There are some naked lies so offensive that profanity is valid response.

Such is the case with Minnesota Governor and failed Vice Presidential candidate Tim Walz claiming that illegal alien pedophile rapist Tou Lue Vang shouldn’t have been deported because people shouldn’t be judged on their “worst day.”

I’m pretty sure lots of people can remember their worst days: They got in a car wreck, they got fired, they found out their wife has cancer, their dog died.

Raping a ten year old girl doesn’t qualify. “Honey, I got fired, wrecked the car, and, oh yeah, raped a ten year old girl on the way home. This day was the worst!”

Also, it wasn’t one day. Vang repeatedly raped his victim over several years. And it doesn’t seem like Vang thought it was his worst day, or he wouldn’t have kept doing it. Cue the Norm Macdonald…

Then there’s the sheer absurdity of the premise, as criminals are sentenced for a single heinous deed all the time. Should murderer Richard Speck be judged on his worst day, or do eight student nurses stabbed or strangled just count as a little “woopsie”? Charles Joseph Whitman’s Texas tower snipping spree? “Just a bad day, son, we’ll let it slide.” Julio Gonzalez killing 87 people by setting fire to the Happy Land Social Club? “Mistakes were made.”

It’s a sign of how badly social justice has morally deformed Democrats that Walz is willing to go to the mat to defend a pedophile child rapist after his evil, illegal alien rapist ass has already been deported. Bill Clinton would have deported him, then given a high minded speech about it before going off to nail another intern. Jimmy Carter would have deported him. Hell, LBJ might have just had him secretly shot and his body tossed into a ditch. Even Obama would have had him deported as the wrong kind of illegal alien. Biden wouldn’t have deported him, because Biden didn’t make policy decisions, so it would probably depend on which Obama holdover aide controlled the Autopen that day.

But all illegal aliens seem sacred to the modern, Marxist, social justice infected Democrats these days, because they’re convinced they provide a surefire path to the electoral promised land. And just as with communists in the Soviet Union, Democrats regard criminals as much more ideologically reliable allies than law-abiding citizens.

But even among Democrats, few are so tone-deaf and politically maladroit as to draw their line in the sand at deporting illegal alien child rapists. This isn’t an 80-20 issue, this is a 95-5 issue that should be used to hammer Walz and anyone foolish enough to defend his position. Every Democrat candidate in the country should be asked whether they agree with Walz that illegal alien child rapists should be shielded from deportation. ICE should be scouring criminal ranks for illegal alien child rapists to deport (honestly, they should have been doing this already). The likes of Kamala Harris and James Talarico should be asked again and again where they stand on deporting illegal alien child rapists. ICE should go to the California state capital, announce they’re deporting an illegal alien child rapist just to dare Gavin Newsom to pardon him the way Walz did with Vang.

Of all those “national conversation on [___]” Democrats claim they want to have, I’m pretty sure “Should we deport illegal alien child rapists” is the conversation they want to have least…

Mass immigration doesn’t stand alone. Instead, Western governments, including ours, have much grander plans for the end of nations.

Allan J. Feifer | July 19, 2026

One of the greater mysteries of our century may be why governments across much of Europe, North America, and even Australia adopted remarkably similar immigration policies seemingly at the same time. It is difficult to believe this happened by chance. And unlike Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand, which explains how complex order can arise without central direction, mass migration appears less like an organic historical development than a remarkably coordinated political calculus.

There are many explanations; some point to economics, others to humanitarianism. Others argue that businesses sought inexpensive labor or that politicians sought new voters. Whatever the explanation, governments across Western civilization not only permitted but actively facilitated mass immigration, even in the face of demonstrably low rates of assimilation by some groups. Government leaders have bent over backward, not only facilitating their entry but also subsidizing their living costs, looked the other way as large numbers of young male migrants, including many with criminal histories, entered and remained, and then protected them from expulsion.

This essay examines the forces that continue to promote this mass immigration despite electoral and mounting fiscal costs, and shows how these new immigrants have consistently failed to assimilate. Why do progressive governments cling to these policies like glue? Why do major media organizations so often minimize migrant crimes while emphasizing stories that reinforce preferred narratives that are harmful to a country’s citizens? Why has a common vocabulary—words such as “welcoming,” “neighbors,” and “safety”—appeared almost simultaneously across governments, advocacy groups, and media outlets?

The central question is not whether large-scale migration has been encouraged; evidence supports that conclusion. The real mystery is how so many institutions, in so many countries, arrived at the same destination nearly simultaneously.

So, how did it occur? To answer this question necessarily requires some inference and speculation.

What we can say is that over several decades, international and domestic organizations and leaders of many Western democracies have shifted away from the central importance of the individual toward a collectivist mentality. Recurring themes promoting transnationalism, nationhood, borders, and identity politics conflict with traditional bedrock constructs such as citizenship and defensible borders.

The people undertaking these discussions and actions are well-funded, disciplined, coordinated, and, if you look at how consistent the messaging and actions are across the Western world, it becomes more difficult to discount coordination by parties, known and unknown, driving us toward a unipolar, undemocratic future. Mass migration is one of the tools of this drive.

So where does this lead? I see three takeaways:

1.    There is a concerted effort to make large-scale immigration seem not only acceptable but desirable.

2.    As during COVID, we can again witness intense pressure to conform to a curated socially correct way of thinking, particularly in blue states and cities.

3.    We are witnessing an intensive effort by progressives to internationalize social, legal, and even historical events, delegitimizing European and American national identities and, especially, America’s constitutional ethos.

Mass immigration is one manifestation of a broader worldview that regards national identity, citizenship, borders, and other inherited institutions as obstacles to be reimagined rather than foundations to be preserved.

If that interpretation is correct, immigration is not the end of the story but the beginning. Once that framework takes hold, it naturally extends into other debates—affordability, antisemitism, international policy, wealth inequality, and countless other issues where traditional American assumptions are increasingly challenged.

Mass immigration is not the only social construct at play; it is simply among the most visible. If this broader project succeeds, what remains is a society progressively reorganized around a different set of political assumptions—what many would instantly recognize as collectivist.

Americans may never have been as disconnected and, arguably, as confused and at odds as they are today. The divisions are palpable, not unlike the question of slavery was before the Civil War. And it is easy to understand why. The various institutions that people follow, from the political party they support to their religious institutions, schools, and the government that leads us, are catering to polarizing constituencies, sending out mixed and utterly confusing messages that frequently make no sense!

I want to say that our institutions reflect logical, evolving priorities, but I can’t. Our institutions are not just confused concerning their underlying assumptions; no, they’re actively rejecting essential tenets, such as the centrality of our country’s founding and our Constitution. Until recently, that wasn’t up for discussion. However, today, progressives are aligning against our historic principles and, frequently, the will of the people.

Illegal mass immigration is ultimately a symptom of a larger debate over the direction of our nation, accountability, and what has allowed policies that would have been previously rejected out of hand. The confusion, uncertainty, and even anger many feel are palpable. Our country is blessed with a system that has a built-in capacity for self-correction. We don’t know today who, what, or even why America’s future is in play. God willing, we’ll figure it out and self-correct before it is too late.

Regardless, immigration cannot be understood as an isolated policy disagreement. It has become a proxy for a much larger debate over sovereignty, citizenship, democratic accountability, and what our country is to become. Until Americans address that larger argument, we’ll continue debating immigration while missing the philosophy that increasingly drives it.

God Bless America.

Indiana Fever guard Caitlin “Contusion” Clark has locked herself into a grievance spiral, constantly gaslighting her fans, the media, and the general public.

I never expected a black-and-white psychological thriller from 1944 to perfectly describe the current, exhausting state of the WNBA and Caitlin “Contusion” Clark’s antics, but here we are.

In the classic film, Gaslight, Gregory Anton systematically manipulates his wife, Paula, into believing she’s losing her mind. He secretly dims their home’s gas lights without telling her, misplaces items only to blame her for being absent-minded for losing them, isolates her, and flatly denies reality as she doubts her own sanity.

The movie shows a slow, agonizing psychological erasure where the victim is forced to choose between trusting her own eyes and believing a fabricated narrative deliberately meant to manipulate her and break her down. The story is where the oft-repeated term, gaslighting, originates.

Indiana Fever guard Caitlin “Contusion” Clark has locked herself into a parallel spiral, constantly gaslighting her fans, the media, and the general public. During this week’s game between the Golden State Valkyries and the Indiana Fever, Contusion Cait drove to the basket and strong-armed Valkyries’ star Kiah Stokes on her way up for a shot. Their legs grazed. Clark fell to the floor, got up and stumbled, then hobbled down the court before recovering to yell at the officials. Referees had called no foul. After Clark angrily shouted at them, two refs issued her warnings. This was a display that one announcer noted would have earned any other player a technical foul in every state in this country.

After the game, Contusion Cait used the press conference to gaslight the media and the audience about the play. “She hit me right in the quad. That hurts. The ref can’t miss that,” she said, “Then I have to play with a contusion on my leg the rest of the game. It’s ridiculous. You can’t miss calls like that. [The ref] said I initiated the contact. Which is fine, but you can’t knee me in the leg. Knock me over.”

The video footage reveals what really happened. It shows that Stokes did not knee Clark in the leg, nor did she knock her over. It was one of the tamest plays in a physical league that regularly sees far worse collisions send players slamming into the hardwood floor.

By insisting she was violently struck when the tape shows a routine basketball play, Clark demands that the public accept her spin over the visible evidence that directly contradicts her reframing.

Clark is keenly aware that a good portion of her fan base, as well as people who don’t watch basketball, might only be exposed to her quotes. She also knows that press outlets will run the most outlandish parts of her comments as headlines, painting her as a victim.

Clark’s habit of manufacturing victimhood has successfully riled up her fan base and prompted Republican members of Congress to step in on her behalf. The political intervention has led to uneven officiating during games and enabled her to continue to mischaracterize plays, making her Black opponents targets of racial attacks by her fan base. It has also emboldened Clark to challenge referees more forcefully on the court, knowing they are increasingly reluctant to call a technical foul on her.

So far, the league hasn’t shown it has the backbone or desire to appropriately rein in Clark, support its referees, or address the racist backlash Black players experience after Clark accuses them of being too rough on her. The league has not backed away from supporting her, and this week, despite her pattern of on-court disrespect, it doubled down, with NBA commissioner Adam Silver calling Clark an “incredible person.”

Instead, individual organizations and players have stepped up to address what the league has been slow to confront. During a recent game against the Las Vegas Aces, Clark doubled over and crumbled onto the floor after experiencing minimal contact with Aces’ star Chelsea Gray. Following that game, Gray received a racist message from a man calling her the N-word. It fell on Gray and the Aces’ organization to address the abuse in a statement, which the WNBA regurgitated in its own release hours later.

Aces’ head coach Becky Hammon took the step most fans and players have been waiting for the league to take for years. Hammon directly called out the racism, saying, “Any kind of racist, homophobic comments. We don’t need you as fans, don’t want you as fans. Just move on.”

Clark’s manufactured pain at the hands of countless Black women players follows a historic trope whereby white women falsely claim to have been physically or emotionally harmed by Black people.

Those claims traditionally move public opinion, punishment, and political power against whatever Black person is named, regardless of the evidence provided to defend them. The trope is effective because it elevates white distress over observable reality by drawing on a presumption that white women tell the truth and Black people, especially Black women, are inherently guilty, liars, and always the aggressors.

By validating Clark’s manufactured white grievances, Republican lawmakers and the league are insulating her from the reality of her declining performance and the physical fragility that has exposed her as incapable of meeting the physical baseline expected of any professional athlete playing in a contact sport like basketball.

It’s hard to imagine that Clark and the WNBA can sustain or absorb this volatile and inane trajectory for much longer. The more she spirals, the more her fan base reads that spiral as proof that the league and Black women players drove her to it.

This has set the stage for a very public, final act.

Because she feels as though she’s been given a get-out-of-jail-free card with the refs, it’s not hard to imagine a scenario where Contusion Cait’s exit comes after she shoves an official and is ejected, choosing afterward never to return to the league.

The likelier scenario, though, is that Contusion Cait erupts on the court again, inciting a physical fight, only for the other player(s) to get the better of her in front of a national audience, leading her to announce she’s leaving the league permanently because she doesn’t feel safe.

There’s another version of this ending that doesn’t need a televised incident. An announcement that the physical toll and injuries she’s sustained over the years playing basketball are taking her out of the game permanently.

This ending would give her and the league a somewhat clean exit. It’s a better alternative than having to confront the reality that haunts them: that their manufactured “face of the league” ultimately didn’t have the talent or work ethic to live up to their expectations.

However her exit arrives, the reality at the moment is that what Clark and her fan base want doesn’t fit the rules of professional basketball in any league on this planet. Not to mention, defense without contact isn’t a version of the WNBA even her most loyal fans would find entertaining to watch.

At any point, both sides could fix this. Clark could put in the work her game is missing. The league could step up and protect Black women.

History shows I shouldn’t hold my breath for either option.

So, I have another alternative for Contusion Cait and her fans to consider.

The good news is there is no need to reinvent the wheel or to try to upend the WNBA when the game she seems to want to play already exists.

Ok, ok. Hear me out. Instead of staying unhappy and creating chaos during every WNBA game while underperforming in front of a national TV audience, Clark should steer her fans away from the W and away from racially attacking Black women.

Instead, she should mobilize them and get them to Capitol Hill to ask Congressional Republicans to start a new government-funded league built around a game called HORSE, just for her.

In case you don’t know, and this description is only for ALL the fans she brought into basketball who are still new to the sport itself, HORSE is the driveway staple where one player calls a trick shot, makes it or misses it, and the other player has to match it or take a letter. The first person to spell out HORSE, loses. There are no defenders, no rebounding position, and no bodies anywhere near the shooter. It rewards shot creativity and doesn’t require any tolerance for contact.

I mean, after all, she’d excel and could TOTALLY become the GOAT of a game where the only thing standing between her and a made shot is her own aim. See how we can all win here?

Or, better yet, I think she’s earned a slightly different version of the same game. Maybe, to make it more challenging and on brand for her, let’s change the name from HORSE to DONKEY.

Newsome, Nicki ChildersI

Interesting Graphs at source

That’s because savvy investors on Wall Street now grasp what’s really going on. They fear that the root cause of Netflix’s woes portends the collapse of the dominant business strategy in tech today.

This is hugely important—and not just for investors or technocrats. All of us will be impacted by how this plays out. And I have a strong hunch that what is bad for Netflix might just be good for you and me.

That’s because Netflix’s failed strategy is audience capture. And you and I are part of the audience it wants to keep in captivity.

More on that below—but let’s start by looking at damage done to Netflix’s stock. When I warned about it in June, the price had already dropped 45%….

The Honest Broker

The Collapse at Netflix Signals the End of Audience Capture The most popular strategy in the tech world has stopped working. That’s good news for all of us. Ted Gioia Jul 17, 2026

Today’s culture briefing is free for everyone. Enjoy!

If you value analysis of this sort, consider taking out a premium subscription.

Please support The Honest Broker by taking out a premium subscription (just $6 per month). Type your email… Subscribe A few weeks ago, I warned about problems brewing at Netflix (and other streaming platforms). In just the last few days, these problems have gotten worse, much worse—and the situation has reached crisis proportions.

Even more revealing—the crisis is now spreading through the tech world like a wildfire. It’s no exaggeration to say that Netflix dragged down the entire NASDAQ today, after the release of its disappointing quarterly results.

Source That’s because savvy investors on Wall Street now grasp what’s really going on. They fear that the root cause of Netflix’s woes portends the collapse of the dominant business strategy in tech today.

This is hugely important—and not just for investors or technocrats. All of us will be impacted by how this plays out. And I have a strong hunch that what is bad for Netflix might just be good for you and me.

That’s because Netflix’s failed strategy is audience capture. And you and I are part of the audience it wants to keep in captivity.

More on that below—but let’s start by looking at damage done to Netflix’s stock. When I warned about it in June, the price had already dropped 45%.

But today, shareholders woke up to this.

Source After today’s debacle, Netflix will have wiped out the entire last two years of stock price gains.

This is usually where I take a victory lap, and point out that I warned of the danger three weeks ago. But there’s bigger story here that must be told.

The disappointing revenue report yesterday is just the tip of the iceberg. The company’s reluctance to provide viewership numbers is an even more revealing sign of how bad things really are.

Netflix once bragged regularly about its growing user base. But yesterday they refused to share updated viewership numbers until 2027!

Source Yet even without those metrics, I’ve seen evidence of a coming corporate collapse—but only if you dug into the numbers.

Last week, for example, we learned that Netflix’s audience is skipping the second season of the platform’s hottest offerings.

Source: Flowing Data That’s scary stuff for Netflix. But it gets worse. The audience is also losing interest in the platform’s brand new series.

Source The situation is so dire that even Netflix’s biggest new series of the second quarter failed to get renewed. But if the platform can’t count on its new hits, will anything save it?

Source Netflix doesn’t want to tell us about users canceling their subscriptions. But just go over to Reddit and other platforms where people say what they really think about the company. You will get an earful.

This is typical:

Funny I was talking to my wife about how Netflix has practically nothing left we want to watch and maybe it was time to move on. If this price increase goes through that would be the final straw. I suspect a lot of others are getting close to that limit….

Another frustrated customer didn’t even make a comment—just shared some numbers. But the numbers paint a dismal picture.

Source Netflix got into this mess by pursuing a simple strategy: (1) Reduce the number of new scripted series (which peaked in 2022), but (2) Raise subscription prices.

That is the “audience capture” strategy mentioned above. The idea is that the audience got captured years ago with cheap subscription prices, and now the platform can squeeze them mercilessly—offering less and charging more. Netflix has been pursuing this agenda for several years now.

Ah, but Netflix isn’t the only company building its future on audience capture. It’s getting used at almost every streaming platform. And even companies outside of the media space are practicing variants of it. You see it at Google, Meta, X, Apple, etc.

It’s shocking how many companies have learned this technique. The entire printer and toner business is now built on audience capture. The same is true of the software industry—don’t even get me started on my Microsoft Office subscription fiasco. And, of course, all those customer loyalty programs (variants on the frequent flyer gimmicks that started this craze years ago) are examples of the same stale strategy.

Even the AI world is turning into an audience capture business—both for itself and its customers. This is one of the key reasons for my frequent criticisms of AI slop. It feeds into step one of the strategy outlined above. The companies use AI to reduce the cost of content, thus boosting margins while reducing their dependence on human creators.

Audience capture has always existed, but never to this extent. When I consulted at BCG we called it a milking strategy, where you raised prices and reduced capital investment in a business—which was now your cash cow. You squeeze all the money you can from it, for as long as you can.

But back then we realized that milking only worked in the short term. Eventually you killed the cow. And the risk is the same today with “audience capture”—which is just a new name for that poor old bovine.

Sooner or later, the audience refuses to be held captive. And that’s happening now at Netflix—hence the stock sell-off.

But it’s happening elsewhere too, although few are paying attention. Look at the share price at Spotify or Disney for ther examples.

Did you know that Mark Zuckerberg’s social media empire has stopped growing? In the first quarter, Meta saw a decline in users for the first time in the company’s history.

Source: Social Media Today This is not just a coincidence. Meta is the king of audience capture, and when it starts losing that audience, other tech companies ought to pay attention.

You should expect to see more problems of this sort at audience capture corporations. And that’s bad news for the technocracy, because this manipulative strategy is everywhere. If it stops producing results, they will need to take drastic steps.

But their nightmare is our blessing. That’s because the end of audience capture means tech companies will need to return to serving customers, not holding them in bondage.

They aren’t ready to take that step—not now, at least. Pleasing customers is hard work. Milking cows is a simpler business. But they won’t have a choice. The cattle are finally resisting. They might even stampede!

Moo, moo, moo!

Sometimes even cattle fights back (Source: Paul J. Everett) I give the leading audience capture companies 12-18 months at most before the worst consequences of their overreach hit their financial statements. And it may happen even faster.

If they were wise, they would start acting now. But whether they fix the root cause of their audience capture mess now or later, the end result will be the same. That captive audience will find itself liberated.

If I’m right, this may represent the biggest shift in the consumer economy of our time. So check back here for updates—because this will be a bumpy rodeo ride for all parties.

The Honest Broker

Karl Marx’s economics, and it concedes valuable ideological ground to the left every time it’s repeated. It’s a line some conservatives still reach for, almost reflexively. It’s time that changed, because even the claim that communism works in theory is plainly false.

In a speech Thursday announcing a global crackdown on left-wing terrorism, Secretary of State Marco Rubio made exactly that argument: communism does not even work in theory. Socialism and communism, by their very nature, require the centralization of power, the destruction of the individual, and the abolition of private property, the very institution that has been instrumental to the development of the West and the greatest nations on Earth. Even as an abstraction, communism is the antithesis of nearly everything Americans have historically believed in.

“One of the criticisms you sometimes hear of communism, for example, is that it sounds good in theory, but it never works in practice. That’s actually not true,” the secretary of state said. “Communism does not sound good in theory. The world it envisions for all of us is small, flat, grey, leveled of all exception, drained of all that is good and noble in the human soul. The world it envisions is a world without courage, a world without creativity or ambition, a world without heroes or glory or great causes to strive towards, a world without miracles, without myths, without men who rise above the rest to do incredible and extraordinary things. And the world communism envisions is a world without God.”

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued a final rule overturning a 2022 regulation from former President Joe Biden’s administration to allow immigration officers to consider an applicant’s use of welfare programs to determine if they qualify for permanent legal citizenship.

In a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) news release on Thursday, the DHS held that the decision will better align immigration law with “Congressional intent that aliens in the United States be self-reliant and not dependent on taxpayer-funded government benefits.”

Furthermore, under the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), a person applying for a visa, admission, or adjustment of status is ineligible “because of the likelihood of becoming a public charge.”

“With this final rule, USCIS officers are empowered to assess all pertinent facts on a case-by-case basis for each applicant,” the DHS stated.

“The Trump administration is upholding the rule of law and protecting American taxpayers from subsidizing aliens who may become dependent on public benefits. USCIS is committed to safeguarding the safety, security, and financial well-being of Americans,” said USCIS spokesperson Zach Kahler.

The rule will be effective on September 18th. A revised version of Form I-485, used to apply for permanent residence or adjust one’s status, will be released. The new version of the form will be required after the effective date.

The new policy could impact hundreds of thousands of migrants seeking green cards every year from inside the U.S., as well as deter migrant households from applying for taxpayer-funded social programs, such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

The rescission of the Biden-era policy also reverts some leeway back to federal immigration officers that they held during President Donald Trump’s first term, according to CBS News.

When effective, the new rule also allows reviewers to examine an applicant’s age, health, family situation, assets, finances, education and skills.

“This final rule is intended to help ensure that those seeking permanent residence are able to support themselves and are not likely to become primarily dependent on public assistance,” USCIS said in a statement on X Thursday.

This final rule is intended to help ensure that those seeking permanent residence are able to support themselves and are not likely to become primarily dependent on public assistance.

USCIS is committed to applying the law as enacted by Congress, providing clear guidance.

Katherine Mosack

Hundreds of California college programs are facing renewed scrutiny after federal data revealed that many graduates earn less than those with only a high school diploma, placing these schools at risk of losing federal student loan access unless their outcomes improve.

A new federal requirement that took effect this month requires colleges, universities and certificate programs to prove graduates earn at least as much as the median worker in their state with only a high school diploma.

In California, that benchmark is about $18 an hour, or roughly $36,000 a year.

An analysis by Michael Itzkowitz — president of the HEA Group — found about 90% of nearly 3,000 California higher education programs met that standard.

Yet about 300 programs missed the mark, with many concentrated in fields such as cosmetology, medical assisting, theater, and fine arts.

If these programs continue to fall short of the earnings benchmark, students could lose access to federal loans as early as July 1, 2028. Schools, however, still have at least two years to boost graduate earnings.

Many of the underperforming programs are run by for-profit colleges, institutions that have already been under the microscope for years over concerns of student outcomes and high tuition costs.

Public institutions also made the list, with theater and fine arts programs at eight California State University campuses and three University of California campuses coming under fire.

Over 30 California programs in fine arts, music, theater, film, and photography failed to pass the new earnings test.

By comparison, about 100 similar programs cleared the federal bar, such as UC Berkeley’s film program and fine arts programs at San Diego City College and the University of Southern California, where graduates reported earning over $70,000 four years after graduation.

New York Post

Newly minted Sen. Darline Graham (R-S.C.) is considering running for her late brother’s old seat in the South Carolina special election, according to one person granted anonymity to discuss private conversations.

Graham was sworn in earlier this week to replace Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who died on Saturday. Her appointment, backed by President Donald Trump, was widely seen as a move to fill the seat with a caretaker who would leave Washington at the end of the term in January.

Graham’s interest in running for the seat was first reported by Semafor.

The filing window for candidates in the August 11 primary opens Tuesday. The field of candidates could include Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette; Reps. Russell Fry, Nancy Mace and Ralph Norman; businessman Mark Lynch; and former Gov. Mark Sanford, among others.

On Wednesday, Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) hinted that Graham could join their ranks. “Darline has so far been off to a remarkable start,” Scott, who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told CBS News. “Why not her?”

A spokesperson for Graham did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The news of her interest in running for a full term came as a surprise to some prominent South Carolina Republicans. “My understanding is that she told Governor [Henry] McMaster that she would accept the appointment to fill the rest of the term, not to be a candidate for it,” said South Carolina Republican Party Chair Drew McKissick.

Cameron Arcand 

At long last, the wait is over — President Joe Biden has written a memoir about his time in the White House. The book, titled Promise Me, America, will be released this fall following the November midterm elections, but that wasn’t the only title that was pitched.

Here is an exclusive list of potential titles that were rejected:

1. If You Don’t Read This, You Ain’t Black: Close, but the marketing team wanted to cast a wider net.

2. My Time As, You Know, The Thing: All the trademark clarity of his presidency in one phrase.

3. Two Scoops of Mint Chocolate Chip, Waffle Cone, Please: Always ice cream with this guy.

4. Look, Fat: This option was ultimately discarded to avoid body shaming any potential readers.

5. The Last of the Dog-Faced Pony Soldiers: A tantalizing tease of the treasures found in the book.

6. My Life as a Chinese Asset: A little too raw and real-world.

7. Tales from a Truck Driving Lifeguard: This title was tossed after the fictional portion of the book was removed.

8. How We Finally Beat Medicare: An inspiring rallying cry everyone still hasn’t figured out.

9. If I Did It: His “hypothetical” confession to killing America, right there in black and white.

10. Truinnernationalundrepressure: Surprisingly, this is more legible than the rest of the memoir.

The Babylon Bee

President Donald Trump’s explosive allegations against China Thursday night are already reverberating far beyond domestic politics.

Speaking from the White House on Thursday, Trump accused China of “the largest compromise of election data in history,” alleging Beijing illicitly obtained information from roughly 220 million American voter files during the 2020 election cycle. The Chinese Communist Party quickly denied the charges, while China-watchers in the United States questioned if the relationship between Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping has been shattered.

“China has all along adhered to the principle of non-interference in others’ internal affairs,” Chinese Embassy spokesman Liu Chang said in a statement. “The U.S. election is an internal matter of the U.S. Its outcome is determined by the votes of the American people. China has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the U.S.”

The spat could have implications for a reportedly sought-after summit between Trump and Xi later this year.

Among longtime China observers, Trump’s accusations immediately prompted questions about whether the administration’s broader China strategy can withstand the allegations. Bill Bishop, publisher of the influential Sinocism newsletter, questioned how the allegations could be reconciled with Trump’s stated interest in maintaining a working relationship with Xi.

“So how can he still be friends with Xi after what he says the PRC [People’s Republic of China] just did in stealing 220m voter files?” Bishop wrote on X. “If any of these allegations are true how can this not be a rupture?”

China hawk Gordon Chang, author of “Plan Red” and “China Is Going To War”, argued that Beijing’s leadership would be deeply unsettled by Trump’s decision to publicly release the intelligence. “China’s leaders are almost certainly in a panic right about now,” Chang wrote. “Bravo, President Trump, for revealing China’s massive interference in our elections and in our society.”

“Trump just showed China who’s boss.”

Not everyone accepted Trump’s characterization of the newly released intelligence. Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, dismissed the allegations, arguing that publicly available voter registration data has long been accessible to foreign governments and private organizations alike. “The idea that somehow these countries are gathering voter files — these are publicly available. You don’t have to hack into them. You can buy them,” Warner said to CBS News.

Trump’s allegations also go further than previously declassified intelligence assessments produced during his first administration.

A January 2021 intelligence community assessment concluded that China “probably continued longstanding efforts to gather information on U.S. voters and public opinion” in order to better predict election outcomes and inform Beijing’s policy toward whichever administration ultimately took office. Another assessment, partially declassified in 2022, similarly found that Chinese intelligence officials analyzed voter registration data from multiple states during the 2020 election cycle.

Neither assessment concluded that China attempted to alter vote totals or directly manipulate election infrastructure.

Just one day before Trump’s announcement, a Pew Research Center survey found that China is now viewed more favorably than the United States in 25 of the 36 countries surveyed — the first time in the organization’s two decades of polling that Beijing has surpassed Washington in a majority of participating nations. That shift, researchers argued, reflects both China’s expanding diplomatic and economic influence abroad and declining international perceptions of the United States.

The Daily Wires ^ | July 17, 2026 | Drew Berkemeyer