be wrong, room to disagree, room to be human.”
Glenn’s question, not just for McNearney and other like-minded liberals but also people on the right who let politics destroy their relationships, is: “Why is it so important to us that everyone sees the world exactly the way we do?”
“My relatives, I don’t hate them because they don’t agree with me. We hash it out, we roll our eyes, and then, ‘Pass the potatoes, will you?’” he says, noting that there are a lot of people in his family who vehemently oppose his views.
In the interview, McNearney also stated, “To me, this isn’t politics. It’s truly values,” but Glenn calls out her hypocrisy.
“Here’s one value that we all used to share: the value of accepting that other people, even family, even people you love, are allowed to be wrong. They’re allowed to fail. They’re allowed to see a world through a different prism,” he says.
“This belief that everybody who doesn’t agree with you, they’re somehow or another misinformed, that they’re somehow lesser, that if they don’t vote the way you want, they’re not voting for your family — that’s not democracy; that’s the seed of authoritarian thinking.”
Eventually, that little whispering voice that convinces you to be angry and reject people who don’t agree with you gets louder and louder.
“Do you force them eventually to see it your way? Because if you’ve tried to convince them and they can’t be convinced, your choice really is love them or force them into silence,” Glenn says.
Or, as Glenn suggests, “You shrug your shoulders and say, ‘Pass the potatoes.’”
To hear more of Glenn’s commentary, watch the video above.
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Dad springs into action after crook breaks into his home in middle of night — then heads to where his kids sleep
“Heard heavy footsteps coming up the stairs,” Kevin Root recalled to KDVR-TV about a heart-stopping 3:30 a.m. encounter at his family’s Denver home last month. “As a parent, you know your kids’ footsteps, and this was not any of our kids.”
The unsettling noises woke up Kevin and his wife, Sarah, the station said — and Kevin got up to find out where the sounds were coming from.
‘It feels unsettling that something so invasive and violating is permitted to happen and the person is back on the street.’
“We had our door slightly cracked, and I saw the shadow go by, and that just is a sinking feeling,” Sarah added to KDVR.
Turns out an intruder had broken the lock on the Roots’ front door — and now he was on the staircase, the station said.
“As I heard him coming up, I said, ‘Who is this?’ I just yelled, thinking, ‘Let me just let him know, like, we know you’re here. We’re awake,’” Kevin recalled to KDVR.
The Roots told the station the intruder kept silent and was heading to where their children were sleeping.
“As a mom, it’s just your worst nightmare,” Sarah shared with KDVR. “It’s terrifying.”
Neither parent had any idea if the intruder was armed, either, the station said — but Kevin knew there was only one thing to do.
“There comes a moment where you’re like, ‘This is me. I’m a husband and a father; it’s on me to do something,'” he told KDVR.
The station noted that while Sarah called 911 from their bedroom, Kevin got physical: “It was just one of those, like, ‘This is my moment.’ So I jumped out of the bedroom, and I pushed him down the stairs.”
More from KDVR:
He says the man fell all the way to the bottom, knocking some pictures off the wall and leaving a dent in the molding. He took a video as police arrived minutes later while the man laid on the floor.
The man eventually went peacefully into custody; all he took from the home was a fall decoration from the porch.
“We’re just thankful that everyone is OK,” Sarah added to the station.
Charley Cooley, 36, faced a felony second-degree robbery charge, KDVR reported, adding that his record shows he already had been arrested in September for another felony robbery charge in connection with an incident earlier in 2025.
Fox News reported that after his September arrest, Cooley was released just days later.
“We found out later about his criminal background, and that stirred up a whole new layer of emotion,” Sarah added to the cable network. “It feels unsettling that something so invasive and violating is permitted to happen and the person is back on the street.”
But it gets even worse.
The Denver District Attorney’s Office told Fox News that a judge set Cooley’s bond at $5,000 property/surety or $500 cash following the break-in at the Roots’ home.
Sure enough, Cooley posted $500 cash, the cable network said, citing KDVR.
“Multiple offenses, and he’s been released both times,” Kevin shared with Fox News. “The reality is he’s back out and has a history of doing this.”
Sarah added to the cable network that “we hope there’s justice and that he’s placed somewhere that prevents him from hurting anyone else.”
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NCAA: Barba bids goodbye to LPU as he sees bright future for Pirates
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The end has come for John Barba as Lyceum of the Philippines University wrapped up its campaign last Thursday in the NCAA Season 101 men”s basketball quarterfinals.
Kaufman: Report on Duterte”s fitness to stand trial possibly out this week
THE HAGUE – Saying it has been “extremely difficult” to work with former President Rodrigo Duterte amid the “impediments” he is facing, his legal team is expecting the report of a panel of medical experts who examined the 80-year-old Duterte”s fitness to stand trial to be released later this week.
DOLE: Employers should have safety protocols for workers amid disruptive events
Employers in the private sector are now required to adopt a comprehensive safety program that reinforces their readiness and ensures the protection of employees amid disruptive events like earthquakes, typhoons, and volcanic eruptions.
