Last year, many Indiana public school teachers promised to end racist diversity, equity, and inclusion practices in schools. If successful, such assurances and the policies that follow would be models for other states. How’s it going?

Turns out, the racism in public education runs deep. This week, the Indiana Family Institute released an audit of DEI in the state’s K-12 schools and found that significant work remains. While some school officials have wiped DEI statements from their websites along with mentions of so-called antiracism, auditors report, “Quietly deleting DEI language from websites may improve public perception, but it does not ensure that the policies, trainings, and practices themselves have been dismantled.”

The audit demonstrates that district administrators have snuck DEI in through the back door by way of staff positions, professional development for teachers, curricula, strategic planning, and student programming. Educators carefully renamed certain activities and positions without changing the descriptions, allowing DEI to persist under the radar.

Auditors even identified recommendations from the state Department of Education that continue to apply DEI-related concepts to instruction. For example, the Indiana Department of Education recommends a literature curriculum called “Wit & Wisdom” that teaches students to interpret reading assignments from the perspective of “power, oppression, race, gender, and social identity.” Some of the materials showcasing the work of communist artists are included in assignments for kindergarteners.

In Carmel Clay Schools, just 30 minutes north of Indianapolis, school officials use equity grading techniques to evaluate student work. These grading practices assume that ethnic minorities are oppressed in public school systems and need lower standards just to get by. Districts such as San Diego Unified in California adopted equitable grading practices during the COVID-19 pandemic, making schoolwork effectively optional for students.

In Carmel Clay, students can turn in blank assignments and still receive 50% credit. And as in San Diego, students can take exams more than once to improve their scores. Policies such as this do not inspire student achievement but, instead, foster the soft bigotry of low expectations.

Carmel Clay is a particularly stark example, as the Family Institute’s audit provides pictures from middle and high schools in the district that promote drag queens and “transgenderism” on hallway placards.

Officials from other districts have been more subtle. In Fort Wayne, near the Ohio border, school personnel have renamed DEI staff positions while keeping the responsibilities the same. One “director of DEI” role was simply changed to “director of students & staff relations.”

The Family Institute’s report has nearly 70 pages filled with examples. The use of racial preferences and advocacy for radical gender policies conflicts with state and federal civil rights laws, as well as basic biology.

“Rather than fostering unity, DEI frameworks often encourage resentment, categorize individuals as oppressors or the oppressed, and shift focus away from merit, personal responsibility, and shared citizenship,” said the Indiana Family Institute’s Ryan McCann.

Given the findings, the report recommends additional audits of every public school district in Indiana. Researchers should review curricula, scour school policies for violations of parental rights, and confirm that hiring and promotion practices are based on merit. State legislators should prohibit the use and application of DEI and racial preferences in school materials. Policymakers should consider the provisions from Idaho and Florida that say no teacher or student can be compelled to affirm an idea that violates civil rights laws.

Meanwhile, local school boards should not wait for state lawmakers to act but should adopt policies that reject racial preferences and stop instruction that tells students they can choose a different gender.

No child should be discriminated against because of skin color or sex, and DEI betrays the idea of equality under the law by advocating for racism in the name of equity. Yet instead of treating students equally, DEI policies create favored classes through gross violations of civil rights statutes.

The Indiana Family Institute has performed a valuable service for policymakers and moms and dads. While Indiana K-12 law is too lenient for now and hardly a national model, the Family Institute’s audit is a design worth repeating around the country.

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal senior contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos.

Victor Davis Hanson: If you look at George W. Bush, people—his reputation has gone up a little bit because he broke with [Donald] Trump, the next Republican. I’m not sure he voted for Trump, and he made his peace with [Barack] Obama.  

There were three things that people fault Bush for. I’m not sure he was responsible. No. 1 was the Iraq War. No. 2 was the Afghan War. No. 3 was the 2008 financial meltdown. I think he was the most conservative Republican president that we have had since forever. 

He was much more conservative than his father, George H.W. Bush. He tried to do a lot of things. I think part of the problem was they thought they could deal with the Democrats. So, they did things like prescription-drug entitlement and things in education that didn’t work out. But they thought that the Left would appreciate that magnanimity, and they interpreted that as weakness. 

So, when you look at Iraq, on the plus side of the ledger, after 9/11, we were told that they were going to blow up airliners, 10 or 11 of them, in the Philippines. We uncovered a lot of al-Qaeda plots, and there were a lot of foiled efforts. And for all the false WMD narratives about Saddam [Hussein], we really never knew what happened to the WMDs. 

We knew he had them, and they might have gone to Syria because we know they were used later by the Assad government in Syria. But that hurt him when Colin Powell went before the United Nations and said, “This is WMD, and they’re going to do this and this and this.”  

But that being said, Iraq never quite degenerated like Afghanistan. 

So, today they actually are working with the United States to expel Iranian influencers. And they do have elections. And we have Americans still there advising the Iraqi government.  

Was it worth all those deaths and mayhem and casualties? I don’t know. We’ll see, but I don’t think it was. I supported the war, and I’m someone who supported it to the end. 

The only thing that was very bad for Bush is the people who really had called for that war was the Committee for the New American Century. That was Bill Kristol, Fareed Zakaria, Robert Kagan bipartisan effort. And almost all of those people turned on the war, not so much as Richard Perle did or David Frum— all of those neocons did. 

And then, you know, as Matthew Ridgway said, “The only worse thing than a bad war is losing it.” So Bush was orphaned, is what I’m saying. There were a lot of conservative scholars, neocons, that said, “You’ve got to go and deal with this, and then if you knock him out and you put a consensual government, it will spread like wildfire.” 

That didn’t happen. It did corral Iran for a few years. And then the Afghanistan thing—it was a brilliant campaign. We removed the Taliban in eight weeks. We had a government there, the Karzai government. Everything was going well, and then we diverted a lot of resources to Iraq. 

But the problem was everybody said the Afghan war was the good war because it was stable and the Taliban were in hiding and regrouping, and Iraq was the bad war. Why didn’t we just get a Karzai? Why didn’t we just do it like Afghanistan? 

Well, the problem was Afghanistan was always the problem. It was landlocked. It had no ports. It was in a terrible neighborhood. The terrain was terrible. The weather was terrible. The Taliban were completely fanatic. They were being supported all around their borders. 

We had to deal with the Chinese, with the Russians, with the Pakistanis. Iraq was flat. It was arid. The weather was clear. We had access to a port, and the Iraqi people were somewhat industrialized and educated compared to Afghanistan. 

So, once people kept saying that Afghanistan was a good war, but when Obama just pulled all the troops out of Iraq, Iraq had a bumpy period. It was stable.  

When Obama took office, there were fewer Americans dying in Iraq each week than the accident rate. It was stable. 

And then he pulled out and he said, don’t worry, ISIS are JVs. And the ISIS people took over. Then we came back in under Trump and bombed the blank out of them. 

And so, Iraq is a work in progress, but it’s better than under Saddam Hussein. But I don’t know if it was worth the cost in American lives.  

I think Americans feel that not one American is worth what—when you see the stuff that’s going on in the Middle East and the idea that we’re going to go over there and try to change their minds, I don’t think so. 

It’s more worrisome that they’re coming over here and trying to change our minds. 

And then very quickly, the financial—that was a Democratic project in Congress, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.  

Sami Winc: You mean the 2008 financial crash?  

Hanson: Yes. That was the idea that we needed to get homeownership up over 60%. 

And we had these subprime loans to people who were not qualified. And then even the interest sometimes was adjusted because they were bad risks, so they couldn’t make the interest payments anyway. It was all speculating on people on Wall Street. 

Barney Frank was right at the middle of that. He was in the House Banking Committee, and he was basically calling people racist who were opposing these reckless loans and the speculation. 

So, all these banks were making these loans, and then they were saying they were guaranteed by the federal government. But the guarantees of the federal government covered what—5%, 2% of the loan portfolio? 

So, when one started to go, everybody wanted to—they all started to default. And then the people who were covering the default didn’t have the capital, and the government had to step in. 

And that said, people sometimes forget that happened in September. So, there was the end of September, one; October, two; November, three; December, four; and January, five. 

When Obama came into office, things were stabilized. If he had just let the actual market forces continue, we wouldn’t have had that 9% unemployment and 0% or 1% growth for his first five years. 

He made it a lot worse with all those crazy programs—Cash for Clunkers, Obama phones, those huge deficits. It didn’t do any good at all, among other things. 

Bush did some good things on the conservative side. The only thing that I really disagreed with him—he had tax cuts, and he came in with a surplus that the Gingrich-Clinton compromises for the last four years under [Bill] Clinton had given us. 

He came in—we were in a mild recession. The dot-com boom had busted. So, he thought tax cuts would spur growth, but he didn’t insist on budget cuts. 

So, we started this cycle where we were working to pay off the debt, and he cut taxes, and he actually got some more revenue for a while, and then all the spending—like prescription drugs, No Child Left Behind, all these massive programs. 

It wasn’t representative. I hope Trump looks at that. I hope when these midterms are over, he really recalibrates and reboots DOGE, and then if he’s going to have these big tax cuts—and they’ve already hit—we’re going to have deficits unless we start cutting, cutting, cutting. 

Winc: Yeah. Well, Victor, we need to go to a break and then come back. 

Hanson: Oh, I should say one last thing—that George Bush was treated, I think, very unfairly by a lot of American people. They call him—all this idea that Trump is unusual and we’ve never called a president a fascist or a Nazi— 

Al Gore said Bush and [Dick] Cheney were digital brown shirts. [Angela] Merkel said it was the old Nazi thing. John Glenn said that. 

That was mainstream. He was the first president that they really called a Nazi. The Left hated George Bush, and they hated Cheney. 

And then, as always happens, when the next Republican came, they transferred their hate and said, “Trump is now the new Nazi, and those other guys, they weren’t that bad. We like them.” 

And they said that exactly about George H.W. Bush. They said, “He’s a wimp. He’s a fascist. But compared to W, we like him.” 

And they said the same thing about [Ronald] Reagan. “He’s a fascist. He’s horrible. He’s terrible. But compared to George H.W. Bush, who’s a meanie and went to war, we kind of like Reagan.” 

And that’s what they always do. 

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

Just months after courting moderates, California Gov. Gavin Newsom is defending closer ties with the Democratic Socialists of America, even after a leaked video showed a member of the group calling for America’s takedown.

“The most important thing that we can do is take that empire down from within,” the DSA member said.

Newsom, speaking at a press conference last week, said he is “for addition, not subtraction,” when asked about working with the Democratic Socialists of America on issues including free community college, higher minimum wages, subsidized childcare, and lowering carbon emissions.

Newsom’s comments drew criticism from conservatives, who argue that socialist ideology extends far beyond mainstream Democratic Party politics. 

According to the Democratic Socialists of America website, the group is the largest socialist organization in the United States, with more than 90,000 members nationwide. When asked whether he would support one of its candidates, Newsom said he is open to working with the organization.

“As I have said, I’m for addition, in the spirit of academia, not for subtraction. I think … parties are better off when they have some grace and humility. There are fundamental shared values that unite us together.”

The governor added, “We have to take back the House of Representatives or we’re going to lose this republic.”

Newsom’s comments represent a shift in tone from last year, when he sought to cultivate a moderate image through interviews with conservative commentators such as Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon. 

Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton called Newsom’s comments “completely pathetic.”

“Newsom is a follower, not a leader. He doesn’t believe in anything other than his own political ambition,” Hilton said.

Whether Newsom’s stance expands the Democratic Party’s coalition or alienates moderate voters is likely to become a key question as candidates position themselves ahead of the midterm election and beyond.

Even Amy Acton, the Democrat nominee for Ohio’s governor, acknowledges that protecting women from having to compete against men is “settled law” in the state.

In doing so, she’s irked progressives.

Her comments appeared in a June 30 article from The Toledo Blade, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states are allowed to protect women’s sports. Although the cases, Little v. Hecox and West Virginia v. B.P.J., came out of Idaho and West Virginia, they upheld state laws in several states, including Ohio.

“I do not support boys playing in girls sports. This is already settled law in Ohio, and as governor, I will enforce and uphold the law,” Acton said.

Those comments have gained attention in recent days. Last Wednesday, the Ohio Democrats Progressive Caucus called out Acton.

Its statement offered that Democrats win when they “unapologetically defend victims of MAGA fearmongering” and “Make clear their plan to improve the material conditions of everyday Ohioans.”

Allowing males to compete in female sports has resulted in over 600 females losing 890 medals to males, according to a report from the United Nations released in 2024. Female athletes have also been injured when forced to compete against males.

Acton’s comments also addressed how she “will always stand up for fairness and protect kids’ health and safety.” She further expressed commitment to working on priorities such as “lowering costs.”

The caucus addressed concerns about costs as well. “ZERO Ohioans have become better able to buy groceries by keeping child sport players away from their favorite sport. Our hearts break for those kids. Those who disagree with that will never vote – let alone doorknock – for Amy Acton,” the statement read.

Nevertheless, the statement expressed a desire to work with Acton. “Despite our disagreement on this issue, we remain ready to work with her to achieve our shared goals to improve life in Ohio.”

“Currently her inner circle does not include a voice representing the newest and largest constituency caucus in Ohio. We believe she will be best equipped to win in November by having a FULL picture of what her constituents want. We hope she will allow us to provide our missing piece of that picture as she goes forward,” the statement concluded.

The statement from the Ohio Democrats Progressive Caucus does not actually show up on its Facebook page. As Signal Ohio’s Andrew Tobias pointed out on X, the statement appears to have been taken down.

The Daily Signal reached out to the caucus for comment but did not hear back.

The Buckeye Flame last week also published a headline declaring “Dr. Amy Acton betrays Ohio’s trans community and yet again forces us into the ‘lesser of two evils’ debate.”

On Monday, NBC4 covered progressives’ frustrations, including a statement from Maria Bruno, executive director for Ohioans Against Extremism. “It’s frustrating to see an otherwise strong candidate take the bait by trying to triangulate a response rather than just being frank: can we please just leave trans kids alone and get back [to] talking about how we can make life more affordable for Ohioans?” Bruno said.

Acton again expressed a desire to focus on lowering costs.

“We are in the middle of political season, and one of the hallmarks of political season is pitting us against one another and intentionally creating fear and chaos for people who are already dealing with a lot, and I think that’s a crime,” she said last Wednesday. “Nonetheless, this is settled law in Ohio as well as now the Supreme Court, and what I am hearing from Ohioans is they want me to focus on lowering costs in this state.”

Bruno is further quoted as saying that “Democrats don’t have to play along” with such rhetoric.

HB 68, which went into effect in 2024 after the state Legislature overrode a December 2023 veto from Republican Gov. Mike DeWine, includes protections for minors against transgender procedures and prevents males from competing against females in sports.

Dave Yost, Ohio’s former attorney general and current vice president of strategic research and innovation for Alliance Defending Freedom, spoke to the Daily Signal last week about the court cases, celebrating how “the Supreme Court legalized biology.”

Yost also pointed out during that conversation that liberal groups in Ohio, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, are trying to argue the issue based on a state constitutional provision passed in 2011, the Health Care Freedom Amendment.

The Daily Signal reached out to the Acton campaign for comment but did not hear back.

The House Freedom Caucus renewed a push to enshrine President Donald Trump’s border directives into federal law after Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., allegedly promised the chamber’s more conservative members that he would bring the border bills up for a vote in exchange for their votes on certain legislation, a source familiar with the matter told the Daily Signal.

Johnson’s office did not respond to the Daily Signal’s request for comment.

If enacted, the bill, HR 9199, the Permanent Trump Secure Border Act, would “secure the borders of the United States” through strict immigration reforms, the implementation of immigration parole enforcement, visa overstay penalties, enhanced migrant vetting, ongoing wall construction, tactical surveillance and infrastructure implementation, border security investments, asylum status reforms, and mandatory reporting on foreign drug cartels.

Throughout his second term, Trump signed several executive orders that demanded the immediate shutdown of the southern border. While those orders have been put into effect by other federal agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security, conservatives fear they will be undone under Democrat-led administrations.

“The democratic socialists want to turn America into a sanctuary for illegal aliens. We can’t let them,” Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris told the Daily Signal.

“President Trump delivered on his promise to close the southern border with executive action. Now we need to codify President Trump’s border policies into law so no future radical administration, like another Biden administration, can erase our border security with a single pen stroke,” Harris added. “Time is running out to save America from the democratic socialists. Let’s get this done now.” 

Similarly, Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who introduced the legislation in question in 2025, told the Daily Signal, “Trump successfully halted the Democrats’ premeditated border invasion, but we risk losing this progress if we fail to codify his agenda into law.”

The representative made the argument that “America’s borders should not be dependent on which political party is in power.”

Rep. Eli Crane, R-Ariz., who echoed his colleagues’ remarks, told the Daily Signal that if Democrats retake the White House, “they could unravel these effective deterrents with the stroke of a pen.”

“Given that they unleashed a crisis on our nation for four years and have gone to great lengths to oppose voter ID, they will undoubtedly attempt to launch another invasion,” Crane added.

Partisan Battle to Codify

Despite having the majority of the chamber and championing conservative policy and strong border rule, Republicans have not been able to pass major border security and illegal immigration reform legislation since the passage of the Laken Riley Act in the spring of 2025.

Conservatives in Congress believe the priorities of the House and Senate leadership have gotten in the way of passing popular legislation, such as HR 2 in the House and the SAVE America Act in the Senate.

In statements made to the Daily Signal, members of the caucus accused congressional leadership of running a messaging campaign in favor of border security and voter integrity rather than taking legislative action.

“We already have sound legislation on the table in HR 2. This bill would prevent any future administration from flooding our communities with criminal aliens, narcotics, and human trafficking,” Crane told the Daily Signal. “It’s imperative that we prioritize passing it through both chambers.” 

Roy echoed those remarks and added in his statement to the Daily Signal that “if Congress believes in national sovereignty and the rule of law, it must codify President Trump’s border policies into permanent law.”

“Border security is too important to be undone whenever Democrats take back power,” Roy said. “It’s time for Congress to stop talking and start acting.” 

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal senior contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos.

Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for the Daily Signal.  

 We’re now in the 134th day of, quote-unquote, “the war with Iran.” I’m speaking on July 12. But we got to remember that we really only had March and April. We started on Feb. 28, about 38 days until we stopped fighting on April 8.  

So, we’re really talking about 90-plus days of negotiations and 38 days of actual fighting. 

That should tell us something about what the Iranian strategy is. They want to talk, talk, talk, and they do not want to fight, fight, fight. We want to fight and get over and go home, and they don’t.  

And they … because of the length of the negotiation vis-a-vis the kinetic part, they may be in an advantaged position. 

Part of the problem is that we have knocked out at least three centers of the four of their government. The theocracy with the death of Khamenei and the disabling of his son and killing of many of the others is sort of inert. We’ve taken out a lot of the heads of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. 

There’s a lot of military planners that were central to Iran’s military, industrial, nuclear complex that are gone, and we have a few elected leaders. And so that’s who we’re dealing with, but we’re not sure if they are good cops and the rest of what’s left are bad cops, or if anybody’s any cop. 

So, where do we go from here? 

What’s happening right now is we have no war and no peace. That is about every day and a half or every other day, what’s left of the bad cops—that is, the theocracy, the military, and the Guard Corps—freelance, and they hit one of the Gulf states or a tanker.  

Notice they don’t ever hit Israel. They don’t ever hit Israel because Israel has announced that their response will be disproportionate and aimed at the surviving government. 

So, they don’t do that. We haven’t said that. But every other day they do that, and now we’re starting to respond disproportionately, and that means for every 50 or so strikes, we have 120 or 130. But that itself will go on and on and on.  

What we need to do is to find a way to do two things: one, stop their ability to make any strikes, and that can be accomplished in various ways. 

We can either stop all of their supplies, and I mean all of them. That is, we can take out their airlift capacity, their airport. We can take out all the rail lines over land to China. We can take out the Caspian Sea ports. We cannot allow any seaborne traffic into Iran.  

And we can take out their electrical generation plant, short out the grid, take out more.  

We can stop their ability to make war rather than just hunt for an individual target, a missile target or a launcher pad or something like that. 

And then we have to make the conditions for which we can go home. We did the hard work. They’re no longer a threat. We’ve taken out their 47-year, half-a-trillion-dollar military investment.  

There’s a lot of other interests that would like the Gulf open, particularly the Gulf Council states, the Europeans, the Japanese, the Chinese, South Koreans.  

So, we need to make Iran so weak, if they do not want to negotiate, and we’re not going to get into this tit-for-tat cycle, that these other countries will be able to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. 

In other words, we’ll leave maybe a rotating carrier group that comes in periodically, a few ships, and they will help organize a flotilla that keeps the Strait open if we have done enough damage to their military that it has no ability to oppose the opening of the strait.  

So, what am I getting at? I’m getting at we need to up the level of damage we do to Iran, and unfortunately that might entail dual targeting electrical plants, roads, bridges, and the actual barracks, camps, military facilities of all the various aspects of the Iranian military. 

And then, once we feel that they are so attrited they’re not gonna pose a serious threat to those who are keeping the strait open, then we can go and remove most of our assets back home and outsource it to the people who have a vested interest in keeping the Strait open. That’s not us. We’re independent of it. 

Our only interest in keeping the strait open is so that our allies don’t suffer from a global recession. There’s some good news. The price of oil has stabilized now. China is importing less. It’s turning to coal power perhaps for its industries to produce electricity, but more likely their electrical car industry is growing and growing and growing. 

Maybe they feel they can cut back on oil. They’re cutting back about 4 million barrels. Venezuela’s pumping more. Russia’s trying to pump more. The United States is pumping more. There’s apostates who have left OPEC. UAE is pumping more. The pipelines to the Red Sea and to the Gulf outside the Strait are now open. 

So, it hasn’t been the catastrophe everybody thought. There’s not a global shortage of oil.  

In fact, we’re looking probably at a global glut pretty soon of oil that’ll radically take the price down. The second thing is that the midterms for the Republicans are not lost. The Senate—the Democrats only have a 50–50 chance, maybe perhaps less, to take the Senate. 

A lot will depend on who takes Mitch McConnell’s place if he’s unable to continue as senator. There’s a Democratic governor who will appoint somebody if he should not be able to take his place back in the Senate. But the midterms are not lost. There’s been redistricting. Both the “stop racial gerrymandering” and red states have outdone the blue states in redistricting. That might pick up nine to 10 to 11 seats. 

And then the latest development is in association with what we’ve seen with Graham Platner. 

The other aspect is the Democratic Party cannot really hide its socialist, Islamicist, and even communist base, and there’s gonna be a lot of high-profile candidates—not just at the congressional level, but perhaps in Texas and maybe Mr. [Abdul] El-Sayed in Michigan, and in some governor’s races—where they’re openly calling for issues, agendas, policies that are antithetical to not just Americans’ belief now, but the whole idea of founding of America. 

That’s not gonna play well. And in addition, the Republicans are probably going to have somewhere between 100 and 200 million more dollars to spend.  

What does that mean? It means that if Donald Trump is able to inflict a level of damage that the Iranians will either concede almost immediately—whoever they are, and I mean I’m talking about the most extreme elements—say, “We can’t take any more of this.” 

Or if they don’t concede, he’s able to hit a number of sites, as I outlined, dual-use targeting, where they’re not going to be able to hurt anybody else, at least for four or five years, then the bulk of the forces can go home, and a residual force can help organize our allies to keep the Strait open, which will be pretty easy to do if we can get rid of their missile fleet and what’s left of their navy. 

So, once again, we are in a cycle of tit-for-tat. The good news is militarily that we are starting to respond much more disproportionately, which we should have done in the beginning, and we’re starting to catch on that the Iranians are either not serious, or they’re playing bad cop, good cop, or nobody’s in charge at all. 

But that’s all irrelevant. All that matters is that we use enough force to prohibit Iran from hurting its neighbors or attacking. We have that power. If we use it, the war will end.  

There’ll be time for the Republican administration to concentrate on the economy and the midterms. 

And we have allies in the region that have all the power they need to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. 

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

Two House bills could effectively implement the key voter integrity provisions of the SAVE America Act, an election security bill struggling to pass the Senate.

The SAVE America Act, which passed the House but not the Senate, would require government identification and proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections and also restrict mail-in ballots, while prohibiting men in women’s sports and transgender procedures for children.

Two new House bills would implement the act’s core provisions with federal funding for states attached, which could allow the Senate to consider passing them via the budget reconciliation process. The process, reserved for budget-related measures, requires only a majority vote for passage rather than the customary 60 votes to overcome the filibuster.

Last month, House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil, R-Wis., reintroduced a bill requiring voters to show photo ID when voting in a federal election, while absentee voters can attach a copy of their ID to their ballot. It also creates a new grant program, administered by the Election Assistance Commission, to reimburse state and tribal governments for providing the IDs. The bill allows eligible voters who forget their IDs to cast provisional ballots.

Separately, Reps. Julie Fedorchak, R-N.D., and Laurel Lee, R-Fla., introduced the SAVE America Through REAL ID Act as a grant program for states to implement REAL ID cards while also requiring the use of photo ID for voting. The cards would indicate whether someone is a U.S. citizen. Lee is the chairwoman of the House Administration Subcommittee on Elections.

If the second bill passed, it would largely address the proof-of-citizenship and voter ID aspects of the SAVE America Act.

These grants could build REAL ID infrastructure and increase access to ID for all Americans, said Don Palmer, senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation and a former chairman of the Election Assistance Commission.

“Federal grants to increase access to REAL ID for voting and everyday purposes will improve that infrastructure to provide identity and citizenship confirmation for registration and improve the sharing of citizenship and eligibility data between the driver’s license agencies and state and local election authorities,” Palmer told the Daily Signal.

“The verification of citizenship electronically and sharing of documentation virtually will decrease the potential hard copy documentation of citizenship,” Palmer added.

Notably, a 2005 report by the Carter-Baker Commission, a bipartisan election reform group chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James A. Baker III, suggested using the REAL ID system for national voter ID to prevent voter fraud.

Although a voter ID proposal would not cover proof of citizenship, most polls show about 80% of the public supports voter ID.

“Americans should be confident their elections are run with integrity—voter ID is a commonsense measure to restore trust in our elections,” Steil said in a statement last month about his proposal.

“This legislation will help improve voter confidence and strengthen election integrity nationwide.”

Fedorchak, co-sponsor of the SAVE America Through REAL ID Act, said voter ID ensures only American citizens are voting.

“Democrats have spent years spreading misinformation about REAL ID requirements and claiming voter ID laws prevent participation,” Fedorchak said after introducing the bill. “This legislation directly addresses those concerns by helping low-income Americans obtain REAL ID-compliant identification at no cost. Election integrity and voter participation go hand in hand, and this bill advances both.”

Lee said the REAL ID proposal would build public confidence in elections.

“The SAVE America Through REAL ID Act removes a real barrier for low-income Americans by making REAL ID-compliant identification available at no cost because strengthening election integrity and expanding voter access aren’t competing goals, they’re the same goal,” Lee said upon the bill’s announcement.

The Trump administration continues to quietly unwind the noxious and, in many cases, illegal DEI-centric policies of the Great Awokening.

A recently released report unveiled by The Washington Free Beacon found that National Science Foundation grants containing “DEI language” have not only dipped from the highs of the previous administration, but they’ve also plummeted to levels not seen in decades.

“The data, compiled by DeepAudit, a nonprofit specializing in AI-assisted research, shows that the percentage of awards with DEI terms is at its lowest point since 2001,” Aaron Sibarium at the Free Beacon wrote on Wednesday.

The National Science Foundation is responsible for about a quarter of all federal dollars that go to colleges and universities. So, these grants represent a considerable amount of money.

The Free Beacon noted that the agency’s mission is to “promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; and to secure the national defense; and for other purposes.”

Unfortunately, that last, “other” category became all-consuming and the National Science Foundation was converted into an engine of wokeness.

The Free Beacon noted that in 2021, under President Joe Biden, it awarded “$3.4 billion in grants that contained at least one of the following terms: ‘equity,’ ‘diversity,’ ‘inclusion,’ ‘gender,’ ‘marginalize,’ ‘underrepresented,’ or ‘disparity.’” In 2025, programs with that terminology received only “$400 million, an 88-percent decrease.”

That’s not all. The decline isn’t just wiping out the upsurge in DEI-focused grants under Biden. It shows that there has been a reversal in the larger trend that made DEI nearly the central focus of government policy.

“DeepAudit used AI to analyze the abstracts of successful NSF grant applications from 1990 to 2025,” Free beacon reported. “It found that the prevalence of DEI terminology had fallen across all grant categories, including education and human resources, areas where the language was pervasive. In fact, over 50 percent of awards dispersed in those areas between 2018 and 2024 included DEI language.”

Leif Rasmussen, DeepAudit director of technology, acknowledged that it’s possible that many of these grant projects may have dodged government rules on DEI by changing their terminology.

Undoubtedly, at least some of that is going on.

DEI remains unquestioned dogma throughout higher education and in many elite institutions. They won’t drop it without a struggle.

However, it also seems unlikely that this huge dropoff is merely due to changing terminology.

The Trump administration has made eliminating DEI and keeping better tabs on federal money a focus across many different agencies.

That represents a monumental shift in this country.

To be blunt, leftist nonsense that once got an unwitting blank check from the American people is now being scrutinized and eliminated like never before. It’s easy to see why Democrats and all manner of left-leaning groups are panicking about the changes.

The self-reinforcing gravy train is over.

Since the early 2000s, wokeness and DEI became the language of the West’s ruling elites. In many cases, so-called diversity initiatives became the justification for the existence of a mushrooming number of destructive programs.

A massive, all-consuming industry had been created to reinforce a particular brand of left-wing ideology and pay the salaries of our new, noxious pseudo-elite.

The basic formula for how to remain on the dole was simple: create something useless, slap a buzzword like “marginalized” and “underrepresentation” to it, and voila, you’d get federal money for whatever nonsense you were “working” on.

It particularly helped to be among the categories of the oppressed.

Not only did this system become self-reinforcing, but it also pushed out any kind of dissent or work that didn’t intersect with its prerogatives. That’s what makes it so insidious, as ideological commitments are merged with financial incentives.

Much like under communism, effort and dynamism have been crushed in the name of political correctness.

That’s why what the Trump administration is doing is so important in the National Science Foundation and elsewhere.

Yes, there has been a national “vibe shift” as Americans finally rebelled against the absurdity of DEI. Putting President Donald Trump back in the White House was as clear a sign as any that the country had had enough.

But unlike the last time around, the Trump administration is truly sucking the air out of the balloon. No longer will success be tied to ideological, racial, and gender box checking.

By pulling monetary support from and putting legal pressure on institutions that discriminate based on race and identity, the administration is creating a larger and hopefully more enduring counterrevolution that will lead America back on the path toward merit, fairness, and equality before the law.

To most Americans, diversity, equity, and inclusion is an abstract, boring idea they don’t have time to worry about. But I’ve written a book on it—“The Ten Woke Commandments (You Must Not Obey)”—and I’m here to tell you why you should be paying attention to DEI.

DEI means that when you apply for a job or promotion, you are not given a fair shake. After decades of indoctrination, college campuses, academia, corporations, and government across the English-speaking world are imbued with DEI.

An old friend once told me that, all things being equal, if a white man and a woman “of color” compete for a job, the latter should be chosen. His reasoning is pure Ibram Kendi: “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination.”

Older, white men who believe this are usually at the top of the career ladder: law firm partner, ambassador, CEO, etc. Their sons, meanwhile, would prefer to be judged on their own merits.

Examples of DEI using race are the most contentious, so here’s another.

Say you are hiring a shelf-stocker. You look through all the applications, and the best two in terms of education, experience, and skills are a very tall woman and a man with dwarfism. (Imagine Caitlin Clark and Tyrion Lannister from “Game of Thrones”).

Who do you pick? How do you choose?

If the job involved no shelves above 4 feet, then you’d have to find another criterion. Perhaps years of experience, character references, or a record of showing up on time might come into play. Height would not be a factor. Neither would race or sex.

But if the job chiefly involved placing and retrieving items on shelves above six feet, height would matter a great deal. Could the problem be mitigated by stepladders or mechanical means without losing speed or productivity? If so, then height would no longer be an issue. If not, then Clark is the better pick, all other things being equal.

Note that sex, gender identity, or race are not issues in this selection. And almost never are all other things equal, given so many measurable variables.

President Lyndon Johnson’s 1965 executive order required that every federal “contractor will take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin.”

Over time, “affirmative action” came to mean preferential hiring based on race. This is the root of today’s DEI in employment. It means we get jobs over others equally qualified, or we lose out on jobs, based on our race. The principle long since expanded to sex.

Later, the concept of disparate impact took root. This idea is that if any occupation, test, or human outcome varies at all from the percentages of the races in the general population, it is due to racism. In Kendi’s words, “a racist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups.”

The remedy to racist policies is “antiracist” ones, i.e., discrimination based on race. In the DEI framework, the same policy is applied to sex.

In past practice, this means that if any entity has more men than women, or more whites than other minorities, then the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, could sue and force it to hire women and minorities over equally or better qualified white men.

Comedian Adam Carolla explained how California DEI policies stopped him from becoming a fireman. Decades later, President Joe Biden’s DOJ sued the Durham, North Carolina, Fire Department because its exam had a “disparate impact based on race.” Durham caved and agreed to hire 16 black applicants who failed the test and give almost a million dollars in back pay. Let’s pray they are not plus-sized gals who couldn’t carry someone out of a burning building, like Los Angeles’ deputy fire chief.

If you are a white man applying to be a police officer, you are at a disadvantage in many departments. Biden’s DOJ sued South Bend, Indiana’s police department, alleging that it “uses a written examination that discriminates against Black applicants and a physical fitness test that discriminates against female applicants.”

How, exactly, did the DOJ come to such an unequivocal conclusion? Simply based on disparate impact. The logic was simple: If fewer blacks passed the test, it must be racist, and if fewer women passed, it must be sexist.

Biden’s DOJ also sued the Maryland Department of State Police. Again, deep-blue Maryland caved and agreed to hire up to 25 applicants who failed the test and pay $2.75 million in back pay.

DEI isn’t some remote, academic mumbo-jumbo that has no impact on you. It affects you, your children, and your neighbors. It affects the safety and prosperity of the entire country.

“Equity” is a mirage—unattainable except by racist and sexist social engineering.

Hiring based on immutable characteristics that have no bearing on a job is both illegal and immoral. America should always strive to make education and opportunity more equal and to open the ladder to prosperity to all. There’s more to do. But talent is not fairly shared out, and some work harder than others. As Ecclesiastes puts it, “time and chance happeneth to them all.”

We should kill DEI and end all employment discrimination forever. Fortunately, the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division is now run by the indomitable Harmeet Dhillon, who understands that the Civil Rights Act bars all discrimination based on race, color, national origin, and sex, not just some. She says that “[t]here is no exception that allows discrimination against employees who aren’t considered ‘underrepresented.’”

No more suing fire and police departments for “equity.”

As Mike Gonzalez reminds us, there is work to be done. But if we don’t, our society will crumble from within as the thinning spoils are shared out based on caste, sex, and race rather than talent and hard work.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster announced Monday that Darline Graham Nordone, the sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, will serve in the U.S. Senate for the remainder of her brother’s term following his death over the weekend.

Speaking at a press conference in Columbia, McMaster formally named Nordone to fill the vacancy left by the longtime Republican senator, who died Saturday at age 71 after suffering severe heart complications. Graham’s office said the senator’s death was preliminarily attributed to an aortic dissection caused by hardening of the arteries.

Graham served in the Senate for more than two decades and was a leading voice on national security, judicial nominations, and foreign policy. His death prompted an outpouring of tributes from lawmakers across Washington and South Carolina, with many Republicans highlighting his decades of public service and close relationship with President Donald Trump

“This is an important day in South Carolina history,” McMaster said during the press conference. “We meet in sadness over the loss of one of South Carolina’s greatest sons. Lindsey Graham recognized the greatness of America and its role in this world.”

“Today, under the law, it is my duty to name a replacement. It is my honor to ask his little sister, Darline, to take his place,” McMaster added.

Nordone welcomed the governor’s remarks, saying that “Lindsey was always there for me, now I am going to be there for him.”

During his initial remarks in the press conference, the governor added that after talking with Nordone on Monday morning, he “called President Donald Trump afterward, to which the commander in chief believed was a great idea.”

On Monday morning, after the governor and president spoke, Trump publicly urged McMaster to appoint Graham’s sister to the seat.

“I recommended, to Governor Henry McMaster, Lindsey Graham’s wonderful sister, Darline, to serve as interim Senator from the Great State of South Carolina. This would be a fabulous tribute to Lindsey, who loved her dearly!” Trump wrote Monday on Truth Social.

Nordone has long been one of her brother’s closest confidantes. After the deaths of their parents when she was 13 years old, Graham became her legal guardian and often spoke publicly about their close relationship.

The appointment ensures that South Carolina will have full representation in the Senate while voters determine who will ultimately succeed Graham.

Republican voters are scheduled to select a nominee in a special primary on Aug. 11. If no candidate receives a majority of the vote, the top contenders will advance to a runoff election on Aug. 25. The Republican nominee will face Democrat Annie Andrews in the general election. The winner will claim the seat once Graham’s term concludes.

Several Republicans have been mentioned as potential candidates, including Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette, Rep. Ralph Norman, and Rep. Nancy Mace. All three have been floated as possible contenders for the seat as South Carolina Republicans begin the process of choosing a long-term successor to one of the state’s most influential political figures.

A key House committee has rolled out plans to delegate some of the Department of Education’s remaining tasks to other federal agencies, and the measure could reach the chamber floor for a vote as soon as Wednesday.

The 10 bills included in the legislative package, released last week by House Education and the Workforce Committee Republicans, are being spearheaded by Chairman Tim Walberg, R-Mich.

“The legislative package reflects a simple principle: education policy should be focused on helping students succeed—not preserving a federal bureaucracy for its own sake,” Walberg said in a statement.

“Rather than allowing unnecessary layers of Washington bureaucracy to stand between families and the services they rely on, the bills would transfer key statutory authorities to agencies better equipped to carry them out while maintaining continuity for students and stakeholders,” he added.

Bills in Question

The 10-bill “Less Bureaucracy, Better Education” package, announced by Walberg, represents Congress’ first major legislative effort to codify the Trump administration’s broader plan to shrink the federal Education Department and redistribute many of its functions across the federal government.

“Students and educators deserve a federal government that works efficiently and delivers results,” Rep. Mark Harris, R-N.C., told the Daily Signal. “My two bills would transfer certain K-12 and higher education programs to the Department of Labor, which already oversees workforce development and employment programs and has begun taking on a larger role in administering federal education programs. This would reduce unnecessary bureaucracy, improve accountability, and help ensure taxpayer dollars are focused on serving students and families. I look forward to the bills being considered in a committee markup.”

Several of the proposals formalize arrangements already in place between federal agencies. But the legislation goes beyond interagency cooperation by permanently transferring statutory authority and program administration from the Education Department to agencies, including the departments of Labor, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Interior, and State.

Among the most significant measures are HR 9607, the Less Bureaucracy, Better Workforce Development Act, and HR 9610, the Less Bureaucracy, Better K-12 Education Act. Those bills would move major education programs to the Department of Labor.

Under HR 9607, Labor would assume responsibility for the Education Department’s Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education, including administration of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, adult education and literacy initiatives, and other workforce-related programs. The legislation transfers “all the functions” previously exercised by the education secretary in those areas.

Supporters argue the move would better align education and training programs with workforce needs because the Labor Department already oversees employment and workforce development initiatives.

Critics, however, are likely to question whether programs such as adult literacy and family education should be administered primarily through a workforce lens.

The K-12 legislation would make an even broader transfer. HR 9610 shifts numerous elementary and secondary education programs from the Education Department to the Labor Department, including Title I programs serving disadvantaged students, migrant education programs, teacher-quality grants, and federal assessment programs.

The package also includes HR 9611, the Less Bureaucracy, Better Higher Education Act, which would move several higher-education programs from the Education Department to the Labor Department. According to House Republicans, the legislation would transfer administration of postsecondary programs, Historically Black Colleges and Universities initiatives, TRIO programs intended to support low-income and first-generation college students, and services for military veterans pursuing higher education.

Other bills in the package would redistribute education-related responsibilities to agencies with subject-matter expertise.

HR 9605, the Less Bureaucracy, Better Foreign Medical Accreditation Act, would transfer oversight of foreign medical school accreditation standards from the Education Department to the Department of Health and Human Services. The legislation would place responsibility for the National Committee on Foreign Medical Education and Accreditation under HHS.

HR 9604, the Less Bureaucracy, Better Tribal Education Act, would move programs serving students on tribal lands to the Department of the Interior, including grants benefiting Native American, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian populations.

Meanwhile, HR 9606 would transfer oversight of childcare programs serving the children of college students from the Education Department to HHS. Supporters say the move would consolidate responsibility for childcare services within the agency already tasked with administering most federal childcare programs.

Two additional measures would transfer international education functions to the State Department. HR 9603 would move oversight of international postsecondary education programs—including the Fulbright-Hays Program—to the State Department and would sunset the Institute for International Public Policy.

HR 9602 would transfer administration of foreign gift disclosure requirements for colleges and universities under Section 117 of the Higher Education Act.

HR 9608 would shift school-safety and family-engagement programs from the Education Department to HHS, while HR 9609 would transfer federal student-loan administration from the Education Department to the Treasury Department.

The student-loan proposal could have the greatest practical impact. Student aid operations account for a substantial share of the Education Department’s responsibilities, and the bill would place the federal loan portfolio under Treasury’s supervision. Republicans say the Treasury already manages aspects of the federal loan system and is better positioned to oversee its financial administration.

Taken together, the legislation reflects a fundamental question at the center of the debate over the future of the Department of Education: Should the federal government continue housing education-related functions under a single department, or should those responsibilities be distributed among agencies that specialize in workforce development, finance, health services, diplomacy, and tribal affairs?

For supporters, the package represents a streamlining effort intended to eliminate bureaucratic overlap. For opponents, it raises concerns about fragmenting federal education policy and reducing centralized accountability for programs affecting millions of students nationwide

Dept. of Ed Closure

For decades, many conservatives have argued that education decisions should be made closer to parents, local communities, and states rather than federal bureaucrats in Washington. The Education Department, created in 1979, has remained a frequent target of criticism from conservatives who view it as an example of federal overreach.

Currently, the department costs taxpayers around $154.11 billion a year, with the goal of enhancing education. However, the 2025 National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that in recent years alone, a record 32% of high school seniors cannot read proficiently, and almost half cannot do basic math.

Fourth and eighth-grade math and reading scores also fell, continuing a collapse that began before the COVID-19 school closures. 

These reasons have led conservatives in Washington to attempt to codify the administration’s desire to shut down the department and return control of education to the states.

However, Walberg has acknowledged the political challenges facing a full shutdown of the department. As recently as May, he said Congress does not currently have the votes needed to eliminate the agency outright, though he expressed support for doing so.

He also praised McMahon for finding “creative” administrative avenues to advance the goal of reducing the department’s size and influence.

Opposing Views

Democrats, meanwhile, blasted the Republican proposal as an attempt to dismantle a critical federal agency.

Rep. Bobby Scott of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Education and the Workforce Committee, accused Republicans of advancing Trump’s agenda at the expense of students and schools.

“At the behest of Trump, Republicans have introduced a flurry of bills that would dismantle the Department of Education and offload critical offices to agencies that are ill-equipped to carry out core duties,” Scott said in a statement. “Despite Republicans’ rhetoric, they are not ‘modernizing’ the Department—they are blessing President Trump’s scheme to dismantle it piece by piece.”

However, Jonathan Butcher, acting director of the Center for Education Policy and the Will Skillman senior research fellow in education at The Heritage Foundation, told the Daily Signal that critics of efforts argue that the interagency agreements “merely split responsibilities across multiple agencies.”

“These legislative proposals answer this claim by transferring full responsibilities for programs out of Education and to other offices,” Butcher continued. “These transfers serve as a model for future proposals to shift full authority over remaining initiatives out of the Department of Education.”

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, a Republican, faulted the Food and Drug Administration for failing to quickly restrict access to mifepristone, the key drug in the abortion pill regimen.

“There’s obviously a political calculus that has gone on in the administration for pro-life issues,” Marshall told the Daily Signal in an interview Wednesday. He acknowledged the political headwinds on the issue but argued that protecting women’s health should outweigh political concerns.

“I think calling on them to see it beyond the political lens, but about being able to protect women across the country from a drug that has obviously had adverse consequences,” the attorney general said.

The Trump White House countered Marshall’s claim, noting that the agency under President Donald Trump has launched an investigation into the drug over safety concerns.

“The Trump administration is pursuing a rigorous review of mifepristone in response to widespread safety concerns,” White House spokeswoman Allison Schuster told the Daily Signal. “This ongoing Gold Standard Science-based safety review by the FDA is just one example of President Trump’s total commitment to thoroughly evaluating emerging drugs to ensure the health and safety of all Americans.”

The Abortion Pill

In making his case about the harms of the abortion pill, Marshall cited a study from the Ethics and Public Policy Center, which analyzed insurance claims data from 865,727 mifepristone abortions from 2017 to 2023. The study identified a serious adverse event rate of 10.93%, even when excluding a majority of emergency room visits to avoid overstating risks.

“The emergency room visits included in the report are only those related to the chemical abortion, based on the diagnosis and procedure codes in the insurance records, and are counted only if treatment for a serious complication related to the chemical abortion took place,” the report explains. “Thus, if a woman took the chemical abortion pill and then got into a car accident or broke a bone, that did not count.” Yet the report also excluded adverse effects such as mild cramping from the abortion pill.

While Trump’s second administration has reversed many acts of the administration of President Joe Biden, the FDA has not reversed the Biden-era rules on mifepristone. The agency under Biden had allowed companies to distribute abortion pills to women via telehealth prescriptions and mail-order distribution. While the FDA has launched its safety review of the drug, the agency has yet to take action to reverse the Biden rule.

“The FDA has been actively working on a science-based safety review of the mifepristone REMS for months, as the agency has stated publicly and in court filings,” an FDA spokesperson told the Daily Signal. The spokesperson also highlighted an information page about the drug, noting that the FDA first approved it for this use in 2000.

The Trump administration has championed pro-life policy in many arenas, from reinstituting the Mexico City Policy (which bars federal funding to promote abortion overseas), to pardoning pro-life protesters who had been prosecuted under President Joe Biden, to reinstating conscience protections for physicians opposed to abortion, to attempting to defund abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood.

According to the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute, abortion pills—which Guttmacher terms “medication abortion”—accounted for 63% of clinician-provided abortions in the U.S. in 2023, up from 53% in 2020.

Marshall’s Acts on the Abortion Pill

Marshall has taken many steps to oppose the abortion pill.

He signed an amicus brief supporting Louisiana’s case against the FDA. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill sued the FDA in October, challenging Biden-era mifepristone rules from 2023. While a three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit granted in May Louisiana’s request to prevent the dispensing of the abortion pill by mail or telehealth prescription while the case continued, the Supreme Court reversed about two weeks later, allowing the Biden-era rule to stand.

The Louisiana case remains active.

Last month, Marshall joined a 14-state coalition urging the Environmental Protection Agency to add mifepristone to its Containment Candidate List for environmental concerns. The list includes “contaminants that are known or anticipated to occur in public water systems and are not currently subject to EPA drinking water regulations.”

“EPA takes the issue of pharmaceuticals in our water systems seriously and employs a rigorous, science-based approach to protect human health and the environment,” an EPA spokesperson told the Daily Signal in a statement Monday. “EPA is currently reviewing comments submitted on its draft contaminant candidate list 6, which lists pharmaceuticals as a group, and human health benchmarks for 374 individual pharmaceuticals that are approved by the FDA and may occur in surface and groundwaters and/or treated drinking water.”

This public comment period represents a step in the rulemaking process under the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974.

“EPA’s mission and the intent of the Safe Drinking Water Act is ensuring safe drinking water for the American public,” the spokesperson added.

Also last month, the Alabama AG sent cease-and-desist letters to six companies he accused of illegally advertising, facilitating, and enabling the sale and procurement of abortion-inducing drugs to Alabama consumers.

“It’s an illegal activity for it to come into the state,” the attorney general told the Daily Signal.

He suggested that the FDA could prevent this state of affairs by preventing mail-order mifepristone.

“You would eliminate this ability for mail-order prescriptions to be able to come in in a clandestine way, if you got back to the requirement that the dispensing has to occur inside a physician’s office,” Marshall said. “That way there is no lawful ability of a mail-order pharmacy to be able to send drugs anywhere.”

When crude oil prices drop sharply, why do drivers have to wait for relief at the pump? The answer follows a convoluted and policy-constrained path from drill rigs to local gas stations.

The prices we encounter at the pump result from this complex chain, which begins with global crude and passes through refining, wholesale, independent retail operations, shipping, pipelines, and taxes. When crude oil costs decline, those savings do eventually reach drivers, but the timeline is measured in weeks, since the costs take time to work through the system.

Recent weeks have seen fluctuating prices after a Memorandum of Understanding was signed with Iran, bringing a brief halt to hostilities in the Middle East and prompting shipping traffic to resume moving through the Strait of Hormuz. As military action in the Middle East began again, prices have climbed back to the mid- to high-$70-per-barrel-range.

The short-lived MOU and limited uptick in traffic did help lower world oil prices significantly, bringing them from their near-$120-per-barrel high in April down to a July 6 WTI price of $68 and Brent price of $72 per barrel. As crude prices dropped, the discussion about gasoline prices picked up.

While prices did come down—AAA reported a national average price of $3.80 per gallon on July 6, down from an average price of $4.19 a month ago—they were still much higher than the $3.15 per gallon prices we paid at this time last year.

If global crude prices dropped by roughly 40% between April and early July, why did gasoline prices only drop by about 10%? What causes the delay?

First, crude oil only accounts for a portion of the total cost of gasoline. Energy Information Administration reporting indicates that crude oil accounts for 57% of the price of regular gasoline; refining, 21%; distribution, 8%; and taxes, 14%. Even though crude prices drop, there’s more to the price we pay at the pump than just what it costs to buy a barrel of crude on the world market.

Heritage Foundation economist E.J. Antoni covered this issue in a recent Fox News interview, noting that crude oil loaded onto tankers or that entered pipelines weeks ago continues to arrive at refineries for processing. What can appear as prices that are “slow to fall” is really the time needed for lower-cost products to move through inventories, contracts, and diverse ownership structures.

Artificial attempts to override this movement distort the responses that bring more supply and lower costs to markets. The mechanisms that encourage additional supply during shortages also provide price relief when costs decline, provided the market is allowed to respond efficiently.

A second issue is that we have hindered our ability to respond efficiently to changes in global crude markets by delaying pipeline construction and allowing the nation’s refining capacity to stagnate over the past several decades. Complex and restrictive regulations, the growing risk of litigation, and ongoing policy uncertainty stop development at every turn, leaving a system that operates at high utilization rates and responds slowly to changing market conditions.

In energy markets, the presence of efficient infrastructure options (pipelines versus more expensive alternatives, such as trucking or rail) directly affects the speed and cost of responding to changing market conditions. Lack of redundancy leaves costlier options as the only alternatives and lengthens the lag time for cost changes to appear at the pump.

Mandates such as the Renewable Fuel Standard and the Endangerment Finding have aggravated this challenge by forcing refineries to close and pushing others to transition to expensive, inefficient biofuel production. These policies have also limited the ability to build the new energy infrastructure needed to move fuels around more efficiently.

Legislation, such as the Jones Act, further complicates matters by restricting the movement of energy. Recent Jones Act waivers highlighted this problem, as allowing fuels to move on non-U.S.-flagged ships increased the amount of fuel that could be delivered. Reforming or repealing the Jones Act would encourage a more modern fleet serving American ports and allow domestic fuels to go where they are most needed at the best price.

The third issue is even reported by news outlets like CNN, which admits that “the overwhelming majority of gas stations” are independently owned small businesses that are not directly controlled by major oil companies. Like refiners, gas station owners purchase gasoline at the prevailing wholesale price and must increase their selling price to cover overhead and other costs, including credit card processing, fuel delivery fees, and labor.

While recent changes in energy policy have begun to reverse negative energy trends by refocusing the nation on energy dominance, overall refining capacity remains almost 1 million barrels per day below 2020 levels. Much-needed flexibility can come with new investments in energy infrastructure. But even if we begin building today, those investments will take years and require a consistent pro-energy regulatory focus to be completed.

Even as we look forward to new construction—such as the planned refinery in Brownsville, Texas—that promises to improve resiliency and competition, high utilization rates and maintenance schedules at the nation’s refineries will continue to limit the industry’s flexibility. That inflexibility will ensure gasoline prices continue to respond slowly to falling crude prices.

Solutions are straightforward. Lower prices are best achieved by expanding supply and reducing regulatory distortions, rather than attempting top-down interventions that interfere with normal price-setting mechanisms.

American drivers would be best served by continued moves to streamline permitting, remove regulatory impediments, and expand production and pipeline construction. Doing this would strengthen the nation’s energy supply and further reduce prices by encouraging competition.

Recent discussions have focused on the speed of price reductions at the pump. Understanding the processes that make up gas prices helps clarify why lags are normal—and why reducing top-down mandates, expanding domestic drilling and refining, and developing essential infrastructure could speed up price reductions.

Affordable, reliable energy depends on resources and the policy choices that allow markets and infrastructure to function efficiently.

While two Supreme Court justices are scheduled to field questions from a House panel Tuesday about the court’s budget, it’s plausible, if not likely, that members will use the opportunity to press the justices about some highly contentious cases.

Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Elena Kagan will appear before members of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government. Some of the subcommittee members have been outspoken about recent high court rulings.

The subcommittee’s ranking member, Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., expressed outrage over the June 29 ruling reversing the 90-year-old precedent in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, allowing a president to remove members of executive branch boards and commissions. The recent case of Trump v. Slaughter involved a member of the Federal Trade Commission.

Hoyer said the high court was “captured by the twisted ideology of unitary executive power” after the majority overturned the Humphrey’s precedent.

“We are about to celebrate 250 years of an America whose Founders were more concerned about the tyrannical over-concentration of power in the hands of one leader than anything else. This Court’s decision in Trump v. Slaughter rejects stare decisis and takes us back to a spoils system,” Hoyer said in a public statement.

Barrett, nominated by President Donald Trump in 2020, is considered part of the court’s conservative wing. Kagan, nominated by President Barack Obama in 2010, is considered part of the court’s liberal wing.

It’s fairly rare for justices to appear before a congressional panel; Kagan and Justice Samuel Alito were the last justices to appear before Congress, in 2019. However, the practice was somewhat common up to the mid-20th century, Georgetown University law professor Stephen I. Vladeck wrote.

Regarding an April ruling on a Louisiana redistricting case, Hoyer said the majority undermined the 1965 Voting Rights Act in striking down the state’s congressional map.

“By allowing Louisiana to redraw its congressional map in a way that dilutes the voting power of minority communities, the six Republican-appointed justices are participating in a brazen ploy to help Republicans keep their House Majority; it is an affront to everything for which John and so many others in the Selma march bled,” Hoyer said in a press release.

However, Hoyer praised the high court for striking down President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship.

“Once again, the highest court in our land affirmed that the president has misread the clear meaning and intent of part of the Constitution,” Hoyer said of the June 30 ruling. “It ruled that those who are born in this country have the right, by virtue of that birth, to call it home as a citizen.”

Hoyer and other Democrats have criticized the Supreme Court for the 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturning the 1973 Supreme Court case of Roe v. Wade, which nationalized a right to abortion.

After a draft of the opinion was leaked in May 2022, Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., also a committee member, said in a statement, “Safe abortions will always be accessible to the wealthy. This ruling would take away bodily autonomy from so many, particularly affecting minority and low-income communities.”

Subcommittee Chairman David Joyce, R-Ohio, after the Dobbs ruling was released, said: “The Constitution does not confer the right to abortion. It does, however, provide states with the power to regulate the practice as they see fit. Today’s Supreme Court decision is a long overdue victory for states’ rights and the sanctity of life.”

In 2023, another subcommittee member, Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., called the high court’s ruling that universities and colleges could not make solely race-based admission decisions “catastrophic.”

“And yet, the Supreme Court today turned a blind eye to this history, striking down the consideration of race in college admissions as if generations of slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow did not exist or efforts to ameliorate these entrenched disadvantages in higher education no longer serve the cause of justice. That is a tragedy,” Ivey said at the time.

In 2019, Kagan and Justice Samuel Alito testified before the same House committee. In 2011, then-Justices Anthony Kennedy, a Ronald Reagan appointee, and Stephen Breyer, a Bill Clinton appointee, testified before the House Appropriations Committee.