Category: Blaze Media
Kamala Harris cackles uncontrollably while claiming she defeated Trump’s campaign strategy to bait her
Failed presidential candidate Kamala Harris claims to have outplayed the campaign strategy employed by President Donald Trump in the 2024 election.
Harris made the comments while a guest on the “Storehouse and Friends” podcast hosted by Tamira Chapman. The podcast was published Sunday, but the clip of her comments went viral on social media.
‘I understood the game that was being played. And I made the decision that I wasn’t gonna get played!’
“I was aware of my opponent’s strategy, and I wasn’t about to fall prey or fall into those traps. And part of his strategy and those around him was to try to take me off our game and message,” Harris explained.
“And I wasn’t about to be distracted by those little, those flames that he was trying to throw to get me away from … my highest priority, which was talking to people about the economy and their well-being in terms of their financial well-being,” she added.
“And that’s, I understood the game that was being played,” Harris added. “And I made the decision that I wasn’t gonna get played!”
Harris cackled at her own joke and prompted the other women to similarly cackle.
“Chess, not checkers!” replied one.
“Three-dimensional chess! I’m telling you!” she added.
On the same show, Harris was asked by a co-host if she faced difficulties as a black woman, and she answered by blaming the Democratic Party.
“Often I feel like black women have this tension between, you know, who they are and the mission that they are trying to accomplish. I want to know if you faced any of that tension when you were on your mission, especially considering that your mission was race agnostic and gender agnostic. You were trying to do the work that the country needed,” asked Melissa Butler. “Did you find that you faced tension of that sort?”
“I think the Democratic Party has taken black women for granted,” Harris responded. “There are very specific issues that impact black women in America that should be some of the highest priorities.”
RELATED: ‘He totally f**ked us’: Top Harris adviser blames Biden for devastating election loss
Harris is on a marketing tour for her campaign memoir titled, “107 Days.” The effort has been ruthlessly mocked and ridiculed by many on social media since she announced it in July.
Video of the entire show with Harris can be viewed on the show’s YouTube channel.
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‘Pure evil’: Feds charge alleged leader of ‘unthinkably depraved,’ violent group involved in child sextortion
A 21-year-old leader of a violent extremist group involved in “unthinkably depraved” extortion of child sex abuse material faces multiple sentences of life in prison if convicted.
Baron Cain Martin of Tucson, Arizona, allegedly ran the online network “764” under the moniker “Convict” after joining the group around 2019 — when he would have been just 15 years old.
‘His alleged actions targeting children as part of the 764 online terror network are so depraved they defy comprehension.’
The Department of Justice at the time of his December 2024 arrest described the 764 organization as a “dangerous network of violent extremists who systematically target children and weaponize child sexual abuse material” in order to support an “accelerationist agenda” to destroy civilized society and the U.S. government.
The DOJ revealed in late October that Martin now is charged with dozens of crimes, including:
- Five counts of producing child pornography;
- Eleven counts of distributing child pornography;
- Three counts of coercing and enticing minors to engage in sexual activity;
- Three counts of cyberstalking;
- Animal crushing;
- Distribution of animal crush videos; and
- Conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
He’s also charged with participating in a child exploitation enterprise, conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, and conspiring to kill, kidnap, or maim persons in a foreign country, officials said.
Martin — who’s been in federal custody since his arrest — also is accused of coercing underage victims to harm themselves numerous times, officials said. The 764 group produces “extreme gore media and child sexual abuse material” and shares the content with members; the group also grooms underage females to mutilate themselves while recording or streaming video online, officials said.
A criminal complaint said Martin allegedly admitted to using the “Convict” moniker and bragged about being the “catalyst for thousands of extortions” under 764. Investigators said he referred himself as the “king of extortion.”
In one alleged incident, Martin coerced a 13-year-old child to cut designs into her body that included satanic symbols and swastikas. He also made her cut his name into “every possible place” on her body.
In another alleged incident described in the complaint, Martin coerced a 16-year-old on Discord to scratch herself until she drew blood and then pour alcohol over the wounds.
He is indicted for alleged crimes against nine victims — eight of whom were between the ages of 11 and 15 at the time of the abuse. He is believed to have other victims.
“His alleged actions targeting children as part of the 764 online terror network are so depraved they defy comprehension,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “We will use every available tool to protect our children and ensure that those who perpetrate such acts of pure evil face the full force of justice.”
RELATED: A 2021 gun arrest in NYC put investigators on the trail of a global satanic pedophile cult
The DOJ in April announced the arrest of two alleged members of 764 in North Carolina and Greece.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said the case was a warning to parents about monitoring their online behavior.
“This man’s alleged crimes are unthinkably depraved and reflect the horrific danger of 764 — if convicted, he will face severe consequences as we work to dismantle this evil network,” Bondi said. “I urge parents to remain vigilant about the threats their children face online.”
Experts say that parents should limit their children’s access to social media and other online sites, especially those which allow strangers to contact and interact with their accounts.
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ICE makes pitch to NYPD cops after Mamdani promises radical overhaul
A poll conducted ahead of the New York City mayoral election found that 9% of residents would “definitely” leave the city and another 25% would “consider” relocating if Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani proved victorious on Nov. 4.
It is yet to be seen whether NYC will ultimately hemorrhage millions of residents in the coming months. It appears, however, that Mamdani’s rise to power has already prompted departures at the New York Police Department.
‘How do you work for somebody who considers you racist and anti-queer and wants to defund the police?’
Citing sources familiar with the situation and Police Pension Fund data, the New York Post indicated that a surge of police officers quit in the weeks leading up to the mayoral election, when Mamdani was a clear favorite to win.
In October, the NYPD reportedly saw a 35% spike in police of all ranks leaving the force. Whereas 181 left the force in October 2024, this year 245 officers left during the same stretch.
Detectives Endowment Association president Scott Munro told the Post, “Morale is down because everyone is concerned about the policies Mamdani wants to put in place.”
“You have a person who is supposed to be running New York City that does not believe in law enforcement,” continued Munro. “What’s coming out of everyone’s mouth is, ‘We’re in trouble.'”
RELATED: Here’s what exit polls reveal about Tuesday’s electoral bloodbath
Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images
Mamdani, who takes office on Jan. 1, has made no secret in recent years of his antipathy toward the NYPD.
The mayor-elect suggested, for instance, in a June 28, 2020, tweet that the NYPD “is racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety” and stressed that it was necessary to “defund the police.”
“How do you work for somebody who considers you racist and anti-queer and wants to defund the police?” said one retired cop. “Things are hard enough already. If you’re eligible to leave, why would you want to stay in that situation?”
Mamdani now claims that he doesn’t want to defund the police; however, he has indicated that he’s not interested in hiring more police to address the NYPD’s near-record-low numbers and appears keen to replace police in certain circumstances with social workers.
On the campaign trail, Mamdani proposed the creation of an agency aimed at preventing “violence before it happens by taking a public health approach to safety.” The so-called Department of Community Safety would have a budget of over $1 billion — drawing $605 million from existing programs — and would appropriate some of the responsibilities of police, including responding to mental health calls and dealing with erratic homeless individuals.
Some individuals with actual experience dealing with the city’s mentally ill and homeless have suggested that Mamdani’s proposal is disaster waiting to happen.
A Bronx cop told the Post, “How’s that going to work when the person pulls out a gun or a knife?”
“You can’t do this without police — it’s impossible,” Richard Perkins, a behavioral nurse with 14 years’ experience told the Gothamist. “No one in their right mind would do this alone. You’re going to get hurt.”
Mamdani’s appointment of Elle Bisgaard-Church as his chief of staff signals he’s likely serious about the DCS. Bisgaard-Church, who serves as Mamdani’s campaign manager, was reportedly the proposed agency’s “chief architect.”
In addition to effectively replacing police with social workers on certain calls, Mamdani has ruffled feathers by committing to both closing Rikers Island prison and shifting the final say on police disciplinary actions from the NYPD commissioner to the anti-police Civilian Complaint Review Board.
‘It seems to me like there may be people from there looking for jobs.’
“Nobody wants to be a New York City cop,” a police union consultant told the Post. “It’s not worth the money, the stress, the danger, especially working for a mayor who wants to take the department apart.”
Blaze News has reached out for comment to the New York City Police Benevolent Association and the Sergeants Benevolent Association of the NYPD as well as to the mayor’s office.
Retired NYPD Chief of Department John Chell recently told Newsmax that about 4,000 police officers of every rank are eligible for retirement in January but suggested that “it remains to be seen” whether there will ultimately be a mass exodus.
In the meantime, law enforcement organizations in other jurisdictions are extending offers to disenchanted NYPD officers.
The Houston Police Officers’ Union, for instance, released a flyer earlier his month telling New York cops “disgusted with the election of Zohran Mamdani” that the Houston Police Department is hiring and offering “competitive pay with [a] 36.5% pay raise just approved over 5 years.”
The Franklin County Sheriff’s Office was one of the outfits in Florida that is similarly trying to recruit from the NYPD, reported WMBB-TV.
“With the changing of what’s going on in New York City with a new mayor and probably a different way of doing things for law enforcement up there, it seems to me like there may be people from there looking for jobs,” said Sheriff A.J. Smith. “And I have jobs. And I would love to have anybody from the NYPD or anywhere up that way that may be affected by the change to apply here.”
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is also seizing on the opportunity to recruit New York cops alienated by the incoming mayor.
ICE shared a recruitment poster to social media last month captioned, “NYPD OFFICERS: Work for a President and a Secretary who support and defend law enforcement — not defund or demonize it.”
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Trump reveals what’s at stake if Supreme Court rules against his tariffs: ‘Devastating’
The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday regarding President Donald Trump’s authority to impose reciprocal and fentanyl-related tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Given the skepticism expressed by liberal and conservative justices alike, there is cause to suspect that things may not go in the president’s favor.
Trump has since underscored in a series of posts on Truth Social that a loss for his administration in this case would prove to be a “catastrophe” for the economy and national security.
Skepticism on the high court
One day prior to the Supreme Court hearing oral arguments in the consolidated cases Trump v. V.O.S. Selections and Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, the president noted that the outcome of the case could mean “LIFE OR DEATH for our Country. With a Victory, we have tremendous, but fair, Financial and National Security. Without it, we are virtually defenseless against other Countries who have, for years, taken advantage of us.”
‘The US Supreme Court was given the wrong numbers.’
While Justice Samuel Alito appeared sympathetic to some of the government’s arguments, his conservative colleagues didn’t come across as entirely convinced.
Justice Neil Gorsuch, for instance, joined his liberal colleagues last week in trying to poke holes in U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer’s defense of Trump’s tariffs, suggesting that the danger of too liberal a reading of the IEEPA in the president’s favor risks creating “a one-way ratchet toward the gradual but continual accretion of power in the executive branch and away from the people’s elected representatives.”
RELATED: Trump’s SHOCKING 25% truck tariff: A matter of national security?
Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Chief Justice John Roberts, like some of the other justices on the high court, took issue with the absence of the word “tariffs” in the IEEPA, which empowers the president to regulate imports of “property in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest” during a declared national emergency.
“You have a claimed source in IEEPA that had never before been used to justify tariffs. No one has argued that it does until this — this particular case,” said Robert.
Roberts, whose note on the unprecedented nature of the interpretation was also raised by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, added that tariffs amount to an “imposition of taxes on Americans, and that has always been the core power of Congress.”
Concern in the White House
Trump, no doubt aware of how the oral arguments went, has emphasized in the days since what is at risk.
Hours after indicating that any money left over from his proposed $2,000 tariff dividend for American citizens “will be used to SUBSTANTIALLY PAY DOWN NATIONAL DEBT,” Trump suggested on Monday that the cost of the Supreme Court’s invalidation of his tariffs — which Barrett said would likely be “a mess” — could be far higher than previously suggested.
Trump noted in a Truth Social post on Monday, “The ‘Pay Back’ Numbers being quoted by the Radical Left Lunatics, who would love to see us lose on Tariffs because of how bad it would be for our Country, are much higher than those being stated by our Fake Opposition — Opposition mainly from Foreign Countries that would do anything to be allowed to charge us Tariffs without retribution.”
‘Possibly non-sustainable!’
“The actual Number we would have to pay back in Tariff Revenue and Investments would be in excess of $2 Trillion Dollars, and that, in itself, would be a National Security catastrophe,” added the president.
In a subsequent post, Trump wrote, “The U.S. Supreme Court was given the wrong numbers. The ‘unwind’ in the event of a negative decision on Tariffs, would be, including investments made, to be made, and return of funds, in excess of 3 Trillion Dollars.”
As all revenues from tariffs, including new and pre-existing ones, through September of this year had raised between $174 and $195 billion, Trump’s allusion to a figure over $3 trillion appears to refer to the potential tariff revenue lost over the next decade.
According to a recent Tax Foundation report, Trump’s tariffs “will raise $2.4 trillion in revenue over the next decade on a conventional basis and reduce US GDP by 0.6 percent, all before foreign retaliation.” Other estimates put potential revenue as high as $3 trillion.
The Congressional Budget Office released an estimate in August indicating that “increases in tariffs implemented during the period from January 6, 2025, to August 19 will decrease primary deficits (which exclude net outlays for interest) by $3.3 trillion if the higher tariffs persist for the 2025-2035 period.”
Trump suggested further that the loss of tariff revenue and return of funds “would truly become an insurmountable National Security Event, and devastating to the future of our Country — Possibly non-sustainable!”
U.S. trade representative Jamieson Greer told “Mornings with Maria” last week that the reciprocal tariffs at issue have netted over $100 billion but less than $200 billion and noted further that if they are invalidated, specific plaintiffs might receive a refund, but it remains unclear what will happen to the remainder.
“As for the rest of it … I’ll hand that file to the secretary of the treasury,” said Greer.
“You’ll have all these importers and importing interests who are going to want that money back, and so, you know, we’ll have to figure out — probably with the court — what kind of a schedule might look like and what the rights are of these parties and what rights the government has to that money.”
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‘Clear example of judicial activism’: Judge gives Democrats a boost with congressional map in red state
As Republicans attempt to redraw districts to gain a cushion in their razor-thin majority in Congress ahead of the midterms next year, an unexpected setback in a reliably red state raises the stakes.
A redistricting case in Utah has potentially thrown a wrench in the nationwide redistricting battle.
‘Turns out, she was orchestrating it from the start.’
The AP reported that Judge Dianna Gibson has ordered the Utah congressional districts to be redrawn in conformity with a 2018 ballot initiative known as Proposition 4, which in effect could grant Democrats a seat in the House.
Proposition 4’s map was drawn by the League of Women Voters of Utah and Mormon Women for Ethical Government, the plaintiffs of the redistricting case. That map largely keeps Salt Lake City intact in one district rather than breaking it apart, creating a reliably blue voter base that could flip one of the state’s four congressional seats to the Democrats.
Gibson rejected S.B. 200, a congressional map that was enacted by Republican lawmakers and that maintained four seats, on the grounds that it did not meet the rules against gerrymandering.
RELATED: Gov. Gavin Newsom threatens to redistrict California after Texas GOP drops new district map proposal
Photo by Matt Archer/Getty Images
Gibson’s decision was reportedly handed down just a few minutes before the clock struck midnight on Monday.
Republican Utah state Rep. Candice Pierucci called the redrawn map a “clear example of judicial activism.”
Pierucci added, “The Judge drove the entire process, set aggressive deadlines and refused an extension for map drawing by the legislature. We moved 104 lawmakers under those deadlines and she herself couldn’t be bothered to issue the decision before a quarter to midnight. We followed her direction every step of the way — turns out, she was orchestrating it from the start.”
All four Utah congressional seats are currently occupied by Republicans, and Republicans currently have a slim majority in the U.S. House, holding 219 seats to Democrats’ 213. Three seats are vacant following two deaths and one resignation.
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Maryland school district allegedly indoctrinates 7th graders about gender: ‘Girl, boy, both or neither’
A middle school lesson is reportedly promoting the idea of “gender identity” and being “assigned” sex at birth.
Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland allegedly has an assignment designed for grade-seven students that pulls directly from pro-transgender sources.
‘Embrace family diversity, create LGBTQ+ and gender inclusive schools.’
The alleged assignment, provided to Defending Education, asks students to match a list of terms with a list of possible definitions. The terms are “sex assigned at birth,” “gender identity,” “transgender,” “gender expression,” and “cisgender.”
One of the definitions allegedly given refers to a person’s “internal sense of being male, female, or transgender,” further explaining that is “how you feel. Girl, boy, both or neither.”
Another definition refers to an “individual’s presentation,” which includes appearance and clothing as they relate to how the individual communicates “aspects of gender or gender role,” according to a screenshot on Defending Education’s site.
A person’s sex is also referred to as what “doctors/midwives” assign to someone when they are born, while gender identity is “how you feel,” the alleged exercise indicated.
Four of the definitions directly cite a program from the Human Rights Campaign, an organization that promotes transgender surgery and hormone therapy for children.
The lesson references WelcomingSchools.org, which describes itself as the “most comprehensive bias-based bullying prevention program” in the United States, meant to provide “LGBTQ+ and gender inclusive professional development training, lesson plans, booklists and resources” for educators who have access to children.
“We uplift school communities with critical tools to embrace family diversity, create LGBTQ+ and gender inclusive schools, prevent bias-based bullying, and support transgender and non-binary students,” the website says.
Erika Sanzi, senior director of communications for Defending Education, told Blaze News in a statement that the apparent vocabulary lesson requires students to “buy into an ideology that many reject.”
“Does MCPS require that students subscribe to gender ideology in order to fulfill the district’s family life requirements for middle schoolers? Because if so, that seems like viewpoint discrimination in a public school,” Sanzi stated.
At the same time, MCPS recently introduced harsher penalties into its code of conduct, which include suspension and expulsion for incidents involving drug possession, for example.
At least one local activist group said the new rules were detrimental to “black and brown students.”
“When we talk about intersecting into experiences of these black and brown students, they intersect to then lead them to be out of the classrooms, which means less time with academic study,” said Dorien Rogers from Young People for Progress, a Maryland group.
As reported by WJLA-TV, Rogers was also disappointed that the code of conduct was written only in English. The school system told WJLA that the new rules would soon be available in six languages.
MCPS did not respond to multiple requests for comment from Blaze News.
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Treasury Secretary Bessent torches MSNBC over Argentina ‘bailout’ claims
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent set the record straight when MSNBC claimed that the Trump administration is providing a “bailout” to Argentina.
‘In most bailouts, you don’t make money. The US government made money.’
News broke in October that the Trump administration would implement a $20 billion currency swap with Argentina, which legacy media outlets have repeatedly described as a “bailout” for the Latin American country. Democrats criticized the plan, arguing that the administration had strayed from its America First agenda and failed to prioritize American farmers, citing trade negotiations with China that led to China temporarily suspending purchases of U.S. soybeans.
During a Friday morning interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” correspondent Jonathan Lemire asked Bessent, “How does a $20 billion bailout of Argentina help Americans?”
“Do you know what a swap line is?” Bessent replied to Lemire.
“It’s a currency swap, yes,” Lemire responded.
“Yes, but what is that?” Bessent asked.
RELATED: Trump’s ‘chainsaw’ ally wins key election in South America
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
“You’re the treasury secretary,” Lemire stated.
“Yes, but why would you call it a bailout?” Bessent questioned. “In most bailouts, you don’t make money. The U.S. government made money. We used our financial balance sheet to stabilize the government, one of our great allies in Latin America, during an election.”
He reiterated that the U.S. would make money from the arrangement, adding that he “would rather use peace through economic strength than have to be shooting at narco boats coming offshore if the [Argentinian] government collapsed.” Bessent called the situation a “generational opportunity in Latin America to create allies.”
RELATED: Trump scores win for American farmers as China commits to ‘massive’ soybean purchases
Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
“By stabilizing the economy there and making a profit, then that’s a very good deal for the American people,” Bessent continued. “There’s a lot we could have been doing for the American farmers, but Democrats closed the government.”
He clarified that the arrangement with Argentina was a $20 billion credit line and that the U.S. has already made a profit on the swap line, which involved exchanging U.S. dollars for pesos.
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Protestant pastor says polygamy is biblical: ‘He divinely ordained it’
A protestant pastor is not backing down from his claim that he can have multiple wives.
Rich Tidwell, a pastor in Canton, Missouri, has sparked an online debate about the acceptance of polygamy in Christianity and whether or not it is biblically justifiable.
‘I have two beautiful wives.’
To the expected amount of backlash, Tidwell recently made an announcement on his Instagram page that his second wife is expecting his eighth child.
“I have two beautiful wives,” Tidwell wrote in a long entry. “We’re thrilled for what the Lord has done for our family,” he added, citing Bible passage Luke 18:29.
The pastor wrote about his justifications in an article called “Plural marriage,” labeling the practice as polygyny, which refers to one man being married to multiple women.
“In 2019, I discovered the surprising fact that God not only never prohibited polygyny throughout the entire biblical narrative (as He did with polyandry or homosexuality), He divinely ordained it in several cases,” Tidwell claimed.
He then cited more passages.
RELATED: Church-hopping: Confessions of an itinerant worshipper
Exodus 21:10 regulates but does not prohibit the practice, Tidwell claimed, when it says, “If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.”
Tidwell also noted 2 Chronicles 24:2-3, which mentions that “Jehoiada took two wives for him, and he became the father of sons and daughters,” as well as 2 Samuel 12:7-8:
This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: “I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you all Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more.”
The pastor continued with more citations and said that if God explicitly gave men more than one wife at any time in history, “Then it was not and is not sin.”
For those who argued that polygyny is not the original design for mankind, Tidwell countered, “Neither is death, nor clothing, nor eating meat.”
RELATED: This crisis in churches is real. Will Christians fight back?
In an article titled “Should polygamist families be welcome at church?” Tidwell shared a letter he wrote to an Anglican church in Missouri requesting to attend its worship services; he was soundly denied.
A priest replied, saying the bishop, clergy, and parish council “unanimously decided against” the family’s participation.
“On multiple levels, polygamy is forbidden in our convictions, interpretation of Scripture, and the Canons and Constitution of the [Anglican Church of North America],” the unknown representative wrote, citing the following: “Canon II.7: Of Christian Marriage, which defines marriage as a lifelong union of one man and one woman.”
“These convictions are non-negotiable,” the letter said. “If you ever repent and become functionally and theologically monogamous, you are welcome to participate.”
Tidwell is a pastor at the nondenominational Ormond Church in Canton, Missouri, according to Protestia.
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ESPN’s empire is crumbling — and Netflix and Amazon are ‘ready to pounce’
ESPN’s reign as the king of sports media may be nearing its end.
BlazeTV contributor Paul Burkhardt is among those who believe this to be true, explaining that the network is “very vulnerable” as competitors like Netflix and Amazon prepare to make a “power play” that could permanently reshape the sports broadcasting landscape.
“I don’t think a lot of people are realizing — and I’ve been on this and been studying this now for probably about a year and a half — I believe ESPN is very vulnerable right now,” Burkhardt tells BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock and the rest of the panel on “Fearless.”
“And it’s the worst time for this to happen, because I think Netflix and Amazon are in a position to make the ultimate power play over the next, say, two to five years. They’ve already started to dabble into the games. They already have the leagues with them to some varying degree,” he continues.
“I think there’s a takedown about ready to happen, and I’m in line to watch it,” he adds.
Burkhardt believes that “Netflix and Amazon are ready to pounce.”
“I think that ESPN could be drunk on its success. ESPN has always had an overinflated sense of itself, particularly the on-air talent, because ESPN had such a monopoly on sports coverage that anybody you put on there was going to have the feeling of having a following,” Whitlock agrees.
“I don’t think Stephen A. Smith has a sincere following. I think he’s been forced down our throats on ESPN, but no one thinks Stephen A. Smith is talented. No one thinks he’s that informed or that insightful about sports,” he continues.
“It’s kind of reflective of the whole mentality of Hollywood and the leftist deal. … If they decide this person’s important; if they want to put Joe Biden in as president even though he’s half dead; if they decide, ‘Hey, no one likes Hillary Clinton, but we’re going to run her for president,’” he adds.
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Lowering the bar doesn’t lift women up
For years, Americans have been told a comforting lie: Anyone can do anything, be anything, and succeed at anything, regardless of limits or differences. But ideological fantasies collapse on the battlefield, where physics, endurance, and human limits matter more than slogans.
After years of social experimentation, the military is rediscovering a basic truth: Equality of opportunity makes the force stronger, while equality of outcome weakens it. The return to gender-neutral standards announced last month by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth marks a long-overdue step toward restoring merit, discipline, and respect across the ranks.
Pretending that men and women have identical physical capabilities doesn’t empower women; it endangers them.
For most of our history, the armed forces held one clear principle: Anyone, male or female, could serve in any position if they met the same standard. The promise was simple and fair — the uniform didn’t care about sex or gender, only performance.
That began to change in 2015, when the Army opened all-male combat units to women. At the time, the Pentagon promised no dilution of standards. But in 2018, when the new gender-neutral Army Combat Fitness Test was introduced, 84% of female soldiers failed. Instead of maintaining expectations, the Army rewrote them.
By 2022, the ACFT 4.0 came with gender-based scoring — a quiet admission that standards had become negotiable. The result: Combat units staffed with soldiers unable to meet the physical requirements of their jobs. That puts missions, morale, and lives at risk.
Worse, it undermines respect for women who do meet the standard. When the bar moves, doubt replaces trust. Hardworking female soldiers — the ones who earned their places — are forced to prove themselves twice: once in training and again in the eyes of their peers.
Diversity by design, weakness by consequence
In 2021, U.S. Special Operations Command declared that “diversity is an operational imperative.” But this new “imperative” wasn’t about the real diversity already found across the military — people from every background, race, and income level serving side by side. It was about engineering statistical parity, even in elite combat units where performance alone must decide who stays and who goes.
That mindset has consequences. Combat units can’t afford ideological experiments. The job is to close with and destroy the enemy — not to serve as laboratories for social theory. Lowering standards in the name of inclusion doesn’t just weaken readiness; it puts soldiers in unnecessary danger.
And no woman who trains to fight wants pity disguised as progress. The women who seek out elite units don’t ask for special treatment — they ask for the same chance to prove themselves by the same rules. When standards drop, those women lose too.
Strength in truth
Gender-neutral standards don’t discriminate. They recognize that men and women are different and that most people — men included — simply can’t meet the demands of combat. That’s not “oppression.” It’s just reality.
Women who pass those standards have demonstrated extraordinary strength, skill, and resolve. They deserve admiration, not suspicion. And those who don’t — along with the vast majority of men who don’t — can still serve honorably in the hundreds of vital roles that keep America’s military functioning.
RELATED: How America lost its warrior spirit when it feminized its academies
Photo by Kevin Carter
A sex-neutral standard is an act of fairness, not exclusion. It’s a recognition that excellence demands truth, not ideology — that merit, not identity, keeps soldiers alive and wins wars.
Restoring purpose
The military’s duty is national defense, not social engineering. Pretending that men and women have identical physical capabilities doesn’t empower women; it endangers them.
Reaffirming one standard for all isn’t an attack on women — it’s a defense of every soldier’s dignity. It calls each person to rise to the challenge, to serve according to one’s God-given abilities, and to be judged by results.
If we want a stronger force — and a stronger nation — we must stop confusing fairness with fantasy. Let’s demand standards worthy of the uniform, and let every soldier, male or female, earn respect the same way: by meeting them.
