News of the World

[kyonides]

US NEWS

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Hunter Biden Says He Won’t Testify Behind Closed Doors, Resisting Subpoena

Hunter Biden made clear during a press conference Wednesday that he will only testify under his own rules and will not comply with House investigators’ lawful subpoena that compelled his testimony behind closed doors at 9:30 a.m. the same day.

Hunter Biden’s failure to appear before House investigators will likely be a factor in formalizing the House impeachment inquiry vote Wednesday evening regarding President Joe Biden’s involvement in the Biden family business.
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“I’m here today to answer at a public hearing any legitimate questions Chairman Comer and the House Oversight Committee may have for me,” Hunter Biden told reporters behind the Capitol Building. “I’m here today to make sure that the House committee’s illegitimate investigations of my family did not proceed on distortions, manipulated evidence, and lies.”

“My father was not financially involved in my business, not as a practicing lawyer, not as a board member of Burisma, not my partnership with a Chinese private businessman, not my investments at home or abroad, and certainly not as an artist,” he claimed.
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If prosecuted and convicted for contempt of Congress, the punishment is up to a $100,000 fine and imprisonment.

Other News

Republicans Introduce Plan to Verify U.S. Citizenship for Mail-In Voters

Republicans on the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, led by Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL), have introduced legislation that would give states the power to verify the American citizenship of applicants registering to vote via mail.

This week, Britt and fellow Republicans introduced the “Citizen Ballot Protection Act” which would give states the ability to more accurately verify that only American citizens are being approved for voter registrations.

Britt said the legislation is necessary as several blue states, counties, and cities pass ordinances opening voting rights to foreign nationals — at least for municipal elections.

“Voting in our country is a sacred right that must solely be limited to American citizens. To allow States to uphold this principle should be simple commonsense,” Britt said.
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The legislation would amend the National Voting Rights Act to allow states to require proof of citizenship for those applicants registering to vote in state and federal elections by mail.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) as well as Sens. Deb Fischer (R-NE), Ted Cruz (R-TX), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV.), Roger Wicker (R-MS.), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS), and Bill Hagerty (R-TN) are co-sponsoring the bill.

Finally, there's a decent proposal being made at the Senate.

Internal DHS Memo: Border Walls Are Most Effective Way to Stop Illegal Immigration

The memo, conducted in June 2017 for then-Acting Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Kevin McAleenan, was obtained and reviewed by the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) following a public records request.

According to IRLI officials, the internal memo examined 25 areas at the border and ultimately recommended the construction of a border wall in every area. Further, a border wall was found to be the most cost-effective tool for DHS to deter illegal immigration.
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The memo directly contradicts President Joe Biden’s claims that border walls are a “waste of money” and “not a serious policy solution.”

“This is vindication to those who were disparaged by this administration for their support of physical barriers at the border,” IRLI Executive Director Dale Wilcox said in a statement.

While Biden canceled all border wall construction immediately after taking office in January 2021, his administration has planned to build an additional wall in Starr County, Texas, due to waves of illegal immigration in the region.
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The memo directly contradicts President Joe Biden’s claims that border walls are a “waste of money” and “not a serious policy solution.”

“This is vindication to those who were disparaged by this administration for their support of physical barriers at the border,” IRLI Executive Director Dale Wilcox said in a statement.

While Biden canceled all border wall construction immediately after taking office in January 2021, his administration has planned to build an additional wall in Starr County, Texas, due to waves of illegal immigration in the region.

LATIN AMERICAN NEWS

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Articles

Venezuela Claims It Is Giving Government Documents to People in Disputed Guyana Region

The socialist Maduro regime announced on Monday that it has begun issuing Venezuelan government documents to the inhabitants of the contested Essequibo region, which makes up most of Guyana.

Venezuela has maintained a historic dispute with Guyana over the Essequibo region since at least 1899, but Maduro escalated the feud in December with plans to annex it.

Granting Venezuelan nationality and citizenship documents to the inhabitants of Essequibo was one of the five questions “asked” on the Maduro regime’s December 3 sham referendum. Venezuelan electoral authorities claim that more than 10.5 million votes were cast in approval of Maduro’s plans to annex the Essequibo region despite extensive media footage suggesting that, in reality, the electoral event was marked by extremely low voter turnout and barren electoral centers.

Socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro claimed that the results of the sham referendum were “binding” and ordered his officials to begin a list of actions to ultimately annex Essequibo, creating a new state in the territory and granting Venezuelan citizenship to the region’s roughly 125,000 inhabitants, most of whom belong to indigenous communities.

Maduro also announced plans to award oil, gas, and mining exploration licenses to companies seeking to operate in the contested territory, which is currently part of Guyana. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has stated that it has jurisdiction over the dispute and is expected to rule on which country owns the Essequibo in the future.

Guess what?  Communists don't care about what the OCJ has to say on the matter.

Lula Gets Anti-‘Fake News’ Socialist on Supreme Court, Skewing It Even Further Left

Dino, who was nominated by radical leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, marks Lula’s second appointee to the already leftist-stacked court since the start of his third presidential term this year.

During his tenure as Brazil’s justice minister, Dino made the regulation of social media a high priority of his office, stressing in March that the Brazilian government had a “dire need” to fight what he described as “hate speech” and the circulation of so-called “fake news.”

Dino, 55, will occupy the vacancy left by former STF Minister (Justice) Rosa Weber, who retired in September prior to her 75th birthday, the compulsory retirement age of all Brazilian judges as established by Brazilian law. Weber was appointed by former Brazilian socialist President Dilma Rousseff, Lula’s protege who was impeached and removed from office in 2016 over corruption allegations.

Dino’s nomination was approved by the Brazilian Senate at the end of a ten-hour debate session with 47 votes in favor and 31 votes against. Dino, a close ally to President Lula and a senator since February, was a former member of the Communist Party of Brazil until 2021, when he joined the Brazilian Socialist Party.

Javier Milei Devalues Peso, Cuts ‘Corrupt’ Public Works – But Doubles Child Credit

Minister of Economics Luis Caputo announced ten measures that he said Milei and his team believe will help begin reducing runaway federal spending and stabilize the country. While most of the measures were cuts to federal programs – such as not renewing any state worker contracts less than a year old – Caputo announced that social programs that put money directly in the hands of the needy would increase the aid offered.
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The measure that attracted the most international attention on Tuesday was the devaluation of the Argentine dollar, bringing its exchange rate with the U.S. dollar from 366 pesos per dollar down to 800. Under the previous leftist governments, Argentina maintained a confusing system of multiple exchange rates to mask the weakness of the peso, including the inflated U.S. dollar exchange rate, the more official street value of the peso (known in Argentina as “dólar blue”), and something called the “Soy Dollar,” which the socialists introduced in December 2022 for soybean growers.

“Since 2019, Argentina’s peso currency has been kept artificially strong by strict capital controls which create a wide gap between the official exchange rate of 366 per dollar and parallel rates as high as 1,000 per dollar,” Reuters explained on Tuesday.

EUROPEAN NEWS

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2 Articles

Putin Attacks Javier Milei, Says Argentine President Jeopardizing ‘Sovereignty’

Putin insisted that “dollarization,” as the process is called, was “the sovereign decision of each country” and he was not inclined to meddle in Argentina’s economic decisions, but appeared to disapprove of the plan.

The remarks are Putin’s first negative comments about Milei since his inauguration on Sunday. Putin issued a formal, albeit distant, congratulatory statement to Milei following the Argentine presidential election on November 19, stating in part, “We hope for the further promotion of our strategic partnership with Buenos Aires in many diverse areas and for the development of constructive dialogue on current international issues.”

Milei has made clear his distaste for Putin’s authoritarian regime for years as a television commentator and has stridently opposed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, currently the most important geopolitical issue for Russia.
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Milei has also referred to the Russian regime as a “murderer” and insisted he would redirect Argentine foreign policy towards America and Israel.
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“Everyone knows the idea of the newly elected President of Argentina to switch to the dollar within the country. This is the sovereign decision of each country, but in Argentina, inflation, as far as I know, is at 143%,” Putin said, according to the Russian news agency Tass. “If today’s leadership in Argentina sees no other way out of the country’s well-known financial and economic problems, that is their prerogative.”

“But this is definitely a significant loss of sovereignty,” he concluded.

Putin discussed the concept of sovereignty in detail elsewhere in the press conference, claiming that, for Russia, “the main thing is to strengthen sovereignty.”

‘Hamas Members’ Arrested in Germany, Denmark, Netherlands Over Suspected Plot to Attack Jewish Community in Europe

Seven people have been arrested, security services including Mossad stated on Thursday afternoon, with three in Germany, three in Denmark, and one in the Netherlands taken into custody.

Media in Germany and Mossad treat the arrests as linked and as part of a plot to attack Jewish communities in Europe, while the Danish government is more circumspect, refusing to confirm or deny whether their arrests are definately linked to those in Germany. Minister of Justice Peter Hummelgaard refused to confirm or deny those arrested by Danish police were definitely linked to Hamas, speaking instead of a criminal gang and a conspiracy to attack Jewish people, reports Berlingske.

German newspaper Die Welt meanwhile reports national intelligence services believe Islamists already in Europe received orders from Hamas leaders in Lebanon to dig up an “underground cache” of weapons “the terrorist organisation had set up in the past”. According to the allegations, the would-be terrorists launched several expeditions intending to re-discover the buried weapons, intending to bring them back to Berlin ready for an operation.

It appears the weapons cache was never found, and the German police are still seeking it themselves. German authorities are reported to have said the arrested men were known longstanding Hamas members who had been under surveillance since last year, and who are thought to have participated in Hamas operations “abroad” before.
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The goal of the Hamas plot was “to kill innocent civilians on European soil… to attack Israeli, Jewish and Western targets at any price”, they said.

Deutsche Welle reports Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen spoke on the arrests from the European Council meeting in Brussels today, saying the news of the plot was “extremely serious”. She remarked: “It is of course — in relation to Israel and Gaza — completely unacceptable for someone to bring a conflict elsewhere in the world into Danish society.