Category: Breitbart
Obama judge derails probe into Letitia James
A federal judge who was appointed by former President Barack Obama issued an order on Thursday disqualifying John Sarcone as the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York.
Adding insult to injury, Judge Lorna Schofield then tossed the subpoenas Sarcone’s office issued in August to state Attorney General Letitia James regarding civil cases brought by the Empire State against President Donald Trump and the National Rifle Association.
‘It acts without lawful authority.’
Sarcone has been investigating whether James’ office violated the president’s civil rights and the rights of others.
Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Sarcone as interim U.S. attorney for NDNY on Feb. 28. His 120-day term began in earnest on March 1.
Since Sarcone was neither formally nominated by the president nor confirmed by the Senate, it was left up to a panel of judges overseeing the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York to appoint an attorney for the district at the end of Sarcone’s term, just one month after he was threatened with a knife, allegedly by an illegal alien.
RELATED: The courts are running the country — and Trump is letting it happen
Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Image
Although the panel declined to grant Sarcone a permanent appointment, Bondi designated him special attorney and first assistant U.S. attorney, effectively keeping him in charge of the office.
Schofield claimed in her ruling on Thursday that Sarcone was not lawfully serving as the acting U.S. attorney for the NDNY as his appointment supposedly “violates the [Federal Vacancies Reform Act] and the statutes governing U.S. Attorney appointments.”
“When the Executive branch of government skirts restraints put in place by Congress and then uses that power to subject political adversaries to criminal investigations, it acts without lawful authority,” wrote Schofield.
She suggested further that because Sarcone “used authority he did not lawfully possess to direct the issuance of the subpoenas, the subpoenas are quashed.”
A spokesperson from James’ office said in a statement obtained by CNN, “This decision is an important win for the rule of law, and we will continue to defend our office’s successful litigation from this administration’s political attacks.”
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How the right got Dave Chappelle wrong
For years, Dave Chappelle has been treated as a kind of honorary dissident on the right. Not because he ever pledged allegiance, but because he irritated the correct people. He mocked pronouns, needled sanctimony, and refused to bow. That was enough. In a culture addicted to easy binaries, irritation became endorsement. Chappelle was recast as the anti-woke jester, the last free man in a room full of rules.
“The Unstoppable…” puts an end to that fantasy.
The right’s long flirtation with Chappelle rested on a misunderstanding. He was never an ally. He was a contrarian whose targets briefly overlapped with conservative concerns.
As the Netflix special begins, Chappelle emerges on stage wearing a jacket emblazoned with Colin Kaepernick’s name across the back, a symbol doing more work than most monologues. It is declarative. Kaepernick, a distinctly mediocre quarterback who parlayed a declining football career into a lucrative role as a full-time political brand, has long functioned more as an abstraction than as an athlete. His protest became performative, his grievance a commodity, his kneel a credential. Before a word is spoken, the audience is told where power, sympathy, and grievance will be placed. Identity is not the backdrop. Quite the opposite. It’s the billboard.
Black and white
From there, the special settles into a familiar groove. Race becomes the organizing principle, the master key, the lens through which every topic is filtered and fixed. America is again framed as a racist hellscape, a uniquely cruel experiment, a place where whiteness looms as a near-mythical menace.
This is not observation so much as obsession. The fixation risks alienating white viewers almost immediately. Some in the audience likely sense it. Others — liberal self-flagellators by instinct — laugh along anyway, even as they become the punch line of nearly every joke.
Chappelle takes aim at Elon Musk, at Trump, at the culture of DOGE-era absurdity, but the jokes rarely travel. They circle. Musk becomes less a human eccentric and more a symbol of tech-bro whiteness run amok. Trump is reduced to a prop, wheeled on whenever the set needs a familiar villain. That might be forgivable — useful, even — if the material pushed somewhere unexpected. It doesn’t. For a comedian of Chappelle’s ability, too much of the set feels curiously unambitious.
Left hook
The most telling moment comes in Chappelle’s account of Jack Johnson. Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion, endured explicit racism. That history is real. That is not in dispute. What is striking is how Chappelle treats that history. Johnson becomes less a man of his time and more a stand-in for black people in the present, besieged by the same “demonic white man.”
And so Chappelle conflates Johnson’s struggles with with the lives of rappers T.I. and the late Nipsey Hussle — and celebrates all three heroes for opposing white America.
As BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock recently posted on X:
This comedy special exposes [Chappelle] as highly controlled opposition, the ultimate plant, a fraud. He pretends to be a fearless speaker of truth to power. It’s laughable. No one with a brain can witness the Charlie Kirk assassination and then argue/suggest that Nipsey Hussle, T.I., and Jack Johnson were/are the real rebels, the real threats to American hegemony. Dave quoted Jack Johnson as saying his life was dedicated to the pursuit of pleasure. He was a boxer with the worldview of a modern gangsta rapper.
Some kings?
And then comes Chappelle’s praise of Saudi Arabia.
Not cautiously. Not ironically. He recounts performing at a comedy festival in Riyadh, openly boasting about the size of the paycheck. He describes feeling freer speaking there than in the United States. Freer. In a society where speech is monitored, dissent is criminalized, and punishment still includes public canings and amputations.
The audience laughs on schedule, applauding with the enthusiasm of trained sea lions. I found myself wondering why.
There is something almost surreal about hearing a man who has spent years describing America as uniquely oppressive extol the virtues of a monarchy where speech is tolerated only when it is toothless. The contradiction is never addressed. It simply floats past, buoyed by bravado and bank balance.
This isn’t hypocrisy in the cheap sense. It is something more revealing — and easier to miss because Chappelle is such a gifted orator. His moral compass isn’t anchored to freedom, but to grievance. America is condemned because it fails to live up to an ideal. Saudi Arabia is praised because it pays well and demands little beyond discretion.
It would be easier if “The Unstoppable…” were simply bad. It is not. Chappelle remains a master of timing. His cadence still carries. The problem is less talent than trajectory.
RELATED: Dave Chappelle faces fierce backlash over criticism of US while performing in Saudi Arabia
Photo by Arturo Holmes/Getty Images
Punching inward
What once felt dangerous now feels dutiful. What once cut across power now reinforces a different orthodoxy. Chappelle no longer punches up or down so much as inward, tightening his world until everything is interpreted through race alone.
The right’s long flirtation with Chappelle rested on a misunderstanding. He was never an ally. He was a contrarian whose targets briefly overlapped with conservative concerns. When he mocked trans men in women’s sports, it landed during a moment of peak absurdity, when the subject was everywhere and ripe for satire. It was easy. It was funny. But it was never a statement of allegiance.
“The Unstoppable…” makes that clear. The jacket, the Johnson parable, the Saudi sermon, the relentless racial framing — all of it points in the same direction.
Comedy, at its best, unsettles everyone. It exposes what our certainties conceal. In this special, Chappelle appears more interested in confirming his own.
Unstoppable, perhaps. But no longer subversive.
How Trump’s capture of Venezuelan oil leaves America’s adversaries sputtering
The U.S. military deposed Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro on Saturday, bringing him to New York City to face drug, narco-terrorism, and weapons charges.
Days later, President Donald Trump — who last month ordered a naval blockade of sanctioned oil tankers into Venezuela and has been in talks with the vestigial Maduro regime about opening up to American oil companies — announced that “Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America” to be sold at market price for the supposed benefit of the American and Venezuelan people.
‘After years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere.’
The geopolitical implications of America’s removal of Maduro and Washington’s increasing oversight of Venezuela’s oil sector are far-reaching.
In addition to demonstrating the reluctance of certain American adversaries to support one another with anything beyond strongly worded statements, Trump’s reassertion of U.S. influence over Venezuelan energy and his removal of the leftist dictator serve to undermine the communist regimes in China and Cuba as well as to threaten Russia’s ability to finance military aggression in the medium to long term.
“The recent actions taken by the U.S. in Caracas were motivated by a desire to show greater assertiveness by the U.S. against China and Russia’s efforts in Latin America,” David Detomasi, a professor of international business at Queen’s University who has written extensively on the geopolitics of oil, suggested to Blaze News.
“Because much of Venezuela’s oil exports ended up in Chinese and/or Russian hands, gaining control over those exports was an important goal,” Detomasi added.
The Trump administration indicated in its National Security Strategy that “after years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region.”
RELATED: From Monroe to ‘Donroe’: America enforces its back yard again
Photo by XNY/Star Max/GC Images
To this end, the administration indicated it would “deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere.”
Venezuela is home to the largest proven oil reserves in the world, with an estimated 303 billion barrels as of 2024.
Despite this natural abundance, output has been nowhere close to what it could be, owing to the nationalization of oil assets under Hugo Chávez in the mid 2000s and other ruinous leftist policies that have since starved the industry of investment, expertise, and infrastructural support. Since the 1970s, when the country was producing 3.5 million barrels of oil a day, daily output has dropped to 1.1 million barrels.
While output has dropped from 7% to 1% of global oil production since the 1970s, Venezuelan oil exports have nevertheless proven valuable for nations antipathetic to the United States, China and Cuba in particular.
China
The Chinese foreign ministry condemned the recent American actions in Venezuela, stating that “such hegemonic acts of the U.S. seriously violate international law and Venezuela’s sovereignty, and threaten peace and security in Latin America and the Caribbean region.”
China, here throwing rocks from a glass house, announced in 2023 the elevation of the China-Venezuela relationship to an “all-weather strategic partnership” and indicated Beijing would back Venezuela’s “just cause against external interference.”
In addition to having its “all-weather” partnership exposed as an undefended fair-weather compact and losing a key ally in Caracas, China now faces the possibility of losing a significant source of energy.
Chinese imports of Venezuelan oil reportedly hit 470,000 barrels per day last year, accounting for around 4.5% of China’s maritime crude imports. In November, Venezuela reportedly sent as many as 746,000 barrels per day to China.
Reuters indicated that a portion of these imports goes to paying down Venezuela’s debt to China, believed to be in excess of $10 billion.
J. Michael Waller, senior analyst for strategy at the Center for Security Policy, recently noted that “depending on the figures, and factoring in Venezuelan oil shipped to China under a false flag like Malaysia, Venezuela and Iran together provide as much as 30-35% of China’s present oil imports.”
RELATED: The Venezuela crisis was never just about drugs
Photo by Manaure Quintero / AFP via Getty Images
Diana Furchtgott-Roth, an economist and the director of the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment, told Blaze News that China wants to buy all the oil it can since it already has coal and doesn’t produce much oil or natural gas.
‘China is not going to send its military to defend Venezuela, and neither is Russia.’
In addition to depriving China of a critical source of energy or at the very least regulating its flow, the economist suggested that the restoration of American influence over Venezuelan energy and the potential of Caracas ramping up oil production may also diminish a key source of China’s geopolitical power.
“If there’s more oil around, it might lose geopolitical power in terms of the demand for its wind turbines, its solar panels, and its electric batteries that go in the electric vehicles,” Furchtgott-Roth said.
As of 2024, China reportedly manufactured 92% of the world’s solar panels and 82% of wind turbines.
Andrés Martínez-Fernández, senior policy analyst for Latin America at the Heritage Foundation, told Blaze News that many of Maduro’s fellow travelers remain in power, so it is presently unclear whether Caracas will keep China cut off or resist its influence.
Martínez-Fernández suggested, however, that ultimately “extricating that Chinese influence and presence in our hemisphere” would amount to a massive victory, serving also to weaken BRICS and reveal how such anti-American alliances “collapse once they’re tested by the strength of the United States.”
“When it comes to it, China is not going to send its military to defend Venezuela, and neither is Russia, even when they have substantial interests there,” Martínez-Fernández said.
Cuba
Whereas Maduro’s ouster and the premier exercise of the “Donroe Doctrine” spell trouble for Beijing, they could prove catastrophic for the regime in Cuba.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel suggested this week that “it is urgent that the international community mobilize, organize, and coordinate in denouncing this flagrant act of state terrorism and the illegal, immoral, and criminal kidnapping of a legitimate president.”
Díaz-Canel’s sense of urgency is understandable granted that Cuba — which has suffered rolling blackouts in recent months and years — relies on Venezuela for subsidized oil.
“If oil supply were to cease entirely, the Cuban economy would grind to a halt,” Pavel Vidal, a former Cuban central bank economist who teaches at Javeriana University, told NBC News. “This would represent a devastating blow to a Cuban economy already in recession for six years and lacking the productive capacity, competitiveness and foreign currency to replace these flows.”
Bert Hoffmann, a political scientist at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies, told Euronews, “Over the last months, Venezuelan oil still made up 70% of Cuba’s total oil imports, with Mexico and Russia sharing the rest.”
‘Cuba looks like it’s ready to fall.’
In addition to Cuba’s energy dependence on Venezuela, Díaz-Canel’s regime was closely linked with Maduro’s, with Cuban intelligence and security services lending a hand in Caracas.
When asked about whether the U.S. should give other countries in the region the Venezuela treatment, Martínez-Fernández said, “By doing what we did in Venezuela, we are helping to cut off lifelines to the more dramatic and dangerous threats beyond Venezuela in our hemisphere.”
Weeks ahead of Maduro’s capture, Secretary of State Marco Rubio made clear that bringing down Cuba’s communist government is the policy of the United States.
“I think every administration would love to see a different type of situation in Cuba. Cuba is a disaster. It’s a disaster. It’s not just because they’re Marxists and because they’re terrorists,” Rubio said. “They’re incompetent. These are incompetent people, and they’ve destroyed that country.”
Trump told reporters on Sunday, “Cuba always survived because of Venezuela. Now they won’t have that money coming in.”
“Cuba looks like it’s ready to fall,” Trump said. “I don’t know if they’re going to hold out.”
Russia
Russia’s foreign ministry characterized the recent American actions in Caracas as “destructive foreign interference” and urged the Trump administration to “reconsider their position.”
While Russia, like China and Cuba, had a close strategic partnership with Maduro’s regime, it does not similarly rely on Venezuelan oil. Nevertheless, the crackdown in Caracas could nevertheless have profound consequences for Moscow.
RELATED: Tulsi Gabbard warns: Powerful foreign allies eager to pull US into war with Russia
Photo by Mikhail METZEL / POOL / AFP via Getty Images
Furchtgott-Roth recently wrote that “Russia, reliant on oil revenues to fund military operations, will suffer if expanded Venezuelan output pushes prices lower.”
Income from Russia’s oil and gas exports amounts to nearly one-third of the country’s federal revenues.
When asked about the timeline for such consequence, Furchtgott-Roth told Blaze News that the consequences could be felt in Moscow in the near future, even though it might take years for Venezuela to significantly increase oil production.
“Prices are set on the basis of expectations of future supply. So as soon as people see that the conditions are in place for Venezuelan oil to be produced in greater quantities, prices will adjust, presumably down lower than they would have been otherwise,” the economist said.
‘They might want to take similar kinds of actions in their neighboring countries.’
While Maduro’s ouster and the potential U.S.-led energy renaissance in Venezuela could profoundly impact Russia, Moscow’s response has been rather muted, amounting to little more than heated blather before the United Nations.
Neil Melvin, a political scientist at the Royal United Services Institute, told Deutsche Welle that “Russia’s support for Venezuela has been more symbolic than practical.”
Although Russia’s influence and relations in the Western Hemisphere have been impacted, Melvin suspects that Moscow does not want to offend Washington with heavy criticism at a time when the U.S. is working to bring the war in Ukraine to an end.
The relative Russian silence on America’s shake-up in Latin America might also have something to do with its own geopolitical ambitions.
Professor Detomasi told Blaze News that while the U.S. action in Caracas might give China and Russia “pause in the operations in Latin America,” they “will use the U.S. action as a justification if and when they might want to take similar kinds of actions in their neighboring countries.”
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‘DOMESTIC TERRORISM’: Footage Shows ICE Standoff With Women in SUV, Shots Fired [GRAPHIC CONTENT]
![‘DOMESTIC TERRORISM’: Footage Shows ICE Standoff With Women in SUV, Shots Fired [GRAPHIC CONTENT]](https://hannity.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-2255109935-300x200.jpg "Federal Agents Increase Immigration Enforcement In Minneapolis")
A dramatic video ripping across social media purportedly captures the moment an ICE agent opened fire on a 37-year-old woman after she tried to barrel her SUV into an officer’s path in Minneapolis, on Wednesday morning.
Nick Reiner’s high-powered attorney withdraws from case — but insists former client ‘is not guilty of murder. Print that!’
High-powered attorney Alan Jackson on Wednesday said he “had to withdraw” from the murder case focusing on his now-former client Nick Reiner, who is accused of murdering his parents — Hollywood icon Rob Reiner, 78, and Michele Singer Reiner, 70 — last month.
Jackson told reporters that “circumstances beyond our control — but more importantly beyond Nick’s control — have dictated that sadly it’s made it impossible for us to continue our representation of Nick.”
Prosecutors have said they have not yet decided if they will seek the death penalty.
Jackson added that he’s “legally and ethically prohibited from explaining all the reasons why” he withdrew from the case but noted that he and his team “remain deeply, deeply committed to Nick Reiner and his best interests.”
The attorney also told reporters that “we’re not just convinced — we know — that the legal process will reveal the true facts of the circumstances surrounding this case, Nick’s case” and that “we’ve investigated this matter top to bottom, back to front. What we’ve learned — and you can take this to the bank — is that pursuant to the laws of this state, pursuant to the law in California, Nick Reiner is not guilty of murder. Print that! Print that!”
Nick Reiner did not enter a plea when he returned to court Wednesday and is now assigned a public defender, Kimberly Green, KABC-TV reported, adding that he will return to court Feb. 23 and remains in jail on no bail.
The New York Times said Jackson withdrawing from the case “may suggest that the Reiner family — Nick has two siblings — has distanced itself from [Nick] Reiner and his legal case, at least financially.
Nick Reiner, 32 — who faces two counts of first-degree murder with the special circumstance of multiple murders — in court spoke only when the judge asked if he waives his right to a speedy trial, saying, “Yes, I agree, your honor,” KABC reported.
Reiner was ordered to remain behind bars at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in downtown Los Angeles without bail following his first court appearance on Dec. 17, when he wore shackles and a suicide prevention smock, the station said.
Reiner reportedly was removed from suicide watch ahead of his arraignment, KABC reported, adding that he could enter a not guilty plea by reason of insanity.
More from the station:
If Nick Reiner pleads not guilty next month, the case would normally head toward a preliminary hearing to determine whether there is enough evidence for him to stand trial. His mental competence for trial could also be a factor.
A decade ago, Nick Reiner publicly discussed his severe struggles with addiction and mental health after making a movie with his father, “Being Charlie,” that was very loosely based on their lives.
The Reiners were killed early in the morning of Dec. 14 and were found in the late afternoon the same day, authorities said, according to KABC.
The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner said in initial findings that the couple died from “multiple sharp force injuries” but released no other details, the station said, adding that police have said nothing about possible motives.
The counts against Reiner come with special circumstances of multiple murders and an allegation that he used a dangerous weapon, a knife, KABC said, adding that the additions could mean a more severe sentence.
Prosecutors have said they have not yet decided if they will seek the death penalty, the station added.
Blood allegedly was found in a hotel room Nick Reiner checked into hours after arguing with his famed moviemaker father at Conan O’Brien’s Christmas party, which took place Dec. 13.
Nick Reiner’s behavior alarmed guests at the party, the New York Times reported in a separate story, citing two attendees who asked not to be named in order to maintain relationships.
More from the Times:
Rob and Nick Reiner got into a shouting match at the party in West Los Angeles, said one of the attendees, who recalled Rob Reiner telling his son that his behavior was inappropriate. The attendee, who did not speak to the Reiners at the party, said that people seemed to be very aware of Nick Reiner’s history with drug abuse, which the family has discussed publicly.
Another attendee said that he did not witness the dispute, but he recognized Rob Reiner in the crowd and noticed the younger Reiner hovering at the fringes of the informal gathering. The guest said that he and other attendees were worried and that several people commented to him on Nick Reiner’s behavior, saying he looked anxious and uncomfortable in a way that deeply unsettled them.
The Reiners were upset and embarrassed about their son’s behavior at the party and expressed worries about his health, NBC News reported, citing another person.
What’s more, Nick Reiner was alleged to have interrupted a conversation involving comedian Bill Hader, NBC News added. When Hader told Nick Reiner that the conversation was private, the source told the news network that Nick Reiner appeared to pause and stare before “storming off.” Hader did not return a request for comment, NBC News also said.
Nick Reiner hours later used his credit card to check into the Pierside Santa Monica hotel around 4 a.m. Dec. 14, TMZ reported, citing sources with direct knowledge.
Eyewitnesses who saw Nick Reiner check into the hotel told TMZ he seemed “tweaked out,” but there were no visible signs that he had been in a violent confrontation, and there were no bloodstains or cuts on his body.
TMZ added that Nick Reiner’s reservation was for one day, but he never formally checked out.
When hotel staff entered Nick Reiner’s room later on the morning of Dec. 14, they found the shower “full of blood” and blood on the bed, TMZ reported, adding that the room’s window was covered by bedsheets.
TMZ said Nick Reiner was located and arrested about 20 miles away in Exposition Park, near downtown Los Angeles, around 9:15 p.m. Dec. 14; authorities were called for medical aid to the Reiner home around 3:30 p.m. Dec. 14, after which the bodies of the Reiner couple were found.
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Anna Paulina Luna refers Tim Walz and AG Keith Ellison for criminal charges: ‘May justice be swift’
Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida said she referred the Democratic governor and attorney general in Minnesota to the Department of Justice for criminal charges.
Luna said the action was the result of testimony provided before the Oversight Committee that was evidence of Democratic officials being complicit in fraud schemes in the Somali community.
‘May justice be swift. The American people are tired of being taken advantage of.’
“Based on testimony today, I have enough evidence to believe both [Gov. Tim Walz] and [Attorney General Keith Ellison] were knowingly complicit in a Somali fraud scheme in Minnesota,” she wrote on social media Wednesday.
“Therefore I have referred them BOTH to the DOJ for criminal charges,” she added. “May justice be swift. The American people are tired of being taken advantage of.”
Luna posted a video from questioning from the hearing where she asserted that Walz had known about the large-scale fraud as early as 2017 and 2018 but did little to address the scams.
She went on to say that they should be investigated for possibly violating laws against criminalized conspiracies to defraud the United States.
“Attorney General Ellison agreed on tape to fight Minnesota’s own department of human and health services in exchange for Somali political and financial support,” Luna said.
Minnesota state Rep. Kristin Robbins (R) testified that Walz had allowed the fraud to grow under his watch.
“Tim Walz and his administration have willfully turned a blind eye to crime, in the face of countless whistleblower and auditor reports, as well as stories by local investigative journalists and Bill Glahn, a fellow at Center of the American Experiment,” Robbins said. “These are actual crimes that must be punished. They are crimes against our moral values that erode trust in government. Governor Walz has known about fraud for years and failed to act.”
RELATED: Tim Walz says Minnesota is ‘at war’ with the federal government after fatal ICE shooting
Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) had previously called on Walz and Ellison to provide “documents, communications, and records” to the committee related to the fraud. They are also called to testify before the committee in February.
Walz has announced that he would not seek a third term in a re-election campaign after his current term ends. Many suspect the growing scrutiny over the fraud allegations forced him to make the decision.
“Minnesota’s Corrupt Governor will possibly leave office before his Term is up but, in any event, will not be running again because he was caught, REDHANDED, along with Ilhan Omar, and others of his Somali friends, stealing Tens of Billions of Taxpayer Dollars,” President Donald Trump responded on social media.
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