President Donald Trump on Thursday signed a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security, ending a record 76-day shutdown.

Agencies within the department that do not deal with immigration enforcement are now funded, including the Coast Guard, Transportation Security Administration, Secret Service, Federal Emergency Management Agency, and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

Congress has until June 1 to meet Trump’s deadline to pass a separate bill funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection through the process of reconciliation. Reconciliation packages can pass the Senate with a simple majority vote, meaning Republicans won’t need Democrat votes to fund immigration enforcement.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement was already funded through 2029 due to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

“DHS is back open, ICE and CBP will be funded through reconciliation (with NO Democrat votes) so liberals can’t play games with federal law enforcement funding,” Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin wrote on X. “

To be clear, this Democrat shutdown NEVER should have happened,” he continued. “To our great, patriotic employees who have continued to protect the homeland every single day without a guaranteed paycheck—thank you. President Trump and I are very grateful to be in the fight with you to Make America Safe Again.”

After two Immigration and Customs Enforcement protesters were shot and killed by federal agents in Minnesota in January, Democrats made clear they would not fund the agency without major reforms to immigration enforcement.

The White House and Democrats held negotiations to find a compromise, but the White House rejected multiple offers that it said put undue burdens on immigration agents.

Most people live for the weekend. Whether a student waiting for that last Friday bell to ring or a businessman finishing up his last meeting of the week, human beings desire to be freed from work. The most extreme form of this might be the way that many people long for retirement, a time when, supposedly, all work will be behind a person. 

From the Christian perspective, though, work is good for the human person. Jesus Christ Himself learned how to work at the knees of his earthly father, St. Joseph, and on May 1, the Catholic Church reminds all Christians of this reality.

May 1 is the feast day of St. Joseph the Worker in the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of St. Joseph the Worker in 1955, in part as a response to communist celebrations of “International Workers’ Day.”

In the Scriptures, we learn that Joseph was a carpenter when Jesus returns to his hometown of Nazareth and the people reject him. They ask: “Is he not the carpenter’s son?” (Matthew 13:55). The Greek word translated as carpenter is tekton, which means “craftsman, artisan, or builder.”

Joseph was a hard worker. He knew what it was like to be entrenched in manual labor each day. Jesus would have grown up with Joseph at the workshop, learning from his foster father.

The fact that the Church designates a day to honor St. Joseph and the importance of work highlights the need for humanity to reflect on how work can sanctify us.

Work first appears in the Bible during the creation stories in Genesis. We are told that God “took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it” (Genesis 2:15). Human beings were made to be in contact with and work with creation. In this way we find fulfillment as the pinnacle of creation.

Then the animals were created and God “brought them to the man to see what he would call them; whatever the man called each living creature was then its name” (Genesis 2:19). This task shows man’s dominion over creation, but it also demonstrates that work is itself a participation in God’s creation.

Work was not given to be a burden but a gift. Work allows us to create and become like God, who is the Creator.

After the fall in the Garden of Eden, man’s work became arduous. However, that did not change the underlying fact that work is itself good—no more than pains in childbirth make children anything other than a gift. In fact, work’s unpleasantness and the pain of childbirth are part of the remedy of sin. They help the human person to learn sacrificial love. Work is redemptive; it teaches us to be selfless, rather than selfish.

In 1961, Pope John XXIII explained that work is a specifically human activity which is both necessary and personal. In his encyclical “Mater et Magistra” (On Christianity and Social Progress), he taught that man needs to work in order to provide for the necessities of life, such as food, water, shelter, and clothing.

Joseph was a witness to this. He worked long hours to provide for Mary and Jesus. Jesus saw the strength and commitment of his earthly father, who was willing to endure his labor out of love for his family.

All men and women today who work to provide for their families do the same. Our work, when approached properly, is an avenue for us to sacrifice and show our love for our families. In the contemporary world, such work usually also requires us to sacrifice time away from our families in order to provide for them. Our work takes us away from them, but in that separation we can learn to love them more.

Work is also personal. It is only possible because of the distinctive human faculties of intellect and will.

Work binds people together. Many form their strongest relationships at the workplace. This is due to the fact that work is interpersonal. The many images of Jesus and Joseph together in the workshop testify to this reality.

When Jesus was crucified with hammers, nails, and wood, he must have recalled all the hours spent with Joseph as a boy in Nazareth in the workshop. The time they spent together bound them together in love.

We, too, can be strengthened by our colleagues to persevere through tough times. We can lift each other up when there are challenges in the workplace because we know that we do not go through anything alone.

In these ways, we can see that work is good for us. The challenge is to not let work define us. Many people live to work instead of working so that they may live. Work can consume us. It can drain us physically, emotionally, and intellectually.

Despite the temptation to make work our god, and despite the many challenges that come with working in the 21st century, let us learn from the witness of St. Joseph that work is necessary and personal. Work teaches us to love sacrificially, and it binds us together as a part of the human family.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

New York City’s democratic socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani has already run out of other people’s money, and he’s only been in office for four months.

Color me shocked.

Mamdani announced in a press conference Wednesday that New York City faces a financial “crisis of historic magnitude” and asked the City Council for extended time to submit his budget. What a surprise that the young mayor is late to turn in his first big homework assignment.

Mamdani is correct that he faces a huge problem, though. The city’s budget deficit over the next few years is projected to rise to about $12 billion.

To put that number into perspective, New York City’s deficit is bigger than the entire budget of about a dozen states.

Mamdani blamed this financial calamity on his predecessor, Mayor Eric Adams, of course.

You can be sure that New York Democrats will return to the “blame Adams” well for some time given that they practically threw him out of the party for opposing President Joe Biden’s open border policies.

Adams does deserve some of the blame. So, does the entire New York City political apparatus—which is notably bereft of Republicans. But this reality is hardly an endorsement of Mamdani’s platform, at least for those not totally bought into the socialist flim-flam sauce he’s selling.

Mamdani never said he’d reduce his predecessor’s spending, far from it. Instead, his entire campaign was built on giving new, “free” things away. Free childcare, free buses, and government-run grocery stores were all at the top of Mamdani’s agenda. All that free stuff doesn’t come cheap.

Mamdani’s excuse for why he can’t afford to fund all these programs is that the city doesn’t collect enough money. Keep in mind, the New York City budget is larger than that of nearly every state in the union, despite having a much lower population than many.

That’s still not enough to fund Mamdani’s grandiose proposals.

“Years of mismanagement and chronic under budgeting, alongside a structural imbalance between what New York City sends to the state and what we receive in return, have taken a toll,” he said, insisting that the problem was one of “revenue.”

In a sense this was all part of the plan. Mamdani spent his first months messaging about how he was frantically searching for money to give to you, the people. Finding nothing, he’ll now seek to do more of what he spoke about gleefully on Tax Day: tax the rich. Or at least say he’s taxing the rich while actually squeezing money out of everyone.

He’s also clearly angling to get a bailout from New York State.

New York City is nearly tapped out, but surely there are more people to soak elsewhere. Unfortunately, the state is running on fumes. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has been reduced to begging rich former New Yorkers living in Florida to please come back to pay for all the fraud, er, I mean wonderful government programs.

This has created an interesting dynamic where Hochul is forced to play a push and pull game over money with a mayor who is quite popular with the Democratic base.

But even in a scenario in which Mamdani gets some kind of bailout from Albany, the future of what was once the financial capital of the U.S. is looking murky.

Mamdani is refusing to take his foot off the spending gas. His further plans put even the previous high revenue in jeopardy. And people are leaving. The “rich” certainly have been, but recent trends show that pretty much every demographic has been fleeing the state as of late (besides the hordes of Biden’s immigrant “asylum” seekers).

The Citizens Budget Commission, a nonprofit think tank, did a study on New York City and found that after the post-COVID-19 influx of immigrants the Big Apple continued its trend of population decline.

This reality is even more dire when one considers that the people leaving typically have more taxable wealth than those arriving.

“Net domestic outmigration not only affects population, but also the taxable income that stays in New York,” the Citizens Budget Commission study read. “Not all income earned by NYC residents moves when they move, but some does. Furthermore, per capita income indicates that in-movers typically earn less than out-movers.  Between 2019 and 2023, New Yorkers who moved out made $68 billion more than those who moved to New York City. This includes a shift of $14 billion to Florida, $2 billion to Texas, and $23 billion to other parts of New York State.”

That leaves Mamdani and his fellow Democrats trapped in an ongoing turf war over who they are allowed to pillage.

As New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino—one of the few Republican officials left in the city—said in an interview with talk show host Glenn Beck, Mamdani’s ideas to get more money are “insane.”

The reality for Mamdani and his friends in the city council is that their larger budget problem can’t be solved with a short- or long-term bailout or tax gimmicks to milk every last dollar out of businesses that may not be around much longer.

The problem is baked into their governing model that’s long on promises, short on examples of success. The New Era of socialism is already looking so much like the old ones. Oh well, you get what you vote for.

Senior Democrat senators told The Daily Signal that voter citizenship and identification legislation backed by President Donald Trump—the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act—has stalled amid unified Democrat opposition.

“I haven’t heard officially that it is dead, but it shows no signs of life,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D‑Conn., told The Daily Signal.

Democrats have repeatedly likened the measure to “Jim Crow 2.0” and argued it would disenfranchise voters.

Asked whether Trump and hard‑line conservatives could revive the bill ahead of the midterms, Blumenthal predicted it would remain dormant. “It seems to be lacking any kind of momentum,” he said.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D‑Va., said Democrats must stay vigilant despite the bill’s failure to advance.

“Even if it hasn’t passed, there are members here and the president who still really want to do it,” Kaine told The Daily Signal, adding that an attempt could still be made to pass the measure by unanimous consent on the Senate floor.

Kaine also declined to speculate on whether Senate Republican Leader John Thune would pursue changes to chamber rules, such as abolishing the filibuster, but signaled confidence that Thune would not.

Republicans on Capitol Hill have previously categorized Thune’s previous efforts to allegedly bring the bill to a vote as theatrics.

Sen. Ben Ray Luján, D‑N.M., echoed Kaine’s assessment, saying the legislation appears driven more by only some members who want to push politics.

“I don’t know if President Trump has given up on passing the SAVE America Act. We’ll see what happens legislatively between now and the midterms,” Luján said. “This feels like it’s more about the midterms than anything else.”

Luján added that he and other senators have highlighted concerns about the bill’s impact nationwide. “I was one of the colleagues on the floor who shed light on how this would hurt all states, not just some,” he said.

Republican House lawmakers have said Thune has urged colleagues to avoid publicly discussing abolishing the filibuster. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R‑Fla., also wrote on social media that Thune told lawmakers there would be “no SAVE America Act.”

When asked by The Daily Signal to respond to the claims directed at him by his congressional colleagues, Thune said he “will look for a window” to bring the bill to the floor for a vote.

Thune’s remarks comes after Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., introduced an amendment to incorporate the SAVE America Act last week. The amendment failed.

“I assume we’re gonna have more votes on it,” Thune told The Daily Signal. “We had one last week, as you know, on the budget resolution, the Kennedy amendment, that didn’t succeed. But we’ll look for windows, yeah, I mean, there’s another opportunity.”

The federal indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, which accuses the SPLC of wire fraud and bank fraud for funding members of the very white supremacist groups it claims to dismantle, has led some financial institutions to block grants to the group.

After Fidelity Investments and Vanguard Financial announced they would stop issuing grants to the SPLC due to the indictment, The Daily Signal reached out to 15 companies on the Fortune 1000 whose (in some cases independent) foundations sent the SPLC more than $10,000 since 2020.

Two of these companies have followed Fidelity’s lead in stating that the SPLC will not be eligible to receive grants through donor-advised funds due to the federal indictment.

“Corporate donations to the Southern Poverty Law Center underscore the need for companies to ensure they are not inadvertently supporting extremism,” Dustin DeVito, director of research at 1792 Exchange, told The Daily Signal in a statement Friday.

“Companies that outsource charitable giving programs to providers like Benevity should also verify that those platforms are not relying on defamatory SPLC smears to exclude eligible charities,” he added.

SPLC Scandals

Last week, a federal grand jury indicted the SPLC on wire fraud, bank fraud, and conspiracy charges for sending money to members of the very white supremacist groups the center claims it exists to dismantle. The SPLC did not deny funding members of the Ku Klux Klan and the Aryan Nations, but insisted the funds were part of an informant program that it used to prevent violent attacks.

The indictment, however, suggests that the SPLC didn’t just pay these field agents—it actually supervised “racist postings” for an organizer of the 2017 Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally.

The claim that the SPLC might be propping up hate in order to raise money aligns with long-term criticism of the group. Critics have long said the SPLC puts mainstream conservative and Christian groups on a “hate map” with chapters of the Ku Klux Klan in order to exaggerate the threat of “hate” and raise money by presenting itself as the key opponent of “hate.” The group has even put groups of medical professionals on the “hate map” for disagreeing with the SPLC’s outspoken support for transgender medical interventions.

Major Companies Funding SPLC

At least 15 major companies have given the SPLC at least $10,000 since 2020, according to an analysis from 1792 Exchange confirmed by The Daily Signal’s own research. Of these, only Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Thrivent Financial, and T. Rowe Price Charitable responded to The Daily Signal’s request for comment by publication time.

1. Gilead Sciences: $750,000

The foundation of the biopharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences gave the SPLC $500,000 in 2022 “to promote student health & wellbeing by advancing education equity,” and another $250,000 in 2023 for the same purpose.

2. Raymond James Charitable: $689,079

Raymond James Charitable, the donor-advised fund associated with the investment bank Raymond James Financial, gave the SPLC $78,505 in the year ending March 2021, $96,360 in the year ending March 2023, $105,375 the following year, and $408,839 the year after.

3. BNY Charitable: $428,500

BNY, formerly the Bank of New York, gave $428,500 to the SPLC since 2020.

The BNY Mellon Charitable Gift Fund gave the SPLC: $115,000 in 2020, $174,000 in 2021, $35,000 in 2022, $51,250 in 2023, and $53,250 in 2024.

4. PayPal: $310,435

PayPal Charitable Giving Fund gave the SPLC: $158,936 in 2020, $68,166 in 2021, $44,007 in 2022, and $39,326 in 2023.

5. T. Rowe Price Charitable: $235,425

The nonprofit set up by investment management firm T. Rowe Price directed donor-advised funds to the SPLC: $7,150 in the year ending March 2021, $45,650 the following year, $51,225 the next year, $50,500 ahead of March 2024, and $80,900 in the most recent available filing.

“T. Rowe Price Charitable is aware of the federal indictment involving the SPLC,” the company told The Daily Signal in a statement Friday. “We are closely monitoring the legal process and will continue to observe the situation, taking action as necessary to ensure compliance with applicable regulatory and oversight standards.”

6. Allstate: $125,000

The foundation for the insurance company Allstate gave the SPLC: $100,000 in 2023 for “defending and expanding the rights of low-income black and brown workers in the Deep South,” and $25,000 in 2024 for a “racial equity go grant.”

7. TIAA: $101,575

The foundation for the Fortune 500 financial services company TIAA gave the SPLC: $78,745 in 2020, and $22,830 for the year ending in May 2021. The foundation closed in 2021, transferring the accounts to Renaissance Charitable Foundation.

8. Goldman Sachs: $90,500

The Goldman Sachs Charitable Gift Fund gave the SPLC: $47,000 in the year ending June 2020, $10,000 in the following year, $13,000 the year after, $10,000 the next year, and $10,500 ahead of June 2024.

“We would not allow donations from our donor advised funds to be directed to an organization under federal criminal indictment,” Tony Fratto, global head of communications for Goldman Sachs, told The Daily Signal in a statement Wednesday.

9. Thrivent Financial: $52,237

The Fortune 500 nonprofit financial services company Thrivent Financial for Lutherans gave the SPLC: $6,239 in 2020, $10,424 in 2021, $12,150 in 2022, $10,336 in 2023, and $13,088 in 2024.

“Thrivent’s generosity programs help clients direct charitable donations to more than 60,000 eligible nonprofits,” Justin Herndon, the nonprofit’s director of public relations, told The Daily Signal in a statement Thursday.

“While client-directed gifts to the SPLC were previously allowed, we recently reviewed the organization against our program criteria and suspended them from our list of eligible organizations pending further review,” he announced.

10. JPMorgan Chase: $46,373

The JPMorgan Chase Foundation gave the SPLC: $14,519 in 2020, $10,846 in 2021, $7,534 in 2022, $7,405 in 2023, and $6,069 in 2024.

Of note: JPMorgan Chase also contributed $500,000 to the SPLC after the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville. The company would not comment when asked about Charlottesville, and did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

11. Northrop Grumman: $31,093

The foundation for the defense technology company Northrop Grumman gave the SPLC $31,093 in 2020.

12. Pfizer: $29,955

The foundation for the pharmaceutical company Pfizer gave the SPLC: $11,528 in 2021, $6,678 in 2022, $7,224 in 2023, and $4,525 in 2024.

13. GE Aerospace: $23,241

The foundation for the jet engine maker GE Aerospace gave the SPLC: $17,649 in 2020, $2,557 in 2021, $2,125 in 2022, and $910 in 2023.

14. Bank of America: $40,586

The Bank of America Charitable Foundation matches the grants employees give to various entities, including the SPLC. Bank of America Charitable gave the SPLC: $18,681 in 2021, $10,190 in 2021, $6,466 in 2022, and $5,249 in 2023.

A Bank of America spokesperson clarified that those contributions came from an employee matching grant program, for which all IRS-designated 501(c)(3) nonprofits are eligible.

15. Liberty Mutual: $10,000

The foundation for the insurance company Liberty Mutual gave the SPLC $10,000 in 2022.

Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to accurately reflect the independence of a nonprofit established by a Fortune 500 company.

The Trump administration is proposing almost three dozen new rules to scale back gun regulations that proliferated during the Biden administration.

The 34 rules placed in the Federal Register on Wednesday included reversing a 2024 Biden administration rule that attempted to force firearms dealers to run background checks on buyers at gun shows. Gun control advocates called this the “gun show loophole.”

Another change ends the 2023 Biden administration rule that restricted pistol braces. Pistol braces are attachments that allow a person holding a pistol to keep the weapon against their shoulder. The Biden administration justified the regulation by claiming the attachment turned the pistol into a barreled rifle that is subject to stronger regulation.

Earlier this week, the Senate confirmed Robert Cekada as director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

“ATF’s mission is to protect public safety and enforce the law—and these reforms reflect our commitment to doing that through regulations that are clear, legally sound, and narrowly tailored to that purpose,” Cekada said in a statement. “Our enforcement focus from here on out is on willful violators and criminal actors, not inadvertent compliance issues by responsible owners and licensees.”

The focus of the proposed rules, now open for public comment, is to scale back enforcement against licensed gun dealers and gun owners who make paperwork errors, and to emphasize a focus on criminals.

The Gun Owners of America, a pro–Second Amendment group, had filed several lawsuits against the federal government opposing regulations, but “that all went away with this new ATF director,” Gun Owners of America national spokesman Stephen Willeford said.

The top priorities for the Gun Owners of America were doing away with the pistol brace regulation and reversing the Biden rule that categorized anyone selling a firearm as being in the business of selling firearms.

But, he said, the changes have come later than promised, which he blamed on former Attorney General Pam Bondi, a former Florida attorney general.

“The Trump administration told us in the first week they would undo all of the Biden administration rulings in the first week, not laws but rulings,” Willeford, co-author of “A Town Called Sutherland Springs: Faith and Heroism Through Tragedy,” told the Daily Signal. “We were worried when Pam Bondi became attorney general. She was never pro-2A in Florida.”

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche asserted the Trump administration is taking a different path than the prior administration.

“The Second Amendment is not a second-class right,” Blanche said in a statement. “This Department of Justice is ending the weaponization of federal authority against law-abiding gun owners. We will continue to vigorously defend their rights as the Constitution demands.”

The rules include repealing existing regulations, modernizing firearms regulations, reducing burdens on gun owners and gun dealers, and providing legal clarifications.

The changes are a response to President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14206, “Protecting Second Amendment Rights,” signed in February 2025, geared at ending “the federal government’s violation of Americans’ fundamental Second Amendment right to protect themselves, their families, and their freedoms.”

Gun control advocates are upset with the changes. Nick Wilson, senior director of public safety at the Center for American Progress, took aim at scrapping the gun show regulation.

“The Trump administration is once again prioritizing the interests of the gun industry over the safety of American families,” Wilson said in a statement Thursday. “The new proposed rule guts a key provision of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022—essentially getting rid of near-universal background checks. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche attempted to spin this as ‘the most comprehensive regulatory reform package in the history’ of ATF, but this is really an irresponsible effort to strip away lifesaving protections in order to maximize gun industry profits.”

We all know what needs to happen for the nation to dial down the temperature of our political discourse—Democrats need to chill. Sadly, that’s unlikely to happen any time soon. 

Why would it? Before Saturday night’s foiled attack at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton, there were at least two known assassination attempts against President Donald Trump, along with an armed invasion of the grounds of his club at Mar-a-Lago that led to the death of the armed intruder, and one successful assassination attempt that took the life of Charlie Kirk—all within the last two years. 

Did the murder of Kirk calm down the Left? No, much of the Left upped the ante. People on college campuses gloated, saying Kirk deserved to die, and the Left’s leadership failed to call out this behavior. Their silence sent a strong signal—it gave permission for such rhetoric to continue, in other places and against other targets. 

There were protesters outside the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner Saturday night, with some holding signs that read “Death to tyrants.” I don’t believe it is at all a stretch to imagine those protesters would have been cheering if the gunman had been successful Saturday night. 

Americans on the left must stop this kind of hatred on their side of the aisle. It is tearing our country apart. 

In the organization I lead, we do our absolute best not to use the word “enemy” when referring to our political opposition. (It is possible the word has slipped through on social media on rare occasions, but if it has, it was a mistake.) As a policy, we train our employees and consultants that the word “enemy” is reserved for the people outside of this country who wish us dead.  

We cannot dehumanize our fellow Americans. We live in communities together. We can have political disagreements and still agree that we all love and want the best for the country. 

This week, many conservatives and Trump supporters are asking whether that assumption about our political opposition holds true any longer: Do they want the best for our country despite disagreements, or do they actually wish those who disagree with them were dead? 

Many Democrat leaders despise Trump so much that they spew hatred constantly. They should take a long look in the mirror and reflect on what can be done to help our country heal. House Minority Leader Hakeem “Maximum Warfare” Jeffries, who just last week spoke of competition with Republicans as if it were World War III, is a prime offender, but there are many others. 

They claim to care about “democracy,” yet they do not respect election outcomes enough to allow the majority to govern. They “resist” at every single turn. They use the language of their base, blindly repeating the phrase “no kings.”  

If we truly had a “king” in this country, the current battle over the Department of Homeland Security’s funding would not exist; the “king” would order the funding, and that would be that.  

If we had a “king,” there would be no reason for Americans like me to crisscross this country working to get the SAVE America Act, a simple, common-sense piece of legislation whose components have more than 80% approval, passed. 

Democrats should prove to Americans that they really care about representative democracy, drop their opposition, and join Republicans in passing the SAVE America Act 

Finally—and most importantly—leading Democrats need to call out the hateful language and the language that calls for death to their fellow Americans. They need to remind their base that we live in the greatest country there has ever been, and while we may have disagreements with people about legislative direction, we can all agree to live peacefully in this country.  

If people are championing the death of an insurance company CEO, or calling for death to “tyrants,” or using explicitly hate-filled speech, Democrats should not invite those people on the campaign trail and should not amplify those voices. Instead, they should call this behavior out and draw a line in concrete making clear that they will not tolerate it in their party. 

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. 

In one of the most closely watched U.S. Senate races, Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown is seeking a comeback after his 2024 loss, this time against Republican Sen. Jon Husted.

After being voted out by Ohioans once before, Brown is hoping for a second chance, giving a recent interview on key topics, including immigration.

During an interview earlier this month with Youngstown’s WFMJ, the former senator was asked what he thinks needs to change with immigration enforcement in the United States.

“I support closing the border to people so they just can’t cross the border at will. But I also say we, of course, should be deporting people that have committed a crime,” Brown said.

“But we’ve also seen these mass arrests and deportations that are disrupting families who are here working every day, paying taxes, paying into Social Security, paying into Medicare. Those are the kinds of people that I want to see in this country who are doing the work they ought to do.”

Drew Thompson, the campaign manager for Jon Husted for Senate, framed the issue as one where Husted has to clean up Brown’s mess.

“After shocking Ohioans in 2024 by claiming he only hears about illegal immigration from the far Right, Sherrod Brown is now desperate to return to Washington and continue the same Biden-era open border policies he supported for 32 years. Jon Husted, on the other hand, is working to clean up Sherrod Brown’s mess by funding border security, supporting border agents, and standing for the rule of law,” Thompson told The Daily Signal.

When asked during the interview why voters would give him another chance, Brown spoke to his previous time in the Senate.

“Well, they’re going to elect me because I’m speaking to workers and farmers and consumers, fighting for them every day. That’s what I did when I was in the Senate,” Brown offered.

When Brown was asked at the start of the interview why he was running again, and what would be different about this term, should he be elected, the Democrat focused on going after Husted’s record.

“Ohio needs a stronger voice,” he responded.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee says Ohioans should be concerned about Brown’s record. In a statement to The Daily Signal, NRSC regional press secretary Nick Puglia said, “Sherrod Brown’s lies aren’t going to trick Ohioans. They know Brown has fought for over half a century alongside liberals like Kamala Harris to open our borders and protect dangerous criminal illegals from deportation.”

During his three terms as senator, Brown repeatedly opposed border security measures. A 2024 campaign ad for Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, highlighted Brown’s opposition to a border wall in 2017 and 2019. The ad also highlighted Brown’s “F” rating from NumbersUSA, a group looking to reduce immigration to the United States.

During his most recent term in the Senate, Brown also took several votes against border security, especially as it relates to the border wall. Brown in 2021 also voted against providing $800 million for U.S. Customs and Border Protection for opioid and narcotic detection at the southern border.

Although Brown’s remarks in the recent interview speak to deporting criminal illegal immigrants as a matter of something he would support, he voted against an amendment in August 2021 that was “relating to providing sufficient resources to detain and deport a higher number of illegal aliens who have been convicted of a crime.” That amendment received support from other Democrats.

Brown also was a co-sponsor of the End Mass Deportations Act, which would have rescinded President Donald Trump’s executive order from his first term to prioritize deporting criminal illegals and denying funding for sanctuary cities.

In March 2024, Brown sponsored a resolution “declaring racism a public health crisis,” which included concerns with “immigration enforcement systems” as an example of “structural racism.”

The race is considered a “Toss-Up” by the Cook Political Report, which recently updated the race forecast.

Rick Jackson, the Republican front-runner in Georgia’s gubernatorial race, was pressed by his primary opponents this week on his history of hiring illegal alien labor.

“You claim to be tough on illegal deportation, but you’ve got illegals working in your backyard as we speak,” Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a fellow Republican candidate, said Monday night. “Who’s the real Rick Jackson?”

Jackson refuted the claim by stating that he is not aware of the immigration status of his employees.

Jones later raised the charge during a segment in which candidates were allowed to question one another directly.

He pointed to criticism that Jackson, while calling himself President Donald Trump’s strongest ally in the race, has donated to Trump rivals such as Liz Cheney and Nikki Haley, profited from staffing abortion doctors at Planned Parenthood, and hired illegal immigrants to perform landscaping work at his home.

Jones also referenced a legal case involving Jackson Investment Group LLC and its subsidiary JIG Real Estate LLC. The case reportedly alleged that the companies—led by Jackson as CEO—employed multiple workers without proper employment authorization documents to perform landscaping services.

“So, you don’t have any illegals working for you right now?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Jackson replied. He said he was not directly involved in hiring individual workers, noting that he employs thousands of people each year and relies on others to manage hiring and verification. Jackson said his companies obey the law and use employment verification procedures, before Jones cut him off.

“It’s just a yes or no answer,” Jones responded. “I asked him if he has illegals working for him right now. He said he did, and then he said he didn’t.”

Moderators then moved the debate on.

Ahead of the debate, the New York Post reported on legal documents from a workers’ compensation case involving Jackson that allegedly stated he had “maintained a long‑standing workforce of multiple laborers performing landscaping and property maintenance work for decades,” including individuals without work authorization.

According to the report, Jackson testified in a deposition that he was unaware that any workers were undocumented but also acknowledged not personally vetting new hires using the required I‑9 employment verification forms.

In the same deposition, Jackson reportedly said he was not directly involved in hiring decisions and primarily interacted with a landscaping superintendent.

“I know that sounds confusing,” Jackson said in the deposition, according to the report. He added that employees were often hired through other entities affiliated with his businesses and that he was unsure whether JIG Real Estate directly employed workers from a payroll perspective.

Jackson has said that if elected governor, he would prioritize deporting criminal illegal aliens. In a recent campaign advertisement, he said, “I don’t care if you’re Muslim or Mongolian, you don’t have the right to force your culture on our country,” adding that criminal illegal immigrants would be “deported or departed” under his administration.

Asked about the exchange at the debate, Jackson’s campaign told Fox News Digital that “it’s just like a corrupt politician to attack Rick over someone hired by his landscaper.”

“Rick would never knowingly hire someone in the country illegally, and as governor, he’ll make Georgia No. 1 in criminal illegal deportations,” the campaign added. “The takeaway from this debate is the universal agreement that Burt Jones has used his office corruptly to enrich himself and attack his political opponents.”

The Republican primary—featuring Jones, Jackson, Attorney General Chris Carr, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, and others—will be held May 19.

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words” from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to Victor Davis Hanson’s own YouTube channel to watch past episodes.

Jack Fowler: Jimmy Kimmel, who’s got a role in this kerfuffle—it’s not a kerfuffle. This is an assassination attempt egged on by morons. Your thoughts about Jimmy Kimmel? 

Victor Davis Hanson: I mean, the worst part about it was not just what he said, that I think everybody remembers, that he set up a little skit and photoshopped himself at the dais of the White House Correspondents’ [Dinner], as if he was [President Donald] Trump or somebody.

And then they splice shots of people that he doesn’t like in the audience in unflattering ways. And you got the impression that they were actually there and listening to Jimmy Kimmel, which was kind of a dissimulation. 

And then he said that, look at beautiful Melania, she has—and she was smiling—the look of a soon-to-be widow, something to that effect. In other words, Donald Trump will either die or be shot, and she’ll be probably kind of, ha ha … she’ll be happy about it. And then when he got caught on it, then he lied and said, well, I was just thinking maybe because she’s so much younger than Donald Trump and he might die. It was just pathetic. 

So, there’s two issues, and that is, under the First Amendment, does he have a right to say that, as long as he doesn’t threaten the life of the president? Absolutely.

Does Disney have a prerogative? Yes. They can put him on there if they want. If they want to be that stupid. It’s their choice. And do people have a choice to lobby to get him off? Yes. There’s nothing he did, unless he threatened the president. Now, maybe he was implying that, but not as much as Madonna, I suppose. 

So, he’s a bore. He is talentless. He’s a mean-spirited person, but he has a right to sound off, and people have a right to say, we don’t want to buy … we don’t want to go to Disneyland. We don’t want to buy anything that has to do with Disney. We’re done with you because you’re putting this guy on to get ratings. And the more he’s on there, the more he’s foul-mouthed, the more he hates Trump.

And you all know that if anybody, anybody said 25% of what he had said about Barack Obama, he would be yanked with a cane, in two seconds, off the stage. 

You remember the clown in the Missouri State Fair, Jack? All he did was he put an Obama mask on. It wasn’t a racist blackface or anything. It was just Obama’s face. And they immediately banned him for life, as I remember, from the fair. For life. And that was their prerogative, if they wanted to do that. 

But we’ll see. I think he does it because he thinks that he can’t do anything—everything else he has tried, his ratings have gone down. At least they’ve gone down enough that they don’t justify his obscene salary in the cost-to-benefit analysis. 

Fowler: Right. 

Hanson: He’s like [Stephen] Colbert. They lose $40 or $50 million, and they pay that guy $20 million or more, $30 million. And he can’t make any money for them. So, it’s kind of like, well, we’re left-wing and we want a left-wing, you know, expensive—we can write it off or something. 

But so, it’s the same thing with all these people. They have the right to say whatever they want, as long as they don’t threaten the life of the president of the United States. 

But it’s so boring. 

Fowler: Victor, I have not watched late-night television, not that anyway, for years.  

Hanson: I haven’t either. 

Fowler: And I did watch Johnny Carson, and it was just humor. And there was no sense, with him, of self-importance or self-satisfaction or smuggery. 

It was just the opposite. 

Hanson: Yeah. He banned people. Anybody who came in and acted like he was a prima donna, he banned. And the other thing is they asked him once, why don’t you—in that period, it got very political during the [Richard] Nixon years. And they asked him, they said, why don’t you go out? And he said, why would I want to offend half my audience? 

That’s what—Michael Jordan said, the same thing, with Jordan. Why don’t you be political? And even Steve—is it Steve Kerr, the coach of the Warriors? 

Fowler: Mm-hmm. 

Hanson: Who could not keep his mouth shut about politics and principles and ethics. And then people reminded him, oh yeah, you go over to China and you play there and you’re part of the NBA investment, franchising Chinese teams, and they’ve got a million people in a slave labor camp. That doesn’t bother you, Mr. Morals.  

And I only mention that because the other day he came out and he had an interview with a left-wing interviewer, and she was throwing these soft T-ball swings for him, you know. And he kind of said—I was really shocked—he said, I was kind of wrong, what I did. I shouldn’t get into politics. And the critics were right about the China thing. So, I was surprised. So, he got smart is what I’m trying to say. 

Fowler: Yeah. Yeah. 

Hanson: And late-night comedy is a joke now. They’re not very talented. Just a small audience. You got 500 channels to watch, other than that. You’ve got streaming people. We got [Greg] Gutfeld who’s out. He’s got much better ratings than these guys do. And it’s a—I don’t know. 

Fowler: Well, it was—I don’t know if it was a great American institution, but once upon a time, it was fun and it was unthreatening. 

Hanson: I never understood it , though, because my parents would—my dad would watch it. Or he taught at the night school, and he’d get home at 10:30, when I was in high school. And then they’d turn it on, my mom and him. That generation, those guys would stay up till 11, and then they’d watch Carson. It started at 11 after—they would watch the late-night news. There was no 10 o’clock news, then it was 11. 

And then it would be over at 11:30. 

Then they’d watch him for—you know, midnight. And then my dad would say, “Up and out.” He’d always imitate Dwight Eisenhower, telling everybody not to, I mean, to vote for Dick Nixon. “Victor, Alfred, Nels, get up and get out and vote for Dick Nixon. Ike, get up.” And it would be 6 o’clock in the morning. 

And I thought, I just saw you when I went to bed at 10. And he stayed up till 11. All those guys did, in that generation. 

Hey, we sleep when we die, as a motto for some of us. 

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

Congress secured major wins for the Make America Healthy Again movement, including striking pesticide liability shields and passing the 2026 Farm Bill.

States’ and families’ rights are protected, and pesticide companies can continue to be held liable for poisoning Americans. The Farm Bill passed the House on Thursday by a vote of 224-200.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., forced Congress to go on the record with a vote stripping the liability shield for pesticide companies accused of harming Americans. Her amendment passed with huge bipartisan support, receiving a vote of 280-142.

“I do not support giving blanket immunity to corporations at the expense of American families. Pesticides are linked to a 30% increase in childhood cancer, and over 170 studies corroborate the evidence,” Luna said, celebrating the win. “This amendment ensures we stand on the side of the American people and the health of our nation, not corporate interests.”

The amendment, the Strike Pesticide Preemption Provision, removes language from the Farm Bill. It now protects states’ ability to enforce and regulate pesticide rules and labels beyond what the Environmental Protection Agency requires and allows lawsuits against pesticide companies to continue to be lawful.

The charge was primarily led by Luna and Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and had support from Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas.

The amendment came in the wake of the Supreme Court case Monsanto v. Durnell, which could instate these liability shield protections Luna fought to remove. Bayer/Monsanto, the Roundup pesticide giant, is currently paying $7.2 billion to settle lawsuits claiming its pesticides cause cancer.

One MAHA loss in this bill included Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, attempting a nationwide ban on soda from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

“Taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to fund unhealthy, sugary drinks that provide ZERO nutritional value,” Self wrote on X after the amendment failed 186-238. “Assistance programs should prioritize real nutrition, not subsidize unhealthy junk with taxpayer dollars.”

Striking down the pesticide liability shield language was a fight Luna did not let up on. Speaker Mike Johnson announced Wednesday afternoon that the Farm Bill would be punted until members return from their weeklong recess. He made a deal with oil hawks, like Roy, who strongly oppose the E15 bill—which, if passed in the House, will be attached to the Farm Bill when sent to the Senate. The E15 bill has been put on the back burner and will get a vote on May 13, which will hold the Farm Bill until then.

Brand new battleground polling shows that immigration topics remain the clearest and strongest issue set for all candidates heading into November’s midterm elections. Despite persistent opposition from legacy media and business interests, voters continue to rally to the “America First” vision of sovereignty, restrained immigration, and robust enforcement of our nation’s laws.

But predictably, the chattering Washington class of political dinosaurs insists that the GOP surrender on this one macro issue that is clearly working. Beltway GOP insiders seem intent on snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Here is the harsh current reality: The GOP faces a very tough November, and my latest Arizona poll underscores that challenge. In a state President Donald Trump won by more than five points, his job approval rating now stands at -16%, with 39% approval and 55% disapproval. This mirrors my last two Wisconsin polls, which show Trump at -15% in that battleground state.

Both swing-state polls show that the war with Iran is unpopular. Right now, only 31% of Arizona voters believe the war is a “net positive” for America, while 51% say they are more worried about higher prices, and only 20% believe those costs are necessary to keep America safe. But despite the unpopularity of the war, Trump’s overall approval has not budged compared to my prewar polling.

So, the economy remains the foremost concern of voters, who continue to struggle and now largely blame the governing GOP. Of all available policy tools to improve the prosperity of the masses right now, the single most effective is immigration.

In order to grow real wages—meaning pay adjusted for the cost of living—immigration provides leverage on both fronts. First, removing millions of illegal workers—where Trump has made significant progress—raises the pay of American citizens in the workforce, especially blue-collar strivers. Second, removing illegal immigrants from the country reduces the strain on resources like housing, providing needed relief to consumers struggling with high prices.

Voters in Arizona grasp the efficacy of immigration enforcement and overwhelmingly back deportations. Specifically, a supermajority of 66% say that state and local police should fully cooperate with federal authorities in the Trump deportation agenda. Even 45% of Kamala Harris voters agree on this point. Within the large Hispanic population of Arizona, a majority—52%—support this law enforcement effort on immigration. That number is particularly crucial because Latino support for Trump has cratered since he took office, with only 28% of Arizona Hispanics expressing positive job approval for the president in this poll.

But in the face of common sense and sound electoral politics, establishment politicians like Rep. Maria Salazar, R-Fla., insist on pushing a so-called dignity agenda to allow millions of illegal immigrants to remain permanently in the U.S. Despite their claims to the contrary, such a policy retreat represents mass de facto amnesty—a surrender on the foundational issue of the patriotic populist movement.

In addition, such a retreat on immigration would amount to a massive political surrender that would dispirit the base and abandon the most popular and effective element of the current conservative agenda.

So, D.C. Republicans: Stop catering to a small cadre of donor-class interests who clamor for a bygone era of porous borders and managed decline. These are not the early 2000s, and George W. Bush is not our leader. Americans demand sovereignty and recognize that immigration control provides a pathway to a safer, more prosperous, and more cohesive society.

Stick to principles—and stick to winning politics.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., has succeeded in rallying his slim majority around controversial measures involving surveillance, immigration enforcement funding, and agricultural policy, successfully leading passage of the bills on Thursday.

The House voted by voice Thursday to pass the Senate’s measure to fund the Department of Homeland Security, sending the bill to President Donald Trump’s desk to end a record-long partial government shutdown. The House will recess after Thursday for a week.

On Wednesday night, after days of struggling to come to a deal, the House passed a resolution unlocking the process of budget reconciliation, allowing Republicans to fund immigration enforcement without needing Democrat votes in the Senate.

In order to do so, Republican leadership had to overcome some rank-and-file members’ complaints about a piecemeal approach to funding the Department of Homeland Security, in which Republicans would fund the agency’s non-immigration responsibilities in a separate bipartisan bill.

Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, an opponent of the piecemeal approach, explained to reporters why he did not demand a recorded vote on Thursday.

“If there was a vote, I would’ve voted no,” he said. “But we weren’t going to win that vote, so we decided to let it pass by voice vote.”

Roy has argued that leaving immigration funding outside of the typical bipartisan process risks a partisan targeting of funding in the future.

Final Touches

House Republicans also overcame bitter disagreements in passing a three-year extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. 

A faction of Republicans had for weeks demanded major reforms to the espionage program to prevent the surveillance of American citizens.

Leadership ultimately won them over with warrant reforms, as well as a prohibition on the development of a central bank digital currency—something privacy hawks have long argued could be used as a potential surveillance tool.

The future of the House FISA bill is uncertain in the Senate, and the surveillance authority expires at midnight.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has said the House’s FISA bill is “dead on arrival” in the Senate due to the central bank digital currency ban.

Senate Republicans are attempting to advance a 45-day FISA extension.

The House would have to fast-track this bill under a process known as “suspension of the rules” with a two-thirds vote in order to meet the deadline.

This is usually forbidden on Thursdays and Fridays, but the House Rules Committee, a leadership-controlled panel, voted to make an exception this week in a resolution that passed on Thursday.

Johnson said after the DHS vote that the Senate should pass the House’s FISA bill to “check the last box,” saying they “don’t seem to have another alternative.” 

Farm Bill

Johnson’s other success was passing a massive farm bill by a 224-200 margin to revamp agricultural policy and provide assistance to farmers ahead of the midterm elections.

Several members initially objected to elements in the bill, prompting Republicans to set up several amendment votes on subjects of disagreement before the farm bill ultimately passed.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., for example, objected to language blocking state regulations of pesticide companies, and her amendment changing this provision passed 280-142.

Midwestern Republicans, hoping to score a win with corn farmers in their districts ahead of midterms, demanded that leadership work with them to build a regulatory environment more friendly to ethanol-blended gasoline, which is often derived from corn.

Thune has indicated the Senate wishes to proceed with its own farm bill.

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President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he is withdrawing his surgeon general nomination for the second time.

Trump announced the nomination of Dr. Nicole B. Saphier, a radiologist and director of breast imaging at Memorial Sloan Kettering Monmouth, replacing “Make America Healthy Again” nominee Dr. Casey Means. Before Means, Trump had nominated Dr. Janette Nesheiwat for the role before withdrawing her nomination.

“I am pleased to announce that I am nominating Dr. Nicole B. Saphier to be the next SURGEON GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Nicole is a STAR physician who has spent her career guiding women facing breast cancer through their diagnosis and treatment while tirelessly advocating to increase early cancer detection and prevention, while at the same time working with men and women on all other forms of cancer diagnoses and treatments.”

“She is also an INCREDIBLE COMMUNICATOR, who makes complicated health issues more easily understood by all Americans,” Trump added.

In a separate post, Trump slammed Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who held up Means’ nomination. The president said he hopes Louisianans vote Cassidy out of office.

“For months, Senator Bill Cassidy (of the GREAT State of Louisiana!), a very disloyal person whose ‘TRUMP’ Endorsement got him elected, but later voted to impeach ‘President Trump’ on what has now proven to be a total Hoax and Scam, has stood in the way of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Nominee, Casey Means, for the important position of U.S. Surgeon General,” Trump said.

Trump said he nominated Means, a “strong MAHA Warrior,” at the recommendation of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy.

“Nevertheless, despite Senator Cassidy’s intransigence and political games, Casey will continue to fight for MAHA on the many important Health issues facing our Country, such as the rising childhood disease epidemic, increased autism rates, poor nutrition, over-medicalization, and researching the root causes of infertility, and many other difficult medical problems,” he said. “Casey, thank you for your service to our Nation!”

Trump told The Daily Signal on March 29 he was considering withdrawing Means’ nomination.

“Something like that would be possible,” he said.

However, the White House stood by her nomination.

“Dr. Casey Means has spent her entire career as an entrepreneur, bestselling author, and researcher bringing attention to America’s chronic disease epidemic and how our healthcare system is failing the American people,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at the time.

The Southern Baptist Convention raised concerns about Means’ past use of illicit drugs, as detailed in her book “Good Energy,” and her lack of commitment in her confirmation hearings to limit the abortion pill.

Means stood out as one of the few public figures willing to take a stance against the birth control pill, saying it is prescribed “like candy” and reflects a “disrespect of things that create life.”

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—Rep. Keith Self has introduced legislation that would effectively outlaw cousin marriages by denying federal recognition and benefits to such unions.

“Cousin marriage—which is permitted under Sharia—is fundamentally incompatible with American culture and values. It should not be allowed anywhere in our country,” the Texas Republican told The Daily Signal. “The vast majority of states have already banned this third‑world practice. It’s time for Congress to finish the job and enact a nationwide prohibition.”

Marriage between close family members is legal, with few or no restrictions, in 18 states and the District of Columbia. Self argues that blood‑related marriages are common in certain ethnic and cultural groups, with rates reaching as high as 40%.

“The expectation of assimilation into Western values includes accepting America’s cultural marriage standards,” Self said.

If enacted, the Consanguineous Marriage Prohibition Act would deny federal benefit recognition of marriages between individuals who are first cousins or more closely related. The bill would alter benefit calculations under Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Medicare, Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. It would also affect federal employees’ life and health insurance benefits.

The legislation would not alter broader legal definitions of marriage.

In a press release shared with The Daily Signal, Self said cousin marriages pose serious health risks to children born from such unions.

“Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) studies have shown that children of these marriages have twice the incidence of birth defects, and the risk of stillbirths and infant deaths is increased by 50%,” the release said. “Throughout their lives, these children experience learning disabilities, health issues, and reduced life expectancy.”

Self’s proposal comes after allegations that Rep. Ilhan Omar, D‑Minn., married her cousin to obtain immigration benefits and entry into the United States. Omar has denied the accusation, calling it a “ridiculous lie.”

In January, Rep. Nancy Mace, R‑S.C., subpoenaed Omar and her alleged “brother‑husband” as part of an effort to determine whether Omar committed immigration fraud or violated federal law.

“If these allegations are true, they raise grave concerns involving potential marriage fraud, immigration fraud, and violations of federal and state law,” Mace said at the time. “No one, no matter how politically protected, should be above the law.”

Omar did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment.

Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, is looking to do something about deadly truck crashes involving foreigners.

This week, Moreno sent a letter to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, demanding answers regarding Modou Ngom, an illegal immigrant alleged to be responsible for a deadly incident earlier this month in Ohio.

“I write today to bring your attention to an inexcusable failure of our immigration and commercial licensing systems, which led to the tragic death of an Ohio family,” Moreno said in his letter to the secretaries.

He wrote in the letter that the “case is not an isolated administrative failure—it is a systemic breakdown with fatal consequences.”

Ngom allegedly triggered a chain-reaction crash that killed three people, including a 1-year-old child, on 1-71 in Delaware County. Others were seriously injured, and lawsuits against Ngom are being filed.

According to Moreno, Ngom is “an illegal immigrant who entered the country unlawfully, falsified his identity, lied to immigration officials to achieve naturalization, fraudulently obtained a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL), and established a trucking company on false pretenses.”

“Simply put, he is a criminal and should never have been in the U.S. in the first place,” the letter states.

Citing the Ohio Department of Public Safety, the senator pointed to a timeline going back to the 1990s, when Ngom first came to the country. Ngom’s Ohio driver’s license, obtained under a different name, was said to have been obtained in 2003. He obtained the CDL in 2007.

Ngom became a naturalized citizen in the 2010s, using the name of Lamine Gaye, though he later went back to using Ngom.

The letter also points to other safety violations.

“When the federal government turns a blind eye and fails to police its own borders, it is innocent American families on Ohio roads who pay the ultimate price. It is no surprise to me that this man was not apprehended under the Biden Administration. Nonetheless, lessons must be learned from this preventable tragedy,” Moreno wrote in his letter, pointing to the previous administration’s relaxed immigration enforcement.

His letter also applauded President Donald Trump’s handling of the immigration issue. Moreno said Trump has “taken historic steps to remove illegal aliens from our nation,” and that “when that responsibility is neglected, the consequences are measured in American lives.”

Ngom was indicted on counts of vehicular homicide and vehicular assault, though the senator called for more to be done. Crashes by foreign drivers have also impacted other states.

“The Department of Justice should bring all appropriate federal charges against Ngom, including, potentially, immigration fraud, false statements, and identity-document crimes. I also encourage the Department of State—if it is determined that Ngom procured U.S. citizenship through fraud or willful misrepresentation—to initiate denaturalization consistent with federal law,” Moreno wrote.

The Transportation Department put out a news release in February regarding a rule finalized by Duffy to “stop unqualified foreign drivers from obtaining licenses to drive commercial trucks and buses.”

In the wake of the latest alarming incident concerning the safety of our chief executive that has shaken the nation, President Donald Trump has a key opportunity to exercise a clear constitutional authority that has gone too long ignored.

Article II, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution grants the president the power to convene both houses of Congress “on extraordinary Occasions.” That power exists for moments precisely like this one, when national security demands immediate action and legislative inertia threatens public safety.

As I have previously recommended, Trump should have immediately convened both houses and kept them in session until they completely funded the Department of Homeland Security.

The president did not take that immediate step in that initial flurry of events on Saturday night. However, it is not too late.

The Senate’s stonewalling continues unabated while the security of the nation remains at risk. Trump should accordingly invoke this power now to force Congress to act.

This is not a radical suggestion; it’s a return to first principles. The Framers deliberately modeled the president’s convening authority on the historic prerogative of English monarchs to summon Parliament during crises.

Perhaps the first and most vivid precedent comes from 1295, when King Edward I faced grave military threats from France, Scotland, and Wales. National security and fiscal necessity compelled him to summon what became known as the (then-unicameral) Model Parliament to secure the funding and legislative support required to defend the realm.

As Edward wrote in his writ of summons: “[I]nasmuch as a most righteous law of the emperors ordains that what touches all should be approved by all, so it evidently appears that common dangers should be met by remedies agreed upon in common.”

Our own Constitution embeds this same logic. The Senate needs to act now for our homeland’s common good.

In many instances in 2025-26, the Senate has operated in a state of suspended animation—holding pro forma sessions that allow lawmakers to claim they are “in session” while doing nothing of substance and yet blocking the president’s use of his clear recess appointments clause power, which I have also advised the president to invoke.

At all times, Congress (in particular the Senate) should be either in session to perform urgently needed work for the nation or it should be in recess, where the president can pick up the slack by making recess appointments so that he can push his energetic executive branch forward. At the moment, however, the Senate often operates in a limbo zone where it does no work and yet denies the president the power to use recess appointments. The conjunction of those two things makes no sense.

This is not governance; it is evasion. Trump needs something dramatic to change the dynamic in the Senate, where a relative handful of holdouts have blocked full funding for the Department of Homeland Security.

The recent security lapse left the president, his wife, and his Cabinet exposed. The Secret Service, charged with protecting the Nation’s highest officials, cannot operate effectively in an underfunded department.

By forcing Congress into real session, the president can break the logjam and compel lawmakers to confront their responsibilities.

Critics would inevitably raise a familiar objection: the current impasse involves border and immigration funding, not Secret Service appropriations. This is a distinction without a difference. Money is often fungible inside agencies.

DHS is a single Cabinet-level department encompassing Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Secret Service, and more.

Appropriations bills frequently allocate funds at the departmental level, leaving internal reallocations to agency leadership under statutory guidelines. A dollar denied for border security is a dollar that cannot be redirected to protective operations when emergencies arise—and vice versa.

Full funding for the entire department eliminates these shell games and ensures that no mission—whether securing the border or safeguarding the president—suffers because of artificial congressional silos.

The stakes could not be higher. America watched in horror as a would-be assassin barreled past lax security. What if he had been wearing a suicide-bomb vest and had gotten into the banquet itself? The Secret Service’s own after-action reviews have repeatedly highlighted serious problems at the Secret Service. Yet Congress has treated these warnings as optional.

Pro forma sessions allow senators to return home for fundraisers and ribbon-cuttings while the executive branch is left to improvise protection with inadequate resources.

Trump’s convening power offers him and us a constitutional circuit breaker. He can still keep both chambers in Washington until a clean, comprehensive DHS funding bill reaches his desk—no poison pills, no partial measures, no excuses.

Some will wring their hands about “separation of powers.” But the Constitution itself rejects the notion that the president must sit idly by while legislators hide behind procedural tricks.

The same document that vests legislative power in Congress also equips the executive with tools to overcome legislative paralysis in emergencies. And it is the Senate’s aggrandizement of power to try to block recess appointments while not even being in session that is the true violation of the separation of powers.

The Framers understood that extraordinary occasions—wars, economic collapses, security crises—require decisive leadership. They did not intend for the president to be a mere spectator when the nation’s safety is on the line.

Nor is this merely about one agency. Full DHS funding is essential to border security, counterterrorism, cybersecurity, and disaster response. Partial funding bills that pit one mission against another only empower those who prefer open borders and lax enforcement.

If he demanded funding for all of DHS without exception, Trump could signal that American sovereignty and the physical safety of our leaders are nonnegotiable.

The American people are exhausted by dysfunction. They elected Trump to restore order, secure the border, and protect the nation. They did not elect him to preside over endless procedural theater while threats multiply.

Even though the ideal moment to act was Saturday night, invoking Article II, Section 3 now would still demonstrate the very leadership the moment requires. He can still tell a grateful nation that the era of congressional evasion is over.

Finally, beyond immediate funding, lasting security requires structural change at the White House itself.

The White House ballroom must be built in order to avoid security incidents in the future. Modern protective operations demand expanded, purpose-built facilities that allow the Secret Service to control access, screen visitors, and manage events without compromising the historic residence.

A single federal judge should not be allowed to try to block such efforts, especially when the objection rests on nothing more substantive than one woman who purports to have her architectural feelings hurt by the new ballroom’s aesthetics. Boo hoo. National security cannot be held hostage to subjective aesthetic complaints or to the whims of a single jurist, let alone both.

The executive branch must be free to modernize White House infrastructure when the safety of the president and his family is at stake.

History will judge whether Trump seizes this constitutional tool while it can still have maximum impact. The precedent of English kings confronting national emergencies by summoning Parliament reminds us that Anglo-Saxon executives have always possessed the power—and the duty—to act when legislatures falter.

When King Edward I summoned what became known as the Model Parliament in 1295 amid serious military threats from France, Scotland, and Wales, Parliament granted the funding and support needed to defend the realm. This decisive action proved that English monarchs have long recognized the necessity of convening the legislature when the realm faced existential threats.

Today’s threat is no less real: determined enemies both within and without, coupled with a Congress seemingly content to sit on its hands.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

In a victory for the Democratic Party’s left flank, Maine Democrat Gov. Janet Mills has dropped out of the state’s Senate race, effectively ceding the party’s nomination to Graham Platner to take on Republican incumbent Susan Collins.

The 78-year-old governor’s departure, which she says is due to lack of campaign funds, comes after months of trailing Platner in polls and fundraising totals.

Maine is an important target for Democrats, who must net an additional four seats in order to gain control of the Senate.

“I very simply do not have the one thing that political campaigns unfortunately require today: the financial resources,” Mills wrote in a Thursday morning statement. 

Mills did not endorse Platner in the statement.

In a late March poll from Emerson College, Mills trailed Platner by a 27-point margin, 55% to 28%, with 13% undecided. Before her announcement, Mills’ campaign had cut digital ad buys.

Platner, a 41-year-old oyster farmer, has plenty of baggage, as his opponents have called attention to his past online posts saying that women should “act like an adult” to avoid rape and ridiculing rural white voters and black people.

Platner has asked voters to look past his online history, saying, “I’m asking you not to judge me for the worst thing I said on the internet on my worst day 14 years ago.”

Platner has branded himself as an anti-establishment Democrat, blasting Senate Democrats for acceding to Republicans in previous shutdown fights. An ally of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., he has also accused Israel of committing “genocide” and supported populist proposals such as “Medicare for All.”

His campaign has employed strategist Morris Katz, who assisted New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s successful campaign.

He will face off against a resilient opponent in Collins, a moderate Republican from a prominent political family seeking a sixth term.

In 2020, Collins defeated her Democrat opponent by over eight points despite having trailed in every public poll.

Collins said in a statement Thursday, “I’m sure this was a difficult decision for Governor Mills, and I thank her for her decades of service to the people of Maine.”

The Daily Signal reached out to Platner’s campaign for comment, but did not hear back by publication time.

Platner’s campaign issued a statement later on Thursday morning. “Janet Mills has dedicated her career to this beautiful state. We are all eternally grateful for her service to Maine as Governor, Attorney General, district attorney, and in the legislature,” the statement read.

This story was updated with a statement from Graham Platner’s campaign.

Rep. Keith Self called for additional federal probes after a watchdog group raised legal and constitutional concerns about a proposed Muslim-centered development in his district.

The Oversight Project, a watchdog group, alleges in a new report Thursday that the East Plano Islamic Center, or EPIC, is violating federal law in spearheading the development of “EPIC City,” a planned 400-acre community outside Dallas, Texas. The development near Josephine, Texas—also referred to as “The Meadow”—would include housing, a mosque, schools, and commercial businesses.

“The Oversight Project’s bombshell report indicates that the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC) is violating federal tax law, civil rights law, securities law, and housing law. If true, EPIC should have their 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status revoked,” Self, a Texas Republican, said.

The Justice Department dropped an earlier fair housing investigation into the community, and EPIC has repeatedly said it is in full compliance with the law. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development launched a separate probe into possible housing discrimination.

“In addition to the ongoing Housing and Urban Development (HUD) investigation, I am calling on the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Department of Justice (DOJ) to launch additional probes into EPIC and its affiliates for violating federal law. The rule of law must be upheld,” Self said.

But the Oversight Project report notes that the community “sold out within days of its original announcement in 2024.”

The Oversight Project asserts its findings raise issues regarding EPIC’s tax-exempt status since a nonprofit created a for-profit entity known as Community Capital Partners, which functions as the project’s developer.

“This explicit financial arrangement—where a nonprofit mosque (i.e., EPIC) has created a for-profit entity (i.e., ERP and/or CCP) that exists solely to funnel all of its profits back to the nonprofit mosque—raises serious constitutional, tax, and practical concerns, especially given that it is geared toward the development of a Sharia-compliant community in EPIC City,” the report says.

“The Oversight Project’s legal analysis of this arrangement, consisting of a straightforward application of the relevant bodies of law to our examination of public records returns, finds that EPIC is likely in violation of its 501(c)(3) federal tax-exempt status,” the report continues.

Community Capital Partners sold investment shares that were typically priced at $80,000 to individuals seeking to build homes in the community, according to the report.

“The Oversight Project posed as a potential investor interested in purchasing a share of property in EPIC City,” the report says. “Marketing materials received through that outreach show EPIC City and CCP sold nearly 500 lots in EPIC City, generating approximately $40 million in capital. Other records show that during the relevant time period, EPIC exclusively marketed the development to Muslims. Thus, it is highly plausible that EPIC raised $40 million in capital by selling plots of land exclusively to Muslims.”

The report goes on to assert that if this is going to be a town or governmental jurisdiction, it poses problems for the establishment clause of the Constitution.

“All actions taken by EPIC to direct, manage, or operate EPIC City should therefore constitute state actions subject to constitutional constraints, including the fundamental public policies concerning religious establishment, exercise, and expression set forth in the First Amendment,” the report says.

It further states the project could violate the Texas Fair Housing Act and the federal Fair Housing Act, which ban discrimination based on religion, among other factors.

The report notes that developers later “scrubbed its public website and changed the advertising language to claim it will be an inclusive community.”

The Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division opened a probe last year at the urging of Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said in June that the DOJ closed its investigation, and “CCP has affirmed that all will be welcome in any future development, and that you plan to revise and develop marketing materials to reinforce that message consistent with your obligations under the Fair Housing Act.”

At the state level, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed two lawsuits. The December 2025 suit alleges violations of state securities laws tied to the sale of investment shares. A February action challenges the legality of a municipal utility district created to support the development.

A Collin County, Texas, court issued a temporary restraining order on March 19, followed by a temporary injunction on March 30, barring the would-be EPIC Municipal Utility District from taking any further action.

Dan Cogdell, an attorney for EPIC, told The Daily Signal the allegations are “all white Christian nationalist bull–, rinse and repeat.”

“This has never been a Muslim-only development, and it was never about promoting Sharia law,” said Cogdell, who represented Paxton in the attorney general’s impeachment trial in the state Senate, in which he was acquitted. “The truth ought to matter at some point.”

He said EPIC was already cleared by the Justice Department and the Texas State Securities Board after two previous investigations, but blamed Texas politicians for “pandering for votes” by continuing the accusations.

This story was updated to include comments from Dan Cogdell, an attorney for East Plano Islamic Center.

Most Americans were glad to get another Tax Day behind them this month. It’s galling to hand over a third of everything you earned last year to government to waste, fraud, and abuse.

Consider the raw numbers. Last year, the federal government took just over $5 trillion. States and localities took another $2.5 trillion. Out of a total personal income of just $26 trillion, that’s 1 in 3.

For perspective, you work for the Feds Monday, you work for your state and locality Tuesday, and you don’t get to put anything in your pocket until hump day.

For perspective, a third is roughly 20 times more than the British were trying to tax in the Boston Tea Party.

Free at last.

Notably, we don’t have tea parties anymore. Partly because they don’t make Americans like they used to, but also because that lost third is hidden: The devil’s brew of income tax withholding, employer taxes that come out of salaries, embedded taxes where the trucker bought diesel, Publix paid property tax, but it’s not listed on the bananas.

So, where did it go wrong, and how do we make it right?

The original sin, of course, was the income tax, passed right before World War I. Indeed, it’s a big reason we had a world war—governments didn’t used to be able to afford them.

It was originally billed as a tax on the rich, with a top rate of 7% starting around $15 million in today’s dollars.

Perhaps you’ll recognize the sales pitch—billionaires will pay just a few percent, and all will be well.

Of course, “tax the rich” was bait as it ratcheted up the rates and ratcheted down who pays, so today the income tax hits everybody over $15,000 and takes a quarter of everything we earn. This does not include the billions of hours Americans spend trying to figure out their taxes under threat of imprisonment if you get it wrong—which is, at least, slightly less painful than a root canal.

So, what would it take to get rid of federal income tax? It’s actually very easy—Congress could literally pass a bill tomorrow. After all, the 16th amendment allows an income tax; it does not require one.

Congress won’t do it. It exists to pillage.

But what would happen if the income tax were eliminated?

The federal government would lose about $2.5 trillion of funding. It would have to slash foreign aid, Treasury bailouts for bankers, welfare for the able-bodied, grants to left-wing rioters, overseas wars (one Iran per generation, pace yourself). Even the tax-funded gender reassignment surgeries for inmates and illegal aliens—they’ll have to get Guatemala to pay.

In concrete terms, the federal government would shrink to half what it was between the 1920s and the 1950s, back before the welfare industrial complex and the fraud industrial complex it built.

In return, you keep the nearly $1,500 a month the median family pays in taxes.

But more important, every American would benefit from an enormous boost to economic growth and wages that could triple that to $4,500 a month per family.

The reason is that, just like cigarette taxes reduce smoking, income taxes reduce income. They discourage work, entrepreneurship, job creation, and business expansion.

And the more productive somebody is, the worse they’re hit. Why would a neurosurgeon work weekends, or a successful rib joint franchise for that matter, if most of it’s going to taxes?

President Donald Trump has repeatedly endorsed repealing the entire income tax—the first president in history to do so.

Polls show overwhelming support for abolishing the IRS and replacing it with a sales tax—including 70% of Republicans and most Democrats.

Sadly, Congress has more fun pillaging the republic, even if its voters want to throw the entire tax code into Boston Harbor.