Author: patriotsheart

Leftist scumbags have now turned their attention to attacking The Greatest Generation after they damaged the Lincoln Reflecting Pool because President Trump hurt their feelings.

As NBC News reported, the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C., was vandalized on Thursday with bubbly soap and graffiti containing a very nasty message to the military.

Per the outlet, the memorial fountain bubbled over with suds, and a complete loser painted the words “Clean hands Dirty $” on one of its surfaces.

The area was also splattered with red and green paint.

Per NBC, one plainclothes investigator bent over and ​measured the damage with a tape measure.

National Park Police told The Washington Post that workers later arrived to remove the graffiti, a claim confirmed by photos obtained by Reuters.

The Interior Department, which oversees the National Park Service, vowed zero tolerance and a commitment to finding the person or people responsible.

The ​vandalism that occurred is an utter disgrace and will not be tolerated, the department said in a statement obtained by NBC. “Our U.S. Park Police are on ‌the ⁠scene, and the investigation is ongoing.

“The public should know we will find the person responsible for this disgusting act.”

Trump also responded with anger, calling the act the greatest insult to the American heroes who fought and died for our country.

He added that authorities are investigating and closed with one good question: Where do these animals come from?

“Our beautiful World War II Memorial was just hit by spray-painting vandals. Trump wrote on Truth Social, “THERE CAN BE NO GREATER INSULT TO THOSE AMERICAN HEROES WHO DIED IN WORLD WAR II.”

“First the Reflecting Pool, now this. We are on their trail! Where do these animals come from???”

The news of the WW2 memorial vandalism comes weeks after left-wing thugs damaged the Lincoln Reflecting Pool.

As TGP readers know, over a dozen people were arrested or cited for their suspected role in the vandalism, but the most notable arrest was that of former Olympian David Hearn.

A DC grand jury returned an indictment of three-time Olympic canoeist David Hearn for his alleged vandalism of the reflecting pool last month. Hearn faced up to ten years in prison after a grand jury in the DC Superior Court returned the indictment.

However, as The Gateway Pundit reported, the Justice Department later dropped the charges against Hearn.

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who previously accused Hearn of “violently and forcefully” ripping up the sealant, claimed on Friday that “flawed installation by the contractor” was responsible for the damage.

The post OUTRAGEOUS! Thugs VANDALIZE DC’s Beautiful World War II Memorial with Bubbles and Graffiti Containing a Disgusting Message – Trump Responds with FIRE appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

By Wayne Allyn Root

Earlier this week, I interviewed President Donald J. Trump. My record-setting 17th interview with the President of the United States produced a Democrat meltdown and liberal media firestorm.

For the past three days (and counting) one specific idea that I pitched to President Trump during our interview has been the #1 story on every liberal political talk show in America.

My idea to secure our elections has dominated MSNOW and CNN headlines. The left is in full- blown panic mode over the reality that President Trump might adopt my idea for…

A NATIONAL SECURITY EMERGENCY FOR ELECTIONS.

Democrats should be in panic mode. Because they know what I know- Democrats can’t win elections without cheating, rigging, stealing and massive voter fraud.

By the way, if Democrats aren’t stealing elections because of the absence of Voter Photo ID…as they claim…then why are they against it? It shouldn’t change a thing.

If Democrats aren’t stealing elections because there is no proof of citizenship…as they claim…then why are they against it? If illegal aliens aren’t voting, it won’t change a thing.

If Democrats aren’t stealing elections because they use mail-in voting to interject millions of fake ballots…as they claim…then why not end mail-in voting? If you’re not cheating, it shouldn’t change a thing.

If none of this voter fraud is actually happening…and elections are safe and secure…and Democrats are for secure elections…then why would Democrats be against more security for elections?

I’ll tell you why? Because they use every one of the scams above to rig, and cheat, and steal elections, every day, in every way.

You know the old joke, “My parents died in 1992 and to my surprise they’ve been voting Democrat ever since.”

Democrats are scared to death…hysterical…in full panic mode…that if we demand Voter Photo ID…and proof of citizenship…and eliminate mail-in ballots…they will never win again.

They know it…you know it…and I know it.

25 million illegal aliens- many of them violent criminals- were imported into this country under Joe Biden (and his boss, Obama- the real President) over a four-year period for one reason…

To vote Democrat and steal elections.

I’ve reported multiple stories on my TV and radio shows about highway police pulling over cars in a speed trap and finding out 1 out of every 4 drivers is illegally in the country.

America is infested with illegals. Altogether there are at least 50 million illegal aliens in this country. Probably a lot more than that. Millions of these illegal aliens are voting. It’s easy- they are automatically registered to vote while they’re at DMV getting their driver’s licenses.

This is in fact, “foreign interference in US elections.”

And if it’s not happening…as Democrats claim…if this is all a figment of our imagination…if elections are secure…then adding voter security won’t change a thing.

Now to Exhibit A- the most shocking, disturbing and disgusting story of 2026.

I told this story to President Trump in our interview. He immediately asked me to send the story to him. Here it is…

This one tragic story encapsulates and showcases every horrible problem in America in one shot.

And it’s Exhibit A showcasing why President Trump must declare a National Security Emergency.

Melissa Ramirez, an illegal alien driver in Connecticut, mowed down a police officer and his girlfriend.

Cooper Whiteside, the police officer, is dead. His girlfriend, Brittany Islami, a mother of three young children, is also dead. The children are orphaned.

The illegal alien was speeding, while drunk and high on cannabis. She is charged with two counts of manslaughter, as well as DUI.

And wait for it…drumroll please…this drunk driving illegal alien murderer is a registered voter in Connecticut.

And she has voted REPEATEDLY.

But the tragedy, outrage, and insanity, doesn’t end there. The Connecticut Democrat judge lowered her bond from $500,000 to $300,000 because of…wait for it…“her deep ties to the community.”

There it is. Everything wrong with America in one tragic story… 

1. An illegal alien criminal who should not be in this country.
2. An illegal alien criminal who has no right to be driving on our roads, or have a driver’s license.
3. An illegal alien criminal who should not have a bank account, or the ability to get a loan to buy a car, without proof of citizenship.
4. An illegal alien criminal driving drunk and high.
5. An illegal alien criminal murdering our American born citizens.
6. An illegal alien criminal who killed a hero cop.
7. An illegal alien criminal registered to vote. I thought Democrats claim this can’t happen?
8. An illegal alien who has voted repeatedly in US elections. I thought Democrats claim this is not happening?
9. A communist insurrectionist judge who loves illegal alien criminals- and lowers bail after they murder two nice American citizens.
10. A communist insurrectionist judge who claims someone who is here illegally, and voting illegally, and has now murdered two nice Americans, has “ties to the community.”

Ties to what community? The cop killer community? The illegal alien criminal community? The Democrat voter fraud community? The communist color revolution community?

So, there’s another of my famous “America Top Ten Countdowns.”

Ten life-and-death emergency reasons why President Trump MUST declare a National Security Emergency for Elections.

If this illegal alien was registered and voting, then they’re all registered and voting.

While they murder us, rape us, rob us, kill our children with drugs, and bankrupt our country.

It’s time to take a bold step. Because Congress is bribed by China and the Drug Cartels. They’ll never do it.

It’s time for President Trump to take the ball in his hands, and declare a NATIONAL SECURITY EMERGENCY.

It’s now, or never.

Because if this isn’t a national emergency, then nothing is.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Wayne Allyn Root is a CEO, businessman, best-selling author, and national conservative TV and radio host, who has interviewed President Trump 16 times. Watch Wayne’s TV shows on Real Americas Voice TV- “America Speaks” weeknights and “America’s Top Ten Countdown” on weekends, and his daily video podcast “WAR Zone Live presented by The Gateway Pundit” daily at 4 PM ET/1 PM Pacific at TheGatewayPundit.com. His website is ROOTforAmerica.com. Read Wayne’s latest fun book, “How Illegal Immigrants Have Made America Great.” It’s 100+ blank pages. The joke is on Democrats!

The post WAYNE ROOT: Exhibit A Why President Trump Has Every Right, Reason & Obligation to Declare a “National Security Emergency for Elections.” appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

First – the wildfires; now – the droughts.

We have been reporting on how the hot summer season in Europe is causing all kinds of disturbances – and one of the most consequential is the drought of many important rivers of the continent.

The mythic ‘Blue Danube’, for example, is so low that it’s causing real problems in the energy system of both Hungary and Romania.

Today (13), it arises that Romania has been forced to completely shut down its only nuclear power station.

Romania has begun shutting down both reactors at its Cernavodă nuclear plant after months of drought and extreme heat pushed the Danube to record-low levels.

The plant normally supplies around 20% of the country’s electricity.

Follow: @europa pic.twitter.com/cpf4gwJKhh

— Europa.com (@europa) August 13, 2026

BBC reported:

“The Cernavodă plant, where two reactors produce about 20% of Romania’s electricity, is not expected to be restarted within the next 10 days.

Earlier this week, authorities tried to increase the water flow to the plant – which uses the Danube for cooling – by sinking barges loaded with rocks in the river.

Neighboring Hungary has so far avoided a shutdown of its only nuclear plant in Paks, which also uses the Danube. The waters in Europe’s second-longest river have fallen to the lowest levels for 30 years in several countries.”

Cernavodă nuclear plant shuts down indefinitely today

Reactor 2 is being gradually disconnected due to critically low Danube levels

Romania now relies on energy imports pic.twitter.com/hQxHEQt0sy

— Brave Romania (@brave_romania) August 13, 2026

Euronews reported:

“The Cernavodă plant, which usually generates a fifth of Romania’s electricity, has been shut down just once before, in 2003, due to drought.

The national nuclear energy company Nuclearelectrica had already shut down one of the plant’s two reactors last month and announced on Thursday that it needed to shut the second as well ‘due to the significant and ongoing drop in the water level of the River Danube’.

Romania had been trying to avert a complete shutdown of the plant’s two 700MW reactors. It had budgeted more than €2 million to try to divert the Danube’s flow in order to maintain cooling of the reactors, including blowing up a rock and sinking four barges filled with rocks into the river.”

Romania shuts down the Cernavodă Nuclear Power Plant due to critically low Danube levels

This is the first such shutdown in 23 years. There is no longer enough water in the river to properly cool the reactors.

The country has already begun importing electricity from Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/mN9FOhnGEd

— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) August 13, 2026

Read more:

EUROPEAN DROUGHT: Danube’s Water Level Has Gotten SO LOW that WW2 Nazi Shipwrecks and Even 1,000-Year-Old Mammoth Fossil Are Revealed in the River Bed (VIDEOS)

The post Romania Forced to Shut Down Its Only Nuclear Power Plant as the Water Levels in the Danube River Drop More appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

Nigel Farage has declared an “overwhelming” victory in the Clacton by-election after resigning his seat and asking his constituents to renew his parliamentary mandate.

The Reform UK leader triggered the election last month amid a parliamentary investigation into a £5 million gift he received before becoming an MP.

Rather than allow Westminster to determine his political fate through a standards investigation, Farage put the question directly to the voters.

“I called this by-election because I wanted the people of Clacton, the voters of this constituency to be my judge, not the mainstream media in Britain,” Farage told supporters Thursday.

“The verdict has now come in,” he continued. “It is a convincing, overwhelming win.”

BREAKING: Nigel Farage says he has won “far more” votes in the Clacton by-election than he did in 2024

“In doing so, we have beaten the candidate for the uniparty: Count Binface” pic.twitter.com/5Vgqyl8rTA

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) August 14, 2026

Farage said he had secured more votes than he received during his historic 2024 victory, when 21,225 people backed him and finally sent the Brexit leader to Parliament after seven previous attempts.

Other political parties refused to field candidates.

Despite their boycott, turnout reached a respectable 44.37 percent, higher than several recent parliamentary by-elections.

The most visible candidate to run against him was a man who calls himself “Count Binface.”

WATCH: Count Binface responds to Nigel Farage calling him the “establishment candidate”

“That’s interesting, isn’t it? Because one of the candidates was a sitting MP, formerly an MEP and the architect of Brexit… if that’s not the establishment, I’d like to know what is” pic.twitter.com/jED2JLi4mi

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) August 14, 2026

Farage portrayed the result as a humiliation for the political establishment that had spent weeks attacking his decision to force the contest.

“The voters of Clacton have stuck two fingers up to the entire political establishment,” he declared.

Farage will not attend the formal declaration after Reform said Essex Police advised him to stay away because of a “credible threat” against him.

The Reform leader said he had also been warned about an “organised campaign to disrupt and degrade the result.”

“I am damned if I am going to stand on a stage, having won a resounding victory… and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies,” he said.

WATCH: Nigel Farage says he will not attend the Clacton by-election count after advice from the police

“There is an organised campaign to disrupt and degrade the result that will take place in a few hours time” pic.twitter.com/aOG7RNISXm

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) August 14, 2026

The official declaration is expected early Friday morning.

The post Britain’s Nigel Farage WINS ‘Overwhelming’ Special Election Victory Against Man Dressed as a Bin (VIDEO) appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

It seems like every single day, Democrats dream up some new excuse to target Trump. Everything is a scandal that they then try to dial up to 11 with the help of the liberal media. It’s all so tiresome.

Enter conservative historian and scholar Victor Davis Hanson. He recently listed some of the charges that Democrats have hurled at Trump and then broke down each issue, pointing out how Democrats did the exact same thing, before Trump.

This is so typical for the Democrats. They think no one remembers anything, even if it happened recently.

This is from Hanson’s own website:

Too Cozy an Attorney General? Democratic Senators voted unanimously against Todd Blanche for attorney general, claiming that, as a former Trump attorney, he was too close to the president. Really? Even if true, the model came from the Democrats—and dates back to John F. Kennedy’s appointment of his own brother, Robert F. Kennedy, as attorney general and Obama Attorney General Eric Holder’s own boast: “I’m still the president’s wingman, so I’m there with my boy.”

Lawfare Worries? Democrats are angry that Republican state prosecutors might find grounds under state law to indict Anthony Fauci, despite his federal pardons for federal offenses. But again, who popularized that stratagem?

Ask the freelancing left-wing state, county, and municipal prosecutors Fani Willis, Letitia James, and Alvin Bragg. They set the example, even though they had to concoct nonexistent crimes to ensure that, if Jack Smith’s federal charges did not stick, their local ones might.

A Partisan IRS? Democrats claim that Trump has unduly leveraged the IRS. This charge comes from the Left that produced Lois Lerner. She subjected Republican and Tea Party-like groups to special scrutiny, delaying or denying their applications for tax-exempt status during Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign.

Remember, an IRS contractor leaked Trump’s tax returns to The New York Times, which in turn made them public during the 2020 election year.

Election Denialism? The Left claims that Trump is doing great damage to the system by questioning the integrity of the 2020 balloting, which had transmogrified from mostly in-person Election Day voting, with identification required in most states, to widespread early and mail-in balloting, without verifiable identification. But who in modern times first popularized the idea of a presidential candidate challenging election results and alleging ballot fraud?

A New York Times-affiliated audit found that, had Al Gore even won his court bid to obtain recounts in the contested counties, the disputed ballots would nonetheless have shown George W. Bush winning Florida. Thus, the Left’s months-long claim that Bush was “selected, not elected” was mere election denialism.

Everything is different, when Democrats do it.

If we had a real media, they would point these things out when they speak to Democrats on their shows.

The post Victor Davis Hanson Points to Numerous Examples of Democrats Doing EXACTLY What They Accuse Trump of Doing appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

For decades, foreign students have been able to come to the United States on a student visa and stay in the country for decades, as long as they were still enrolled in a class or two. That ends now.

Trump’s Department of Homeland Security has announced a new set of rule changes to the student visa program, first and foremost, the amount of time that a foreign student can spend here. They’re limiting it to four years, the amount of time typically needed to obtain a college degree.

The changes were made in July, but this is getting noticed now because the new policy goes into effect next month.

This system has been abused for years by people who come here and never leave. The changes are long overdue.

The DHS put out this press release:

Trump Administration Issues Final Rule to End Foreign Student Visa Abuse

Today, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the publication of a final rule that officially eliminates the “duration of status” loophole that allowed foreign students, exchange visitors, and media representatives to remain in the United States indefinitely without routine government oversight.

The new regulation establishes a fixed period of admission for nonimmigrant visa holders in F, J, and I classifications. This decisive shift restores integrity to the nation’s immigration system, combats rampant visa abuse, and strengthens national security through regular vetting. A fixed period of admission is currently in place for many other types of nonimmigrant visas.

“For nearly half a century, the outdated ‘duration of status’ system has compromised national security and created an environment ripe for immigration fraud,” said DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. “For decades, foreign students have been admitted into the U.S. indefinitely, allowing thousands to abuse our immigration system by perpetually enrolling in courses to avoid having to leave the U.S. By implementing clear, finite limits on these visas, the United States is reclaiming its ability to properly screen, vet, and monitor individuals within our borders. This final rule ensures that foreign students remain focused on their primary purpose: completing their studies and returning home.”

Since 1978, foreign students have been admitted into the U.S. for an unspecified period, enabling thousands to become “forever students” by perpetually enrolling in courses to avoid departure. The final rule ends this exploitation through several major reforms:

• Fixed Admission Caps: Nonimmigrant students (F visas) and exchange visitors (J visas) will be admitted for the length of their specific program, not to exceed a maximum period of four years.
• Mandatory Federal Extensions: Visa holders requiring additional time to complete an academic program must formally apply for an Extension of Stay (EOS) directly through U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). This transitions oversight from university staff back to federal authorities and subjects applicants to biometric vetting, background checks, and fraud screenings.
• Reduced Departure Grace Period: The time allowed for F-1 students to prepare for departure, transfer schools, or change status following graduation is reduced from 60 days to 30 days.
• Program Change Restrictions: The rule introduces strict limitations on academic changes.

This is going to have a serious, positive effect. It will definitely cut down on the number of people in the country illegally.

The post Trump DHS Announces HUGE Change to Student Visa Program That Will Stop the Practice of ‘Endless College’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

Politics

The Illusion of Law

Judges will not save our republic.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images

Law is power with lipstick. 

Contra Chief Justice John Roberts, judges are not really umpires calling balls and strikes. The rules and precedents they must interpret are too diffuse and contradictory; choosing which to prioritize or rely upon is a bit like looking out over a crowd and picking your friends. Decisions of the United States Supreme Court are better understood as corroborative. Majority, concurring, and dissenting opinions alike are the product of subjective reasoning, often telling us more about the priorities and predilections of their authors than the objective meaning of the law itself. 

Take constitutional interpretation. One school of thought, most prominently advanced by Justice Antonin Scalia, is “originalism”—that is, the notion that the text must be read and understood as the contemporary public would have read and understood it. A competing perspective endorses a “living constitution” whose meaning evolves in the manner as circumstances change. Chief Justice Earl Warren captured the essence of this view in the opinion he authored on Trop v. Dulles (1958): the Constitution, he wrote, “must draw its meaning from the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.”

Both methodologies can be defended; different people find them compelling for different reasons. Justices can switch back and forth depending on what result is desired in a particular case. Consistency is not required. As the bard says, the wish is often father to the thought.

Statutory interpretation is similarly plagued by contradictory canons: the Plain Meaning Rule v. Legislative Purpose. Judicial precedents are sometimes confined to the specific facts of the case, and sometimes applied broadly according to a decision’s rationale. Justices can and do apply both approaches to reach results they applaud.

The principle of stare decisis instructs the Justices to resist overturning precedents. But the doctrine is more a mood than a command. The Supreme Court abandons or affirms precedents as it pleases.

Practicing lawyers know judges are not bloodless, impartial umpires. This is why they “forum shop” (that is, look for favorable jurisdictions in which to plead their cases) and tailor arguments to individual judges based on the latter’s interpretive proclivities.

And the ultimate tendency is for the law to reinforce, rather than constrain, the exercise of political power. The paradigmatic case here is Trump v. United States (2024), in which the Supreme Court crowned the president with atextual or counter-textual constitutional immunity for presidential crimes. The decision imbued the occupant of the White House with vast powers, including the implied ability to launch whatever wars he sees fit, kill criminal suspects without evidence, spend or impound billions of dollars, and rule by decree.

The venerated Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes acknowledged in The Common Law that judging is not defined by Aristotelian logic:

[BLOCK] The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience. The felt necessities of the time, the prevalent moral and political theories, intuitions of public policy, avowed or unconscious, even the prejudices which judges share with their fellow-men, have had a good deal more to do than the syllogism in determining the rules by which men should be governed. [/BLOCK]

The equally legendary Justice Benjamin Cardozo expressed a similar view of judging in The Nature of the Judicial Process: “The great tides and currents which engulf the rest of men, do not turn aside in their course, and pass the judges by.”

Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes went perhaps the furthest to remove the lipstick from the law: “We are under a Constitution, but the Constitution is what the judges say it is.”

Judges, then, are not our salvation—and they never were. Our republic can only make meaningful, lasting improvements through the action of the citizenry. Americans must use their votes and their advocacy to constrain an overpowered presidency and make Congress again the first branch among equals, as the Constitution’s authors intended. 

As a final consideration, let us look at the war powers the President has been able to seemingly effortlessly usurp from Congress. Taking cures from the latter’s supine impotence, the Court has mostly refused, in the modern era, to rule on questions that implicate the balance of such powers between the executive and legislative branches. But it was not always this way.

In Little v. Barreme (1804), it ruled that President John Adams lacked legal authority to order the capture of ships sailing from French ports. Congress had authorized seizing vessels traveling to French ports, and the executive order exceeded that statutory limit. Further, the Court declared that Captain George Little could be held personally liable in damages for following an illegal presidential order.

In contrast, it is unimaginable in today’s monarchical White House that President Donald Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, or their military subordinates would be held legally accountable for murdering hundreds of suspected drug traffickers without trial in the Caribbean or eastern Pacific. The execrable “King can do no wrong” principle of the monarchies our forefathers sought to consign to the ashbin of history is, unfortunately, back in the saddle in the United States.

The post The Illusion of Law appeared first on The American Conservative.

Latin America

Expert Panel: Trump’s Latin America Policy Won’t Stop Drugs

The Quincy Institute hosted a Tuesday discussion of the Trump administration’s fight against “narco-terrorism.”

Photo by ULISES RUIZ / AFP via Getty Images

The Trump administration’s Latin America policies are too simplistic for the complicated problems facing the region, a panel of restraint-oriented foreign policy experts concluded Tuesday.

The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft gathered Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera, co-director of the Corruption, Networks, and Transnational Crime Research Center (CONTRA) at George Mason University, Isabel Pereira Arana, senior coordinator for drug policy at the Center for Law, Justice and Society (Dejusticia), and Lee Schlenker, research associate in the Quincy Institute’s Global South program, for a forum on the Trump administration’s policy toward crime and narcotics in Latin America. The panelists discussed potential issues with the United States’ decision to pursue a militarized approach to problems in the region, including the elasticity of criminal operations and the collateral damage an overreliance on coercion tends to produce.

Schlenker argued that an overly securitized strategy for confronting organized crime and drug production neglects root causes such as local poverty. In many areas of Colombia that are heavily involved in the growing of the coca plants used to produce cocaine, for example, the crop is one of the only ways local populations can make a good living. Increasing development in these rural regions can provide alternatives to coca production for their citizens and increase accessibility for the national government, which struggles to consistently control remote areas of the countryside.

Schlenker also noted that a military- and law enforcement–first approach does not address the political and financial networks that enable cartels to continue their illegal activities. 

“There are security challenges,” Schlenker said, “but they need to be paired with real efforts to actually have opportunities and alternatives and state presence and legal institutions and efforts to combat corruption and impunity and collusion with business and political executives that enable these illicit economies to thrive.

Another issue with the Trump administration’s fixation on drugs is that it neglects the diversification of organized crime into other areas of the economy, noted Correa-Cabrera. “We’re dealing with criminal networks in a complex adaptive ecosystem that are criminal, but that are not connected with drugs only,” she said. “That’s something that U.S.–Mexico cooperation is never going to deal with.” 

Correa-Cabrera argued that Trump’s demands and threats are forcing Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum to pursue a suboptimal, drug-focused strategy to appease Washington, rather than effectively attacking the most vulnerable parts of the cartel economy. Allowing countries like Mexico more independence in their counter-cartel campaigns would probably yield more success than demanding they subordinate their policies to the American “War on Drugs”-style approach.

As Pereira explained, militarizing the problem can also backfire. Given the resilience and mobility of criminal networks, cartels are often able to adapt and even expand their operations if the other underlying problems aren’t addressed. “We’re going to see numerous expressions of the balloon effect,” Pereira said. “Once a market is pressed here, it displaces over there. But it’s not just the geographic displacement…. Technology also seems to respond to pressures from interdiction and the market.” Today an acre of coca produces far more cocaine than it did 30 years ago, as growers and the manufacturing process have become more efficient to cope with fumigation and other supply-chain disruptions.

For the panelists, this adaptability helps explain why decades of drug-war policies have failed to eliminate either the supply of narcotics or the criminal organizations that profit from them. Military force may temporarily disrupt cartels and fumigate coca fields, but the underlying business just shifts elsewhere. A more effective policy, these experts argued, would combine targeted security cooperation with rural development, financial enforcement, measures to strengthen local institutions, and a broader campaign against corruption. Unless the Trump administration adopts such an approach, they warn, its efforts may merely shift the ways and places in which organized crime operates, rather than actually defeating it outright.

The post Expert Panel: Trump’s Latin America Policy Won’t Stop Drugs appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

Without a U.S. Deal, Iran May Wind up a Mideast Outcast

Tehran’s reliance on the Houthis complicates relations with Riyadh.

“Trump will not reach an agreement with us. We will put up with him until his term ends.” That recent quote was from Majid Shakeri, an advisor to Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. 

Tehran is signaling that it is not waiting for a better offer. It is waiting for January 20, 2029. While that posture is understandable, Iran may find that such a policy comes with unexpected downsides as other regional actors figure out their own relations with Iran.

Shakeri’s quote and the broader signaling by Iran are hardly surprising. They confirms what many, including The American Conservative’s senior editor Andrew Day, suspected after the launch of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran in February 2026, the assassination of the influential moderate figure Ali Larijani, who had been secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, and the body’s subsequent reshuffle: Iran’s government has grown more hardline in its orientation toward the U.S.

Larijani’s successor, Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, was recently dismissed and replaced by Mohsen Rezaei, a high-ranking veteran IRGC figure. Zolqadr was seen as close to Ghalibaf, who led the Iranian delegation in talks with Vice President J.D. Vance in Islamabad.

So, an advisor to the man who led negotiations now voices opposition to negotiations, and the man he advises has been knocked down a peg amid the rising prominence of an IRGC hardliner. That latter development was likely no accident. As reported by Amwaj Media, by removing Zolqadr, Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei may have sought to curb Ghalibaf’s influence.

Obviously, the rhetorical adjustments reflect the shifting balance of power within the Iranian system. And the reshuffle does not seem to indicate any underlying turmoil or loss of competence and institutional memory. Rezaei, like Ghalibaf, is a figure with deep military experience and political ambitions, having unsuccessfully run for the presidency as a relatively pragmatic conservative .

Beyond the personnel reshuffles, however, lies a reality that transcends domestic politics. Shakeri may not be the most influential figure within the Iranian system, but he reflects a growing consensus in Tehran: There is no point in future negotiations with the Trump administration unless Iran’s non-negotiable conditions are first satisfied: economic relief, an end to the wider regional war—including threatening statements against Iran—and withdrawal of U.S. forces from the region. Until those terms are met, Zolqadr said this weekend, the Strait of Hormuz stays effectively closed.

The logic is brutally simple. Why would Iran rescue a president who started a war—twice—during active negotiations on the nuclear standoff? From Tehran’s perspective, the United States chose conflict over diplomacy. The administration escalated, miscalculated, and now finds itself stuck. None of the United States’ war aims have been achieved. The Iranian government remains in place and much emboldened, with its highly enriched uranium still under its control, and now also with control of the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most critical energy trade chokepoint.

Iran certainly does not see itself as a defeated party, and its leadership is willing to inflict maximal costs and humiliation on Trump. Is it any wonder why, after the U.S., together with Israel, bombed the country, assassinating its political and military leaders and killing more than 1,000 civilians? Iranian leaders simply do not see it as their responsibility to provide Washington with a graceful off-ramp.

Iran’s decision to stiffen its negotiating posture, however, is not vengeance for its own sake. Tehran appears to have concluded that Washington is simply too dysfunctional to honor any agreements. The memorandum of understanding, signed with Pakistani and Qatari mediation, required the U.S. to remove sanctions and unfreeze Iranian assets. As Washington failed to fulfill these provisions, Tehran assessed that it had not acted in good faith and was using the ceasefire to replenish depleted stockpiles to relaunch the war. Tehran has come to see Washington as simply agreement-incapable—at least so long as Donald Trump occupies the White House.

So Iran will manage the process of “neither war nor peace,” as Shakeri has put it. The winning approach, in its view, is denial, ambiguity, and strategic patience—bleeding American political will while betting on a future president less mercurial than Trump.

Not everybody is convinced of the merits of this strategy. Mohammad Ali Shabani, a seasoned London-based Iran analyst, remarked that the former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s own “no war, no deal” posture led to “war followed by a terrible deal.” Shabani mocked those who now “spin more limbo as a masterful scheme to force Trump’s hand.”

And this time, Iran may find itself in an even more vulnerable position—not only because of the U.S., but also because of regional powers. As long as there is no deal with Washington, Tehran will have to rely on its proxies and allies, such as the Houthis in Yemen and Shiite militias in Iraq, to keep inflicting costs on the world economy as leverage against the Trump administration.

But that risks incurring the hostility of other states. The closure of Bab-el-Mandeb to Saudi vessels by the Houthis, for instance, antagonizes Saudi Arabia, which is looking for new allies to help bolster its security. The Mecca Joint Defense Agreement—recently signed by Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Turkey—is conceived as a hedge against multiple sources of regional instability, including Israel. But it’s also built around protecting Saudi Arabia from Houthi missile and drone threats.

Iran may find that its budding strategy of waiting out the Trump administration, rather than striking a deal, leaves it more isolated in the Middle East. Its continued reliance on the Houthis as a pressure lever against the U.S. and Israel could complicate Iranian integration with the Mecca pact nations.

As other regional players lay the groundwork for a new Middle East, Tehran should be mindful of the ways that continued enmity with the U.S. could leave it isolated from its neighbors.

The post Without a U.S. Deal, Iran May Wind up a Mideast Outcast appeared first on The American Conservative.

Rabbis on Monday urged New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to stop painting Israel as the Evil Empire because of the toll his remarks are taking on innocent New York City Jews.

The meeting between 10 Jewish leaders and the Muslim pro-Palestinian mayor came against a backdrop of rising anti-Semitism in New York City. Anti-Jewish hate crimes rose 8.5 percent through the first seven months of the year, New York Police Department officials said last week, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The rabbis collectively sought to have Mamdani tone down his rhetoric on Israel.

“There were rabbis from across the entire spectrum of our Jewish community, and yet no one gave the message to the mayor, ‘Everything is going great,’” Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, said, according to the Forward.

Jacobs said lashing out at Israel and calling for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu make life worse for everyday people.

“Everyone agreed that the current course can’t go on,” Jacobs said. “The way he vilifies Israel, and so constantly, is really causing harm.”

Jacobs said he urged Mamdani to shift his tone, according to The New York Times.

“I’m happy to work in partnership with your administration, but Mr. Mayor, you are 90 percent of what could be different here,” he said.

He recalled telling Mamdani, “If instead of vilifying Israel, you spoke constructively, in measured tones — that would move the needle more than anything else, and I’m hopeful you’ll use that power.”

“There was no tiptoeing around the elephant in the room,” Rabbi Jonathan Leener, leader of the Prospect Heights Shul, a liberal modern Orthodox synagogue in Brooklyn, added to The New York Times.

“The mayor’s comments have ramifications and he needs to be aware of how in the current climate, that just adds to the temperature and creates an environment that I think a lot of Jews feel vulnerable in,” he said.

Leener said he wants Mamdani to protect Jewish citizens and not incite hate.

“That should be his focus and not making comments unnecessarily about the conflict,” Leener said. “Or having a bit more nuance around it. That it’s not just good versus evil.”

Others said Mamdani need not change his opinions, just his tone.

“If he is going to criticize Israel or speak for Palestinian freedom, which I do regularly, then it really matters that there is complexity in his message,” Rabbi Rachel Timoner of Congregation Beth Elohim in Brooklyn said.

“We can’t vote there, we don’t have any ability to change what’s happening, yet people are profiling us and spewing hate at us because they’re angry at the Israeli government,” she added.

Some rabbis bristled that Mamdani carefully selected who attended the meeting.

Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz, of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun, a Modern Orthodox synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, said he was not invited, according to the Jewish Chronicle.

“My initial reaction is it’s classic Mamdani. He has no interest in the serious work of rebuilding his relationship with the Jewish community,” he said.

“He wants to feign interest in the Jewish community but is only ready to meet with Jews whom he picks and chooses as ideologically comfortable,” he said.

“Turns out, even they are fed up with him,” he continued, referring to news accounts that the rabbis who met with Mamdani urged him to watch his language.

This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.

The post 10 Rabbis Confront Mamdani Over His Role in Fanning Flames of Anti-Semitism appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.